Geometric Portraits

Links I used to research:

The Universally Recognized Facial Expressions

Wikipedia Facial Expression

AltmanG_Easy from a website 

Facial expressions are universal. No matter where we come from, we are all wired with basically the same facial expressions to use when we feel an emotion like joy, sadness, disgust and anger. There has been controversy over this subject, but I agree with the scientists and people who think they are universal.  Charles Darwin wrote that  “facial expressions of emotion are universal, not learned differently in each culture”. This I found from The Universally Recognized Facial Expressions. Wikipedia Facial Expression also says that there has been controversy over this topic, but it has studies that agree with it.

First you take a photo. It can be a self-portrait using PhotoBooth, like we did for Poly 1, or a self portrait with a different kind of camera, like we did for Poly 3 or a portrait of someone else, like we did for Poly-2. Then, you take it into Photoshop.

AltmanG_Poly-2 

For our Poly 1, we took a symmetrical photo. This is so you only need to do one side of your face, because you will flip it later. Use the line tool to draw a outline of your face, and all the features, making sure that your grid is on and that the end of your line intersects with the grid.  Then, draw triangles over all of your face, small ones on your features and big ones on your skin. Then you fill in the triangles with color by going to filter<blur<average. Then cut out your face, flip over a copy, and put it on a white background and you are done. For Poly 2, we did not draw an outline, but just used our polygonal lasso tool to draw triangles, then using the eyedropper tool to select a color and going Alt+Delete to fill the triangle. Then we made our background more Low Polyish and adjusting curves and brightness.

My Poly 1 and Poly 2 were very different in how we did them. The Poly 1, has a grid over half of the face, and both sides are completely symmetrical. Also, it looks more realistic. Poly 2 is more creative and harder to do. It is not symmetrical  and it has a background that looks like low poly. In Poly 1, the computer blended all the colors of the triangle to blend it in, whereas in Poly 2, we had to hand select the color and had to make sure that no triangles were the same color that were next to each other.
However, both things are created in photoshop, take a lot of time, and have the Low Poly look. Also, they are both very interesting to look at.

Verbal Landscapes

Nature impacts everyone's life.  However, for me, nature is very inspirational and I love to just explore everywhere, from my backyard to the woods. I love to collect things from nature, and have quite a collection. Nature is also big in my family, and we try to go on as many hikes and swims as possible. Nature is also very soothing for me, and I try to be in it as much as possible.

Timelapses, such as the ones in my video, are creating by filming a wide view of something for about 10-20 minutes. In this project, we are also required to use environmental tripods to film both timelapses and slow mos. Later, when you import your video footage into Final Cut Pro, you go to the ReTime editing tool, which will let you slow down or speed up your footage. You would speed up a timelapse. For a slow mo, you would do much of the same things. Except, you would do a close or macro view of your subject for 30 seconds to 1 minute. Then, you import your footage to Final Cut Pro, and go the ReTime editor, but you would make it slower not faster. Timelapses are sped up so you can see things like clouds moving or waves breaking faster. Slow mo's are slowed down so you can see movement in great detail, like leaves moving or water washing onto rocks.

One of the hardest parts of this project was filming the timelapses and being able to keep still long enough to do it right with no shakiness. Also, the editing has been a bit of a struggle for sure. One of the most fun parts was the filming of the slow mo's and writing the poem. The slow mo's were fun because I filmed some fun things and was pretty easy. The poem was really fun and fairly easy to
write. I love nature, so I definitely had a lot of material to chose form to write my poem.

Our critique is of 27 people viewing your video as a class. Most people, 70%, gave my project a 3.  I think that's pretty much what I think. However 5, people, 18%, did give me a 4 and two people said I had the best video, so I'm very flattered. I definitely feel that some parts are a 4 quality, but some things, like the shakiness, is more of a 3, so it's difficult to pick what grade it is. Two people gave me a 2, which I definitely don't agree with. It is not developing.  I'm glad no one gave me a 1. I agree, with most of the results that I got.

