Period 1
Good morning! Hope all is well for you today. I introduced the camera research assignment yesterday. Today I would like you to finish up your camera research project and turn it in. I'm also going to show you a new touch up today. This edit is all about sharpening. Often times photos will lack sharpness, especially if you are shooting with a DSLR. That's one downside of using DSLR's. Point and shoots focus by constantly sharpening the image until it is as crisp as possible. DSLR's function differently. Anyway, let's talk about sharpening. You don't want to sharpen everything in a portrait. Skin should not be sharpened at all actually. As I mentioned earlier in class, skin isn't as smooth as we like to think. Sharpening skin actually makes skin look worse as pores, blemishes and discolorations become even more drastic. This gets ugly! Things that you want to sharpen would be eyes, eyebrows, hair, features, but not skin features. This video will walk you through sharpening in Pixlr. When you're finished, as always, upload the before and after on Schoology. Don't forget about the camera research project though! Have a great day everyone!


Period 4
Hello there guys. Hope all is well for you today. As you work through experimenting with camera apps, I thought this might be a good time to talk about histograms and photography. Many of the camera apps or cameras will show you the photos histogram. This will tell you a lot about the photo. Watch this video and I'll explain histograms with some examples. Nothing to turn in today, just keep experimenting with apps and learn about histograms from by watching the video. Have a great day!


Period 5
Good afternoon guys. Today we are going to start learning about type. While it is certainly not the most exciting thing on the planet to discuss... after all, it's just letters, it's crucial to so much of what we do and see as a society. For today I would like you to watch this video it's a rather long video. I apologize for that. Once you've watched the video, simply go onto Schoology and answer a few review questions to get credit for it. That's all for Thursday's lesson! Have a great day today!

Period 1
Hello there class. Hope all is well with you today. We talked awhile back about buying a camera and what all the features are. Today I wanted to get into the differences between an DSLR (Digital SLR) and a Point and Shoot camera. Point and Shoots are pretty comparable to smartphone cameras, but both are rather different from DSLR cameras. Please watch this video to find out how they compare. Once you're done, I have an assignment for you. Hypothetically, you are buying a camera. I want you to do some research on three cameras that you think might be good for you. Find the specs, price and anything else important listed on this sheet. You can look on Amazon, Walmart, Target, Best Buy or the camera makers own websites. If the specs that I'm asking you for are not listed, I'd definitely check the manufacturer's (Canon, Nikon, Sony) own website. I made a brief video where I go through the process here. Once it's done, upload the sheet to Schoology in the Camera Research assignment. This is a little of an assignment so I'm going to give you today and tomorrow to work on it. If you have questions, let me know!


Period 4
Hi there everyone. Hope that today is going well for you. Today is the last day to work on your lighting photos. They are due tonight before midnight. It sounds like most of you are using DSLR's to take your photos with a few of you using Point and Shoot/Smart Phones. Regardless of who you are, I'd like you to spend a little time looking for camera replacement apps for your phone. Our phones are much more capable than you may be aware of. Apple and even Google in some instances try to make the camera really easy to use so. This locks us out of some valuable functionality of the camera. One app that works on both Android and iOS is Lightroom. You can use it to edit, but more importantly it can take picture and replace your stock camera app. I'm not telling you that you have to shoot with a third party app like Lightroom, but I would like you to research, install and experiment with some alternative, third party camera apps. While I know that many of you are using DSLR's for the class, I know that most of us use our smart phones to take pictures often... maybe even more! These apps can really help your phone reach new levels. So, find some camera replacement apps... how bout two or three. Try them out. Please don't feel like you need to buy any apps! Certainly you are welcome to, but I don't want you to have to spend your hard earned money! Experiment with those apps, and report back to us and tell us what you think! This isn't due until Monday so you have time to experiment and live with the apps a bit. Like I said, I think this can help your phone be a little better as a camera, but I don't expect it to replace your DSLR! Have a great day!


Period 5
Happy hump day Graphics class! Today is the day that your logo is due. It does need to be created as a vector graphic. Just make sure that the file that you upload to Schoology is a Gravit file. Remember that a Gravit file will not show any detail when viewed on Schoology, but once I download it and open it in Gravit I will be able to see it. I have nothing new for you today. Tomorrow we will move on into new territory. Hope you have a fantastic day today!

