ART1070- My Farewell Post

Dear Phoebe (and Art-classmates),
Let me begin by saying that I initially took this course because I was stressed out and pissed off. I was overwhelmed with chemistry and math courses (I hate them!) and needed something different....anything different. My best friend Sama is an art-major and was signed up for this course- so I figured "Why not?". I took this class with the intention of learning something outside of my boring (and slightly nauseating) major. I was absolutely terrified at first, because A) I am FAR from artistic and haven't taken an art class since elementary school, and B) I am literally tech-UNsavvy; I know nothing about computers and technology and even have a hard time operating my facebook. I am nearly handicapped when it comes to computers/online programs. This class is based on both art and technology- so you can probably see why I was so intimidated.
To my surprise, all of the assignments turned out to be very do-able. So long as I was willing to do a little research/reading, and spend some time on "practice runs", I found that I was able to keep up! Eventually I grew comfortable enough with the assignments, that I was able to incorporate some of my own personal creativity into the projects! This is where I really began to love this class. For example, the editing of my Urban Landscape photos, the creation of this blog, my video mash-up, and the creation of my website, all gave me the opportunity to be as creative (and crazy!) as I wanted to- so I had a blast with these assignments.
Before I knew it, I had developed a Saturday-night tradition: come home from work, eat dinner, spend all night relaxing, and taking my time to learn that week's project/assignment. It became the most stress-relieving day of my week. This art class gave me some "me-time", which was much needed! It was the first time in my college career that I truly felt like I was learning something new, valuable, and applicable to the real world. I have spent hours and days trying to learn concepts on molecule bonding and theories on integration- KNOWING I would never use any of it again. Then, I get to this class, where I learn skills such as website-construction, slideshow/presentation-building, photo-editing, etc, and I know I can/will use these techniques again in my career.
In summary, not only did this class provide me with some space and time to relax and have fun- but it also taught me so many things that I never thought I could be capable of! I was the girl who couldn't create a graph on Excel, and now I can make an entire video (music included!) all from scratch! I am very proud of myself :)
Phoebe, you are one of the most wonderful instructors I have ever met (ironically, you are the only one of my instructors that I have never met- lol this is my first online course). It was so refreshing to be taught by such a passionate, enthusiastic, and hilarious instructor. If all of my teachers were like you, I would actually show up to class and pay attention! I am very sad that this adventure of a class is over already, but if you teach any other art classes in the future- you can count me in! Thank you for a productive, enlightening, and thrilling semester!
Sincerely,
Eman

PS: you called the pink font on my Slate-layout (on my website), a "curious" choice of colors. Well, my gray cat, Sophia, has been wearing a pink collar since birth, and was very offended by your comments :)

She inspired the color palette for my site :) :) :)

4 days and 4 exams until Cali.

I cannot believe that in only four days I will be on my way to LA. It feels like just yesterday that I was blogging about my "dream internship" and how "impossible" getting one in Cali would be. This is so surreal; my wildest dreams are coming true right before my own eyes! I am, certainly, the luckiest girl in the whole wide world. Im not sure what exactly I did to deserve this, but you can bet your a** that Im going to work as  hard as I can to keep these kinds of opportunities in my life.

أشكر الله على كل شيء في حياتي


I only have to survive four more days in Toledo, and four more final exams, until I am completely free. I'll arrive in LA just in time to celebrate Cinco de Mayo- perfect timing, huh? :)

The Final Countdown

Only ten more days 'til I arrive in LA! The next ten days consist of six final exams, two more art projects, one more lab report, one more math homework assignment, and one more chemistry homework assignment. I have five days of class left: two Organic Chemistry lectures, four Calculus III classes, four Physics I classes, two Chem. labs, and two recitations! Breaking it down into numbers helps make it seem like it's so much closer!

Going Back To Cali.

I only left California about three weeks ago, and already, IM GOING BACK. Only about ten days until departure. There are no words to describe my happiness, excitement....and STRESS! SO much to do before I go, including the SIX finals that I have to take (I'm serious.) Lots of work to do, and lots of nonsense with moving, packing, and getting settled in a new place in LA. It will all be worth it though- this, I am sure of. May 2nd is the day my huge adventure begins. I will take my physics exam that morning and jump on a direct flight to LAX that evening! Crazy, huh? (lol @ Morgan) This will be my THIRD time flying to California in the last year- I am absolutely blessed. How many people can say that?? Not many! Notorious BIG wrote the theme song to my summer- check it out :)

3 Weeks!

Leaving for California in less than three weeks to take on a 2-month long internship! I feel like the luckiest girl in the world! This is an absolute dream come true and I feel SO much closer to my ultimate goal of going to school out on the West Coast :)

Just a reminder from last summer, of what Ill be seeing this summer:

Los Angeles, California.

