Digital Media Design Reflective Journal
(October 7th 2020) Avatar Feedback
In todays lecture we presented our avatar designs to the rest of the class by describing the methods and we used and the inspiration for our designs, while also giving feedback on how we could improve our work. These were the main points that I received in terms of improving:
● Tune pegs on the guitar are not as well done compared to the rest of the drawing.
● Loop the music notes from the top of the canvas
● Fill in the empty space above the guitar
● Add gradient to background
I decided to act on all this feedback and come up with something that includes all the points. I moved the position of the guitar to fill up some empty space in the top right while also removing the tuning pegs from view, killing two birds with one stone. I also transformed and enlarged the music notes to fill the entire left half of the background, which in turn, fills up more empty space. The pre feedback avatar has the gradient hidden as I was not sure if it fit well over the image. However, someone suggested I should add the gradient only to the background when explaining this in the feedback session. Although subtle, it is defiantly an improvement. Lastly I transformed my face by stretching it horizontally, to better match the real proportions of my face, while also filling up more empty space.
In conclusion I'm happy I bit the bullet and presented my work to the class as it provided me with helpful feedback that's made a huge improvement to my work.
(Pre Feedback) (Post feedback)
(October 5th 2020) The "Aliake"
In today's lecture, I was tasked with creating an "aliake" which is a mixture between a snake and alligator. I felt the best way to do this was to edit an alligators head onto the body of a snake as their heads are quite similar, to begin with. Photoshop was used for this task
I started by looking for an image of a snake and alligator that had similar perspectives in the way that their body is positioned. Once I found these, I masked out the alligators head and free transformed it over the snakes head to get it into the correct position. I then feathered the mask of the alligators head and smoothed the edges to give it a more natural place in the image.
After that, I layered up some shadow effect around the head using the burn tool which gives a convincing natural shadow. The alligators head was originally not the same as the snake's body so I used the colour balance adjustment layer, which I clipped to the layer below to match the green colour found on the snake. I also adjusted the curves of the image, making the whites brighter and blacks darker, which I found made the alligator head look more natural as it seemed to sync up the brightness
and darkness across both the snake layer and alligator layer.
Finally made a duplicate of all my layers and flattened them. This is so I could experiment with different filters and effects. A lot of the filters in the filter gallery did not work well, however, I found that the 'ink outline' filter gave an intimidating effect while not changing the image too much.
(October 4th 2020) My Avatar
This evening I sat down and completed my avatar drawing and decided to use Photoshop as it's the software I'm most confident using. The task was to create an avatar that represents yourself.
I started off with some construction lines to roughly plan the layout of my design which I can also use as a guide for the neater ink layer later on. Referring to my mood board I made yesterday, I decided to only add one of my hobbies (guitar) with the music notes as I think it would have been too cluttered with more objects. I experimented with adjustment layers to change the colour balance of the overall image to give the design a slightly purple hue to match the background. I also adjusted the levels of the background to make it a little darker which makes the drawings pop out a bit more. I used the FX tool quite a lot too, using it to add strokes, outer glows, and drop shadows to my drawings. Another thing I tried was a gradient overlay, however, I thought the effect was a bit too much and preferred the simpler colour block look that I was originally going for.
I experimented with different positions for the guitar, music notes, and character which was possible due to my use of different layers. The last image is my final avatar design.
(October 2nd 2020) Mood Board/Brainstorm
Today I completed a mood board/brainstorm for my avatar design. I've figured out pretty much exactly what I am going to do in terms of software, medium, and content for my avatar. Tomorrow I will make a start on the drawing.
(October 1st 2020) Note taking and Adobe Illustrator
Today I went over and took notes from the 'Module Introduction' and 'Adobe CC' lecture PowerPoints. I also looked into the process of disruptive design more, as I couldn't wrap my head around it during the lecture. After writing my notes, I decided to open Adobe illustrator to have a play around and see how similar to photoshop it was, as I am already quite fluent in that.
(September 28th 2020) The Pros and Cons of Smartphones
Smartphones have increasingly become more a part of our daily lives, relying on them for almost anything and everything. Although this breakthrough in technology has done a lot of good, some cons come with it. The addictive nature of phones is a big one as it can disconnect us from the real world, and damage our relationships and workflow. Also, looking at a screen for hours on end is not healthy and can lead to eye problems. On the other hand, smartphones give us easy access to thousands of useful apps which can be very useful to all types of people. In particular, the 'be my eyes' app matches visually impaired people with people who have better eyesight to help them with tasks
(September 28th 2020) The Pros and cons of MMO's
MMO's are video games where there is a large scale of other players in the same lobby, in which the player can interact with in some way. An example game would be The Elder Scrolls Online, in which you share the world with a large number of other players who are all completing missions and doing their own thing. These sorts of games provide a more sociable environment as a lot of MMO's give the option to easily party up with any player you meet, along with text chat and audio chat. A downside to this, however, is that people are easily susceptible to bullying from other players due to text chat and voice chat. Although, this can easily be countered as most online games have an option to mute other players.