Period 1
Good morning photographers. Today we will continue on our exploration of portrait touch ups. Today's edit is to make someone look more tan. You could use this technique to make someone look like the Hulk or a Smurf but ideally the man goal is to look better! We will need to use a combination of Pixlr E and Pixlr X to make it happen. This video will walk you through the process. Remember that when you do this, only the skin should be colored. If the persons shirt, eyes, teeth, the background etc are tanned, then it just looks like a filter was applied to the entire image! Just the skin, maybe hair should be colored. Erase from everything else. When it's complete, upload the before and after to Schoology. That'll do it for today! Have a great day!


Period 4
Good morning class. Hope all is well today. Nothing new for you all today, just some more time to work on experimenting with lighting techniques. Take your time, play with it, have fun, and get some great photos! Have a great day!


Period 5
Good afternoon Graphics geeks! Hope your having a good day today. I made a brief video for you today to explain how you can fix your vector. I would open up the practice vector that you did and maybe experiment along with me in my video. I'm not requiring you to experiment and upload anything to Schoology for this, but I strongly recommend that you try it so that you have the technique available to you when you have issues with you vector. Basically I'm teaching you more tricks to add to your tool box. like my Dad always told me, having the right tool for the job makes all the difference! Have a great day everyone!

Period 1
Good morning photographers. Hope you had a fantastic weekend. Today in class we will continue to explore portrait touch ups. So far we have used the clone stamp to remove a blemish and used the blur tool to soften skin. In today's lesson, we will remove lines, bags and dark circles under someones eyes. It's not very difficult to do and this video will explain the process. As always, you will need to have a before and after version of the image to upload to Schoology. That's it for today! Hope you have a good day!


Period 4
Good morning everyone. Hope the weekend treated you well and you're ready for a new week. Again today you can work on your lighting photos. I was planning on having you turn them all in today, but in an effort to give you more time to experiment, I'm bumping it to Wednesday. When you're done with your pics, choose you're 10 best and upload them to Schoology in the Lighting assignment. Have a great day everyone!


Period 5
Hello there everyone. Hope you all enjoyed the weekend. I'm really missing the warm sunny days we were having a few weeks back, but summer is coming right?! Anyway, today in Graphics you can start to draw your logo in Gravit. To do this you can use shapes, the pen, or any combination of tools to make your design. We spent a lot of time learning to draw with either so that you had a bunch of tools at your disposal to make your logo as smooth and clean as possible. Just make it professional looking. This means not only clean, but simple. Think about scalability. If the logo has too much detail it will be really messy once it's scaled down really small. Think of the Apple logo, the swoosh, the golden arches, each of them is simple enough that when shrunk to the size that it could fit on a coin, it's still recognizable. It should be tight (things close together) or enclosed in a shape similar to the way Starbucks is in a tight circle. I don't care if it is exactly the way the rough does! As long as it is similar, but more importantly, awesome looking, I happy! I really want you to be able to spend a lot of time making this legit looking so this isn't due until Wednesday just before midnight. That's all I have for today, make it a great day!

 Period 1
Good morning and happy Friday everyone! It's Friday, so you have 10 pictures due today. Don't forget to upload your angle photos today. This weeks picture assignment is a little easier as it doesn't require any reading or anything. It's simple and open to interpretation. I would like you to take pictures with a "Splash of Color." This is to say everything has to be bright and colorful in the pictures you take. That's all for today. No touch ups for today, just upload your photos for the week. Have a great weekend everyone! 


Period 4
Good morning all and happy Friday! Nothing new for you all today. Remember that I'm giving you time to research, plan and shoot your lighting photos. You have through Monday to shoot these. I feel like that's a reasonable time frame. If you think not, please email me and state your case! I'm willing to give you longer if you feel like you need it. Hope you have a great Friday and an amazing weekend!


