Homework Due 4-25-12: Photos of Classmates

Homework for 3-14: KONY 2012 Questions

1. Summarize the documentary KONY 2012 in one paragraph. What is it about? (one paragraph) 

        The main idea of the video is raising awareness of the actions of a man, Joseph Kony. The video describes the awful things Kony is doing in central Africa, kidnapping children, killing innocent people and abusing human life. It explains that they want to make Joseph Kony a household name, not for people to praise him, but so as many people as possible can know of the horrible things he is doing and also to make a community of followers. The video tells that if enough people know about Kony, then it is more likely for him to be captured and brought to justice.  

1. Why did the filmmaker choose to make this film? What does he hope to                     achieve? What is his specific goal and what is his strategy for making it happen? (1-2 paragraphs) 

        One thing the filmmaker mentions is his personal connection with the subject, through his relationship with the boy, Jacob, who lives in Uganda. I think there are definitely other reasons why the filmmaker made the video, but I think the main reason is because of his personal appeal. 

       During the course of the video the film maker mentions many times what he hopes to achieve through the video. He wants to raise awareness for what is going on with Kony and what he is doing in Africa. There are many different ways to raise awareness about something, but I think making a really compelling video is a great way to do it. I think the video is just really a tool to get people engaged about the subject. Just like the posters, bracelets and shirts are also tools. 

1. What is your personal opinion on the strategy he is using to raise awareness? Is it effective? At some point, people get tired of seeing "the same old posts" about an issue. Some of you have already asked the question "what's the point of this video?" What is the point? Even if you're personally tired of seeing links and posts about it, do you think there is value in saturating the media like the film proposes? What would you do different? (1-2 paragraphs)

       Personally, I think this video was an excellent way to get the massage out about Kony and was we have seen on facebook, it was been very successful in doing so. The effects in the film were very good and I found them extremely compelling, I think because the video was interesting to watch, it made more people drawn to see it. If the film was just someone sitting telling you about Kony for half an hour, I think it would definitely be less popular and would have raised a lot less awareness about the subject.

        I think at some point a portion of people might get tired of seeing all of the “Kony 2012” posts on facebook and other websites. I bet most of those people who will get annoyed with the Kony posts are those who have not seen the video yet. If they start to understand what the video is about and what the motives are, I think  they will realize all of posts and “shares” are for the purpose of raising awareness about an important topic. So although all of the talk about Kony might get old, it is for a good cause. I think most people can appreciate that.   

1. What do you think about about the idea of making a "bad person a celebrity?" Are there any negatives to this approach? (one paragraph)

        The whole “make Kony famous” idea was quite new to me and it was a very interesting way to make the subject popular. It has definitely worked though, for he has become fairly famous and most of the people I know have either heard of him or seen the video. I think there are certainly downsides to this approach. Some people might have a problem with everyone knowing who he is. A possible reason might be because the awful things Kony does are pretty disturbing and not exactly something appropriate for everyone. This could be a problem if it were common knowledge.

1. What is the difference between raising awareness and between a call to action?

        For me, I think “raising awareness” is more just telling someone something, rather than actually asking someone to do something. While “calling to action”, I think, is actually calling people to do something. This video can do both, depending on how the watcher reacts to it. The video does raise awareness, because it holds information about a subject and makes people aware of what is going on. On the other hand, it also does call to action. Many times it asks to please share the video on facebook and let people know about it; I see that as a type of “calling to action”. 

