Final Project: NouNou Tweaks

The final project for art 120 was as such: choose an object, take its picture and with that image apply many computer and hand done techniques to it in order to produce new and unique imagery. The project encompassed file management, book construction and binding, printing methods, scanning and creative image generation in many different methods. I chose my old teddy bear as my object. He is named NouNou, which is what teddy bears are called in France. I was born and raised there for my first twelve years and my first nanny actually made me the teddy bear. Finding suitable digital image manipulations was difficult. I ended up making quite a mass of them and then choosing the ones that worked. For the handmade treatments I was most interested in finding interesting textures that would complement NouNou. One of my favorite hand manipulations was the one in which I used colored pencil shavings. I really liked the marrying textures within that treatment. I created and assembled the book cover. The cover's fabric is made out of synthetic fur, just like NouNou. The actual binding with the book cloth was a little difficult... I discovered that less PVA glue is better. Overall the final book suits its purpose and honors NouNou! Bellow are a few pictures of the finished product as well as some of the finished images. More can be found here!

Fourth Ten Tutorials (Read/watched)

Tattoo Removal
I wanted to check this tutorial out since I have this tiny tattoo on my left ankle that I really hate and wish i would have never gotten...of course! Instead of just using the clone tool this tutorial really shows you how to really remove a tattoo and leave the skin looking untouched.

Cool Graffiti
My boyfriend loves graffiti and is really good at it too. I'd like to attempt to do some rad graffiti and maybe show him up... although he naturally has an advantage. The graffiti look is explained in just 13 steps...loves it!

Image into Text
This tutorial seems like a trick most users should know how to master. It could be interesting to have compelling words matched with compelling imagery.... literally.

Leather Strap Logo
I thought this tutorial could be useful for learning how to make labels that are versatile. The tutorial is clear and easy to follow.

Jacinth Juice Effect
I looked at this tutorial since its title intrigued me. What is Jacinth juice? The final image looks like crawling larva or something. Weird....wonder what this could be used for...

Split Toning
This tutorial looked like a cool effect to do on images. The video is five minutes. Spilt toning is a multi step process, much more than I had expected. The end result is nice though.

Stencil Effect
This tutorial shows you how to get a raw stencil effect out of an image. I really like the high contrast in the image. The treatment gives the picture a comic book look which can look really cool with some images.

Desert Time
This tutorial shows you how to create an imaginary desert landscape. The final image is nice. I think it has the potential for a book cover or even a movie's poster. The time and effort needed to complete this one is great..but worth it.

Colorful Web Layout

This tutorial's final layout is interesting. A little too eighties for my own taste. I think that happened due to the combined image pattern choice that was used. If done with complementing images the result is much more successful. To do or not to do a portfolio-resume webpage....?

Special Layout

I was attracted to this layout since I really like layouts that are intimate. The tutorial's layout is one that resembles the wall of someone's living room or something. Everything is magically neat and it really gets you motivated to snoop around. This web layout uses people's natural curiosity to its advantage.

Second Completed Tutorials

Image Manipulation

This tutorial was quite long and extensive. I chose to do it since I liked the visual effect created by having duplicates repeated at lower opacities with extra goodies. The motion lines that the tutorial seemed to be overbearing for this little bear. I therefore excluded that treatment. This tutorial was helpful since it directed me toward a several sites that have great plug ins, brushes and the like. It was like being in a great candy store picking and choosing minus the sugar rush...

Colorful Posterization

THis tutorial seemed like a great treatment to apply to my teddy bear. There were a few nice tricks demonstrated in this tutorial which was made it even more fun!

Thermalized NouNou

This tutorial looked like it work well for my teddy bear. UNfortunately my teddy bear doesn't have enough depth in his structure. This minimized the coolness factor of this thermalized treatment. My little bear still looks burning hot!

Nounou's Got Cracks

This tutorial came handy in establishing a cracked paint look to my teddy bear. The tutorial was helpful, useful and thorough. The author made it very easy for anyone who wanted to either follow along using their own imagery or by using his.

Third Ten Tutorials (Read/watched)

Watercolor Text Effect

This tutorial looked cool. I think this type of text effect would be great for posters and banner ads. A few nice tricks are given in this one which is always an added bonus!

Making a Gold Medal
I thought this tutorial would be fun to use at some point. Who knows I may be asked to create some gold medals...and I could bring them to reality digitally using this tutorial. The process is fairly easy which is great.

Virtual Auto using 100 Brush Techniques

This tutorial is extremely long. Generating a virtual car from a photograph of a car is a lot of work. I sometimes wonder how exciting it would be to design cars. I wonder if they use adobe software or if there are other programs that they use. In any even this tutorial would be fun to do some long rainy afternoon!

Changing Brush Sizes SUPER FAST
This video tutorial shows you the various ways one can change their brush size without having to go up to the main navigation bar. Sometimes its hard to visualize all the ways and their benefits, but this video does just that! I would recommend this video to anyone who is about to use their brushes.

Making a real looking Light bulb!
I wish I would have found this tutorial when I was constructing my Sagmeister postcards in order to create a better looking or more realistic lightbulb. The tutorial seems to be quite easy to do.

Mental Hospital Scene
This tutorial seemed like it would be fun. I love horror movies...and well the final product is slightly horrific. The man looks like he was just maced. Poor thing...in a straight jacket and maced! It also looks like the mace is producing smoke which is then shaped in his screaming face! This would be fun to do for a halloween card or an anonymous card to some insane person...

Modern Web Portfolio Layout
With the world becoming more and more tech savvy it seems like it might be necessary these days to actually have a web page with your resume and portfolio. This demonstrates your tech savvyness among other things. As I have been thinking of how to produce an attractive web page; I felt like this tutorial would be useful in guiding me in the right direction. I love black...so it was a good guiding start!

Apple in Disguise

This seemed like a fun tutorial. It shows you how to take an object and make it look like it is unzipping its suit. Out with the old in with the new... I feel like this type of image manipulation could be used well with cosmetic products...for cellulite for instance... you could show a woman's cottaged thighs being unzipped to reveal smooth beautiful legs!

Clean Blog Theme Design

After looking at some professional blogs out there I wanted to find out how difficult it is to design one myself. This tutorial shows you how to design a "clean" blog theme. The tutorials design is not of my taste. Nevertheless, the tutorial is resourceful.

Ward's Deleting Whites

Ward Jenkins was a special guest in our class. He did a live tutorial for us which was done using Ustream. It was great to see the tutorial and be there during its recording.