Chapter 3 Graphic Animal

Now what can I say, besides "I loved this project!" Now that was just plain fun...

I felt that the final image did maintain the essence of the original object.

What I learned from the object from the physical analysis was that (and maybe this may be just the photos I looked at) the creature's tail would appear to be out in photos taken while on land, but the tail rarely stuck out while swimming.

I think what pleased me most about the final image was that it was exactly what I had envisioned it being.

I actually finished this a lot earlier today, but let it sit where I could see it throughout the day to make sure it was what I wanted. Obviously it was since it is now posted.

Graphic Animal Roughsketch

I free handed this from the photo I chose. It was the basic idea of what I wanted. I also thought that a slight flair of our Southeast Alaskan Native Art would help to bring in the flippers without everything being so blunt.

Graphic Animal Idea

The moment I saw what our project was, I knew immediately which animal I was going to use...
My husband and I went scuba diving in Maui this last June and got the chance to swim with sea turtles. I fell in love with the creatures immediately! What an awesome experience! The Green Sea Turtle was adorable and graceful in the water.
After viewing picture after picture online, I chose this particular photo by Jamie Harbord. I got this photo from www.greatbarrierreefinfo.com. I liked it for this project because the angle was really perfect for what I had in mind. The way the light hit the sea turtle was exactly what I was hoping to find and the flippers were displayed nicely.

Project 2A: Expressive Type and Design

Now that was just plain interesting and not as easy as I thought it would be.

I started on my laptop and ended up moving to my Mother-in-law's computer to use her printer so I could print, cut-out, and scan text. However, I had more luck with her Photoshop on her computer than with my own. So I didn't have to go through the effort of printing or scanning. I was able to do this all within the computer. I saved it and sent it to my own email and was able to manipulate it more using my laptop that I am more comfortable with.

I am so thankful to have gotten my book assignment in early, because I would have been cramming at this point due to the unexpected events that have happened in my home-life. I had fun doing this with the computer, but this amount took quite some time. It sure sounded easier than it was.

Even though I knew the basic meaning of each word, I still looked up the definitions online to be sure I was using the right idea of how to apply the text I felt would best fit the word. There were a few words that had more meaning than one such as "Stodgy" had both the definition of being heavy or very old-fashioned and "crush" could mean to crush an item or have a crush on another person. So I chose the basic meaning most people are familiar with.

I think this typeface does the best job of supporting the word "Sludge" for what fonts I had available. I would have liked something more expressive for "Ornate". I manipulated the "sludge" type by using tools like the move tool, smudge tool, and brush tool in Photoshop. The other words only required using the move tool to widen or squash down as well as arching it.

The type I used for "Sludge" gave a pretty good idea of the meaning of the word to start with then I added a lot of black to make it appear to be a murky hole of ooze and dripping. This style of type really made it easy to create the effect I was hoping for in the composition.

Metlakatla's AMHS M/V Lituya Accident

Not even sure where to start, but... My husband is the captain of the A.M.H.S. M/V Lituya that was aground on an island off Metlakatla. What a freak incident! Our winds were so strong that the vessel broke free of its mooring soon after midnight Friday morning (Jan 30th). The Lituya docks overnight daily in Metlakatla and was secured as usual, but the winds were too powerful.

We were awoke by a police officer banging on our front door and I received a text from my brother saying "The ferry is loose in the bay" (12:40 a.m.). As my husband threw on clothing to run out the door with the officer, I let him know I could see the Lituya spinning in the bay from our upstairs window as it was moving swiftly toward the direction of a couple of small islands we call the "Twin Sisters".

As he and others headed out in boats, I noticed it had stopped spinning and knew it found either an island or rocks that are abundant in our bay. The lights went out on the Lituya (batteries exhausted). The weather was nasty for water crafts, but our brave people didn't hesitate to get out there in pairs. One man even tried going out in a small skiff and its engine died causing a slight distraction for what was going on, but he was brought back safely into our breakwater.

My husband went out on one of our police officer's, Roger McKeehan's boat with Royce Hayward's seine boat as back-up to see what it looked like for trying to get onto the ferry. The Lituya was, at that time, brushing up against the rocks of Scrub Island, and the boats came back in for Steven to get on another boat (our Mayor Karl Cook's bow picker with Rich Hudson's gill netter as back up) to attempt to get onto the ferry(2:15 a.m.). The waves were 7 ft+ and as hard as he tried, it was just too rough. Our Mayor reported to me that Steven had actually grabbed onto the deck a couple of times but it was way too dangerous to continue. They came in again to wait for the weather to improve. however, the tide was changing and going out. It had been high tide and chances of getting it safely away were getting slimmer.

The weather improved slightly by 4 a.m. and they went back out in the same two vessels last tried (Mayor's and Hudson's). By what I could see from the window (and binoculars), I could tell Steven was successful at getting aboard the ferry this time, because the Lituya's lights came back on. Daniel Marsden's seine boat headed out as the Lituya's lights came on. From the chromium light of Daniel's seine boat, I could see that the stern of the ferry was definitely on the rocks and the ferry was listing horridly to starboard. I could see the area that they load cars on the starboard side rocking close to the water. The Lituya's lights went out again and the boats came back in. It was pitch black out there so we wouldn't be able to watch how the ferry was doing until daylight. There were other boats, but I wasn't sure whose they were, but thankful for all the people who didn't hesitate to help. The ferry was definitely going aground and the Coast Guard and tugs were called in.