Poetic Personal Statment

My Sketch

My Text

Poetry is an elaborate form of writing that is used to express yourself. You can add rhythm or rhyme to make it better. You can also make it personal by adding personal thoughts, opinions and personal experiences. This will make it personal. Many things can be poetic, such as photography, videography, paintings and nature. Poetry is very expressive. I think poetry is used to describe something in a way that you might not have ordinarily thought of.

This is my poetic personal statement that will be on my Poetic Designs Project. Here it is:

I wish to write a story

of things glory and gory

Someday, one day

I will be what I want to be

Arguing for a fee

Happy, having fun, yet free

and when I am old in age, 

a cat lady

I used rhythm to make my Poetic Personal Statement more fluid and nicer to read.  I think rhythm is very good for poetry.  Also, I think using your creativity to think of words that rhyme makes your poetry more interesting. I used rhyme throughout my kinda short statement. I also tried to use metaphors throughout it. I think rhythm is very good for poetry.  It was fun figuring how many things rhyme with "e".

Music Video Finale

P3T9 Stayin Alive from Kapaa Middle School MEDIA on Vimeo

Song: Stayin' Alive           Artist: The BeeGees          My team: Alex, Nick and Me

Lyrics:

Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk

I'm a woman's man: no time to talk

Music loud and women warm, I've been kicked around

Since I was born

And now it's all right, it's OK

And you may look the other way

We can try to understand

The New York Times' effect on man

Yeah, Nick and Alex totally worked great together! 

Whether you're a brother or whether you're a mother

You're stayin' alive, stayin' alive

Feel the city breakin' and everybody shakin'

And we're stayin' alive, stayin' alive

Ah, ha, ha, ha, stayin' alive, stayin' alive

Ah, ha, ha, ha, stayin' alive

Well now, I get low and I get high

And if I can't get either, I really try

Got the wings of heaven on my shoes

I'm a dancin' man and I just can't lose

You know it's all right, it's ok

I'll live to see another day

We can try to understand

The New York Times' effect on man

Whether you're a brother or whether you're a mother

You're stayin' alive, stayin' alive

Feel the city breakin' and everybody shakin'

And we're stayin' alive, stayin' alive

Ah, ha, ha, ha, stayin' alive, stayin' alive

Ah, ha, ha, ha, stayin' alive

Life goin' nowhere, somebody help me

Life goin' nowhere, somebody help me yeah

Me and Alex hanging out

Our team is doing Stayin' Alive by the BeeGees. This is an 70's song, so its one of the oldies! Whoo-hoo! Our storyline is about a girl, (me) who was walking in the park with her friends, Nick and Alex, when she sees a tree, and she wants to climb it. Her friends try to convince her that she should not do it, because it is dangerous. She listens but decided to do it anyway. Her friends are very worried about her, but she prevails. She climbs the tree, and comes down easily, and her friends are relived that she was alive. This is related to our song lyrics. I am overcoming my fears, do something I would not normally do, and still stay alive!!! So, our lyrics definitely match our storyline.

Nick enjoying the tree

Our fast edit montage is going illustrate the struggle between me and my friends. What I'm talking about is when I want to climb the tree, and my friends don't want me to. What it will be is one shot me climbing the tree, one shot of Nick worried, me climbing the tree, Alex worried, me climbing the tree and then my excited face. This is showing that I am climbing while my friends are worried and then I am on the top and I am staying alive! This is will probably not be quite as fast paced as I would like, but it will probably between 1-3 seconds each shot. Another shorter, faster, and quite better fast edit montage is at the very end of our music video. It is about me thinking back to what happened that day. There is one shot of me that we green screened and put on a red background, thinking, then there will be one shot of Nick worried, one of Alex worried, one of me climbing, one of Alex and Nick relived, and me happy, and me going, "Well, it all worked out good". I think this is nice end to our music video.

Alex "acting" (like a dog)

This project definitely showcases our best talents. Our filming showcases our filming skills, which if their good, their music video will turn out good.  If your stuff, is well, not as good, then you might want to re-film. Our lip sync, well I guess that showcases our practicing skills? Because if it's not good, you obviously didn't practice. Our editing definitely showcases our editing techniques. Also, how good you can maneuver in imovie definitely shows. If your good, your music video will have transitions, green screened stuff, and more! Plus our psds for our bloopers and intro graphic showcase our acuteness in Photoshop.