1. What is an issue you feel strongly about - strongly enough that you would want to not only raise awareness, but call people to action? Be specific - in other words, don't just choose a topic like 'eliminate world hunger.' It doesn't have to be a global issue, but it should be a specific, definable one where you are proposing a specific solution. What is a specific way to focus on that topic? Ask yourself the following questions: 

• What is the issue? Bullying 
• Where is it? It is really everywhere. In schools across America and other countries, but not only in schools in neighborhoods, even in households.    
• Who are the people affected? I think it is mainly children who are immediately effected by this, but when you look at the big picture it is more than just children. When a kid is being bullied his or her self confidence can drop, sometimes to the point where the kid will put himself down, verbally or possibly by cutting themselves. When it gets to that point, I would say its not just the child who is being effected, but that child’s family and friends as well.  
• Why should people care about this issue? I think bullying really is one of the biggest issues in schools. People should care about it because it is harming people everywhere and that’s really not cool. If every person had their fullest self confidence it would be a much happier world. By preventing bullying I think people would be stronger and generally happier. 
• What can people like you do to solve the problem; to help? For me personally, this really is not a huge deal, mainly because I go to a pretty small school and it just does not happen a lot. For most others though, I think the main ways to help solve the problem is to, first, not bully someone else and, second, when you see it happening just try and stand up to it. If everyone did these two things I believe this would no longer be an issue. 
• What specifically can people do? When you see someone being verbally or physically abused in the hallway of your school. If it is not a situation where you could stand up to it yourself, talk to someone else about it, maybe an adult. Try and get other people involved, because the fact is none can really do this on their own, it takes a community. 
• How could you use the media to call attention to the issue? In the case of “Kony 2012”, the main way they got the word out was through a video. The fact is, there are a ton of other videos out there: anti-abortion videos, anti-terrorism videos and a lot of anti-bullying videos too. With Kony that one video happened to catch on, maybe just because it hit the right group of people at the right time, who knows, but it did. I’m not saying you have to do something media related to catch attention, but that is a good way. There are lots of ways to use media to spread an idea like bullying, you could write articles, make a video, post on facebook, whatever you think your biggest area of influence is.
• How can you get people's attention? Most everyone knows about bullying in some way or another, but I think lots of people just take it for granted and do not do much, maybe because they just think it is a normal thing that will always happen. The fact is it really doesn’t have to happen and it can be stopped. I think a good way to get people’s attention is just by spreading the word, talking to your friends about it. It might not be a big thing like creating a huge video or making a speech, but even just small things like talking to people about it can make a difference. 

-Grant William Howard Snodgrass

Homework for 2-29-12: Final Pictures

These are my four final photos on the subjects: Spouse and Society/The Lost

-Grant William Howard Snodgrass

Homework for 2-22

2-22-12

Grant Snodgrass 

Rough Draft of Talk

          I really want this talk to be pretty casual and laid back, but still sort of deep. I think I have two subjects which can be very influential, so I think its important to capture that. I also really do not know what the format for the talk and pictures is going to be like, this is just my rough draft.

          “Hey, my name is Grant Snodgrass! For the past two months or so, I had the privilege to capture, through photography, two really impacting topics on how God interacts in the world around me. Those two subjects are: spouse/significant other and society/the lost. I really enjoyed thinking about and photographing these two subjects.

          On the topic of spouse/significant other, I really wanted to show how relationships are a gift from God and how we can benefit from them. When God made humans, He did not make just a man or just a woman; He made both. I believe this is because men and women are meant to have a relationship with one another and not be alone. I am fortunate to have a really great mother and father who demonstrate this connection for me. 

          The second subject, society/the lost, I particularly enjoyed. I really feel like this is one of the biggest places God interacts with us. If you look around you, where you live and the people who are there, that is your society. Here in Portland, there is, for sure, an interesting society of people. There is a pretty big mixture and in it there is definitely a good amount of those who are lost. It says in Mark 2:12,“On hearing this, Jesus said to them, ‘It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick." I think this is a really cool point which relates to the topic “the lost”. Everywhere around us there are those who are lost, including ourselves in some ways. I think we just have to be open to let God work through us with those who are lost and less fortunate than we are."

