Up the Creek

This little image crossed by my desk recently and it struck me as interesting. I love the year seven photo challenges, the 7’s amaze me at least once a week. Good work Miss W!

The Year 7’s recently got inspired by the Olympic games host nation China, to create some very interesting artwork. Based on the Peking Opera, the masks are colourful and lightweight.

Using their hands, the sculpture compound was made damp and squeezed to the right consistency. It was then pushed into the mould in a thin layer, and popped out when dry. It was given a base coat of paint and the colour layers were built up one after the other.

The year 8’s recently completed a unit of study on Australian artist Sally Morgan. We delved into the very personal nature of her artwork and the stories told within them. The students were then given the task of telling part of their family history through their painting.

The photo challenges have been taken on board by the year 7’s with heaps of enthusiasm. Three people have bonus points for their imaginative use of their camera. They are Aidan, Nathan and Henry.  Some of the challenges undertaken so far are: Puddle stomp, milk moustache, get up high, air guitar, jump, pets, portrait of mum, poke a face, pieces of me and numbers and words.

I am really impressed with all of the efforts so far. Its great to see year 7 thinking about what they are going to photograph and  the efforts they have made to make the image look just right. The photos are so much fun to look at they just make my day.

Below is Barty and Coops  effort with the Jump Challenge. A strange angle has made this image unique and interesting, (even though Coop has no head). It looks like he is literally jumping into the picture area. Well done boys.

A really interesting image from Sharna. Its actually an extreme close up of her eye! Notice how the colours have muted and the close up has distorted the shapes. It becomes very cat like! Excellent effort.

A while back I posted a blog on an art project I was working on with year 9 and 10 students. (The CD scaled fishes)

We finally finished the sculptures and they were hung in the school library. This was a change from the original plan: they were to hang outside the school. The reasons were many and varied including the fragility of the finished work. The most influential factor was that the library had a ready made, empty blue wall, just behind the shelves that was big enough to accomodate the ’school’

I think they look great in their new ‘pond’ surroundings.

all images (c) author

The challenge has been set for year 6 and 7: A Photo a Week!

Wow! this is a really great opportunity for all of you to learn some awesome things about imaging (and maybe yourselves). I have decided to share some of my favorite photography tips so perhaps your images will become a really great way for you to express yourselves.

• Get close. Getting close to your subject matter is a great way to show all the detail without having things that distract the viewer in the background.
• Be spontaneous. Have fun, try and make things not too fake and staged. (Think cheesy grins)
• Make sure there is light (but not too much). Too dark or light photos are really hard to improve even in Photoshop.
• Experiment. Try and put coloured plastic things - even tissue paper - over the flash.
• Try from a different angle. A different viewpoint often sets a photo apart from other images.
• Try not to have your subject right smack in the middle of the photo.
• Don’t think too hard about your photo, just push the button. It helps keep things spontaneous. (see tip no. 2)

These little tips can help you to really get interesting images out of your camera, regardless of if its a digital mega pixel wonder or a simple 35 mm happy snapper.

For some real experimentation try to shoot some or all of the following:

• Take a photo of your feet in every different place (room) you step, only once a place. Challenge -For the whole weekend!
• Take a separate self portrait with each of your hats (beanies, baseball, visors) on, the more the merrier, portrait close up. Challenge- change your eye position in every shot and make a flick book of the photos. (printing required)
• Climb a tree (or get up high) and take a photo of your backyard. Challenge- get a shot of someone playing or riding a bike in your yard from up high.
• Take a close up of your dog, horse, cat, goldfish (whatever) with something over the flash to change the overall colour of it. Challenge- sneak up on your pet unawares and surprise them.
• Get a close up portrait of your mum.  Challenge- over the table at breakfast time, while she enjoys the cup of coffe or tea you just made for her.
• Take your camera every where and search for something unusual. Challenge- finding something truly unusual to photograph.
• Take photos without looking through the viewfinder. Challenge- taken from beside your hip pocket.
• JUMP. Challenge- the snapshot subject should be in mid air, bonus points for a star jump.
• A photo of your best milk moustache, portrait, head/shoulders close up.  Challenge- no challenge this is just funny.
• A shot inside the school bus as someone gets onboard. Challenge- get the bus driver in the shot too.
• Air guitar time! A shot of you playing air guitar with gusto, hair flying everywhere! Challenge- as Angus Young of AC/DC (or some other rock legend)
• Poke a face, (otherwise known as gurning) Challenge- Show us your best horriblest face.
• Pieces of you. Take some shots with only bits of you in them, ie. your hands as you write,  your eyes as you read, your teeth as you brush them, etc. Challenge- another flickbook to be made here.
• Gumboots. A must have in country life. Challenge- Puddle stomping (you MUST keep your camera dry, before attempting this, put your camera in a plastic bag, twist and tie a big knot in the open end)
• Cartwheel/handstands. Great fun, look great, Challenge- get the subject in motion.
• Wild colour. Find something that is just outrageously coloured. Challenge- Get a close up with lots of contrasting  or dull colours around it.
• Show us your grade prep portrait photo. Challenge- To actually find it.
• Shadow self, your shadow. Challenge- Elongated on brickwork or the watertank for extra texture interest
• Numbers and words. Challenge- Self portrait with numbers and or letters in the background - the bigger the better.

