Forest of Tolkien

Today, you will experience a walk through a Forest of Tolkien.

Neutral Materials

In chapter 11 of our book Stewart talks about all of the different materials used in art and how structures are created, etc. I absolutely love seeing art pieces that are made out of already existing materials, so I really enjoyed reading this chapter. I tend to think of home crafting and art journaling when I think about stuff like this chapter brought up. I know that it's kind of a broad leap, but I greatly enjoy viewing and creating art journals myself, and I do find them to be a type of art piece.

People who do art journaling put a lot of creativity and thought into their work and create absolutely beautiful pages, so I'm going to share a few that I've seen here! I LOVE to see how many layers are put into this work!

Design Principles

While reading this chapter, I kept applying all of the principles to my thoughts about my photography process. I realized that a few of these things are things I have always struggled with.

Balanced grouping, especially in Family Photos, is something that I have a special frustration with, because I feel like I really just don’t have an eye for. I can do 1-2 people easily, but when you get more than that? I pretty much cannot come up with any really nice combinations when in the spur of the moment. I realized this struggle a couple of years ago, and while I still haven’t gotten a lot better, I have made a little progress and it is a skill I am very definitely trying to grow.  

On the other hand, there are some aspects of design that I feel like I have been able to gain skills in more easily, such as Emphasis through Contrast, and Scale and Proportion. Four years ago, I taught a three week photography class to young teenagers about Dramatic Emphasis through Contrast in Photography, and it was super fun, and I loved getting to share my love of dramatic, contrasting photography with young teens who were super willing to soak up all I had to share. It was a great three weeks.

Anyways, my thoughts here are that it is very interesting how some of these principles come much more easily to me as an artist than others.

Below are four Dramatic Light/Contrast shots that I used or took for that class, and one is a photo that I took to show texture, which is another design principle.

Stop, It's Hammer Time

I'm having a ton of fun working on my Stop-Motion project, currently titled "Stop, It's Hammer Time" simply for lack of a better, more reasonable title. I am going to try and come up with a title more acknowledging of the content of the video, but we'll see.

My project is very heavily Lord of the Rings related, so just be aware that my nerd side is definitely showing right now. And I'm very much considering using the idea of vignettes... My video is currently resting at about 40 seconds, and I am hoping to get it over one minutes, but we will see how that goes when I actually make it into Final Cut Pro.. In the mean time, I am trying to come up with another 'light bulb' (please read this again in Gru's voice if you didn't already) moment idea!

I can't wait until I am able to see my own finished video!!!!! I'm so impatient. Lol.

Our Campus...

Have you ever stopped outside in the early morning and taken a moment to just realize and appreciate how amazing stunning our campus is?

I did yesterday morning on my was to the COMPASS club Bible Study. 

I am so glad I stopped to take a few photos.... I was astounded by the beauty!

All are taken in HDR on my phone with the colors boosted just a bit and a vignette added!

Site Specific

In chapter nine of our text on page 187, Stewart talks about Site-Specific artwork, and after some reading as well as the additional input from my F-A 331 class, I have developed an interest in large-scale site-specific artworks.

Recently online I came across a couple of articles about major art pieces that have really interested me, and this is one of them. I find the whole thing, concept and execution stunningly beautiful. 

The text from the article below:

"“Man and Woman” is a 8 meter (26 foot) tall moving steel sculpture by Georgian sculptor Tamara Kvesitadze. Located in the seaside city of Batumi, Georgia, the two figures represent a Muslim boy, Ali, and a Georgian princess, Nino, from a famous 1937 novel by Azerbaijani author Kurban Said. The tragic story ends with the lovers separated by the invasion of Soviet Russia.

The statues begin to move every day at 7 p.m., merging for a short embrace, before leaving each other behind. After 10 minutes the movement is complete. The statue was designed in 2007 but only installed in 2010; it has since been retitled “Ali and Nino.” You can find and English translation of “Ali and Nino” on Amazon."

Chapter 8: Cliches

     When our text talks about “Cliché’s” in chapter 8 (163 Stewart), they mention the concept of thinking of death when we see skulls or thinking of tranquility when we see seagulls, but I immediately thought of Ads for perfume and cologne. They are always totally cliché images of men and women looking super sexy and like they are about to “get it on” with just about anyone who might look at the picture. 

     

Honestly I find these images sleazy and more of a put off than a turn on, and I wish these companies would find some other way to advertise. I’m not wearing perfume because I want to get it on, I’m buying and wearing perfume because I want to smell pleasant. So the other idea in the text about cliché’s-- that they get “worn out” is definitely true in my mind.