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F!#%  A&$ - “Fine Art”

 Decoding the terminology of art

Have you ever been to an art gallery, exhibit, or show and wondered what people were saying when discussing art? Sometimes the language used to explain visuals can be confusing, misunderstood, misinterpreted, or just plain uncommon. It can be hard to ‘get your foot in the door’ of an art conversation if you aren’t sure what is being said!

                (^this is my favorite picture on the internet)

In some cases, you may read this thinking a few of these terms may seem obvious or simple - but it is better to be reassured of your knowledge and understanding then to question it entirely.

Here is a basic list of art terminology and concepts that I have learned over the years, I’ve bolded the ones that have been used significantly throughout my undergraduate degree program.

WOODCUT --- Printing from a woodblock that has been carved out, like ink on a stamp.

VANISHING POINT --- Used for linear perspectives this is the point at which parallel lines come together, meet, or converge. Think of a set of train tracks, the further away they get, they appear to become one point.

TRIPTYCH --- Artwork in a set of 3, often displayed in a distinct manner to show the relation between each piece while also clearly showing any differences.

RELIEF PRINTING --- In this printmaking process, the artist removes all the areas that will not be transferred onto the final product. This can be done by etching away the copper or carving out the wood of the plate / block being used.

OP ART --- Short for “Optical Illusion” art which uses color, scale, and shape interaction to confuse the eyes

NEGATIVE SPACE --- The space that is the background as opposed to the image or art depiction itself

MONOPRINT --- A unique printmaking process that uses wet ink transfer for the original print, and then makes reprints that will all vary from the original print due to the realignment, ink dryness, pressure changes, etc.

LITHOGRAPHY --- When ink prints are transferred from their copper surface onto paper using a press.

INTAGLIO PRINTING --- First, cutting a design into the top layer of hard metals, often copper plates are used. Then, applying ink to the metal surface and wiping the surface after, leaving the ink only in the carved-out portions of the plate. Next you use a press or evenly distributed weight source to transfer the ink to paper. Imagine a stamp that is inside out but has the same effect.

HATCHING --- Parallel lines that are used to represent shading and tonality.

ETCHING --- Plate is first covered with varnish, and then a dry point pen is used to expose parts of the plate allowing ink to seep into these parts. The deeper the exposed lines are (based on amount of time in an acid bath), the darker the lines will be when ink is added.

DRYPOINT --- An etching burr that cuts incisions into the copper plate, it looks like a sharp pen

CHIAROSCURO --- Strong but sensible contrast between light and dark, used to give the illusion of depth

AQUATINT --- Printmaking technique to add gradients in tone, Rosin dust is heated onto the copper plate, and will create pits and cracks when put into a bath of acid. Oftentimes artists use a varnish to block certain areas from being ‘bitten’ by the acid.

Reference Photos:

http://imgur.com/gallery/s4dTtBy

https://www.pinterest.com/explore/optical-illusions/?lp=true

https://www.pinterest.com/explore/cross-hatching/?lp=true

https://hubpages.com/art/Airbrush-Stencils-Give-you-wings-or-a-ball-and-chain

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Photo or CGI?

Can you tell the difference?

If you’d like to test your skills at spotting the difference between Photo and CGI I have this link: CGI QUIZ!

Lately computer-generated images or “CGI” have become a regular concept in media and media strategies worldwide. Chances are, you have seen hundreds if not thousands of CGI’s each day.

Now, you’re probably thinking: That’s all fine and dandy but- what exactly is a CGI? Well I’m glad you asked! It is a graphic design that can be used in conjunction with other media to construct photo-realistic visual representations.

Another question that may come to mind is what would we ever use this for, how is CGI even relevant? Well to give you an idea of how often CGI is used I found some examples online. Did you know that:

3/4 Of Ikea magazine images or Computer-generated. This image below is entirely CGI created – no photography whatsoever was used. This means new and expansive opportunities for Graphic Designers and Computer-based artists. As you can see a few very skilled artists can create CGI’s that are able to design realistic imagery. This technique can be implemented to replace photography in some instances. The benefits of CGI over photography are that it saves time, money, and allows more adjustments post-design. 

Lieutenant Dan on “Forrest Gump” used CGI to remove his legs from the scene

Movies have been using photo realism CGI, cartoon CGI, and in this above example, ‘removal’ CGI for years. The cartoon versions often have realism incorporated subtly. These examples include children’s popular cinema such as Disney and Pixar films. These films tend to have very detailed backgrounds and objects, but more exaggerated faces and bodies for each character.

Video games, such as HITMAN, focus more spending on the advertisement graphics than the actual creation of the game

Have you ever seen a video game advertisement that completely blew your mind, you couldn’t wait to buy it as soon as it comes available? The graphics and soundtrack were so immersive that you felt like you were actually a part of the game? When you finally play that game that had you so excited- does it end up falling short of what you had hoped and expected - considering the ad? Probably.. and this is all thanks to the wonderful use of CGI!

Many times CGI is used to upsell the game content by creating hyper realistic scenes to give you a ‘taste’ of what to expect. Circumstances like this tend to lead to buyer’s having cognitive dissonance because the ‘packaging’ doesn’t match the ‘product’. Maybe one day we will have more CGI realism quality video games!

This is valuable information for understanding how businesses, industries, advertising, and marketing are all transitioning. Art is much more flexible and varied now. We have the ability to convince the eye that a bunch of rendered pixels were at one point a 3-dimensional space. CGI is like the perfect combination of photoshop and imagination with a lot of visual volume in the mix. Can you think of any examples of CGI?

