Digital Remix

B+

Chris Robinson

June 13, 2011

Art 214

Digital Remix Project Assessment

For my project I decided to focus on the outdoors, and the aspects, which I love most about it. My major component of this picture was a shot I took of the St. Mary’s River during a snow day in 2010. I then added the Presidential Range of the New Hampshire White Mountains as my background of the picture. The right side of the foreground is a picture of a beach I found on Wikimedia Commons. I then used a classmate’s scan of a piece of wood to create a walkway on the left side of my foreground. Lastly, I added a photo of a shack in the woods that I took while I was skiing in Lake Tahoe, and combined that with a classmate’s scan of a tapestry to make it look like this was a portal to another dimension. The last image in the picture is of a man “laying out” for a Frisbee, which I found on Wikimedia Commons. I incorporated this to reveal to the viewer what I consider to be the most fun things in life.

Ultimately, I was using this remix to reveal my idea of paradise: a combination of water and mountains, with winter’s snow and summers sand only a step away. I included the shack in there to convey a mindset that I do not need material in my life to be happy, but it is where I am which makes me happy. I incorporated the Frisbee player because ultimate is my favorite sport to play when it is warm out. Having him in the direction of the beach implies I would rather do that activity when the weather is nice. If you notice, the shack is all the way to the left, and it contains many images related to skiing, like the front steps composed of skis or the ski company stickers on the outside walls of the shack. The reason that this is on the left side of the image is to explain to the reader how my favorite activity to do in the winter is ski. I have the picture basically split in two, with snow to the left and sand to the right to symbolize my conflicting interest. While I love both environments and activities equally, I am at odds with myself over where I ultimately want to be.

The project itself was a great opportunity to get used to the basic tools, and techniques of Adobe Photoshop. I now feel confident enough to combine images, and make the ultimate picture appear to be semi-realistic. I feel like the part most lacking in my image is the realism of the mountains in the background. I tried to make it like they were there in the picture as the legitimate background, but I feel like it is easy to tell it is pasted in. I think I had the most trouble with this was do to the position of the sun when I took the two images. The sun was on the right for the photo of the mountains, but my main image (the one I took by the graveyard) the sun was on the left side. I am also a little disappointed I couldn’t get the sand and snow to mix better. I tried to brighten and blur it, but it still looked forced. I thought about playing with the transparency of the snow right next to the sand, however that would have made everything in that layer more transparent.

Overall I feel like my work is acceptable, but is definitely in need of improvement. I am eager to hear what my classmates have to say about it, and the tips I can get in order to have a final piece I can call my own and be proud about.