Presentation Zen: Pecha Kucha and the art of liberating constraints

In reading the Presentaion Zen blog on Pecha Kucha, I have learned many things.  Pecha Kucha was invinted in Japan in 2003 in Tokyo by two Japanese architects.  A Pecha Kucha is a powerpoint presentation that is twenty slides long, and you must spend twenty seconds talking about each slide, therefore your presentation will last six minutes and forty seconds.  Pecha Kucha was developed to keep presentations short and sweet, and to the point, and so more could be seen.  There are Pecha Kucha nights in cities all over the world.  Pecha Kucha is a good training exercise for people to practice, because of the limits that it has.  The Pecha Kucha method is more more exciting for someone to pay attention to than a 50+ page slideshow that a professor has ready for the class.  Pecha Kucha only lasts for six minutes and forty seconds and is able to offer a stimulating discussion, and a powerpoint takes up an entire classroom session, leaving no time to ask question at all.

Live Blog From Wednesday 11-7-12

There are many do's and don'ts of using Powerpoint Presentations.  Make sure to spell check your work, if a word has a red line under it, go back and check it again.  Do not over use bullets, only mark important information, or "key points" with bullets, every single word should not have a bullet beside it.  Make sure that you don't pick clashing colors on your slides, for example two different tones of the color yellow, this will be very difficult for people to see.  Only put one key point of information on each slide, you don't want to put too much information on a slide and bombard a person with information.
Only give about three or four reasons supporting your arguement, after that people will lose interest in what you are saying.  Make sure that you know what you are talking about, and be interested in what you are going to talk about, no one is going to be interested in listening to you if you aren't having a good time talking about your subject.  Lastly, don't use the Powerpoint as a teleprompter, and read it word for word, the people you are presenting to can read the slides faster than you can speak, and will get bored.  You should have other notes to complement the slides you are using.

Original and Recreated SlideShare Slides

Original Slide from SlideShare

Recreated Slide

The Photoshop Effect

In class we watched a video on the photoshop effect.  In this video a reporter volunteered to be photographed and photoshopped just to see the effect that it has on people.  The reporter was very excited about being able to see herself in a photoshopped point of view, she even said she thought she liked her self better as photoshopped.  In reality most people would like to see themselves as photoshopped, because with photoshop you can always change what you don't like.

In part two of the video on photoshop, there were several comments on taking photoshopped pictures out of the media, because they are causing problems.  Someone also made a statement that photoshopped pictures should be tagged in magazines and other forms of media to let people know that the photos are not "real"and that they have been retouched.  I think that adding a disclaimer to a magazine about the photos would be a good idea if that is what the media thinks is best.  A warning label doesn't really stop people from doing other things that are supposed to be dangerous.  

Dove Beauty Ad

In the Dove Artificial beauty ad we saw that in ad campaigns, pictures are not always what they seem.  The Dove company wanted us to see the process that a model goes through to have her picture taken from looking "normal" to having a styling team fix her hair and do her make up, and then having a professional come and take and edit the pictures.  The girl in the video did not even look like the same person after the team of professionals got through working with her.  It is kind of funny, that we don't even recognize that photoshop has been used in pictures sometimes, because we are so accustomed to pictures looking that way.

Different angles.

Four different angles of the seating area in front of the Hamrick building. I took a picture from the left side, the middle, the right side, and from the steps looking down.

Photographs and Ethics

In Friday's class we viewed many different links to show how ethics can affect the outcome of photographs.  In many ways photographs can be altered for the good, to crop out something that didn't need to be there, to edit the contrast, and other small details.  In the pictures that we viewed, the editing purposes were misused.  The cropping tools were used to make one thing look a different way than it really happened. Also, the editors were superimposing images onto old background of other pictures that had been used several times.  Many photographers also tried to make something seem as if it occured naturally, such as a toy being found during a natural disaster, but one photographer in particular made is very obvious that he was randomly placing objects into the pictures, because the toys weren't dirty and they were oddly placed. 

          Some of the links that we went to were:

1. http://click.si.edu/Story.aspx?story=178
2. http://www.tc.umn.edu/~hick0088/classes/csci_2101/false.html
3. http://mediamythbusters.com/index.php?title=Fauxtography
4. http://blogs.photopreneur.com/worlds-most-infamous-staged-photos

 

Second Set of Photos I Took

First Set of Photos I took

Day Two: Seond Half Of The Pat Wright Lecture

Pat Wright's Photography Rules
Rule 3:
Use different angles, shoot vertical or horizontal pictures, bend your knees to get a lower view.

Rule 4: Use different camera lenses.  Whether you have a camera that has removable lenses or a point and shoot camera that you can change the settings on.

Rule 5: Be aware of the light and how it affects the composition.

Rule 6: The rule of thirds.  Divide your picture into three equal parts.

