6/27/2017 0 Comments Phase 4This is my phase four photo. For phase four, I wanted to push myself out of my comfort zone. I hated the ocean. It was too big and scary for me. I also hated not knowing exactly what I was getting into, because I've always been anxious about the unknown. So I decided to go snorkeling at La Jolla cove, where I had never been before. I was so afraid that here wouldn't be anything good under the surface and that I would drown or get bitten by something, but I had to let it go. I faced my fear and I got an experience I'll never forget. I got lots of crazy good footage of the ocean life AND I didn't drown! I followed my original plan mostly except instead of writing a reflective piece, I wrote a poem instead. I'm more comfortable with poetry, but I still wanted to challenge myself. Usually my poetry doesn't rhyme, but this time I pushed myself to try to rhyme. The rhymes are a little weak, but overall it turned out pretty nice. For this phase I chose to read a book about ocean conservation. I wanted to read a non-fiction book because I wanted to push myself out of my comfort zone with that as well. I've always been a fiction person, so I decided to move away from that and try non-fiction. Oceana is probably the most boring thing I've ever read, but I think it helped me get more comfortable with the non-fiction format. I couldn't bring myself to read all of it, so I read there chapters on topics that interest me. I leaned so much about things like overfishing and how big industrial fishing rigs are killing fish populations, and ruining the ocean floor at the same time. I was bored out of my mind half the time but the information I did take in changed my entire view on things. Overall, I think phase 4 really did help me grow as a person, and I really appreciate the wonderful opportunities given to me by Mike, Andrew, and Kalle.
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5/29/2017 0 Comments Week 16PHase 4 updateWe went snorkeling on the 18th and went through bag footage, so I might have my final photo already. We plan on going snorkeling again on he 7th of June to see if we can get more/better shots now that we know what the water is like and what's below the surface. I want to get more shots of animals this time, because that's what I found the coolest about the underwater scenery. I forgot to write my reflective piece the first time, so I'm going to make sure I do it on the 7th. I also have to get through some more of my book. I'm really struggling with it because I think it's quite honestly the most boring book I've get read. I'm not used to non-fiction, but I'll never learn to love it if I won't try.
5/29/2017 0 Comments Week 15Above: my phase 3 photo Meeting Reflection:
When I went to my meeting, I already knew what I wanted to do. I planned to get underwater photography, write a reflective piece. I don't know what book to read but I figured Mike could help me find something. I had my proposal done and I brought it to get feedback to make sure my plan was secure. Mike and Andrew gave me good critique and asked questions to make sure my plan was fully though out. It helped me understand exactly what o should focus on and Mike helped me find Oceana, a book about ocean conservation. My meeting helped me make sure my plan was good, practical, and that it would be super rad. My final decision was to take go pro videos and take stills from those, to write a reflective piece and a poem about the experience, and to read Oceana by Ted Danson. 5/5/2017 0 Comments Week 14This week we went camping! My group got photos of the Milky Way galaxy with some landscape as well. We went to about 4 different locations to get photos: All the way across from our campsite, 2 destinations on a connecting bridge, and on a nearby hill. We had a 30 second exposure (which now that I think about it, might have been a bit too long) so we had to use a tripod to make sure the camera was steady. We also had to do our best to keep people from walking in front of our camera, which proved to be more of a challenge then I thought it would have been. I mostly helped make sure the camera was level, framed a couple shots, and kept people out of the shot. Other people in my group messed with the settings, as I'm sorta clueless when it comes to that kinda stuff. In all honesty, I didn't really get to do as much as I had hoped, but other people in my group had more of a vision than I did I guess and were mostly focused on their ideas. There are lots of great memories I made on this trip, but my favorite and one that I hope will stick with me is a story from our first night there. My group was waiting for 11:00pm to start taking photos, so to kill time we played a couple of rounds of uno and chatted. That's when a kid named David decided that he wanted to stay up till sunrise. He convinced my best friend, Maddie, and she managed to convince me and all my other friends to stay up as well. We all went on to take our photos. I drank a monster to stay up for our photos, Michelle went to sleep, and we all shivered until 3:00am when we were finished with our photos. I was 1000000% ready to sleep, but then David reminded me that we were staying up. Sunrise was at 6:00am, so we had some time to kill. Obviously that means we played more uno and talked about everything and nothing. It was really cold and we were all kinda tired and cranky, but we made it (Although Lourdes fell asleep a couple times so we had to wake her up.) 6:00 came, and if brought the LAMEST sunrise I have ever witnessed in my life. We were all lowkey mad at David (who swears he stayed up the whole time, but he totally took a nap before the sun stared coming up) but we also thought it was funny that we stayed up all night for a bad sunrise.
