Final Reflection

1. I think my most successful project were the charcoal drawings. In this projects, I successfully explored the different concepts, took risks, and explored the different medium of art. I also think I was really engaged in this projects, and I kept persevering until I was fully satisfied with the project. My favorite part is how precise the details are and also the different values that I included. I remember being hesitant about making some of the parts too light or dark, but looking back, I'm really happy with how it turned out. 
2. The most challenging projects for me were the paintings in the color project. I think I was mainly hard for me to maintain the same shade of color, so I had to paint on top of what I already had if I didn't mix the colors the way I had before. I didn't really think about the textures when I started painting, so it was also hard for me to incorporate the textures. However, by the end of the project, I learned how to make meaningful strokes, which made each painting unique and more diverse.
3.  Composition- I think I improved a lot on making a composition unique and creative. I learned how to use new concepts like balance and movement to add a certain tone to my artwork. Compositions also include color, and I learned what colors make art interesting. All of these aspects also change the focus point of the art, so I liked how I was able to make the focus shift from one part to another, which also made my work more interesting.

         Photoshop- One of the units I enjoyed the most was photography, not only because I like taking pictures, but also because I learned how to use Photoshop. I feel like I really connected with and enjoyed the software because I found it somewhat similar to editing pictures, which I also like doing. I was able to learn about so many new tools like the lasso tool, which ended up being so helpful for all of my photography projects.

          

        "The main part of your composition doesn't have to be in the middle"- I think this lesson was one of the biggest concepts for me. Before I started survey, I thought all drawing and paintings had to be centered, but now I know that having the main part off-centered can be better. This especially changed my view of art during the rayograms, charcoal drawings, and paintings/diptichs, where I was able to experiment with my composition to make it as interesting as it could be.

Landscape Reflection

1. For this project, I wanted to incorporate texture into my drawings and pictures while also showing tension. At first, I didn't really know how to control the ink coming from the brush/caligraphy pen, so a lot of my drawings had many darker values, which brought out the lighter values and created a nice contrast. However, I wasn't as happy with that first one, since I thought they looked "messy," and I think part of that was because I could see where I messed up. For my next drawing, I was proud of it and liked how I gained control of the flow of ink, even though the mountains further away should have been lighter than the ones closer to the foreground. I also tried to make more meaningful strokes in the drawings, which helped to make them look slightly more polished. With all of these lessons that I learned throughout the project, I was able to make my final drawing (the picture of it is attached) my most successful, since it included a variety of textures and values. I became much more comfortable with painting the trees with the mountains, and I really liked how the leaves on the trees had a combination of light and dark values. I took a different approach when taking my pictures at Phoenix Lake. Although I still included the moments of tension, I unintentially took more close-ups than landscape pictures. I really like my first picture (attached) because the area where I focused it draws the most attention. I also like how the background has lighter and darker values mixed into it. I also liked my second picture because the tree roots create an abstract pattern.

2. Based on the feedback I got, I did a good job of using textures and contrast. Also, the people who wrote the feedback said that they liked how I used mountains to create a calming tone. Some suggestions were that I could have added more of a variety in my paintings so that it's easier to find a theme. In some of the paintings, I should have made the background darker than the foreground. I think I also should have also made my second picture a little darker to bring out the dark values.