Time

Where does time go? I haven't got time..... Make time....... If I had time......A waste of time...use your time....run out of time....lost time.....manage time.....lots of time....time is running out.

I've just been thinking about time prompted by the fact that its now February and at college we have started work on the units in block 2. These are the last units of the BTEC course and by June this year our studies will culminate in our final exhibition. The next sixteen weeks will see students busily researching, planning,exploring and creating their final major projects. I always find this stage at the beginning of the projects the most difficult. I can get so involved in research and planning and before I know it the deadline is fast approaching and time becomes my enemy. Poor old time...always being blamed when we fall short of our own or others expectations.

So during this block of study I have decided to turn time round and look on it as my friend. I have a whole 16 weeks to complete four units....that's loads of time !!

FAIL TO PLAN.....PLAN TO FAIL

If I make a plan with my new found friend then the next 16 weeks should be an enjoyable experience. There will be goal setting and lots of lists to keep me on track each day. I like lists.

Before moving on to the next phase of my art journey I need to just finish off with my final pieces from block1, so here are a few images of my completed work.  

Three oil paintings on canvas for Extending Specialist Techniques Unit. These paintings explore different approaches to painting the landscape. This gave me the opportunity to play with oil paints, discover new techniques and explore colour  relationships. This unit certainly made me push my boundaries and I feel the need to do more

Final piece for photography unit. I made a plaster cast mask of a friend's face and then used multiple black and white photographs to cover the mask both inside and out. As the mask rotates it reveals the optical illusion of her face coming outwards. I spent quite some time making this mask and getting the finish right. I had to work into the wee small hours to complete on time and as a result my sketchbook didn't fully reflect a lot of the working up to this final piece. That old time thing again, although I take full responsibility.

I loved the final result and I have to say I had a fantastic model who had no fear at having her face covered in plaster making sight and speech impossible and breathing restricted. Thank you Kate......by the way did you know I had plans for more?!!!

 

   

How to Kill Two Birds with One Stone

Tonight I was working on designs for the surface pattern unit at college. I wanted to explain how my design had developed from two dimensional to 3D so decided to use photographs. I photographed the object and then loaded the image onto the computer to crop it etc before printing and pasting into my sketchbook.

Suddenly a eureka moment........I could use this for my photography unit. You have no idea how happy this little light bulb moment made me feel. I played around with the image on Picassa and this was the result. I love the contrasts in the image. It looks like the logo for The Scottish Gallery!

My photography unit has been lagging behind, probably because it's the one I feel least confident about. I thought if I really concentrated on the other two units first I'd have just enough time to complete photography, hoping that the tight time schedule would fire up some inspiration. 

Little did I think I could kill two birds with one stone

As someone who likes contrasts, while I was doing two jobs at once on the computer a message popped up to say the temperature in New Zealand was approaching 25 degrees. Here the temperature was zero degrees. This produced another light bulb moment....but that's for another post. 

More Images

On the periphery of the campus I found these gates and I thought that it would make an interesting image looking through. I also liked the colour and the texture of the rust which added interest. I had difficulty taking the photograph as the light was shining on the screen and I had to hope for the best that I had captured the image I was looking for. I played around with this quite a bit trying to get the idea of looking through some sort of window but nothing seemed to be working. I went back to the beginning and decided to crop one section of the image as I had done on the previous photo....... and here's the result.

I like this image and I think the composition works but I would like to see the gate sharper. The texture of the rust is visible but I think it could be better. I took the image back to colour and enhanced the colours which really highlights the rust and the texture on the gate.

 I think the tones are too close to show up well in b/w and if my intention is to show texture then the image benefits from colour. On the other hand the b/w version makes me think what the story behind the image is. The choices we make when altering images therefore depends on the intention

Location Photography

Collage started this week and I feel like we hit the floor running. It was straight into location photography. The task was to head outside for 45 minutes and return with six photographs
......PHOTOGRAPHS not snaps.
Shouldn't be too difficult you may think. Unfortunately Borders College campus and surrounding area is not known for it's magnificent architecture and outstanding beauty. In addition to this I felt sure that many of the students were much more technically experienced with state of the art photographic gadgetry on their I-phones. This was going to be a challenge. I set to the task with some doubts but determined not to fail...........after all it's only the start of the unit............get a grip!!

Ok job done. Must be one or two "photographs" here. Now it was time to play with these images and digitally transform them into something even more interesting. Photographs Apple Macs and Photoshop were all too much in one day, so I returned home to the familiarity and comfort of my laptop and Picassa

This was the first image to be digitally enhanced. I thought that this iron fence looked like arms with pronged fingers reaching upwards to the sky...or a bit triffid like.

and after cropping straightening sharpening edges changing to b/w and Holga-ish this was the result.

Not triffids any more but certainly dark and threatening. I wondered what I could do with another section of the same photograph as some of the shapes in the bottom left hand corner were interesting and had potential.

Wow!!!! I'm really beginning to enjoy this now. I used the same effects as in the previous exercise and introduced another step - something called HRD-ish which "emulates high dynamic range look"! This added real depth to the image by adding the light tones making the shapes behind the fence recede. I like this image. I feel like I am looking through a fence at the shapes in the distance. The fence says KEEP OUT. The imagery is suggestive of something military, like a firing range and I feel cold, fear, suspense. They are like robots programmed to destroy- cold metal devoid of feeling.

This is a PHOTOGRAPH 

This exercise has taught me to really look at my surroundings with different eyes and that we are surrounded by imagery that has endless possibilities. There are images within images and images within our minds. We just need to keep our minds and eyes open.........think I need to stop before this gets too philosophical. More digital play-time tomorrow.