This project was the How to project. For my project, I chose to do: How to put on a face mask. I first took pictures of every step in this process and then uploaded them onto an Adobe Illustrator document. After, I traced over each picture and created the square boxes as well as a title panel that translate well with the colors in my drawings.
Meira Tompkins:
Teen Magazine Parody
We are Not Contained by Society’s Ideals
I’m concerned how people are perceived by society’s skewed standards and amplifications of this in the mainstream media. On magazine covers, women are hyperbolically sexualized and women of color are rarely recognized. Because of society's ideals of body image are so singular there is no room for anyone else:
The audience should care because the the misrepresentation of ethnic women on magazines is a problem. They should also care because of the labels people place on men and women looking a certain way appear on magazine covers. The ideals society instills upon teenagers reading magazines causes anorexia, bulimia, and depression. Also it often invokes racism and homophobia. Magazines do not give you a full picture. They provide you with select molds of celebrities and play it off as normalcy.
I got my inspiration from the aunt who is a photographer. She once edited one of the photos she took of me onto a magazine cover and I wanted to take that concept into something more thoughtful as I thought of what magazines really do to their audiences. The Onion was also one of my many sources of inspiration. Because of its convincing headlines, it seems like an actual current news article. But, when you take a closer look, it is a complete satire that can challenge and enlighten the audience.
This piece was called the fragmented self portrait. I created my piece by taking several different clips of other pictures and overlaying these pictures on top of one picture. I then blended the overlaying clips into the base picture to make the image more cohesive.
My original idea for the monster project was to use Photoshop to look like a vampire, but my idea changed as I played with different eye colors. My monster is a take on expressive makeup with a Princess Bubblegum twist (a character from Adventure Time). I got this idea by the colors in my piece, which is the biggest part of my project. The contrast in warm and cool colors make my piece more vivid and popping.
Starting my monster project, I used a tutorial on YouTube to change my eye color from blue to a yellowish amber and a pink magenta. I used multiple layers and the curve adjustment to achieve this. Next, I changed my hair color to a much brighter pink using a selection and then I used a brush in the soft light mode to cover my bangs in a similar color. This was definitely the most difficult thing I tried to do because it was very hard to achieve a blended color transition from the hair on the head to the bangs. I also selected my lips and changed the color slightly. After this I put a filter into the background using the Palette Knife filter to focus the focal point on my face instead of the background. Lastly, I highlighted my face and added final touches to make my piece more cohesive.
