Amanda Loeser's Headshot

For this assignment, I used iPhoto to edit my picture. I changed the exposure, contrast and added some highlights. I like the way it turned out and plan on adding it to my website. 

Leisha's Headshots

To complete this assignment I used Pixlr.  I cropped the image to get rid of the electrical outlet and better line my eye up as a focal point.  I used the focus tool to blur the bottom of the image so that my chair would not be a distraction, but rather sort of fade into the background.  I increased the saturation to 25 and added the Sanna filter to darken the image without losing any light. 

Original

Edited with Pixlr

RET's Headshot

For the headshot exercise I went to GIMP (again).  I figured the biggest changes I could make were evening out the background, skin tones, and giving an all around softer look to the image.  I think I sort of made that happen, however I probably could have toned down the teeth whitening and background whitening a little bit.  Here are my results:

Increased the saturation slightly.

Might be able to see the teeth^^

For some added fun I took the following as well:

Leisha's Colors

Contrast Cool/Warm

Monochromatic

Overlapping and Transparent

Kara's Color Assigment

I had a lot of fun with the color palette! Below are the ones I came up with

Itten Contrast of Hue - Primaries

Monochromatic

Illusion of Overlapping/Transparency

Amanda Leech Headshot

Original Image

Edited Image

This was a fun assignment, and now I have a great headshot for work! I cropped out the busy stuff in the background, and played with the color (brightness, contrast, saturation). I will also admit that I whitened my teeth a little...

Lauren's Color Palettes

Monochromatic Composition:

Overlapping/Transparent Hues:

Itten's Contrast:

Jen's Color Assignment

Happy snow day everyone!  :)

Itten's Contrast of Compliments

Overlapping hues

Monochromatic

Color Assignment

Monochromatic Composition 

Overlapping Composition 

Ittens

Kara's Headshot



Old Image

New Image

For my headshot, I made subtle changes.  As you can see from the old image, the coloring seems somewhat dull/grayish. I attempted to add more color to my face/hair so that it'd contrast better with the background. I was also able to fade out the shadow a bit in the background. I edited the image using Sumopaint, and I altered the brightness, contrast, saturation, and color temperature.

RET - Coloring inside the lines (Color Assignment)

Itten Contrast

Monochromatic

Overlapping/transparent hues

Amanda Loeser's Color Assignment

MONOCHROMATIC COMPOSITION

OVERLAPPING/TRANSPARENT HUES

ITTENS (SIMULTANEOUS CONTRAST)

Main Post from Christy: Some Interesting Points about Doodling and the Brain

 So, as I was considering / researching what I would write about in my main post, I was drawn to a TED talk that made some really fascinating arguments that were supported by research into topics directly related to this class. I really didn't know much about visual literacy before this class, although I had been taught a lot of similar stuff as an art major in undergrad. In the art department, we didn't hear terms like "visual literacy" to describe what we were learning to do in our studio classes, although it could be summarized as learning to see the world in a certain way and to then convey those feelings / perceptions / ideas to others visually. I'm intrigued as I see how aesthetic and design skills are so intertwined with the field of education, and I'm also excited to see that the term "visual literacy" is becoming more widely recognized. Doodling usually invokes stereotypes of artists or daydreamers, but should this activity be reserved for "those sorts of people"? Click the link below to watch a short video (about 6 minutes) about how doodling affects the way our brain processes and retains information.

Doodlers, unite!

In this video, Sunni Brown argues that doodling is not valued--and even often frowned upon--in our culture. This effect is even more strongly felt in the workplace, or in "settings in which we are supposed to learn something." She postulates that our culture may be "so intensely focused on verbal information that we are almost blinded to the.value of doodling," adding that it seems to be considered by many to be an "anti-intellectual" activity.

However, Sunni argues that there is a disconnect between society's perceptions of doodling and the reality of its value. She gives scientific support for the value of doodling to enhance retention of information and maintain mental focus. Perhaps the most fascinating part of this video for me was when she used a single slide to visually convey what she was verbally explaining (exemplifying her own lesson in practice; she explained that there are 4 ways that the brain makes sense of information to make deicions--visual, auditory, reading / writing, and kinesthetic. She points out that for humans to genuinely grasp new information, it must be presented through at least two of these modalities, or one modality that is combined with an emotional experience. She further argues that doodling engages all four modalities and also holds the potential to prompt an emotional experience.

With statistics like these, Sunni Brown has an excellent point: why does society view doodling as a childish (or even rude) activity? Perhaps the tendency of artists to doodle regularly is part of the reason they can unlock their inner creativity in the powerful ways conveyed through art. I love Sunni Brown's revised definition of doodling, which specifies that it is "to make spontaneous marks to help yourself think."