REFERENCES:

https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=DQK1lR4X&id=7692BC5C9F40E31431124E1B18C9D30BCD2004A7&thid=OIP.DQK1lR4XET1LW6ti9-vk1gEsCo&q=ikea+cgi&simid=608028346851135092&selectedIndex=0&ajaxhist=0

https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=M1MhB%2fbw&id=5BB3E2530A8F80A77EBEB7C35CFC19585F898F9D&thid=OIP.M1MhB_bw0On_-qwqSVUK-wEsC-&q=lieutenant+dan&simid=608024859328974161&selectedIndex=13&ajaxhist=0

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=how+to+photorealism&docid=608038753558662422&mid=A6B65C1305ADA47B97AAA6B65C1305ADA47B97AA&view=detail&FORM=VIREHT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5nROO9jg4E

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My new idol - Graphic Design artist, Tyler Spangler!! Just spent about 2 hours checking out his amazing designs! Go check out his page!

http://tylerspangler.com

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December 6th, 2016

This day was an important day in my life. It was the week before final exams for fall semester, I was sitting in my living room studying for my upcoming marketing exam and eating supper. It was late- probably 8pm or so when I got a phone call that changed everything.

Before I go any further you should probably know a little background info.

Here is my family. Me, my sister, dad, and mom. My sister and I grew up on a farm where my dad raises beef cattle and my mom sells insurance. We moved into our farm home when I was 5 years old.

Here is little 5 year old me and my older sister on our first day of moving in. We obviously were not very excited to get our picture taken back then! This has been our home for 16 years.

This is our home now.

Back View:

Front View:

December 6th, 2016 my mom called me balling her eyes out. I couldn’t understand a word she was saying so she handed the phone to my sister. A fire started in our home. We live in the middle of nowhere so our neighbors could not see the flames and smoke until the entire home was engulfed in it. It turns out there was a mouse chewing on electrical cords and it sparked a flame while we were gone. Unfortunately, we had three dogs and three cats at the time. (That seems like a lot of animals but we had a large home originally) One cat survived and came out with only a scorch mark on her white fur and some severe PTSD. Everything else was gone.  

Here is a picture of our dogs that we lost that day; Pikachu- she was a puppy we found on our land who had been tossed out of a moving vehicle by her original owners who did not want her. She sustained a significant hip injury from hitting the gravel from the height of a car window. This picture is the day my dad found her eating our cat food, she had been with us for 4 years. Next is Charlie, the white fluff ball who was my mother’s dog and we had her for 6 years. Lastly was my dog, Zena who we had adopted from a humane society 2 years ago.

After hearing the news of this tragedy, I immediately came home to take care of my parents who were a wreck. We stayed in a hotel and were greeted by much of our small town community with sympathy, clothing, and food. I am very grateful to this day of everyone who helped out. We spent the next few months looking for a place to live, moving from place to place constantly, and trying to itemize everything we had owned before.

Since that day, we are still living in temporary homing, but have started to rebuild our home. We have rescued these beautiful pups to help ease the emotional devastation this event has caused and we appreciate every moment a little bit more. Say hello to Bonnie and Clyde, my parents new rescue pups- as well as my newly adopted pup, Axel. Thanks for reading!

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After a long day at work today we decided to play on the playground. My dog Axel has some serious potential for puppy olympics 😦😂 #MKT400UWL #catahoula #boxer #justforfun #wallclimb #workoutmotivation

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Adobe Illustrator | Pen Tool

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Adobe Illustrator | Pen Tool #MKT400UWL

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I CAN’T DRAW

This is a phrase people like to throw around quite often. I don’t like this mindset one bit. A professor of mine, Joshua Doster, explained to me perfectly what is wrong with saying “I can’t draw”:

Everyone can draw.

It is having VISUAL INSIGHT that makes you an ARTIST.

This makes a lot of sense to me because sketching and drawing is a process and it is something practiced. No one is born with an inexplicable ability to transform real life items and beings into 3D or 2D representations. It is about seeing the visual parts that can come together into creating a visual representation that others can associate to and recognize.

A lot of drawings start out as a line, oval, curve or combination of the three. I find this particularly true for my drawing technique as well as many other artists who I admire. This is also accurate for Adobe Illustrator users who constantly transform simple circles into shapely hearts and triangles into complex flowers.

To draw with visual insight,

you must deconstruct what you are trying to construct –

If that makes any sense! By this, I mean start with the eyeball icon and simplify it. What shapes do you see - a circle, inside a circle, inside a football shape. Now this may seem redundant but it applies to much more complex visuals just the same.

See above for an image that I ended up recreating in a drawing this Spring. I really love this portrait! Using this simple technique can make a complex task such as making a face with eyes, lips, a nose, brows, shadows, highlights, etc. much quicker to create. This is the idea of focusing in on one piece of the puzzle rather than being overwhelmed with all the textures and visual distractions in front of you.

Another useful technique for visual thinking is to exaggerate. I have used the ‘remove saturation’ and ‘change contrast’ abilities all too much in my drawing endeavors! THANK YOU, TECHNOLOGY!! This helps to remove the ‘noise’ of color and multiple tones. See below.

Using this feature is another way to avoid ‘biting off more than you can chew’. It basically helps simplify the image to show the extreme darks and lights with a barely-there mid-tone.

My last trick for today to help your visually insightful minds ( ; is to explain how to use a combination of these methods! Using both the exaggerated contrast, with a greyscale or low saturation applied, draw over images you print out to practice seeing the ‘structural’ image. Having the simplified shapes will also help with the direction of the light as well as angles!

These are only a few of the basics to visual insight! If you like my tips and tricks or want to see how my drawing turned out please <3 this post and I will update my Tumblr with the final result later on. Thanks for reading! (Photo Credit/Model: Christina Nadin)

*****3D--me