Other Tips from Pat:
1. take more than one shot
2. Always carry more than one memory card
3.Carry plenty of batteries
4.Set your camera clock to the correct time and the calendar to the correct date.
5.Keep image resolution set to high.
6.Experiment with different light settings.
7.Carry lens tissue to keep lenses clean
8.Carry a small notepad with you to keep track of information you may need.

Live Blog-Pat Wright Lecture

The video that we watched was about the composition of photography.
Composition can be explained as:
The process in which something is made.
The process in which something is arranged.
The process in which something is combined to make a whole.

Photography is a trial and error thing, you can learn many different techniques from magazines, computers, but most of all get out there and take pictures.

When photographing people, incorporate the background of where they are, not just an upclose shot of the people.
Show people in their environment, as much as possible.

Photography rules to live by:
Shoot tight and keep empty space to a minimum
Shoot sharp hold the camera still, or use a tripod, to erase fuzzy shots.

Movie Poster

 

I chose to remake the Flubber movie poster, into "The Stickiness Factor" movie poster.  I chose this, because the green, slime that Flubber is made out of looks sticky.  Even though, the stickiness factor doesn't have anything to do with sticky dirty messes it does deal with things sticking to your brain.  Joan Ganz Cooney, the creator of Sesame Street along with two partners wanted children to learn, but she knew that many children  didn't have the same advantages that others had.  That is why they developed Sesame Street in the ways that they did, animation taught children the alphabet and numbers, and many guest stars came on the show and talked about values and emotions.  Over the years, the educational value of the show has been tested, and time after time it passes the test with flying colors, because even though Sesame Street looks like a regular children's program, kids do pay attention to what they are being taught when they watch.

Original and Resized Wagon Wheel Pictures

                                                                   Original Picture

                                                                      Resized Picture



Picture Retrieved from Morguefile

Licensing for this picture: http://www.morguefile.com/license/morguefile 

This ad shows contrast by using color and by using different texts.  The gray coloring in the background contrasts agaisnt the white in the background.  Repetition in this ad  includes the use of the same type of text, and the use of the same elements, the dog.  I thought the alignment of this ad was centered, because the bigger dog's head and front paws made a line that went through the center of the page.  Proximity is shown in this ad by putting the words us and them under the bigger and smaller dogs, and by putting the contact information, and company information by themselves.  This ad shows contrast in text, because when the ad say us and them it uses one type of text, then for its logo it uses another type of text.

Design Principles and Font Principles

This ad has lots of contrast with its colors. The pink and purple shades are contrasting againts the background, also the yellow and black against the background and with each other.  Things that are repeated in this ad are colors, texts, and elements of design such as a star emblem or an emblem with an R on it.  The alignment for this ad is centered, the bottle is the main focus in the ad, and all of the details are offset around it.  Proximity is shown in this ad by the tagline of this ad being place beside the bottle. In this ad the texts that are used contrast with each other, because they are two different types, one is a script text and one is a serif style text.

Concordance, Conflict, and Contrast

Typeface examples

These are six groups of typefaces that we learned about in class.  They are listed above, and an example of each kind is given.

Four basic principles of an ad that I chose

 

 

The ad that I chose to asses the four basic principles of was a 1970's Life cereal ad.  Although this ad was before my time, it appeals to me, because like me Mikey the subjectof the ad is a picky eater. The contrast in this ad is related to all of the bright colors on the cereal box and on Mikey's shirt, against a white background.  The black text also contrast against the white background.  Repetition in this ad that is noticeable are the two cereal bowls, and there is ceral in the bowls and on the box.  The use of the same type of text is also repeated in both sections.  The alignment of this ad is centered, everything is focused on the picture of Mikey and the box of cereal.  There are a few proximities in this ad. In this ad the statement "If you have a kid like Mikey, you need a cereal like life." is close to the picture of Mikey and the picture of the ceral tying them together.  Then the paragraph explaining why Life cereal is a great ceral is close to the box of cereal, tying them together.

Notes from class

Proximity:
Proximity is grouping things together that are related.
A lack of uniformity can cause confusion.
Proximity in a design will usually overwhelm color.

Alignment:
When items are aligned on a page the result is a stronger cohesive unit
"Nothing sould be placed on the page arbitrarily. every item should have a visual connection with something else on the page."
When aligned elements are physically separated from each other, there is an invisible line that connects them, both with your eye and in your mind.

Repetition:
"Repeat some aspect of the design throughout the entire piece."
consistency

Contrast:
A way to make things stand out
"If two things are not exactly the same, then make them different. Really different."
Large type vs. Small type
Thin lines vs. thick lines
Cool colors vs. warm colors
Horizontal elements vs. Vertical elements

Four basic Principle of a soup ad

When analyzing this ad I saw many things.  The contrast in this ad is very dim, you have the light color of the crane against the shadowy background of the picture.  The repetition in this picture is very small and almost unnoticeable, it is through a use of color.  The color that is used many times throughout this picture is yellow, but it is in several different shades.  The alignment of this picture is slightly off center.  The proximity in this ad is that the crane-home and the soup bowl are tied together by the tagline of the ad.