Digital Collage
Space Boy
70 cm by 94 cm Digital Collage March 2018 Exhibition TextSpace Boy is a photoshop piece inspired by Elon Musk's project "Space Man" and Alex Katz. As seen below I am depicted as some form of alien-human hybrid, this is meant to express the way I see myself in many situations... Alienated. Additionally I am passionate about space and hope to journey in my lifetime. Additionally a great amount of time was spent trying to capture the photo of the galaxy and show it's vibrancy which represents my passions for space.
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Inspiration
Spaceman is the result of the Falcon Heavy launch on February 6th, 2018. It technically is not classified as art by most, however it can easily be argued that the piece has artistic qualities and high levels of detail and purpose. Spaceman was launched into orbit simply because Elon Musk wanted him to be sent up there, additionally he wears a prototypes Space X space suit that is sending back information on the suit's performance in the elements. I personally love space and I watched the launch for the Falcon Heavy live and payed close attention to all the details surrounding the launch. I am passionate about exploring the unknown and innovating functional products that are unique and iconic. The idea of making iconic things drove me to find out what I believe to be iconic and unique. I personally am more likely to remember a work of art if it is simple in composition and vibrant in it's colors. Although it will be difficult to do with just a smartphone camera I would like to incorporate the galaxy into my finalized collage. When looking at the Spaceman I realize that he does not look human, he looks somewhat alien. I plan to take photos that have similar angles to the shots of Spaceman.
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Andy Warhol is an excellent example of simple objects being made iconic through the use of simple yet impactful portrayals. His self portrait is easily recognizable as a Warhol piece, this is the kind of impact I want to have in my own work. As I view his work I can immediately picture myself visualized floating in space with an abstracted alien form. I plan on incorporating his simple color schemes and impactful backgrounds into my own work. The component I want to replicate the most is the framing of the portrait and the facial expression of Andy Warhol.
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Planning
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When it came to planning, I was very unsure on how to visualize my final digital collage without actually just digitally making it. To help visualize and plan out my finalized piece I began taking photos to incorporate into my final piece. Here you can see three separate portrait style photos of myself, I was looking for iconic expression, but also a fairly simple composition as to not overwhelm the context of the piece. In the first photo I can be seen laying in the ice on a dismantled kitchen sink, at the time I wasn't sure as to whether or not I was going to keep the background to the image. It was a fairly aesthetic photo but looking back on it now I believe it was slightly misdirected and it focused to much on trying to be iconic instead of just doing it. The next photo of my head on a pillow was closer to what I was looking for seeing as it had a simple background that did not distract from the foreground of the image. Additionally it had the emotional expression that I was looking and best replicated an Andy Warhol photo. The 4th photo in the slideshow is actually of the galaxy, I tried desperately to obtain my own photos of the galaxy. I knew that I wanted space to be in my collage, I just didn't know the best way to do it. So as part of my planning phase I researched the best areas and times to capture the galaxy in Wisconsin.
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Process
The process for the digital collage process has had the largest learning curve to adapt to out of all of the projects I have completed thus far this year. The first part of my process was taking a lot of photos. I took photos all over Wisconsin; Rhinelander, Eagle Cave, Milwaukee, and Kenosha. I collected the photos of the galaxy up in Rhinelander. I had to research a date and time in which the moon would not be out and the sky would be clear to take these photos. I chose to take them in Rhinelander because it is far up North and there is minimal light pollution. Taking the photos was actually extremely difficult regardless of the near perfect conditions. To make sure nothing was in the sides of the photo's I needed a clear place to take the photos, however much of the terrain is wooded up there. To solve this problem I hiked out into the middle of a frozen lake and set up a small little platform to rest my phone on. To take the photos I had to increase my phones shutter exposure time to 30 seconds, this allows for the lens to absorb light for 30 seconds. This requires nearly complete darkness, otherwise weird light effects can happen to your camera. After my galaxy photos were finally collected I began working on my portrait photos. I felt most satisfied with the photos taken under my bunk bed because of the lighting and the framing of my of face. The next step was removing the background from the photo of my face, to do this I used the magic wand tool to remove the background from the photo. Once my face and upper body was cropped out I added my galaxy background photo. After filtering both photos so that they matched in hue and saturation I began cartooning my face. I was inspired by Andy Warhol's self portrait to cartoon my face. To do this I had to add three separate layer masks to the layer array and then set there values to be that of solid colors. Once I had the proper colors selected I began outlining my facial features in one of three colors, I only used three colors because of my inspirations for the project but also so that I looked more alien. I used a Wacom tablet to accurately trace the outlines of my features, following the cartooning of my facial features was a final filtering process.
