Final Assignment

Our final assignment was to make a magazine cover. I also found this assignment to be quite fun. I loved choosing the photo, editing it, choosing a color scheme and fonts, and making up captions. I was quite happy with how the finished product turned out, and am quite happy with how the class went for me.

Homework 12- Masks, Continued

I love working more with masks! I think that's because masks are a tool I will need to become more and more proficient with as my use of photoshop continues. I wish that I would have had time to also use a photo of my own for this week's assignment, but the text's photo will have to do. I found this assignment to be fun.

Homework 10- Vector Surrealism

This week, we learned how to use the pen tool. I have to be honest when talking about this assignment, it was not my favorite, and the lack of effort on my part definitely had to do with my lack of interest in this. I took this photoshop class to learn more about editing portraits, which is not something which we have delved very deeply into. However, the pen tool will be useful when selecting items, and I am glad to have worked with it. I must say that this is not my most favorite assignment of the entire class, though.

Mid-Term Assignment- Historical Collage

Because I am a nurse, I chose to focus my midterm collage on one of the most famous nurses in history, Florence Nightingale. Known as The Lady with the Lamp, Nightingale provided revolutionary care to soldiers in the Crimean War. After the War, she became a statistician who researched infection rates in hospitals, and helped to develop some of the basic hygiene principles we use today. She also founded the first ever nursing school, and helped nursing evolve from a job that was performed by either homeless people or nuns, to a profession that is well-respected and highly desired.

I chose to make the photo monotone, mostly because the only photos of Nightingale are very old, and mostly sepia-toned. The more current photo of the stethoscope looked very jarring next to her photo until I changed the color scheme. The only piece of this that I was not completely happy with was the piece in the bottom left corner, her signature. I couldn't get it to look just right, but after finishing week 8's homework, I feel that I now possess the skills to make it a more seamless transition.

Homework 6- Adding Text

I took this photo at a family wedding last summer. Morgan was a Flower Girl for the second time, and she completely embraced the job. We found this adorable dress on etsy.com, and she loved it. At the reception, she had so much fun dancing on the dance floor before anyone else was brave enough to join in! The original photo had horrible lighting, much of which needed to be edited when I was working on this project.

Homework 4- Color

Another beautiful background from our trip to New Zealand! This photo was taken in Arthur's Pass, a very remote little place that is very green, lush, and mountainous. My sister-in-law did all of her fieldwork for her PhD here, so she was able to tell us great things. My daughter, Morgan, was so excited to go for a hike- and she handled the slippery trails like a champ! The photo of her on the bridge was actually taken here in California, at Muir Woods on a giant rock, but the excitement that she has on her face in this photo was a perfect compliment to how excited she was to hike in Arthur's Pass.

This assignment was technically difficult for me, as making selections was initially very hard, and the original photo of Morgan was not easy to work with. However, it provided me with lots of good practice, and I was very happy with the results.

Homework 3- Duotone

Our assignment for Homework 3 was to create a duotone graphic. I really love the mood that black-and-white photography can set, so this assignment was right up my alley! As I made this image, I couldn't decide between making the subjects of the photo (my husband and our daughter) super-dark or not. I decided that I liked the feeling that the shadowy figures provided, so I went with it.

The background photo was taken in Kaikoura, New Zealand last summer. It is one of the most beautiful places that I have ever been to. The three of us took a vacation in NZ to visit my brother-in-law and his wife, who were living in Christchurch at the time. The foreground photo was taken on a beach in Santa Cruz a month or so after we arrived home.