7 a.m. and we could finally see that the ferry was aground and still mostly upright. Steven met the incoming tug at the state dock and they headed out to investigate the vessel to start planning how to get it off the rocks safely. I sat on the state dock to wait and watch and be there if Steven needed anything. They came back in to get my camera (the picture he took of the Lituya above). the town's people kept our ball field (closest open area to view the incident) constantly packed. The schoolchildren came in groups. Thank goodness the weather cooperated.

2 p.m. and a half hour shy of high tide, the two tugs pulled the Lituya from the rocks of Scrub Island. Then divers investigated the Lituya's hull before towing it to Ketchikan. It was in amazingly better condition than it could have been for what it went through.

The policeman who first noticed it missing upon their security check had thought the Lituya broke its bow line, but after looking at the computerized equipment aboard the Lituya, Steven noticed it had broke free from the stern breaking all four cables. A man who worked in a huge warehouse above where the Lituya docks said the roof to their building had torn off in the wind and how wicked the wind gets in that area and very unpredictable.

There really was not much of anything that could have been done to prevent what happened and although it was a horrible accident, I thank God that the Lituya is still afloat and able to be fixed. I have been told that this is not the first time this has happened and definitely not the biggest vessel this has happened to here in Metlakatla. There have been log ships that have broken free from their mooring (from a very near location to the Lituya's dock) and drifted into the same islands or those nearby. My father told me his 92-foot boat did the same thing many years ago, but it had survived then.

I am even more thankful that my husband was safe in all his attempts to board the vessel and for his safety after successfully getting aboard and shutting down things and closing watertight doors. The Lituya safely awaits in Ketchikan for the dry dock.

Thoughts on Chapter One and more

Okay, so I thought the answers were going to pop up all too easy as the answer to question 1 appeared immediately, but... Not so. There were a couple of questions I actually used other internet resources to verify if I was actually understanding it. The book was a little vague to what one question was asking, but having used the internet, it made what was written in the book more clear.
The most interesting part of Chapter One to me would be the the Sagmeister poster "Sagmeister Inc.. on a binge" and not at all because the art was of interest, but that a designer would go to the extreme of gaining 25 pounds for a piece of his work. Wow... Us women would not risk that.
I could also understand the basic definitions of the principles and elements easily as I've done so much art and music growing up. However, understanding is different from remembering and reciting.
It has been a while since I've taken college classes, so it has been interesting getting back in the swing of things.

I was hoping for more color manipulation on this blog site. I typically use black, as a good amount of my wardrobe resembles that of someone in mourning. I will wear black until they invent a darker color. However, I have been vigorously trying to incorporate other colors. Black being the main class blog color led me to use pink. Pink is my favorite color, but I don't believe I wear it well and definitely do not like pink on the walls of my home. I was hoping for more color variation in this blog site. As much as I love pink, the combination I chose to use took a little deliberation as it was a little gaudy and bright, but then I thought... a little fun at that and different. Add a little brown-tone in sepia and title gave it an antique look. Absolutely none of which I would have chose given more options, but I liked the end result.

I also realized that the town I live in is the only place in Alaska that does not change time come daylight savings time. When the time switches this Spring, we shall be back on the same time as Alaska. As for now, we are an hour ahead of all of you. I do not agree with the reasons our community does this and there are so many reasons it should stay with Alaska, but until intelligence strikes someone who can change that, I'll have to remember to coordinate the time for meetings...

Image Resizing and a little more

This is one of my favorite pictures. I took this of my husband, Steven, while we were out trout fishing at a lake on our island. He called it his favorite spot.

So, I chose this one to resize. I used the information on our class blog site to make sure I was doing it right. I went into the "How to resize an image" in the image editing resources area and used the first You Tube tutorial by teachertube.com.

My Photoshop is an older version (Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0), but worked just fine. I was pretty sure, but had to check that Pixels/inch and dpi meant the same thing before applying the 72 pixels/inch. Yahoo! Answers had this comment, "The common display resolution is 72 pixels per inch, or dots per inch." in reply to someone's question about resizing an image. I had used this resize feature before, but to get the exact inches of a picture to fit a frame or scrapbooking, etc...

Getting set up for school for the first time was very crazy and time consuming. I didn't realize there were so many sites and areas for the University of Alaska. After getting into my email, I could see where communication with the Class Instructor was essential. My account was not set to have access to the blackboard, but the Help Desk worked quickly to correct this. Over the course of a few days, I was finally set. What a headache, but glad to be ready. I saved the Class Syllabus and Task and Assignment Timeline to my computer after reading them.

I can say that the delay in starting the class was a small blessing for me, because I must have been one of the last to enter the class and had ordered my book at that time and it arrived the day our instructor announced that "Class Officially Begins" being the same day I was able to access the blackboard.

Whew...