Introduction
“How can I use unconventional forms to express myself?”
For this project, I pushed myself with creative risk-taking through poetry, music, art, and web production and discovered my personal art style and aesthetic. In Digital Media, I was challenged with programs like WordPress, DSLR Cameras, and Pro Tools. Design pushed me to be more creative and think outside of the box with our conceptual creature made in Adobe Illustrator.
When I first learnt about Freestyle requiring students to take English there, I was disappointed as English is one of my favorite classes and I was hoping to take Honors English. However, what I didn’t expect that when I came to Freestyle, English would end up being my favorite class. Gaining confidence to speak up in discussions and getting valuable feedback on my writing, it has been a great experience. In Digital Media 1, I valued getting to understand complicated programs and technologies and even use them in my daily life. After learning how to use the DSLR Camera, I ended up being the designated photographer for my brother’s 18th birthday.
Haiku
In Freestyle, all the assignments are tied together in our classes. With English, this Haiku project was the first of the year. We were giving a randomized prompt sounding like: I am feeling _ through __. My prompt was I am feeling elation through looking through a macro lens, and also had to take a photo that is related to our haiku. For Digital Media, I used a Tascam Audio Recorder to record me saying the poem, and used Premiere Pro to edit the audio with the poem.
I valued the challenges I ran into in Premiere Pro. For a short and simple video, it sure took a lot of little details to make sure everything was perfectly timed and looked aesthetically pleasing. However, it was equally as rewarding to see the final video.
Poetry
In English, we read works of free verse poets like Ada Limon and others, and were given full creative liberty to make our own – it could be about anything! Incorporating that with Digital Media, we learnt how to use Photoshop to edit the words of the poem onto a photo that we took, and later used Dreamweaver to make it available on our website with both the visual and audio, which was a big challenge for me.
“Codependency” is a free verse poem about learning how to be okay with the company of yourself, and not having to surround yourself with people all the time to feel fulfilled and to avoid loneliness. The speaker in this poem is close to me, and in this poem, she is getting food and reflecting on seeing two people having a good time as she is by herself. In the first stanza, I use an objective correlative to represent associations with independence and get the readers to reflect on their own associations and experience with the speaker seeing the two friends talking together, and feeling sad, and even envious. When the tone changes from yearning and sadness to a sense of peacefulness, the speaker’s attitude toward independence and being by herself shifts from bleak, to hopeful and serene. Ultimately, the pattern of imagery in this poem shows how the speaker views herself and her growth as a person throughout the poem. In order to improve this poem, I adjusted my stanzas and general organization/punctuation in order to develop a tone and convey a sequence of events. In short, I would like my reader to come away with the idea that it’s okay to not be around people all the time and to reflect on their experience with codependency and feeling incomplete.
Photoshop Blend Modes
In Digital Media 1, we were learning about Photoshop and the different blend modes we can use to edit photos and make them more visually pleasing and used our own photos. While I did run into lots of technical difficulties with Photoshop, I overall enjoyed the experience and saw how I can apply this photos taken everyday.