 

Animated Life Lessons

P3T2 Friends Clean Garage from Kapaa Middle School MEDIA on Vimeo.


My teammates are Steven and Tierra. Tierra is really athletic and doesn't like to sit still. She is also very neat and orderly. Steve is also neat and gets distracted quickly. He has a bunch of different hair colors that he like to wear. In our story, both these peoples traits get exaggerated to form our story. In our story, both Steven and Tierra are neat freaks. Steven is very easily distracted by talking. Tierra is very neat and careful in our animation.

Our animation is pretty humorous. It looks kinda weird with everyone dancing, talking or trying to work! Also, at the end, we threw in a funny little joke about a garage cleaning business. Check it out when you watch are animation! We also have life lessons. They are that everyone's different and you should respect that. Also, by working together you can get things done. Plus, you should make sure everyone's ideas our heard.

Our team had a lot of challenges, especially since we had not worked together before, it was difficult to know who should do what.  Some of us in our team did not work as hard as others, which probably created some hard feelings. Also, none of us were particularly well-versed in photoshop. As Mr. Sanderl accurately says, we have a "love-hate" relationship with photoshop. However, we are gonna get through it, and that's what counts! We have had differing levels of productivity during this project. Sometimes we were doing great, some times not as much. I'm not really sure what our greatest moment was, but getting it done was definitely fun! Also, animation, once you get started is really entertaining.

Character Devolpement

Hi  everybody! Now we are doing some awesome animation in class.

Photoshop cut-out

I have a kooky personalty and I can make people laugh.  I want to make people happy by making them laugh. I am smart and I dance all the time. I'm dancing right now! I am neat freak at heart, but if you saw my room you wouldn't believe me!  I absolutely love to sing songs.  I'm such a animal lover. I refuse to kill insects except for mosquitoes.  I smile when I'm nervous. I'm also dramatic. I have a lot imperfections. I chew with my mouth open. To be honest, I misspell when I type on the computer and have to check my spelling later. I also tell bad jokes a lot. I also love to tap out beats with my hands or pencil. I read when I'm not supposed to if its a good book. So, I definitely have humorous and relatable imperfections.

My awesome GIF!

The character traits I plan to exaggerate on is definitely my open mouth chewing. I'm going to make it look like I am a cow chewing her cud! (nom nom!) You might see me ridiculously misspelling words while on the computer. That is a humorous trait, not necessarily for me, but definitely for other people.  Also, I will be saying like, the worst jokes ever. (Ha, groan) Now that's not necessarily funny for other people, but it is to me! I'm also doing a funny little dance in my GIF. It kinda looks weird, but I'm okay with that.

Green Screen 

There is a lot of steps to create our GIF! First off, you have to take, or have someone take for you, a photo of you. You should try to have this done with a very simple background, or in our case, a green screen. You should be facing the camera with your hands and legs spread out. Basically, pretend you are making a snow angel standing up. Then, take that pic to photoshop and using the quick selection tool, cut out your body from your background. Then, go to windows > animation and make sure you have frames at the bottom of your screen. After that, make a copy of yourself. Using your first copy, you should have yourself enter the screen. You do this by creating several frames and in each one, move your character toward it's place. If you want your character to move into the frame, move it a tiny bit each frame. Now your beginning is done! To make your ending, select all of your frames of you entering the screen and click the "new frame" button, right next to the trash. You will now have you entering twice when you play your animation. Now select the second set of frames and go to the tiny drop down menu at the far right of your frame timeline. Click the option "reverse frames". If you play your animation, you will be moving in and out of the screen. Cool, you now have your beginning and end. Time for the middle! Between your entrance and exit, make several copy frames. Turn off the your first layer of yourself and make sure your second layer is on and selected. Then, go to edit and puppet warp. Now, place pins on yourself. Only put them in areas that you don't want moved or warped. Move the pins to make your body move. Now keep doing this, and you have a GIF. I like my GIF and I think it's lots of fun.

.MOV Film Festival

P3T1 Girls Use Technology from Kapaa Middle School MEDIA on Vimeo.