San Diego, California.

Mission Beach, California.

My One-Week Visit to SoCal

So I just got back from California last night after spending one amazing, perfect week in San Diego and LA. I have never been to Los Angeles before and the city instantly stole my heart. EVERYTHING about that town is perfect. There is so much to do and see, and the city is so live! LA is up and running 24/7, like me! If you ask me, Los Angeles is the city that never sleeps! I got to see some of the most high-end and posh shopping centers that I have ever laid eyes on! I got a first-class tour (from my boyfriend :) of some of the most beautiful SoCal neighborhoods (in "the hills"), and of course, I got to eat at a lot of really cool restaurants (shout-out to our night at Street, if you're reading this, Morgan!). It was wonderful, to say the very least. Most importantly, I was able to meet with a potential employer...sort of. I have been trying to get an internship in LA this ENTIRE school year, and out of some heaven-sent-miricle, I am ecstatic to announce that I got the internship! :) It would be in Century City, which is near or in Beverly Hills? Maybe? I couldn't be a happier girl! Now I just need to secure a place for me to stay, and I can call myself Cali-bound :) The other significant portion of this trip was three hours south of LA, in San Diego. Here, I attended the American Chemical Society National Conference. It was SO cool- the ultimate nerd-fest. I got to see some of the world's leading chemical companies advertise their newest products and recruit new chemists to work for them. I got to see the "demos" (basically realllllllllllly upscale science projects) of chem. students from all over the nation. My ACS chapter from UT presented a demo and did really well; for anyone who cares, the demo was on polymers and how the are created/used in green chemistry. There were lots of events that I attended in this three-day conference such as dinners, awards ceremonies, speakers, etc. I also did  A LOT of shopping down there (Juicy Couture for my sister!) and am now the most bankrupt girl in all of Toledo. Pictures from the trip, and lots more stories and details to come!

Typography & Text-Based Art!

The following two images were converted to basic ASCII using glassgiant.com; it is a senior portrait of myself, and when it was at its original, blown-up size, it was nearly impossible to define the image. After reducing the image size down to this, it is a lot more clear what the picture is. You can definitely tell that this is me in the picture :) The photograph below is also a senior picture of me, and the further you zoom out of the photograph, the more it looks like the original image, except in grayscale!

 This image was also converted to ACSII, however I used the "more powerful" software on text-image.com. I think that you certainly can see a significant difference between this picture and the previous two images; this one displays a lot more detail, and the text is a lot more definitive of the lines and shading in the photograph!

The following image was also produced on text-image.com, but it was converted to the HTML format. It is supposed to be a picture of me standing at the top of a flight of stairs. What I really liked about this format was how rich the coloring was! Each individual letter is colored a different shade to represent all of the lighting, in detail, in the photograph- VERY cool!

This is my final image made on text-image.com and I made it using the Matrix format. It is supposed to be a picture of me and a cat; I thought that Matrix was pretty cool because it only uses green and black to depict a fairly detailed image.

 

The following three images are my Tagxedo creations! I LOVED this website! Very scrapbook-ish! Haha, I would totally use creations on this website for t-shirt designs, birthday cards, posters- virtually anything! The images produced are very attractive and interesting- you can't help but look at them! I made three pictures on this website representing my cat, my trip to California that I will be taking in a few days, and this warm spring weather that I have been enjoying. These are all screenshots, and you can see this in the third image that captured the effect of my mouse scrolling over a word on the image :)

Last, but certainly not least, are my Textorizer images! This first one was made on TextorizerI, and n matter WHAT I did to the settings, the image was never able to be defined. This is the best picture that I could produce, unfortunately. The words never seemed to completely fill the open space, which I thought was weird. Anyways, I took a screenshot, including my setting details and the original photograph, so that you can see what I did and see what it is SUPPOSED to look like lol.

This picture was made on Texterizer II, and I liked how it turned out A LOT better than the first program, because it filled the entire image with color- no empty space! However, for some reason it would not allow me to adjust the opacity and bring it down to 0- which was very strange. You can still see the basic outline of my original image behind the text and I wish I could have produced an image composed entirely of text!