Period 5
Happy Friday everyone! Yesterday we worked on our thumbnail sketches for our logos. Today we are going to move on to the second step of the layout sequence... the rough. This will be drawn a little larger and colored. The goal is to develop the design a little more, making it more smooth, clean and adding the colors that you so desire for the logo. Keep all of your research in mind as you choose colors. You don't have to entirely fit the same thing you found through research, sometimes being a little different is good! But keep in mind that if you go drastically different on the colors, you shouldn't also go drastically different on the symbols too! Once it's drawn, your do for the day. Just upload a photo of your rough to Schoology and call it a day! Hope you all have a terrific weekend!

Period 1
Today I'd like to show you a new tool, the blur tool. While with think of skin as smooth and soft, that's not always the case. Pores, discolorations, moles, pimples, hair... all of these things add to the appearance of skin and can make it much less smooth than what you see on magazine covers! Using the Blur Tool we will slightly blur the subject of our portraits skin. This will give it that smooth appearance that you see in celebrity photos. Take a look at this video for more details. Don't forget that you will need to have a before and after version on Schoology to get credit for the assignment! ​Hope you have a great day!


Period 4
So as we move deeper into the class I want to get you back into shooting. For a photography class we haven't done a lot of shooting so far. A lot of that is because I'm still trying to figure out how to handle the camera diversity that we have in the class. I sincerely apologize guys... this is challenging to try to figure out and not leave anyone out or disappoint anyone! So as we try to figure out exposure and I come up with the best ways for us to experiment with exposure with whatever devise you have, I thought we would just explore some creative photography. First stop on the creative photography train... lighting! Without lighting we wouldn't have any photography. Remember, photography is capturing reflected light on a sensitive surface. It there's no light, no reflecting, no colors and nothing but darkness. Experimenting with lighting can take normal photos and make them really cool. This is particularly important considering the state of life at the current time. Some of you have expressed that you are not feeling very inspired since we are stuck in quarantine. Totally understandable! Check out this post on lighting. The examples use a toy truck... nothing super interesting and yet the photos that you see of the truck are cool because of the techniques that the photographer uses on each photo. As we talk about social distancing, this article seemed to be particularly relevant too. I also found a short video that gets into lighting in a simpler form. There are countless resources out there online. These are just a few from my favorite photography site. Please feel free to explore on your own if you don't like my resources. Your goal over the next few days is to take at least 10 pictures where you experiment with lighting. Have fun with this! It's so cool because it really drastically changes your pictures. I'm giving you the next several days to shoot but the photos won't be due until just before midnight on Monday. In an ideal world, I would try out all of the techniques and then just turn in your 10 best, but your free to do it as you would like. Take your time, have fun with it, and get some cool shots! If you have questions, I'm here for you!


Period 5
Hello everyone. Today we will start to sketch some thumbnails. I have made this video to explain the process of drawing thumbnails for your logo. Please watch it and then you can start to sketch your designs. I would like you to sketch at least 4 different designs on paper. Because I don't have a camera mount here at home, you'll see me sketching on the computer. This is only to make it easy to show you what I'm doing! Please don't worry with using software or even with making these logos look perfect! They are simply sketches... they can be rough! The point is just to get some ideas flowing and to see what they look like in real space, not just inside your head! Remember that they don't have to be drastically different! They should all be for the same musician, using the same name, and similar symbols. Please don't stress out, just think about it and try things out. Feel like you can't do this because you're "not good at drawing?" Well think about it... does the swoosh really look like a wing? Does Patrick Star really look like a start fish? Nope! They are stylized and your style is what can make this unique if you just lean into your own style! Once the thumbnails are done, please take a decent photo of them and upload them to Schoology. That's it for today! 

Period 1
Good morning everyone. Today we are going to continue to explore the realm of portrait touch ups. Yesterday we learned how to use the Clone Stamp, today the Heal Tool. Both are pretty simple to use in my opinion, but the more you experiment with them, the better you will get with them. So the Heal Tool. Use it to remove bags, wrinkles or dark circles under the eyes of someone in a portrait. This tool is probably even easier to use than the Clone Stamp! This video will walk you through the process. Remember once again to save a before and after version to turn in on Schoology. As always, if you have and questions, email me. I'm happy to help but may not get back to you immediately! Hope all goes well and that you have a fantastic day!

