Back to Reality

I never understand why Spring Break goes by so quickly. As much as I try to savor the moments it seems the Monday of school rolls around even when I pray that it won't. Once again, I am the WORST at taking pictures, I rarely even have my camera with me! BUT on my spring break adventure with my best friend, I managed to capture a few key moments on camera, well with my cell phone at least :)

We went down to Athens, Georgia and Auburn, Alabama to visit some friends from our junior college...thankfully Atlanta was in the middle of the two which is where we spent an entire day being tourists, checking out the Coca-Cola museum, Centennial Park, The Westin (tallest hotel in the Western Hemisphere) and of course eating some delicious Cheesecake Factory! This picture is from our parking spot on the top layer of the parking garage, little did we know on the streets things were a bit rougher than this this view :-/

This is kinda hard to see, but it seems we ALWAYS hit the major cities at rush hour, Atlanta at 5 pm both times and this is Birmingham, AL at 5 pm..we just learned that sitting still was more enjoyable with the windows down, music up and enjoying the nice weather :)

Hello? Spring Break!

It seems that as it gets closer to Spring Break the days keep getting longer! And even today, being so dreary out...makes me feel like it's not even a good thing to look forward to at all, but I won't let this nasty weather get me down! Because just think..the closer to Spring Break, the closer to summer which means...NO SCHOOL :) The Photoshop Composite project was a stretch, it really jogged my memory, but I think in the end I felt confident in my ability to use the different tools and understand the Principles of Design. I feel like I am going to like Illustrator much better, I am just struggling trying to figure out how it works, it's very different working with vector images, but I like the quality much better.

Some useful shortcuts for Illustrator can be found at...
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/Illustrator/14.0/WS714a382cdf7d304e7e07d0100196cbc5f-6426a.html

Text Effect Tutorial

I found that basic is my best friend and that I should certainly keep it simple to figure things out before I try to get too elaborate..so therefore, a lot of y'all might have WAY cooler text effects, but I was able to understand this one and I'll count that as a victory in my book :) 

http://www.photoshopessentials.com/photoshop-text/text-effects/stroke-text-with-brush.php

Shortcut Keys

As the weeks have gone on I found myself lost when it came to the shortcuts. I easily forget if I'm supposed to hit shift or alt or control, so I found that I do my assignments a lot better with a shortcut key sitting by my side and while there are many out there, I liked how this website broke down the available shortcuts by section...

http://help.adobe.com/en_US/Photoshop/11.0/WSD578BD7D-07BC-46f6-AAC2-6E491E8AD818a.html

I hope that you can get some use out of it too!!!

More of that GLiTTERY MAGiC...

Well, once again the week was consumed with snow, but I won't complain, it's absolutely beautiful :) and I CERTAINLY won't complain about the GORGEOUS weather out now, sunny and 60 wow, where did this come from? Well I suppose this post will be awfully similar to the previous as with the snow comes pictures and my mom is always snapping wherever she can :) In the picture posted below, one of my friends had messaged me saying he had "disassembled snowmen for sale, cheap!" so I told my mom who got a BiG kick out of it and proceeded to make the following...(notice how DEEP the tractor tracks are!)

Snow..Such a Beautiful Thing

I LOVE the glittery magic of snow, it may be a hassel to drive around in, walk on campus in, and yes ususally with snow comes some bitterly cold temperatures, but there's something about that sparkling dust that warms the inside of my heart. While enjoying a few days off of school, I stayed with my parents. While I'm not real handy with a camera(although I hope to improve those skills soon!!), my mom is and she takes some beautiful pictures, especially with the snow so I figured I would share.

picture by Suzie Wright

Other Composition Techniques

The above picture of the tennis court was retrieved from http://www.photoble.com/photography-tips-tricks/leading-lines-in-photography/ under the heading "Leading Lines in Photography. The photo was saved as a JPG file, which as we learned is 24-bit, making it High Color. I find that it is a good example of the composition technique, leading lines. Not only is there the line of the tennis net, but there are lines on the ground from the concrete and the lines created by the fence around the court, all leading to the effect of the vacant tennis court.

What a cutie! This picture is a good representation of the composition technique, framing. Not only is the boy framed by the wood posts, but his face is framed through his haircut and freckles. This picture was also saved as a JPG file and I found it on, http://www.digital-photography-school.com/tips-portrait-photography under "Frame Your Subject".

From www.webdesigncore.com I found this amazing photo that I think grasps the old saying "a picture is worth a thousand words," as it is titled "Tramonto Silhouette". From the title is is obvious that this JEP file formatted photo is an example of the composition technique, silhouettes. I think the idea for the photo was brilliant, it captures such a fun, yet calm scenario all in one.

~Sarah Wright