A pack of Extra gum, the reason for all the wrappers
Three pieces of Apple technology
Three books, a small fraction of my assigned reading
A notebook for my film class where technology is not allowed
More pens and pencils than I’ll use, maybe once a week
A calculator for my FIN 201 class
The Emory water bottle given to all students at move-in
My house keys, untouched since leaving home
My Emory ID and dorm keys, now part of my daily routine
My wallet
A tube of Aquaphor and an old lip gloss
A few Halls cough drops from when I had the freshman flu
A single Starburst from Wonderful Wednesday
I think what is in my bag represents that average college student. With some aspects of my personality showing through. Specifically, almost every college student has a computer or some piece of technology in their bag, but the only difference with mine is that it’s covered in stickers. I think this illustrates the creative side of my personality. I chose to format the contents of my bag in a neat rectangle format just because I thought it looked best this way. I have so many things in my bag that it makes more sense to spread them all out instead of putting things on top of each other. What was most challenging about this assignment was organizing my items. I kept changing the order of my items until I got what I liked. Personally, I don’t think my bag represents me as a person that much. There are very few personal items in my bag, and I think personal items are a big part of understanding someone, especially when it’s just based on a picture of what’s in their bag.
Trying to think of an idea to complete this comic took me longer than expected. I didn’t realize how hard it would be to compress a story into only 3 panels without overcomplicating it. I looked up 3-panel comics on the internet in order to get inspiration and realized that the comic could be pretty simple. For my comic, I made it somewhat simple. In the first panel, I have a man walking down the sidewalk with a dog off to the side behind a fence. Then, in the second panel, I have the man petting the dog. And then in the 3rd panel, I have the man walking away, ending the story. Creating this was very different from the past assignments we have done in this class. This is because, for this assignment, you had to be more consistent with your drawing since you are creating a story.
The image on the left was taken by India Iacono and the image on the right it from Flickr
I started out this assignment by searching Flickr for possible images that I could crop into one. After 10 minutes or so, I found this task much harder than I initially thought it would be. I eventually settled on the idea of doing something with a fish. I originally wanted to do the head of a fish and the legs of a person. However, I couldn’t find a proper photo that I could crop in as the legs. Then I realized that since I was doing a fish, I could change my fish to a goldfish and have the second half of the body also be a goldfish, just as it would be the snack. My final image is like a play on words because they both have the same name, but the images are completely different. One is a goldfish like the animal, while the other is a Goldfish like the cheesy snack.
While creating these visual notes, I realized that I was double-checking all of my work in order to make sure that I would be drawing the correct thing. In a way, this was good because it forced me to check my work and make sure that I truly understood what I had written down in class. I discovered that having to break it down into images was helpful and allowed me to further grasp the concept. Personally, I enjoy drawing, and I liked incorporating little images into my notes, so this was a fun experience. What was helpful for me throughout this process was tracing images that I found on the internet and changing them into something that worked in my notes. I was expecting my visual notes page to be a lot more packed with information, like my class notes. However, because of the use of images, it helped tell the story of my notes more clearly.
While creating these visual notes, I realized that I was double-checking all of my work in order to make sure that I would be drawing the correct thing. In a way, this was good because it forced me to check my work and make sure that I truly understood what I had written down in class. I discovered that having to break it down into images was helpful and allowed me to further grasp the concept. Personally, I enjoy drawing, and I liked incorporating little images into my notes, so this was a fun experience. What was helpful for me throughout this process was tracing images that I found on the internet and changing them into something that worked in my notes. I was expecting my visual notes page to be a lot more packed with information, like my class notes. However, because of the use of images, it helped tell the story of my notes more clearly.
While completing my literacy narrative assignment, I found it a lot easier since I was telling a story rather than writing an analytical paper. Doing the memory exercise allowed for my writing to have a lot more imagery than it typically would have. I learned that I do enjoy writing essays and that it can be fun, especially when there is less structure. Throughout the paper, I discuss what it was like for me to go to a school that didn’t know how to properly teach students with learning differences. And at the time, as an undiagnosed kid with dyslexic, I had to deal with always feeling behind. I think that someone may think the most interesting sentence from my essay is “From that day on, I missed social studies class for the rest of the year.” Just because even now I’m surprised at the fact that I would have to miss one class in order to catch up on another.
When first starting this assignment, I had trouble finding an object that I could turn into an art piece. I looked throughout all my drawers in my dorm and finally settled on an unused lightbulb that I had once planned on using for my room. At first, I was going to turn it into a balloon, but realizing that it would be too simple, I changed my idea to a hot air balloon. The biggest trouble I had with this was figuring out the scale for the basket. In my first sketch, I made the basket too big and in the second, too small. Despite this being a drawing, I still wanted it to look as realistic as possible, and for that to be true, the balloon part of the hot air balloon needed to be significantly larger. For my final sketch, I added in some clouds and birds, further representing that this drawing was taking place in the sky.
I chose to create my avatar as a collage incorporating aspects of my personality, such as where I am from and things and places I love. Specifically, the background of my image is a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich on a roll, which is one of my favorite foods. In the foreground of my image is my name with different cut-outs, with some of my favorite places in New York City (where I am from). The I in this image is the view I have from the corner of my apartment building, which is of the Empire State Building. The N is a cutout from the subway line, the one train, that I used to take to school every day. The D in the collage is the Washington Square Arch, a park that I would walk through on my way home with my friends almost every day. Finally, the A is a picture taken from the Battery Park Pier on the lower west side of Manhattan, facing Jersey City, another spot that I would often visit with my friends. All these images were taken by me throughout my years of growing up in New York City.