The biggest challenge is to keep the photos together in an album. With dates and a little  writing documenting what techniques  and challenge you were experimenting with and how you think it turned out. It will become something fantastic for you in the future to look back on and smile about.

I stumbled onto a fantastic weblink last week. I was reminded of the simple things in life and how we just dont see the beauty contained within the everyday and mundane.

http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/15131

If you read through the blog entry you discover that the story centers around a man (Jamie Livingstone) who took a Polaroid a day - for eighteen years! Livingstone called them his Photo of the Day. They depict a life simply through images right up to and including the day he died. 6,697 images in all. The Jamie Livingstone site (link on the blog above) has all of the images indexed into months and years.

The story only seems to have broken in the last seven days. The blog above has had 8,723 ‘Diggs’, nearly two thousand more than when I first read it. The actual Jamie Livingstone site  got so many hits last week it crashed the server. A large company has offered to host the site so it wont crash again. After such exposure Jamie Livingstone also has his own Wikipedia  entry, entered just last week.

One of the best comments I have read so far about the images came from someone on Meta Filter, krippledkonscious:

“I had to think a little bit about why this is so stirring. This is not a technical achievement, nor an endeavor that requires an inaccessible skill set. This is one thing, done once a day. Something so spare and ordinary, just taken to extraordinary lengths. A simple thing: whatever struck his fancy on a given day - just capture one thing on film. Simple.”

Well I think its not so simple. I have been involved in several Flickr groups that endeavour to take a self portrait a day for a year (Flickr group 365 Days) and another that takes a self portrait a week for a year ( Flickr group 52 weeks). I have failed miserably on both counts. I now have an incomplete collection of about 75 self portraits which have been taken over the space of two years. I find myself boring as subject matter.

Have a look at the images of an ordinary life made extraordinary. It is hard not to be moved by them.

Printmaking Safety

Our very first day of lino printmaking ended with some interesting facts.

•  Fact 1. No matter how many times Miss Regan shows the correct way to cut lino using the special tools someone always manages to cut themselves.
• Fact 2. The more we know about making prints the more we enjoy it.
• Fact 3. Our prints always manage to  look beautiful when finished.

Cameron was the unlucky winner of the Printmakers ChocolateFrog. Awarded for being the first to cut himself with the tools. A dodgy honour if ever there was one. Thankfully he was ok and a band aid was put to good use. Courtney looked a bit pale at the sight but managed to compose herself.

 Which brings me to printmaking safety. Im going to list the rules and hopefully we can avoid another chisel cut.

• Always cut AWAY from your hand or body.
• Always cut AWAY from your hand or body.
• Always cut AWAY from your hand or body.
• Always cut AWAY from your hand or body.
• Always cut AWAY from your hand or body.

Take your time and rotate the lino to cut in another direction, rather than rotate your ‘cutting hand’ back towards your other hand or body.  Take your time with the cutting. Art is not a race, slow and steady is the best policy, it also gives the best results.

PRINTMAKING

Creating a good print is all about learning techniques. Cleanliness, understanding the thickness of the ink, getting it straight on the paper are universal techniques across all types of prints.  But making the art is only half of being a good artist. Writing and analysing your work is equally important. When writing in your art journal it is important to keep a decent list of the techniques you have learned. No two prints are the same but we can minimise the difference with good practice. Another tip for understanding your own art is to look really hard at your own work and notice things that you like and dislike about it, then write it down!

Printmaking tips and tricks

* Clean Fingers! Try and keep your fingers clean of grime and dirt but more importantly keep them clean of paint or ink!

* Clean Paper! Keeping you paper clean enhances the final result and you dont have to cover any mistakes.

* Just the right amount! The right amount of ink or paint is probably the single most important thing to learn. Too much and the ink fills up the lines you  want to stay white or clean. Too little and there is not enough colour left behind.

* Have everything ready! Remember drying times are important. If the paint or ink dries before the print is pressed, no ink will transfer. If it dries on the paper, it will stick to it and tear when you remove it.

* Take your time when lining the image up! Otherwise the registration will be out and the image will look blurry.

This list may be added to as we go along.

Working closely alongside Murch with grade 4/5 I.T. We decided that the students needed custom avatars to individualise their blogs, and show everyone how fantastic and creative they are. The students were given a 15×15 cm square to measure and rule. The idea was to work within those boundaries to allow the completed avatar to still have as much detail as possible when reduced to a thumbnail (tiny) size. The students were also encouraged to use tissue paper collage create a background for their personal image. The other option was for the student to draw the image with a hand drawn background behind the figure.  The completed images were photographed digitally  at high resolution and then reduced.