​
Period 4
Happy Hump Day! Hope all is well with you all today. Yesterday I had an article about exposure for you to read. Today I want to share a video from Nikon with you. It too is all about exposure. Once you're done watching it, all I want you to do for the today is to tell me what kind of camera you are using right now. I'm really debating whether we should get more into smartphone photography or camera photography as we start to ramp up the photo portion of the course. So on Schoology you will find an assignment called My Camera. Just tell me what you're shooting with, and whether you would be interested in exploring phone photography or camera photography. That's it! Have a great day!


Period 5
Good afternoon everyone. Hope you're well today and that things are good at home. We started to plan for your logo yesterday. We spent a lot of time researching and coming up with some ideas to use to represent your client... the musician. The next step is to begin planning. Before we get into the actual planning, let's discuss how Graphic Designers plan out their work. This video will walk you through the process and explain why it's done this way. Please watch the video. Afterward, I'd like you to go onto Schoology and list the four steps of the Layout Sequence and then tell me which one I don't require anyone in my class to do. You'll find the assignment titled Layout Sequence Feedback. That's it for today! Hope you all have a great day!

Period 1
Hello photographers. Hope all is well with you today. We are going to jump into the portrait touch ups today. I want you to know up front that there will be quite a few assignments this week, but they shouldn't take you long. I will introduce a few tools/techniques each day and ask that you do them to any one of your portraits. This doesn't have to be one of the photos that you have taken for the assignment the other week. It can be any portrait you've ever taken... as long as it's school appropriate! So today I'm going to show you the clone stamp tool and you'll use it to cover up a spot. A pimple, mole, birthmark, discoloration in your skin.. just cover it up. This video will explain how to use the clone stamp in Pixlr. Before you do anything to the photo make sure you have an unedited, original version of the photo saved somewhere. When your done editing, save the file a second time and upload both the edited and unedited versions to Schoology in the Clone Stamp assignment.  


Period 4
Hello there everyone. Hope you're having a good day so far. We are done with reviewing composition. Unfortunately, since we don't have Photoshop, DSLR's and laptops, we will talk a lot more about composition than we would normally do in the class. The good news is that moving forward we will talk a lot about smart phone photography too, not just DSLR photography. Before we get too into the camera it's self, I want to revisit exposure. I found a really good article that summarizes the three legs of the exposure tripod. We talked about this in Intro, but as we aim to get more unique photos, we are going to need to dig deeper into exposure. Please read this article. Take your time and really think about what is being said and try to wrap your head around this. Once you've done this, you're done for the day! Hope it's a great one!​


Period 5
​Hi everyone. Hope you're having a good day today. Yesterday we talked about logos, why they're important and how to make more effective logos. Today we are going to put those skills to use. Today we are going to develop a logo. What for? You are going to pick a musician. This could be a famous musician, an upcoming musician or just a friend of yours that like to play music. I do not want you to simply draw the Metallica logo and call it your logo. If you pick a famous musician that already has a logo, I want you create a new logo for him/her/them. I made a video explaining how I might go about getting started with this project. As you watch the video, remember, the goal is to look for inspirations... not find something to copy and call your own! 

Period 1
Good morning everyone. How was the weekend? Hope you enjoyed some time away from your Chromebook! We're now done with the merging project so we can move into portrait touch ups. I often refer to these as beauty touch ups because they are the type of thing that you will see done to the celebrities on the cover of a magazine. Over 95% of the images you see on a daily basis have been touched up, doctored to make the photo more appealing. Actually, take a look at this video produced by Dove, the skin care company. In it there is a "normal" girl that undergoes a makeover and then even receives a digital makeover. Now, I'm not a cosmetologist! I'm not here to teach you about makeup, hair, nor would you want me to. However, I will show you how to perform a digital makeover of sorts. Since we can't use Photoshop we will be able to go as in depth as I normally would but I'll still show you some cool stuff! As you watch the video, think about what is happening... is it ethical to play God the way the photographers are doing? On Schoology you will find an assignment for today about just this. I would like you to take a side for or against the Photoshoping images and try to convince me to join your side. Would you feel comfortable with someone playing God on your photos? Does it change your opinion if the edits don't fit in to what we consider classic attractiveness? This should be at least 5 sentences in length. Convince me!

Tomorrow we will begin our portrait touch ups. Hope you have a great day!