So I just wanted to share that interesting video, and ask what you all make of Brown's argument. How do you feel about doodling? Is it useful to you, especially in this class? Personally, I find doodling helpful but have a hard time compelling myself to do it, and I think this is because I am so detail-oriented. I have trouble letting go and letting my mind come up with crazy, good, and bad ideas all at once. I rationalize to myself that I will work harder on one or two ideas rather than brainstorming freely, and that this will save time. Does anyone else experience this? Does Brown's argument seem valid to you, from what you know of learning theories and from your own personal experience?

Christy's Final Logo

So, to make a long weekend short--I was in a rather bad car accident on Saturday. I was recovering during the beginning of this week, so I know I am posting this logo late. My finished logo is below.

FINAL VERSION:

I am pretty pleased with my final product. I took many suggestions from my peer reviewer and really improved upon my original draft. For easier reference, I am pasting the earlier version below:

Most importantly, I changed the colors to match the official JMU colors (the gold is a lot less gold than I thought it would be!). I think this made the logo much more attractive and will make the program look more professional and easily affiliated with this institution, should the Ed. Leadership program director choose to use it. I also found a more appropriate font and moved the "JMU" to the bottom, made it slightly more muted than the program title (gold vs. black), and spelled out "James Madison University." I thought this also made the logo suit the program a bit better, as it focuses on serving aspiring school administrators, and this design change feels more appropriate because of the formality.

Finally, I have included one final version of this logo. I almost considered it done when it was at the point that is shown below, but something was missing. Just look at the difference made by that line that highlights the word "educational"!!....I was amazed at how much more cohesive the piece felt after I added it (refer to finished version above).

Katie Bowser- Logo Assignment Final

Katie Bowser- Symbol Assignment

Amanda Leech Color Assignment

I had a very productive snow day! Here is my color assignment:

Jen's Final Logo

For the final logo, I shaved off a little bit of the points on the heart rhythm.  I think they were a little too much.  I also centered the heart rhythm between the text.  I decided to keep the text aligned the way it was in the last after conducting an informal survey.  I kept the blue color, because I do think it makes the the logo easier to read.  It was also a predominant color in their prior logos.  Thanks for the feedback!

Erin Murphy logo

Here is my class logo.  I wanted to use DNA in the worst kind of way.  I feel that there is a possibility for it to become too cramped when it is shrunken down.  I really like using the idea of DNA due to the fact that it contains human "history" on a chemical level, it is constantly remaking itself and it is the book to being human. 

This one is better since I added the stroke to the "ms"

Amanda Loeser's Logo

Here's my final logo for Mindforge Fractions! I didn't like my first draft for multiple reasons, but mainly because it didn't convey anything math related. I kept the blue color and decided to add in the numbers and change the fonts. Overall, I wanted to keep everything nice and simple.

Kara Martinez's Final Logo

I had originally had the hands upside down because I really wanted to use some of the fingers as an "M" shape so that I could start my organization's name (Multiracial at Madison) off with that. However, I felt that it somewhat messed up the message being sent by the image of the hands. I wanted the hands to convey the message that "I am here!" "I am a multiracial student at JMU," or "There are  many of us," or something along those lines. I don't feel that message was being conveyed with the hands upside down. Like Rob said, it looked like they were reaching down. This is what motivated me to turn them around. So, not being able to use the fingers as the letter "M," I went ahead and just typed out the entire name of the organization using a font that I felt went well and was still visible. I thought a good way to unify the words and hands was to use the same colors for the words as the hands. I did so by utilizing the Eye dropper tool on sumo paint, and I definitely wanted to make sure that "Madison" was the gold color - which I thought worked out nicely. I also asked several people at work what their thoughts were on my varying the colors of the letters in the word "Multiracial," and they seemed to prefer that over only using one color for the word. I also felt it went along with the message; multiracial individuals come from a multitude of backgrounds with varying phenotypes. I am pleased with the overall turnout.

Robert Turner's Final Logo

Thanks for all the great comments and likes on the first draft y'all.  I went back and played around with the coloring a bit.  I ended up doing a basic color for the John C. Wells Text and faded both the main and sub text.  I like it, but in the future I plan on adding our Star-Ball in there to substitute in for the C in John C Wells.  For that reason I didn't bother going back in and placing a period next to the C as it will be gone once I try to draw a Star Ball in there.

Again I used GIMP for this.  After this project I am confident with putting GIMP on a CV.  Really useful piece of software once you know how to use it.  I highly recommend downloading it if you don't want to buy photoshop and also would use the lynda.com tutorials to get started.

Jordan's Final Logo

I went off the feedback I got to un-busy my logo a bit by moving the ship down to take up less of the circle background and reduced the number of waves, and blended the hull of the ship into the waves (which was way more challenging to do in Illustrator than I imagined it would be!).  I added the name of the prospective company to make sure a name could be associated with my symbol.  I am overall really pleased with how it turned out despite the snares I ran into on the way!