5/5/2017 0 Comments Week 13This week we mostly planned our hitlist for our Astrophotography camping trip, epoxied photo's, and had open work time. On Friday is when we made our tent groups, packing lists, and figured out supply's and food for our camping trip. It was probably not a great idea to leave all of that stuff till the last minute, but there's nothing we can do about it now. This week for both chemistry and humanities we focused on our photography hitlist for our camping trip. My group is gonna get pictures of the Milky Way Galaxy. Our object starts rising at 11:00pm and will be right aboive us at 3:00am, meaning between those times are our best chance to capture it. We have to be facing between East and North East and we'll locate the galaxy by finding the constellation Cygnus.
4/23/2017 0 Comments Week 12This week we had lost of open work time and writing time. We had to write one longer piece for humanities and two smaller pieces for humanities, so we had a lot of writing on our hands. In Chem, we learned about polymers, monomers, and the polymerization process through a lesson and and experiment in which we made slime. - How does epoxy work? Epoxy is a 50/50 mix of resin and hardener. The hardener acts as a catalyst to the resin, which means adding the hardener to the resin is what causes polymerization. A polymer is a chain of monomers linked together. An example of a polymer is PVA (Elmer's Glue) and borax. The monomer in this situation has two carbons with hydrogen around them on all of it's sides except for one. In the one open spot there's one acetate. This is what makes PVA or Polyvinyl Acetate. The borax acts as the catalyst, and adding it causes all of the monomers in the PVA to link together and create a polymer. Polymerization is just when he catalyst reacts to the monomers and causes them to form bonds with each other in all directions. This experiment help with the project because it helped us know what was going on with the materials we're handling. Now I know why the consistency of the epoxy changes while I mix it. What can we learn from light? What information is in light? Light can teach us about the elements that things like planets and stars are made of. You can tell by the kind of bands it makes when it absorbs light. Light also lets us see color. Color comes from an object absorbing and reflecting a certain energy/color of light. In humanities, we answered the question "How does the work of scientists, artists, and philosophers lead to wonder and curiosity?" In 350+ words. Below is how I responded to the question.
Scientists, artists, and philosophers all deal with life in the lens of their own jobs. They each deal with life and death, creation and destruction, light and dark. In the specific example of light, many people from each of those professions and more (including composers, poets, authors, scholars, and saints) were inspired by the phrase in which Genesis said “Fiat Lux” a Latin which inarguably translates to “Let there be light” in every translation. I think they were inspired by this because of all the different theories on how light began and how light affects life in such a dramatic way. Each of their ideals on light are different, so the phrase hits and inspires them differently. All the different ideals of the old great artist, scientists, and philosophers are some of what has shaped modern creation stories. Most of what people in these professions do, is made to make you wonder. Artists create things with a vision and concept. In the case of some artists, they create for the sole purpose of making others think deeply about what they've created and how it makes them feel. Sometime pieces involve abstract and high concept subject matter, and that makes people curious about what is meant to be portrayed in the piece. The meaning of an art piece can never be exactly known, unless the artist themselves explains it. Without being explicitly told, all people have are their thoughts and wonderings about the true meaning. Philosophers ponder deep subjects like the meaning of life and what is love? (baby don't hurt me) Philosophers are always asking questions which obviously makes you think, but the questions they ask are things that are widely accepted to be unanswerable. For example, there's no way a person could actually know for certain if there truly is another life after death, but that doesn't stop philosophers from asking themselves and others if there is. In a way, there whole job is marking themselves and others wonder about some of the most important things of life. Scientists cause wonder in many ways. For example, when scientists discover new things, people wonder how that thing has never been discovered and how the scientists discovered it. Scientists go through numerous tests, reviews, and revisions in order to try to prove that things they themselves are wondering