Assignment 1 and 3 Improved

Here's my updated Assignment 1 (SDOF) with a more interesting subject, I hope.

This is a cute little squirrel made of wood. My dad placed it on a wooden log, and I think it's quite interesting to frame it with a leaf from a plant placed nearby. This is a canted shot, though it's not obvious. I did a bit of editing to reduce the effect of back lighting.

*I'll redo Assignment 2 again, I'm working on Assignment 3 first as there is more to change.

For Assignment 3, the feedback was that the theme of materialism was not obvious. The money in the collage are too subtle and the scene is too calm to portray the encroachment of materialism. Jing suggested I can do something with the flying ArtScience Museum(s) instead. She said they look like lanterns, which is interesting as this manipulates the structure of the buildings. Hence I should elaborate on these lanterns instead, and portray a romantic feel. I can also add mythical flying creatures to bring out the "fantasy" part of the montage, since mythical creatures don't exist in reality.

I think this is interesting, as I (and probably some of my classmates) initially thought that our assignment has to bring out some big issues, but by concentrating on simpler concepts (e.g. manipulating the structure of the ArtScience Museum) we can bring out the theme of urban fantasy too.

Here's my improved version:

Generally, I did what Jing suggested, but instead of a shadow, I turned the mythical creatures, the Pegasus (flying horse) and the fairy, into constellations instead. I think this blends in more with my night sky.

Here're the links to my 5 images:
ArtScience Museum: Original
Moon: http://www.flickr.com/photos/springfieldhomer/63766256/
Pegasus: http://www.flickr.com/photos/13521837@N00/2468089142/
Fairy: Original (hand-drawn by my friend for another module)

Clouds: Original

* Note: Since this assignment is on appropriation, which means we can take photos from other sources, I hope the timeline does not matter, as although the fairy and clouds are drawn and taken before this semester, I only manipulated them today. If not I'll draw and take photos again (:/) though I hope to get feedback first...

Assignment 3

Our assignment was to create a digital collage/montage with a theme related to urban fantasy.

One of the first things that came to mind was materialism, as it is one of the problems more unique to the city (e.g. poorer rural areas are less concerned with material possessions when they have problems with day to day survival). Moreover, I had this photo from Assignment 1 in mind.

I intended to use it for deep depth of field but I chose the helix bridge instead, since this has nothing in the foreground that can be used as a reference point. However, I thought this photo looks rather nice, and since it's about the city, I can use it to depict urban fantasy.

Hence my idea for this assignment was to show the city being engulfed in materialistic pursuits, although the humans who live there may not be conscious of it. I did this by adding photos of money (coin and notes) onto the white spaces of the photo. In order to make the photo visually less crowded, I tweaked the original photo as well. Here is what I came up with:

(Note: Most of the montage was done before the last tutorial, Class Exercise 4, thus I probably did some of the editing the long way round. However, since I only started re-sizing the ArtScience Museum image yesterday, I converted it into a smart object ;))

I duplicated the ArtScience Museum photo a few times and separated the different elements. I had one layer of the water, one of the museum, and one of the background with the buildings and the night sky. I erased the buildings in the background of the ArtScience Museum, and re-sized the museum to isolate and bring more focus to it. I also made the background buildings smaller and used the stamp tool to fill up the resulting spaces. The opacity of the background buildings are then lowered.

Next, I put an image of a $1 coin into the sky. This functions as the moon, which can be interpreted as materialism being something urban dwellers look up to, since the moon is usually the first thing we see in the night sky as it is the brightest.

I then superimposed distorted images of notes onto the water, to make them seem as though they are floating in the water. They (as well as the coin) are deliberately out-of-proportion, to show that money overpowers the buildings, what's more the people (i.e. us) who live and work inside them. The notes layer are set to Vivid Light, Soft Light, or Overlay at different opacity to blend into the water.

I used money of $1-$10, and not $50 or more, to show that not only the rich are concerned with materialistic pursuits. I may change this if notes of $50 or more are more coherent with the ArtScience Museum photo, a place associated with the richer.

Lastly, I duplicated images of the ArtScience Museum, and changed their blending mode and opacity to make it look as though the museum is being drawn into the coin. I did this because I thought since the ArtScience Museum looks like a flower, and it is about the Arts, this may depict that nature and art are losing their significance to materialism. I'm not sure if I can edit anything to make the message clearer though, shall see how the critique session goes.

No humans are shown in the photo. This portrays the apathetic attitude towards materialism: as we do not see individuals in this macro view of the city (as a whole) being consumed by materialism, there is less motivation to change the way things are. The absence of humans can also show that people are generally unconscious of the negative effects of materialism that frame endless wants as needs. I think people find it difficult to relate to materialism as there is less human factor in general public discussion (e.g. as opposed to natural disasters, where people are filmed dying, which motivates others to help).

