Monthly Archives: November 2012

Animated Head

 

Image

http://bestgamewallpapers.com/civilization-4/genghis-khan

This is an animated .GIF of Genghis Khan who was the founder and Great Khan of the Mongol Empire, which became the largest contiguous empire in history after his defeat. He came to power by uniting many of the nomadic tribes of northeast Asia. By the end of his life, the Mongol Empire occupied a substantial portion of Central Asia and China.

Fun Fact: There are over 16 million people today from all over the world that are descendants of Genghis Khan.

Portrait Project

Anh Duong
Period 3
Investigate:
In order to do the portrait project, I must first know what the project requires and learn the skills that is needed to complete the task. The portrait project requires me to take a photo of myself or someone else and use Adobe Illustrator CS6 in order to make it unique and nice. I plan to find and research information on how to create portraits using AI. I will also use tutorials and use them to make my portrait. I plan on using more than 1 tutorial in order to create my portrait because it will look better. I browse through many tutorials and finally found one that caught my eye.

The one that I wanted to do was:

It seemed a bit too easy, so I decided to find a 2nd very similar tutorial in order to do 2 tutorials in my project.


Design:
I plan to follow the tutorials and combine them into my project. The 2 tutorials will guide me and help me create my portrait. Both of the tutorials have a similar theme. They are both “Coldplay” style based, meaning they will have a very similar theme, making it easier to combine them together.

Plan:
I will use these 2 tutorials and make my project. First, I will read and take a good look at the tutorial. Then I will attempt to mess around and try the tutorial. Once done, I will deciding how I want to make my portrait and I will begin creating the project. I will follow some steps from a tutorial and some steps from the 2nd tutorial. Together, they will combine together and form my project.
In the beginning, I only thought about doing 1 tutorial, but then I decided to do 2 tutorials in order to make my artwork better and more complicated.

Create:
I first began messing around with the tutorials. I try out their steps and instructions.


I decided that I didn’t like this step, so I decided to start a new one. It took me forever to create a perfect radial gradient.

I wanted my project to be somewhat different than the tutorials, so I did a different color than the one mentioned in the tutorials.

 

Added some color and blur for more effects

.

Added some colors on the top.

For the next step, I took a picture of Macro Tapia so that I can use him in my project. Now it’s time to cut him out and put him on my project. I used this website (http://creativemac.digitalmedianet.com/article/Layer-Masks-in-Adobe-Photoshop-28265) and Mr. Wegscheid as my tutorials to cutting out my picture.

Finished cutting him out.

Added him to my project.

I used this website to find more information on how to use filled layers.

http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/how-to-use-fill-layers-in-photoshop-cs6.html

I also added some more color using the brush tool.

I decided to mess around with the picture. I changed the bottom half and darkened it.

I used this website to teach me about brushes.
http://digitalscrapbookplace.com/university/tutorials/ps_brushpalette_ep.shtml
.

I found some cool smoke and decided to add them onto my picture.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5a8s0ol9tPY/UCIMVmjJPHI/AAAAAAAADgg/myhDo0M4bbg/s1600/Candle_Smoke_by_wasd.jpg
http://www.dymax.com/blog/images/smoke-adhesive-fume.jpg

I decided to add some rectangles and set them to overlay to create a unique effect. It made my picture look even better than it did before. I was pretty satisfied with my overall progress so far.

I thought that I was finished, but then I realized that I could still add some more details to enhance the picture.
http://designreviver.com/tutorials/photoshop-101-how-to-use-the-free-transform-tool/
I used this website in order to transform my rectangles.

I decided to add 2 more small lines onto the picture.

Added even more random brush strokes and dots. I’m done with my project!

Evaluation:

Overall, my portrait project went great and smoothly. I finished on time and learned many new things about Adobe Photoshop CS6. For example, I learned more about layers, color transformation, shape transformation, brush strokes, and cool effects from different websites. I had a great experience trying and testing out new designs, tools, and ideas.

For instance, I spent a whole day trying to find the best tutorial that would fit me the most. After 2 class periods, I found some Coldplay tutorials that really made me want to make my own piece of artwork. I later spent the rest of my time trying to create my portrait while also learning new tips and tricks about Adobe Photoshop CS6.

The creation of my portrait wasn’t always perfect and neat. There were many things that went wrong and frustrated me. Learning about the new things that you can do with layers was very difficult. I also had a hard time trying to find the right idea and tutorial for my portrait. I wasted 2 class periods deciding on which tutorial I was going to do.

All in all, this project ended up very successful. This experience gave me new knowledge and new set of skills that I had picked up and learned on the way. Furthermore, the project that I made by myself was very unique and magnificent. I am very content with the work that I had done and the art that I had created. However, if I could redo this project again, I would add more details, shapes, brushes, layers, and colors in my artwork. To sum it all up, this portrait that I had created went better than I had originally planned and I am satisfied with the art that I have created.