Gridiron Greatness- Photos

(Final) Gridiron Greatness: A Tribute to the 2008-09 GL Highlanders

Gridiron Greatness is a nostalgic look back of maybe the most incredible year of my young life. It is a collection of mural-style large pictures of of incredible moments of my senior year high school football season, which ended in a trip to play at storied Giants Stadium. Two pictures display "Highlander Football" the first from our first game, the second from our last game. The others display designs and values that the whole team learned from playing the great game of football since we were in youth league.The pictures are as big as I could possibly make them and my display is so large, you would think your in a stadium.

After collecting the photos I had from that year, I brought them into Illustrator and put them all through Live Trace- Color 16. This created a very painted, mural like look that really made them seem even grander and more nostalgic. I added the graphics and text in Photoshop and tried to use a variety of exciting designs that fit each picture. I taped two large display boards together and arranged the photos in a certain order on each portion of the double boards.

Personally I think this is one of the most exciting pieces I have ever created. It is definitely the largest by far. If there was one thing I could change about it, it would be making the white of the display board identical to the white of the border of the printed pictures. Other than that it came out exactly how I imagined. This piece's real strength is its size and variety of large colorful pictures. I think it is excellent.

Self Portraits

These are two self portraits I did in photoshop and illustrator. The first one "Nasty" was done entirely on illustrator and captures the way I am in competitive sports. The second one "Avengers" was done on both photoshop and illustrator and displays my love of marvel superheroes, more specifically their movies. Featured from left to right is Spider-Man, Wolverine, Iron Man, Myself, Invisible Woman, and the Beast.

Artist Presentation

Anthony and I highlighted the similarities between two of the greatest animators of our time. John Lasseter of Pixar and Chuck Jones of Warner Bros and MGM fame. Lasseter was inspired in many ways by Jones who was his idol of sorts. Both share characters with outrageous personalities. They also are similar in how their characters interact with each other. Interesting character interactions are what make stories come alive.

Above are stills of two of Lasseter's works (Toy Story and A Bug's Life) and two of Jones' works (Looney Tunes and How the Grinch Stole Christmas).

The Whitney Museum

Last Wednesday I went to the Whitney Museum in New York City. Personally i don't really like museums that much . The work in museums always seems so detached and dull, but thankfully I did see some pieces that caught my interest. Pae White's gigantic Mural closeup of smoke was really cool and interesting. The size is what really makes that piece work though, I don't think one would get the same feeling if it was the size of a conventional painting. I'm not sure how White made it, but it seemed to have a topographic-like texture to it.
The favorite piece of the entire museum was Paul Pfeiffer's Fragment of a Crucifixion. It was small projection of a basketball player going nuts after he dunked on some poor soul. I believe that the video was obviously altered in some way because the player is clearly wearing an Orlando Magic uniform but the team logo and player number are gone. Also there are no other players around him, so either they were edited out or the video was taken at a slam dunk contest. I think other players were edited out because there is noticeable blurriness around the player especially when the camera moves. Really fun piece, its a great celebration.

The Return of Freakazoid

This is a tracing of logo of Freakazoid I did in Illustrator. Freakazoid was cult favorite cartoon in the late 90's. It followed the comical exploits of a computer nerd who transformed into the powerful, and insane, Freakazoid to fight crime and save the world.

Self Evaluation

I think that both projects for the mid term turned out great. They really capture the essence of what I wanted to convey. Little details like placing some mountains and balls on the SUV as reflections, adding shadows, and lightening myself up really add to make both projects more realistic. However, I wish I could have had more realistic looking reflections on the SUV and and a more realistic shadow for myself in Snow Planet Adventure and Championships Won Here, respectably. Overall they are two strong and interesting pieces.

Production Log

Championships Won Here- I was inspired to create this piece by those big bold Nike and Under Armour ads that promote training. I thought it would be interesting to put and athlete in a game uniform in a practice setting. I composited three pictures: one of my driveway, one of the back of a net, and one of myself in game action. I blurred the edges where the cut objects meet, used the dodge tool to brighten myself up, and used the burn tool to create my shadow.

Snow Planet Adventure-I wanted to create an unusual and fantastic world for an SUV to navigate. This piece is a composite of a Ford Explorer, two snow banks, and many reproductions of TCNJ's blue pixel. I blurred the edges where all objects meet and used the burn tool to create a shadow of the vehicle. I copy and pasted images of the snow banks and the balls on the SUV but I reduced their opacity to make them look like reflections.

Midterm Projects: " Championships Won Here" and "Snow Planet Adventure"

These are my too altered photos I did for my midterm. The first, "Championships Won Here," show an ice hockey player working on his shot in the driveway. The piece represents that championships are really won by the hard work done in the off season. The second, "Snow Planet Adventure," shows an SUV coming up a snow mountain surrounded by floating blue orbs. It represents the power of imagination and as people we should always be exploring new worlds and ideas.

Fixing a Photo

These are before and after pictures of of the view from my dorm window. The second is the original and the first is what photo shop was able to clean up.

Seeing the Light: making of "Lord's Hand"

Above are the two photos I compounded and altered to create "Lord's Hand."

Artists on SOCS

Professor Sanders put u a few interesting artists on SOCS that all have to do with imaging in some way. Gregory Crewdson digitally alters photos to create an unusual effect. By taking different pictures at the same place but at different times, changing the lighting and combining them together he creates truly unique work. Teun Hook is my favorite of this group and through the use of digital editing he places himself in fantastic situations like the polar ice caps. He edits so well it really looks like he is where he says he is and doing absurd things like sticking his head through paintings. Jeff wall is similar to Crewdson, but he takes far more ordinary subject matter, and distorts them credibly through digital editing. Cindy Sherman work is older and is not edited digitally. She took photos of her self as a celebrity in all the stereotypical poses. All of these artists produce very interesting images.

Lord's Hand

This is an altered photo I did in photoshop. It symbolizes God's superiority over the often misguided knowledge of man. Notice the glow of His hand reflecting off the roof of the library.

US Open Champion

This is a compound photo of me and the US Open trophy that I did in Photoshop. Tiger better watch out for me...

1st Photoshop Painting

This is a painting I made while playing around in Photoshop for the first time. It depicts an original super hero designed by me vigilantly watching over his city.

Inherited Traits

Last week I attended the Inherited Traits art exhibit here at TCNJ. Both of the featured artists, Nina Katchadourian and Heidi Kumao, took two different takes on the the common theme of family. Katchadourian's pieces had a more positive and nostalgic feel to them. Kumao's pieces were darker and highlighted the imperfect and entrapping qualities about family.

Points, Lines, Planes, and Objects

This photos shows points becoming lines, lines becoming planes, and planes becoming objects.