Finally, I made an image out of lines- using Excoffizer! I liked this program the best because it was a lot of fun to play with the settings and adjust the spacing of the lines- you can see the difference between my first and second image. The only difference is the amount of space between each line that composes the photograph- this alone changes the image SO much! I thought that it was an interesting program to play with and I think that a lot of different artwork can be produced using this!

Scribbler, Scribbler Too, and Flame Paintings :)

(This picture was made using Scribbler. It was my first attempt with the program and I made it by drawing a few simple, random lines across the canvas and then beginning the "Scribbler", and the program was "scribbling", I constantly changed the color of the "paintbrush" and had the transparency and thickness of the lines set to "random" so it was constantly changing as my picture was being created. I think that overall, this program may be a little bit tricky to use if you have a very specific image in mind, that requires a lot of detail. This program randomizes the placement and webbing of multiple lines so I think it could be very challenging to create a precise drawing with it.

This picture was also made Scribbler; with my second attempt at the program, I tried to make a picture that actually represented a tangible object. In this case I tried making a flower, starting with a few simple lines shaped like flower petals. I had the transparency and thickness of the lines set to "random", as I did before  and constantly changed the color, altering between different "cool" colors.

This was the first image that I created on Scribbler Too. What I liked about this program is that it was a lot less random than Scribbler and I was better able to predict the outcome of my drawing. I really liked the "webbed" appearance of the brush a lot more than the "finger painting" look of the Scribbler brush. This drawing is obviously not of anything particular, but I liked how it demonstrates the basic function of the Scribbler Too program.

This image was my second attempt with Scribbler Too and this time I was able to change the thickness and intensity of the "webbing" to create a specific image. I really liked how this program automatically attempts to connect all lines drawn; this created some very interesting blending effects when I would switch in between colors. In my image, the grass, the sky, and the moon, are all two-toned, and the "webbing" helped mesh the two colors together. I thought it was really cool and personally think that with the right creativity and artistic abilities, one could make masterpieces using this software!

Here is my first image from Flame! I personally loved this program a lot more than Scribbler and Scribbler Too, because I am not an artist (at all) and this program literally creates the art for you! It was really fun working with a medium like this; I certainly never have before! I decided that you can use "painting with fire" to convey ANY emotion, not just anger! With the Flame program, you can adjust the color of the flame, the intensity, the thickness, and the blurriness of the "fire", which allows you to create virtually anything. If I had to pick an "emotion" that I was depicting I guess I would call this one excitement, simply because that's the feeling I get from this picture :)

This is my second drawing on Flame; this picture uses less "fire"-like brush strokes, rather, it uses brush strokes that look more like colored light. I thought that this program was really neat because it really isn't just "fire" that you can use as your medium, it's "light". I basically created streams of red and green light reflecting off of one another against the black canvas. It reminds me of a really intense "Northern Lights" scene :)

California-Bound!

Lucky me! I am flying into Los Angeles in exactly two weeks! I will spend two days in LA, and will be meeting with an attorney to discuss a potential internship for this summer (internship in LA = MY DREAM!). I will then go to San Diego where I will spend two days shopping and laying out on the beach, followed by two days attending the American Chemical Society National Conference! I will then take a train back to LA and will fly back to Toledo the next morning; this is going to be the most incredible vacation/business trip I have ever taken! I don't think I've ever been so excited for anything! Wish me luck!

My Video Mash-Up!

MEOWWWWWWWW!!!! This is the video-mash-up that I made for my digital media art class!! The song is "Shake It Out" by Florence + The Meowchine (remixed with my own original beat!). Inspurration fur this video comes from my obsession with cats, as well as those depressing Unicef/"Feed the Children" commercials that always seem to play late at night! I wasn't mocking any world issues here; I was only trying to raise awareness of the challenges that felines face in this country every day :)

Aviary Face Swap!

Here is my face swap! It was made on Aviary for my Fundamentals of Digital Media class!

