PE2_Photoshop

Screenshots from Lynda.com

Not finding sufficient information from my Google searches, I decided to step it up a notch and try some Photoshop tutorials at Lynda.com. I did a search for the software and realized that there are hours and hours of demonstration tutorials about Photoshop, but they are all focused around specific tools or options (the software is so complex!) not around a certain project that could be done, like the portrait manipulation. These tutorials were things like, "Using Layers", or "Lasso Tool". I tried to pick out the most pertinent ones that would benefit teaching Photoshop with high school art students. In total, I watched about 10 3-5 minute videos about different skills. I picked up a lot of tricks and more familiarity with getting around the interface, but still not an overarching goal or theme to plug all the information into so that I can retain it all efficiently!

PE1_Photoshop

For my practical experience, I decided to try and tackle some of the basics in Adobe Photoshop. This is something that I have wanted to learn and incorporate into my teaching, but always felt overwhelmed to start. If I can, I would love to have Photoshop as one of the applications that students use in my graphic design Learning Center for my ARP. So, the first thing I decided to do was to try and think of a project that I would like to have the kids do using the software, and Googled how to do it. That idea was to create some sort of self portrait with special effects, like make yourself into a monster or character from Avatar, for instance. My first few leads were a bit disappointing as far as actual instructional content, and I felt like I was kind of lost doing my experiments. At the end, I got so frustrated that I jumped to a Web 2.0 tool, Befunky.com, which does free photo editing, just to get some ideas for what techniques I could search for to learn in Photoshop. It gave me the idea to start looking around at "cartoonizing" effects. Still really couldn't find much specifically about that, just more general tutorials.

Here are some of my experiments...

BP12_OMM_Zooburst

This is my one minute commercial about the Web 2.0 tool Zooburst, the digital Pop Up book maker. This is an awesome tool to use as an alternative visual presentation tool, to showcase imagery, to create a digital story, or to write children's literature.

Check it out at Zooburst.com

Images from Zooburst.com. Music from Garageband.

BP11_Comment to Anne Alsup

Please follow this link to my comment on Anne Alsup's review of Symbaloo.

BP10_Comment to Dennis Dill

Please follow this link to my comments for Dennis Dill about Museumbox.

BP9_Zooburst

Zooburst.com

I chose Zooburst for my Web 2.0 tool this week because I am interested in coming up with alternatives to present visual content. With Zooburst, you can create and manipulate digital Pop Up books. I love the extra dimension of Pop Up books in real life, so I knew I would love it online. It turned out to be very easy to use, and offers a great variety of editing options. I can see it being great as an alternative to “everyday” tools such as Keynote or Powerpoint. With Zooburst, the images actually advance towards the viewer, and occupy a space similar to a gallery in each page. Plus, each page or the entire book can be commented on, embedded, or shared.

I really liked how the background can also be changed, not just in basic color but imagery can also be added. You can make the images in the background more “fuzzed out” if you want more focus on the book pages. It could be all photographs, all 3D objects from the Zooburst library, or a mixture of both. The text could tell an actual story, or just describe the images. I thought it was a perfect format for presenting an art portfolio, so I started adding a few of my works, and put images of me in the original galleries in the background. As I watched the final results, I realized that Zooburst would be wonderful for digital storytelling, as the background, text, links, and 3D object library can really form a rich, multi layered progression of events. I think students would be highly engaged in either watching content being presented using Zooburst, or creating their own Zooburst book.

W1 & 2_Reading