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Experimentation
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Experimentation was a huge part of this project, each step in the process came with a lot of experimentation. The photos were one of the largest parts of my experimentation, I took over 120 photos for this project and ended up only using 2 photos in the final product. Everything was heavily based around quality, if the photo was blurry or had bad framing I did not use it in the finalized piece. Additionally I realized that Spaceman and the Self portrait by Andy Warhol both had very simple compositions. To continue to replicate the composition of their works I eliminated all of my photos that had overly complex background or poorly lit foregrounds. I additionally tried editing some of the galaxy photos to see if I could make them clearer or more appealing to look at however I quickly realized that this would not work after some of my photos were ruined by a purple lens flair. I briefly experimented doing an entire digital collage with the photos of me laying on the kitchen sink but after a few failed attempts at cropping the photo properly and applying layer masks I realized that it would not work. I experimented with adding more layer masks as well but those too distracted from the overall goal of the piece. I was looking for iconic expression, but also a fairly simple composition as to not overwhelm the context of the piece. In the first photo I can be seen laying in the ice on a dismantled kitchen sink, at the time I wasn't sure as to whether or not I was going to keep the background to the image. It was a fairly aesthetic photo but looking back on it now I believe it was slightly misdirected and it focused to much on trying to be iconic instead of just doing it.
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Reflection
Spaceman will continue to inspire me to strive to make passionate work and pursue my dreams. This project turned out to be exactly what I wanted it to be, it appears iconic, I am abstracted in form and appear alien, and I got some excellent photos of the galaxy that I am very proud of. My favorite part of the process was trying to figure how to bring the collage together and make it look recognizable to most people. Already many of my peers have been able to figure out my inspiration for the work based on the framing of the photos and the background image, I plan to truly expand my horizons this summer with the summer photography project and allow myself to experiment with many different settings and photo types.
ACT Responses
1. Clearly explain how you are able to identify the cause-effect relationships between your inspiration and its effect upon your artwork.
Elon Musk although not an artist heavily inspired my art through his work at Space X and his general passion for everything he does. Because of him I have incorporated space and new designs to my work.
2. What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author of the Elon Musk article was primarily focused on the innovations that Space X has brought to the table for the space industry, however he briefly highlighted the passion and originality Elon incorporates into all of his work.
3. What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I discovered that people often overlook the aesthetics that are produced through the advancement of technology and simply focus on the advancement that has been made.
4. What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
My central idea surrounding my inspirational research was finding artists that were passionate about their work and how they convey their personalities.
5. What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I like to believe that Elon Musk works towards his passions regardless of where society or business wants to take him. I inferred that Elon's work is also his art.
Elon Musk although not an artist heavily inspired my art through his work at Space X and his general passion for everything he does. Because of him I have incorporated space and new designs to my work.
2. What is the overall approach the author has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
The author of the Elon Musk article was primarily focused on the innovations that Space X has brought to the table for the space industry, however he briefly highlighted the passion and originality Elon incorporates into all of his work.
3. What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures etc. while you researched your inspiration?
I discovered that people often overlook the aesthetics that are produced through the advancement of technology and simply focus on the advancement that has been made.
4. What was the central idea or theme around your inspirational research?
My central idea surrounding my inspirational research was finding artists that were passionate about their work and how they convey their personalities.
5. What kind of inferences did you make while reading your research?
I like to believe that Elon Musk works towards his passions regardless of where society or business wants to take him. I inferred that Elon's work is also his art.
Bibliography
- Koren, M. (2018, February 08). Where Is Elon Musk's Space Tesla Actually Going? Retrieved May 14, 2018, from https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/02/tesla-elon-musk-mars-spacex-asteroid-belt/552719/
- Presentation Name. (n.d.). Retrieved May 14, 2018, from https://www.emaze.com/@ACFZIFFI