It was derived from these two photographs (two of my neighbors, Ed and Alexis)

The hybrid of these two pictures was created using Aviary's "Phoenix" Image Editor. Because I had to merge the two different skin tones at the neckline, this task was EXTREMELY difficult! lol it literally took me all day, but I think that the end result is not too bad, and decently funny! I used the "clone" tool to copy and paste bits and pieces of both Ed's and Alexis's skin onto each other, so that they merged well. I also used the blurring and the smudging tools to try and make the "cut off" line less noticeable. Finally, I "flattened" the two layers together and played with the brightness and contrast of the image in an attempt to make it all "flow" a little bit more smoothly. It isn't the most convincing or beautiful piece of photoshopped art, but it certainly took a lot of effort on my behalf and we all think it's pretty funny :)

Google Docs Presentation

Here is a presentation that I made using Google Docs, for my Digital Media art class. The theme is "A Day In My Life", where I attempted to capture that various events of my typical school day, via photography. I pieced these photographs together with captions, and hopefully it all sort of tells a story, of what a day in my life is like, from beginning to end!

Urban Landscape VIDEO :)

Make your own slideshow with music at Animoto.

This is my Urban Landscape Edited album (from Flickr) set to the track "Midnight City" by M83. I selected only about half of the photographs from my album to feature in the 30 second video. The photographs featured were taken in solely in Toledo, though, the photographs that were absent in the video were actually taken in California and France. I chose to make this video one that exclusively debuted my recent Toledo photography because I wanted the video to depict only my current skills and interests in regards to photography. The track playing was downloaded under the file format "MP3" with the preset of "Higher Quality" (128 kps/5.7 MB].

Urban Landscape Edited Photograph (Take II !)

So the post right before this one was of my favorite photograph from the "Urban Landscape Edited" Set on my Flickr account! The photograph that I selected was taken in Paris, France, years ago, and is therefore being considered 'invalid' for this project. I was asked to choose my favorite of the Toledo photographs that I took, and the one displayed below, is what I selected. This picture was taken in the past week, outside of a parking garage on UT's campus, at night. It was taken by the camera in my phone, which was set to (2592 x 1552) or 5 megapixels. For having a lower number of megapixels (in respect to my 9 megapixel camera), I would say that this image turned out to display a decent resolution, and because it is so clear, I am assuming that my camera did not use interpolation. To enhance the photograph, I increased the contrast, so that the railing, staircase, and ridges in the stone wall were all very defined from one another. I also increased the temperature to make the picture have "warmer" tones in them. Finally I increased the shadows and decreased the highlights in this photograph to emphasize the appearance of urban decay and the presence of broken light in the photograph.

My Favorite Photograph

Below is my favorite edited photograph from my "Urban Landscape" set, on Flickr. I took this photograph in Paris, France, about a few years ago, in the summertime. This is a photograph of the hotel that I stayed with my mom and sister. I took multiple photographs of the building from the crowded streets; it was difficult to capture a good angle but this is the best one! Because the photograph was taken at night, a lot of the details in the building were hidden in the shadows- I was able to correct this using photo-editing software in which I increased the highlights, contrast and exposure of the photograph. This really helped to emphasize the overall light in the photograph. Also, I realized that my camera unfortunately has a lot of interpolation because it is supposed to be a 9 megapixel camera, and even when it is set to photograph at its highest resolution, the picture still appears somewhat 'fuzzy' or undefined. I learned that a 9 megapixel camera should normally cost  ALOT more than what I paid, so I realized that Kodak used interpolation to increase the resolution on my camera, at a low cost. As previously mentioned, I didn't have to do much to this photograph because the overall quality of it was naturally good. My favorite thing about this picture is how little editing was needed for it; the natural lighting in the photograph did all of the work for me!

Introductory Post

This is my first ever, introductory post for my blog! My name is Eman Al-Hassan and I am 20 years old. I am a Chemistry student at the University of Toledo and I'm considering picking up a minor in Political Science. I have two goals that I would like to reach by the conclusion of my undergraduate career: to graduate with a B.S. (not B.A.!!!) of Chemistry, and to be accepted into a prestigious California law school. I have approximately two years to make this all happen, and you can bet that I am doing everything in my power to get there. I am really focused on school this year and am working hard to bring my GPA up to a 3.8 (I am desperate for it to be this high). I didn't care much for school my freshman year and didn't do as well as I should have, so I am now working twice as hard, as a sophomore, to clean up the mess I made last year. Hopefully my perseverance pays off- I guess we'll find out at the end of the semester!
Anyways, I signed up for this digital arts class to keep myself from going completely insane; too many chemistry and math courses can really make you lose it. I think I can learn a lot from it, and hopefully will become more tech-savvy. (:
-Eman Al-Hassan