Ceramics Project

Like most ceramics, the medium for mine was clay. When the piece was finally finished it measured about 10.5 inches in diameter. While creating the project, the design element that was stressed the most was the form. I used many techniques when creating this project. We used molds such as a bowl or pot to either hump or slump the clay over. I slumped mine inside a larger bowl. I also used my hands to smooth and shape it, and various tools around the room to create a design on the inside of it. My piece can serve many functions, from holding food, water, or any small objects such as keys. I created the design for my project by looking at some of the radial designs we created in our sketchbooks. I then chose some of my favorites including the triangles pointing opposite directions and the circles radiating outwards. I also knew i wanted something around the outside of the piece as a part of my design so i included the small circles surrounding the top of the piece. I learned many things from the project. Such as the hump or slump method and what radial designs were. If we ever repeated the project there are a few things i would change even though i was satisfied with the outcome. I would paint the red clay on thicker, i thought is was thick enough but it didn't come out as opaque as i wanted it to be. Also i would spend a little more time smoothing it out and making it smoother on the underside because it was inside the bowl and it made it hard to smooth.

Landscape Painting

The landscape painting started with a few pictures we cut out of magazines or found on the Internet. We chose a painting for the sky, background, and foreground. We first practiced and arranged our composition by drawing a picture using sharpies. We used atmospheric perspective by making the things that were farther away in the painting, faded and less colorful than the things up close. In my painting specifically, atmospheric perspective was shown with the mountain's details not as clear as the trees and hills were up front. Light source was shown with the highlighting on the tree trunks. Also the mountains had many values showing it had a lot of depth and structure. The color scheme for my painting was analogous, using yellow, yellow orange, orange, and red orange. These colors allowed me to create a wide variety of shades and tints which i used for the sky and the trees, the ground being the darkest and the sky being the lightest. Also, black and white were used to mix with the colors i chose and also to use for any parts of the painting that were simply colored black and white. Brush strokes were an important part of my painting. Different kinds of brush strokes were used depending on what i was painting. For the sky, i used horizontal, back and forth strokes to create the gradient look. The mountains were different though. Mountains have a lot of value and structure. I  used diagonal motions with the brush either up or down, also going in different directions to show the dimensions of the mountain. To create a leafy texture on the trees, i took my brush and using only paint on the end, dabbed it everywhere i wanted leaves to be. This created a spotted look, mimicking leaves, and also allowed there to be space behind the leaves where the mountain could be seen. I used value in my painting by making the sky fade from a darker coral-red color behind the mountain, to a light pink, or cream color at the top of the sky. I also used value on the mountain with the gray-scale colors, this also allowed me to make the mountain appear more dimensional.

Pastel Still Life Project

I planned my pastel still life composition by setting up the candy so the pieces touched slightly, but not enough to where the labels couldn't be seen. I also wanted most of the space in the picture to be filled, so i kept that in mind when planning the composition. A thumbnail sketch is a quick, simple drawing of what you would like the final outcome of the project to be. It is important so the artist knows whether or not their composition is correct and if things should be moved around a bit. We used view finders to help us with our compositions and thumbnail sketches. The view finders helped me see what my still life would look like depending on which part of it i chose too draw. We would look through the view finders at different angles and create thumbnail sketches to get a better look at our compositions. To make the items in the still life appear three dimensional, I made them over lap slightly, then added shadows on the candy below it to show they were touching. Also, i used the techniques we learned in the perspective unit to made box like shapes for the pieces that were wrapped that way. We created light source by adding shadows below the candy on the table and also where the candy overlapped and touched. Also highlights were added to the areas where the wrappers appeared almost shiny, and where the piece itself appeared lighter.