Here are the links to my images (I searched in Google Image first):
$1 coin: http://kforkiat.blogspot.com/2010/12/its-end-of-2011-one-more-day-to-go-for.html
$2 note: http://www.epier.com/BiddingFormDutch.asp?1859663
$5 note: http://notes.syazwan.com/2010/04/singapore-bank-notes.html
$10 note: http://notes.syazwan.com/2010/04/singapore-bank-notes.html
ArtScience Museum: Original

Class Exercise 4

We had a Photoshop tutorial this week. I think it was a good recap and I also learned new image editing techniques :)

Our main focus was on non-destructive editing. Actually I did it before, just that I didn't realize it was called non-destructive editing. For example, since I'm using CS5, the adjustment layers that I usually create are on a separate layer. I've also read in a newspaper column somewhere (I can't really remember, it was probably at least a year ago) that another way of non-destructive editing is to copy the original image to another layer and edit from there. This is so that the original image can still be retrieved from the background layer.

Nevertheless, I became more sure of some editing techniques after the tutorial and also learned something new.

1. Layer mask: I used this before, but I've always thought it was kind of confusing, because I have to be sure of what should be on the top layer, and what I should erase using a black or white brush. However, after some practise in class, I think I became more confident and may use this in the future.

I would have copied the original image and changed it to black and white on the top layer, then use the eraser to create this effect instead of a layer mask.

The layer mask is much more effective though. For example, if I accidentally erased something wrongly, all I have to do is to change to a white brush and paint over the erased area. This mistake will be much more difficult to undo if I copied another layer to black and white and used the eraser tool. Although I can undo my steps, there is a limit of 20 steps in Photoshop. Hence I may not be able to restore the black and white image if I exceeded 20 steps, unless I copy the image again and edit from the start. If I used layer mask though, I don't have to worry about this limitation. By not having to duplicate images, the layer mask technique also reduces the file size of the Photoshop document.

In addition, I've also learned the shortcut "X" that allows me to change the background and foreground color, which makes life easier ;)

2. Smart objects: I think this was helpful as I didn't quite know what smart objects mean in Photoshop. I added images which were automatically converted to smart objects before, but I didn't know the significance. The class taught me that smart objects can be re-sized (especially from big to small, and to big again) without degrading image quality. I had this problem before, so I'm really grateful to smart objects =)

3. Refine edge: I've learned how to use the quick selection tool in NM3217 before, and I think it's better than magic wand tool (which sometimes leaves jagged edges around the selection) and magnetic lasso tool (which is more tedious) that I had learned back in polytechnic. Nevertheless, I still wonder how people manage to select tricky images such as those with hair and fur. This tutorial introduced me to the "Refine Edge" option under quick selection tool (I guess I didn't notice it or attempt to try it out before, though I've got CS5 for a year or so). By using edge detection and smart radius, I can adjust the settings to select the boy's hair easily, to rather good results. (The image of the boy is superimposed on that of the field.)

I'll definitely keep this in mind :) I also used layer mask and quick selection to change the color of the boy's shirt. This was a good idea I learned, as using the paint bucket to fill the selected area with black or white is more efficient as opposed to using a black or white brush.

Assignment 2 Critique Session

My group mates said my concept was clear and they can tell that the 4 photos are in the same series. However, the execution could be better. For example, instead of taking still objects, I can take photos of everyday activities in action, or people engaging in the various everyday activities (i.e. waking up, brushing teeth, pouring cereal for breakfast, etc). This makes the photos more "lively".

My group mates also mentioned that the first photo (of the teddy bear on the bed) looks deliberate and not everyday. They mentioned that I can take a photo of a messy bed instead. I think this feedback is really helpful as I didn't realize the problem of others being able to recognize the "posed" photo.

Thus, after the critique session, I decided to make my photos look more lively and realistic. However, I think it may be rather troublesome to get someone to pose for me. One solution may hence be to adopt Hanis's suggestion, which is to take photos with my mobile phone from different angles as I am engaging in everyday activities (i.e. from first person's point of view). I think I can show that the photos are taken with a phone camera by using filters from apps. I'm not sure if this will work out though. Shall upload the photos again.

Class Exercise 3

We were supposed to find digital collage(s) or montage(s) as a group and justify why we find them aesthetically pleasing. My group decided on this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/-collage-/2382083933/, because we liked the effect of the textured wall showing through the skin of the girl. It gives a creepy effect like the ones commonly used in horror movies, where ghosts or some other supernatural beings can appear through walls. At the same time, however, the girl is rather sweet-looking, and she holds a bunch of flowers in her hands. By placing her in front of a forlorn-looking background (i.e. the peeling wall), the image also portrays a sense of nostalgia. As Jing mentioned, the image also portrays a sense of decay. This is a good example of a digital montage as at least two images (of the girl and the wall) are blended smoothly together.

This image is part of a series. Other images can be found by searching "digital montage" on Flickr.