October 31, 2008 Homework: Photoshop Paintings

The five images or paintings I'm going to create are based off Chip Forelli's nightmare of black and white landscapes. I will create these dreamlike landscapes that don't make much sense, but done in the same beautiful fashion as Forelli. The first four will include seascapes with bizarre trees and water. They will be consistent in size and format. Then the last painting will be a surreal abstract with a human fetus in it.

October 31, 2008 Homework: Book Cut Out Revised Idea

My revised version of the cut out book, is going to be the same idea, but going further into the depths of the past and the present. I've chosen seven of my previous images to use and base my new versions off of. My new images will be of the present that relate to each of the images previously, such as the photo of the bottles I will take a photo with a bar in the background. Instead of using me as a prop for the present, I will use a different person, but I do not know who it will be yet. These photos will be done in the same manner as being ultra wide angles, and have a lot of activity. There will five to seven images. The images above are the seven I will use.

October 24, 2008 Homework: Book Cut Out

Into the Looking Glass

When looking for a magnifying glass at an antique store I came upon some old brass binoculars and I thought it would be great to convey a story through looking through them within a space. My idea was to do a self portrait with me looking through these binoculars in a basement full of antique contraptions and things under Beale Street. I wanted to portray the vision of seeing the past through a moment in time, which is me. The fidgety look of me is an effect that I could not help because of my process in which I performed with the help of Khalifa, but in a way it is sequential to the idea of a moment in time. I represent an infinitesimal thread in the fabric of time, and the background represents the past, the forgotten, and the abandoned; it also is the antithesis to the wild life that perpetually plays above. The masks cut outs will be in the binoculars.

October 17, 2008 Homework: Masking Images

I haven't really come up with a sound or coherent idea but more of a simplistic way of looking at things in a unique way. I used several different pictures that relate by bricks and stones. I will have a rectangular mask of each image in an area where the viewer's eye is brought to, such as the focal point. Sadly, this not the main theme I wanted to do, because I haven't had the time or people; I really wanted to use a friend as part of a still life and have in their hands a magnifying glass holding up to their side, which would be masked out revealing a hint of the next image. But I couldn't find the right kind of magnifying glass to do this project, so I had to resort to this, which isn't bad for a rough draft.

October 8, 2008 Homework: Commercial Work Part II

For part two of this assignment National Geographic wants me to dwell deeper into the meaning of the artificial environments in which animals of today live in and the natural environments that they use to live in or their diminishing lands they are living in. I will basically take five pictures of animals within the Memphis Zoo that do not look healthy or comfortable within their simulated landscapes, and I will gather five images from the internet of those particular animals in their natural homes and combine them. The background of the image will be the animals within their prisons, and the foreground will be the lettering which will be masked with the images of the free animals. The lettering will read "I've Spent My Entire Life Trapped In A Cage" which is from the song "Give It All" by Rise Against.

The other five photos will be dealing with looking into other worlds within our world. I will use five of my macro shots of rare rocks and petrified wood that simulate landscapes, and then will combine them with landscape images and aerial views of land and sea. The background of each image will be the macro shots and the foreground will be the lettering in which will be masked with the images of landscapes. The lettering will read "A Different Perspective".

October 3, 2008 Homework: Commercial Work

I have thought about this for a prolonged time and I think that I would like to do what National Geographic would not do, a negative connotation of animal life within a prison, basically a typical zoo, in which I will do the Memphis Zoo, because it is definitely not the zenith of zoos within America, and it is not National Geographic's purpose. I want to compose my images to the pseudo-world of the animals and the world of entertainment for people and how they interact. I also want to convey a strong sense of direction and angles and shapes. I also want to convey especially how children interact with the animals.

This is possibly the coolest commercialized photo I have ever seen. The image of the car has not been manipulated digitally, but the car has been drawn on with sharpies by the Prestige Lamborghini dealership. This was done for a show in California, and this is an advertisement for it. It took about two weeks to complete the drawing. The art itself is pop art and very detail and connected to each other; it is well laid out throughout the car. It even appears on the windows.