-Grant William Howard Snodgrass

Homework for 2-15

Shot list for photos:

Subject: Couples

• LS, Maywood Park Bike Path - Lauren and Lance facing away form the camera, walking away and holing hands or having their arm's around each other. I want this image to show binging in a relationship is a sort of walk on a path and a journey. I would like it to be late afternoon so the sunlight shows through the trees onto the path and to have a really warm feeling to the picture
• MS, Street - Ideally, I would like this one to be Lauren and Lance standing in the street hugging or something of the sorts. Hopefully under the street light so most of the image is pretty dark, except the two subject who are lit from above. I want this one to portray a more sad emotion, not completely depressing, but like they are separating for a long time and are saying good bye. 
• MS, Inside on a couch - I want this picture to display the fun that can be had when in a relationship with someone. The past two images were more serious, while I would like this one to have a more fun feeling about it. I would not know, but from what I see, people who are married and have a significant other really do tend to have a good time with that person. This is what I want to show here. 
• CU, Outside in the grass - My idea for this one is for the two subjects to be lying in their stomachs outside in a yard. I want the frame pretty tight, with focus on the two’s faces, while the background of the image is out of focus so the attention is completely on the detail of the faces. 
• MS, Inside a kitchen or living room - I would like for the photo just so be of, ideally, my mother and father. I want for the two subjects just to be standing in the room with their arm’s around one another, just to demonstrate companionship and company in a relationship. 

Subject: Society/The Lost 

• MS, Sidewalk downtown - This would be very hard to do, but my idea is to have the focus be on someone standing in on the sidewalk and have the rest be blurry, possibly with people going by. This is a pretty rough and far out idea, but something of the sort I would be happy with. Because the subject, “Society/The Lost” is pretty broad and I think it is hard to plan when taking photos out in the real world because you never know what you’ll find. 
• LS, Along building wall - I would like to capture the action in society. An idea I have is taking a shot along the wall of a building and showing the movement of everybody. I also want to sort of use a wall or something to frame the picture on the side, for I think if a photo has too much going on without a framing it can be confusing to look at.
• CU, Bricks in Pioneer Square - I know for a fact, on each one of the bricks in Pioneer Square there is a name printed. I would really like to do a shot where the camera is level to the ground and the image is of a lot of the bricks and names, with one singular name in focus. I think this would show a sense of community in the society, with all the names of people put together in one photo.
• MS, Homeless man - I think a big part of “The Lost” are those in need and such. In Portland there is, for sure, no shortage of those in need. I would like to do a picture of a man or woman who holds a sign on a street corner. I think there would be a lot of emotion in an image like this. For the technical side, I think it would be really cool to have the main subject maybe, actually not in focus. This, I think could portray how people like this can tend to be brushed aside, without being noticed. 
• ELS, Portland - I would really like to do an extreme long shot of all of downtown, or at least most of it. This would be from the East side of the river, similar to what we did for night photography in our class photo shoot. “Society” is really nothing individual, but a group as a whole. This is why I think it is good to have a photo of the whole society in which I live. This will definitely be hard because of the camera I have and it’s lake of wide shots. 

-Grant William Howard Snodgrass

Homework for 2-8-12

Where I see God interacting in my world:

Spouse/Significant Other:

I believe that relationships are a gift from God. None of us would ever be the same without our relationships in our lives. Just think about spending your life on a deserted island, by your self. This is the type of idea I would like to capture in my photos, that we would not be the same without relationships and more specifically romantic relationships.  I am blessed to have two parents which get along very well and are extremely significant characters in my life. Because of this, my mother and father are definitely two subjects that I would like to include in my photos. The other major romantic relationship in my life is my sister Lauren and her boyfriend Lance. These are two very awesome people and I can really respect the relationship that they have. So, I would like to capture their relationship in my photos as well. I do want to capture that the subject is romantic relationships, so just holding hands and such, but obesely nothing to intimate. If we just look around there are so many ways God blesses us with marriage and significant others. 