Now we are doing an awesome project, filming!! The keywords for my group's video are:

computers

first time

Alex "modeling" for the camera! 

humorous

bickering

teaching

cooperation

challenge

These keywords will connect with audience because they are all words that people would often use to describe something like their day.  People may have even had a situation that they would have described with our keywords. Then our keywords would definitely connect with those people. These words are also connected to our video because our video is all of those words. That's why we picked them! Hopefully these words will connect with our audience just like our film will. Our film is all of these words. Its about the challenge of the first time with computers, where two girls bicker as their tutor tries to teach them. They finally cooperate at the end of this humorous film. 

Christina needed a nap after working with us!

Gillian and Alex discussing things. 

My message for my film is that it takes awhile to get used to using technology. Our characters definitely go through a change. Gillian (played by me!!) and Christiana (played by Christina) go through the change. At first they do not want to cooperate with their tutor Alex (played by, yep you guessed it, Alex), so they are not getting anything done and they are complaining about that. Alex gets fed up and tells them that they will not be getting anywhere if they do not listen and the girls finally realize that it's true. They decide to listen and a couple hours later they have figured out how to do some simple stuff. Then they go out for shave ice to celebrate. The two girls go through the change, because it is they that have to listen so they will understand.

Gillian and Christina hang out at the library.

The biggest challenge we faced was working together. Our team is made up of natural   leaders, so no one really wanted to follow each other. We had a lot of trouble figuring it out. During the script writing stage, it was difficult to make a solid script, because people kept changing their lines. Finally, we decided to take a fair, diplomatic approach, a.k.a, we took turns doing everything. Filming, directing, acting, scripting and editing was all shared. This worked great! However, like everybody, we had our rough spots, especially during editing. In the end, though, we pulled through and was able to create our video!

Tiny Spherical Worlds

AltmanG_Polar1.jpg

There are several reasons why making images of composite photos are very popular. For example, in making photo montages it is very cool to see multiple views and positions of the same thing. Also, and I can speak from experience, it is very fun to put multiple photos together to form an image, like we did with our photo montage. Also, even though a panorama doesn't seem like a bunch of images, it is, because when you take a panorama with a smartphone, or a camera that does panoramas, it is taking a bunch of pics when you are holding down your shutter button. So, panoramas are really popular because you can see a really big landscape. Also, in the kind we are doing now, the polar and spherical images, are made up of a lot of images that a photo editing program will help you make it like a sphere.

Okay, on to the next thing! There also several differences with polar and spherical panoramas, the most obvious, (to me), is the perspective. The polar panoramas' perspective is looking down from a spaceship onto a planet. The spherical panoramas are slightly different, because their perspective is from inside the planet instead of outside. You feel that you are in this really cool planet where there is stuff on the walls. Also, in the polar panoramas, the sky is on the outside while in the spherical  panoramas, the sky is on the inside. There are also technical differences. For instance, when  you are using Photoshop, you do different processes to make polar and spherical panoramas. However, you take polar and spherical panoramas the same way, the difference is how you do it in photoshop.

AltmanG_Sphere2.jpg

AltmanG_Sphere1.jpg

AltmanG_Polar2.jpg

You obviously have to do multiple steps in Photoshop to make your tiny worlds believable. I mean, seriously, who would want to look at a image that looks completely unrealistic. So, you have to things to make it look as realistic as it can be. This is done by using the "clone stamp tool" in Photoshop, which is basically copying and pasting parts of your images to other places, which creates a much more realistic effect on the viewer. Another thing you need to do when taking your pics is to make sure nothing is touching the sky, like a tree. If you do accidentally do this, your tiny worlds will not be as realistic, because you will have a tree in your planet's atmosphere.  Also, as a handy tip, rotate your edited world by 90 degrees clockwise or counter-clockwise to distract the viewer from any slight mistakes you might have. Plus, it looks way cooler if you do that. ;) Also, when you are taking the photos that you will turn into a tiny world, you need to have it look like a good panorama, so when you turn it into a world it looks like an awesome world.

Hockney Style Joiners

Hey guys! Since were doing really fun and awesome photomontages, we are writing a post about them.Yay!