Period 4
Hello there guys! Hope you had a great weekend. I miss the warm weather that we had a week ago! It feels like we're heading back to winter rather than summer! So today is more time to watch and comment on the videos that your peers have posted on Schoology. So there's nothing new today, just time to finish up. Tomorrow we will move on and away from the Tips Book.


Period 5
Hi there everyone. Hope you had a fantastic weekend and were able to get away from you Chromebooks for a little bit. I love technology... I have all kinds of it around the house! I'm finding now that once I'm done working for the day I put it away and want to do something other than use the laptop! Maybe that's just me though. So you should be pretty proficient at drawing now. Irregular lines, shapes, you can handle it! We are going to step away from drawing in Gravit and talk a little about logos today. I have a lesson that I developed from a book about logo design. Please watch this video. It's important because the next project that we do will be creating a logo. So today we are going to focus on what makes a great logo. Watch the video and then call it a day!

Period 1
Happy Friday everyone. The end of yet another week of cyber school. I feel like we're getting in to a good routine here and have this down by this point. We may not have wanted or expected it to be this way, but we're making it work and making the most of this situation. I really appreciate that you all are being so patient and cooperative. This isn't easy for any of us but with our collaboration we're making it happen! Being as it is Friday, you have 10 mew pictures to turn in today. They are not technically due until 11:59pm, but you don't want to wait until the last minute right?! Get those 10 texture photos in to Schoology before midnight so you get as much credit as possible. The rest of today is simply for you to spend on next week's photos. What I want you to do for next Friday is take 10 pictures from a different perspective. Most of the photos that we take are with us standing flat on the ground holding the camera at eye level. This week I want you to break that trend. Take some photos from the ground level, take some from up high, take some that are dutch (at an angle, just make it a significant angle or it appears to to be an accidental angle). I found a good article on exactly what I'm talking about. Give it a read before you start shooting. So that is it, it's a wrap for week 3. Upload your Texture pics, read about Perspective and start taking your photos from a different perspective for next week. Have a fantastic weekend everyone!


Period 4
Happy Friday everyone. The end of yet another week of cyber school. I feel like we're getting in to a good routine here and have this down by this point. We may not have wanted or expected it to be this way, but we're making it work and making the most of this situation. I really appreciate that you all are being so patient and cooperative. This isn't easy for any of us but with our collaboration we're making it happen! So what will we make happen in Photography today? Well, you have hopefully made and uploaded both your Tips Book and your video lesson of your tips to Schoology. You may have noticed that when you uploaded the video it was in a discussion format. I would like you to watch your classmates videos and comment on at least 5 videos. These comments should be more that just "Good job Eddie!" or "I like the way your book looks Destiny." Try to add something thoughtful to your post, commentary that will create or add to the discussion. I'm not looking for scholarly writing here though! Don't sweat this too much, just try to learn from each other and take in the ideas presented. Since there are quite a few videos and I'm asking for a 5 comments from each of you I will give you today and Monday to accomplish this. We'll start moving off into another direction on Tuesday. Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Take care!


Period 5
Happy Friday everyone. The end of yet another week of cyber school. I feel like we're getting in to a good routine here and have this down by this point. We may not have wanted or expected it to be this way, but we're making it work and making the most of this situation. I really appreciate that you all are being so patient and cooperative. This isn't easy for any of us but with our collaboration we're making it happen! So what are we going to make happen today in Graphics? Well, we have spent much of the week hard at work on creating vector graphics. Until recently you probably weren't even aware that this type of graphic existed since most of the images that you use are rasters from your cameras. Really though, vectors are the life blood of the course. We use them to screen print images on to t-shirts, make vinyl decals, develop 3d prints, dye-sublimate onto mugs and water bottles. These images, since they are so scale-able have nearly unlimited potential. So what you have learned this week is crucial component to Graphics. What I would like to do today is revisit our Rasters vs Vectors lesson. No, you won't have to listen to a boring video that I have made again. Not today anyway! It's Friday, we've had a tough week of learning to draw, so I want to end it with a Kahoot review. Now, since we aren't all together and everyone is on a different schedule, you can simply play the Kahoot on your own. When you are done, take a screenshot of your results and post it on Schoology to get credit for the review. That's all that I want you to do today, well that and to have an excellent weekend!