Midterm Self-Evaluation

My goal for the midterm was to seamlessly incorporate my manikin (in various poses) into my photographs of random TCNJ locations. I came up with this idea because I wanted to do something simple but also interesting, and I believe this idea fit that criteria.

I tried using both old and new photoshop techniques. Some of the older techniques were simple size transformations and movements. The newer techniques included the distortion and warp transformation tools, which I used when I created the shadows and reflections, the dodge and burn tools, which I used heavily on the manikin itself, and layer masks and color adjustments. I made sure to have a non-destructive work flow and I accomplished this by duplicating my original images and then modifying the duplicates.

Through the course of the project, I learned that poor photographic lighting can be a challenge. Instead of taking a poorly photographed picture and trying to edit and modify it in photoshop (post-production), I learned that modifying the way the initial picture was taken (pre-production) can be much simpler.

Because I have limited experience with Photoshop and I have a heavy scientific rather than artistic background, I had some trouble figuring out how to incorporate the manikin naturally. However, I believe I accomplished my goal for the midterm. Overall, I enjoyed working on the project and I was particularly proud of the image containing the manikin and the purple pixel.