Tools and Technique

Blog Post #1: What is Art?

This is an image that had my eye on since i first saw it, but the artist in general has messages and real reasons behind his work. The name of this image is calles HipHopcracy and his quote for this image was "This is a conceptual place. The concept behind this piece is that hip-hop and street art is invading the world, and will soon consume everyone."  I call this real "Art" because an artist has a vision of what he wants to create, and its inspiration and willing to work on it and perfect it, is what makes an artist and what make art. 

More great work from this artist: http://www.thefifthorder.net/

Blog Post 5: Connecting my Project to the Definition of Art

1. What is your complete definition of Art? What is your definition of "not-Art"?

I believe that i have not come up with my own true definition on Art because I'm not as experienced as other great artists out there, but I am getting there.  But in my point of view, Art is created when you are inspired and use your feelings and emotions in it, I use art to express what I'm feeling and most of the time is when I see a piece of art that inspires me to create my own, and try my best to make as best as i can and give my all, and not just take shortcuts and do it the lazy way.  I consider my self an artist because I don't do it because I'm bored and its a way to make money, I do it because i enjoy doing it, and I'm always open to learn any form of Art possible and I've never gotten bored from it, and always look forward to what's next.

2. In what ways is your art project a good example of your definition of "Art"?

The ways my art project is a good example definition of "Art" is that you can see the type of mood i was in.  In my theme, I'm using a space theme, over the city of San Francisco, but I do not only want to stop there, with this new style of mine, i feel that other cities are next, such as New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Sydney, etc.  Also, when I came up with this theme, i was in a good mood, and at the time i was looking for a space wallpaper, and i came across an image of the moon over a landscape with a lot of stars and such, and i like the idea but i didn't want to copy this image or the designer, so I went in a different direction and it worked really well.

3. What moods or feelings does your art project communicate?

The moods and feelings my art project communicates would be a happy mood when you enjoy life and you are proud to be a part of it, and thankful for what you are given, and every day you get to stare at the sky and wonder the impossible and  the possible. In this case, I wish I would look up and see the sky exactly how it is on my illustration, and that's also another thing that i bring to my designs, dreaming.  Like i said above, I wish I looked up and see space happening right above me, allow yourself to dream, even if it never happens, in the end its the thought and meaning behind it that matters.

4. What has been the most difficult part of this project so far? How have you gotten over challenges?

The most difficult part of this project has been looking for websites that have exactly what i need.  For example the image resolution, i was looking for a golden gate bridge picture at 1920x1200 but almost all of the pictures online have to be purchased.  Luckily i found a website where they actually had images at this resolution for free and took advantage and I've been using it since.  I have gotten over several challenges in photoshop in order to accomplish certain effects and perfect them.  Once these challenges come up i try my best to solve them right away to not waste any time.

Progress Post

So I have gotten my first image done and I believe it came out exactly the way I wanted it to.  I feel that blending  is really great, but i need to work on my reflection technique because i feel that it has more like a smoke effect than water ripple.  I worked through the frustrations and challenges that came up in the moment and although I got frustrated myself, I try to not to get pissed and just come up with a solution.  Anyways here is the first of many and I hope to create better quality images as I go.

Goals and Trajectories

My Art project: Series of images of a "Spaced Out" San Francisco using 

What do you want the message of your finished project to be?

I'm not going for a certain message but a certain wild goal, by i want to call it a futuristic theme but i don't quite see it that way.  I came up with this idea when i was looking for golden gate bridge wallpapers, meanwhile looking at space wallpapers. where before i have seen in some websites/tutorials that when they are editing a landscape, they mostly like to add a moon image.  from this is where my inspiration came from, and combined the two.  also i wanted to test myself and not look at any tutorials while working on this, i wanted to test my self in how well i get along with photoshop after a lot of practice in a matter of less than a year.

What artistic effects do you want to achieve?

Besides just adding some space images i want everything to blend really well as if it were really there.  to do this i took fro what i know and experimented alot with this.  i went back and forth to see what technique i knew the best.  I found a technique that took more than usual but it worked at the end. Also i though it was time for me to start finding my own technique and style with photoshop and i have to say my piece is really going to prove this becaue i have not seen it anywhere else and i have a pretty good picture of what its going to look like but first i have to find my tools and get started right away.