My photomontages are very different from David Hockney's. First of all, he uses a way better camera than me, because I mostly use my dad's tablet or my Nikon camera.  Plus, he invented photomontages and I obviously did not. Mine are also more abstract and have more blank space than most of his work. His work also includes many, many photos, whereas mine mostly contain about 15-25 photos. For example, the third photo of his work has a lot more photos than my photomontages. David Hockney also uses a style of photography that takes photos from multiple points in space. This is shown in the second photo. I also think that several of his photomontages are designed to provoke an emotion. This could possibly shown in the first photo.

Images can be positive or negative and can provoke positive or negative reactions. For instance, a photo showing adorable kittens and/or puppies at the Humane Society definitely is positive. I mean, who would not, upon looking at a photo like that, not have the positive reaction of either wanting to  find homes for those cute kittens and puppies, or adopt all of them.  That is a example of a positive photo provoking a positive reaction. However, photos can show and provoke a negative reaction. Any photo showing or promoting drugs, smoking, alcohol, abusing substances, or anything inappropriate is a negative photo. That is like, the definition of a negative photo. Those photos will also provoke a negative and often inappropriate reaction.   There are many examples on different social media sites. For instance, when I am looking over my dad's shoulder at his facebook account, I will see positive and negative photos posted by random strangers (mostly the negative photos) or my dad's facebook friends (the positive photos). Recently I saw a cool photo of Gandhi, which is totally a positive photo.However, there are some completely inappropriate stuff on facebook also. You should take only completely appropriate and positive photos, not only for school, (obviously) but also for fun.

I hope that my photomontages' positive message will be easily identified by the viewer. In my final photomontage, my message is that trees are awesome and they should be respected. The avocado tree that I photographed is my favorite tree ever, and I just feel like all is right in the world when I am with it.  Climbing it is super fun too! Talk about a birds-eye view!  Plus, it produces fruit so that's definitely a plus! Also, trees give you oxygen and therefore, we are dependent on trees to survive. We should not be killing the lives of trees just for wood and paper. I hope that my photomontage represents the message that we need to respect trees and they are also the best thing ever!

My final photomontage

My school photomontage

I got these photos from http://joinerphotography.com/How%20to/1JHowTo.html

My Mother, Bolton Abbey

The desk

Pear Blossom Highway

2016 Aspirations

First of all a little song! ;)

"We wish you a Merry Christmas,
We wish you a Merry Christmas,
and a Happy New Year!"


 Thank you, thank you! I'll be here all week!

#kmsgt_fruit

This year, I have five goals that I am trying to reach. My first goal is to exercise every day. I took three types of dance for three years each, and I certainly don't want to lose all of that physical health! I also want to stretch regularly, too.  My second goal is to be more careful and aware of things. I am forever bumping into things and getting bruises! My third goal for the new year is to write in my planner more at school. I sometimes forget to and I have to strain my brain to remember all my homework. My fourth goal for 2016 is to help my parents with cooking more often and to maybe learn or invent new recipes. My fifth and final goal this year is to be doing more art projects. I really love that kind of thing, but I haven't been doing it very often lately.

#kmsgt_sky

My most important goal out of my five is my first goal, to exercise more. This is important because I want to grow stronger and become more flexible. Right now, I can't even touch my toes when I bend down! :( However, I know that exercising and stretching daily will help me with that. Also, my mom stretches every day and she is very fit, so I want to be like that when I'm an adult. Plus stretching and exercise keeps your heart and other internal organs healthy. If I regularly exercise then it will become a habit, and I want to practice building good habits. These are the reasons why this goal is my most important one.

#kmsgt_flower

Of course, you have to have steps to ensure your success in completing your goal. For me, I have several steps. My first step is to write a note that I will put on my bedroom door that says, "exercise every day". I also will write a similar note in my bathroom and in my planner. My second step is to follow those notes and exercise daily. I will also stretch every time my mom does and maybe during recess and lunch too. My third step is to eat foods that do not have any food coloring and hardly any sugar, because when I eat that kind of thing I do not want to exercise . My fourth step is to have a chart where I mark a box off every time I exercise. Hopefully, these four steps will ensure my success in completing my goal by the end of 2016.