Society/The Lost:   

This subject I am particularly excited about shooting. To me society is the biggest place where I see God interacting. As as for the lost, I definitely see God interacting here, like it says in the Bible “it is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick”. I do not think this means God doesn’t work thorough all of us, but particularly those who do not know him is who we should be interacting with. For this subject I would love to go to a more urban environment, such as down town Portland or really anywhere more urban. I would  really like to capture the culture and society where I end up shooting this, even if it is just in my neighborhood. Portland is definitely filled with lost people in the society, so I do not think I will have a problem finding places to shoot. The only dilemma is it can for sure be awkward to go up to someone you don’t know and ask to take their picture, this is the main obstacle I believe I will have to face for this subject. 

-Grant William Howard Snodgrass

Homework for 2-1-12: Tools

Tools Palette Customization: This allows you to change the what tools you want to show as well as the ordering and grouping of the tools. You can do it by going to preferences > Tools.

Burn Tool: It allows you to darken parts of your image, while keeping the photo natural. You can adjust the strength, size and whether it affects the highlights, mid tones or shadows.

Sponge Tool: This one just allows you to saturate or desaturate parts of your image. It can be helpful for naturally bringing out or not certain colors of the picture.

Clone Stamp: You can take a sample from part of your image and essentially stamp it in another place with this tool. With it you can retouch images by taking out or adding things to the picture. 

Versions: This one is really cool because if you make a mistake which a simple "command-Z" can not fix you can use this tool. It keeps ever different version of your image and lets you access all of them in a timeline, then you can just pick the one you want to restore your image to.

Full Screen: The title discribes this one. It just lets you edit and use in pixelmator with full screen.

Auto Save: Again, the title discribes what this tool does. Pixelmator will auto save all of your work so you don't have to manually press "command-S" every now and then. 

Getting Pixelmator: This one isn't really a tool, but just how to get Pixelmator. You can buy it in the Mac App Store and it will download to your applications folder.

Dodge Tool: This is the opposite of the burn tool. The Dodge tool allows you too brighten specific parts of your image Again, with it you can choose to adjust the highlights, mid tones and shadows. 

Smudge Tool: This one I find really cool and helpful. What you can do with it is smear parts of the image to make it look smoother. 

Heal Tool: I really wish I had this tool for the assignment last week and I think its pretty cool looking. It is essentially a large clone stamp tool and it seems to work seamlessly so you can take out large or small parts of you picture. 

Eyedropper Tool: With this you can sample a certain color from your picture. With that color you can then go on and paint.

Red Eye Tool: This is a pretty simple tool. All it does is get rid of the red eye which sometimes happens when taking a picture with flash. It will automatically fix it or you can manually by using the tool over the eye. 

Layer Group: This tool allows you to group certain layers to make them easier to manage. Once you have them as a group you can edit them as if they were a single group. 

Crop Tool: Like a normal cropping tool this one just allows you to crop out different parts of an image. When you are copping, the tool also uses lines to show the rule of thirds. 

Exporting Images: To export an image go to file>export. From there you can choose which type of format you want and then just click "export". 

Opening Images: There are a few different ways to open an image in pixelmator. The first is to just go in to file>open and choose the correct photo. Another is to just drag an image from your desktop straight into the pixelmator app in your dock. 

Polygonal Lasso Tool: With this you can just select parts of your image using straight lines. To use it just open it in the tools palette and start clicking to make the points for your selection.

Magic Wand Tool: You can select the backgrounds of images with this tool. Just select it and use it by clicking and dragging outward 

Marquee Tool: With this one you can select round areas of your picture. It can be good for selecting eyes, balls or really anything roundish. 

Lasso Tool. Like the "Polygonal Lasso Tool". Although, with this one you can select freely, instead of just using straight lines for selection. It can be good for choosing parts of the image which are more gagged and rough.

Gradient Tool: You can create a gradient from one color to another with this. You can do a variety of different gradients with it, like from the center out, diagonal, side to side, etc. 

Remove Backgrounds: You can do this by using the magic eraser tool. This can be helpful if you just want a single object without any kind of background.

-Grant William Howard Snodgrass