about are true facts. In science, nothing would happen without wonder and curiosity. How would you know what to test and research if you weren't curious about something? Scientists are really really important and actually know what they're doing unlike some people (cough trump and pence and all the other conservative assmasters) and also global warming is real so take that. 4/16/2017 0 Comments WeeK 11This week we started preparing our final landscape prints. A group of girls including me (the same who developed for the last phase) were all interested enough in the process to ask to be taught how to help people epoxy the photos. Apparently, since we're all SO intimidating to other people, nobody said anything about us helping UNTIL a photo was messed up. Then people realized that they should take responsibility of their photo because in the end it's their's, and if anyone is going to mess it up it should be the person who's photo it is (although hopefully nobody else photo gets messed up). After that situation, the six of us decided to let people take responsibility for themselves by choosing to step back and not help other people with their epoxy. • How does each part of the process change/involve light? Each part of the process is affected by light differently. The light source in the actual photographing affects all sorts of things like color value and quality, contrast, and exposure. The lighting also affects editing, because editing depends on the light in the photo. For example, if your photo is very under exposed, when editing you'll turn the exposure up or if your photo is not saturated enough for your liking you can turn it up to make the colors pop. The resin blocks the glare from direct lighting and also blocks harmful if lightning rays that cause photo fading. • Why is it important to frame and exhibit work? It's important because for lots of things. For example, it gives you opportunities to learn and experience how to present your work. It also give all kinds of people a chance to see the work and see what your capable of. Presenting beautiful work feels all sorts of lovely, because is shows that you're capable of doing fantastic things. — What role does each step play?
There's 4 steps to creating beautiful photos, each of which are very important. These are the 4 with explanations in why they matter 1. THE PHOTO The original photo matters because of it's not height quality to begin with, it never will be. You want to have the highest quality and most beautiful picture you can get. You want something that would be good without the next three steps but great with them. Everything from the framing, to the balence, to the contrast should be top notch. 2. PROCESSING IN PHOTOSHOP This is important to make sure your photo is in its best form before print. You want to make sure all he details are taken care of, so that it's smooth sailing from here. Honestly, after this step, the hard work is done. You want to make sure to De-noise the photo to get rid of any pixelation, and to make sure your saturation, contrast, vibrance, and brightness are what you want. Once that's done, you do the necessary editing for the metallic photo paper, which usually includes balencing the red in the photo and turning down the contrast. 3. METALLIC PHOTO PAPER This paper adds extra dimension and wow factor to your photo. The sheen of the paper makes the photo look more smooth and professional. It especially brings out bright colors and highlights, making them look brighter and clearer and overall nicer. The paper is kind of expensive, but it just give our photos another layer of beauty and uniqueness. 4. EPOXY TOP COAT Epoxy serves many purposes. It makes it look more clean and put together, as well as adds depth to he photo. It reduces glare and give more opportunity to see the photo as it truly is, and it resists sun damage. It's truly a perfect addition to our photos. Not only does it make the photo look even better, which is hard to do at that point, it gives the protects the photo and gives it longevity. This is a perfect selling point, but also it's good to have insurance that all the layers of hard work put into the photo will stick around. 4/10/2017 0 Comments Week 10This week we mostly worked in our project groups. We also talked about matter and conducted an experiment with dry ice, as well as clean, revise our Steinbeck inspired writing, and write about someone else's photo. My project role is a Travel Agent. This week we helped plan out a trip to sunset cliffs. We helped with permission slips and the important details to make sure everything went as planned. In the future we hope to plan more field trips and make sure the calendar is constantly updated. this week in chemistry we played around a bit with dry ice. We learned about phases of matter and how to make he solid dry ice turn into a liquid. When we were playing with it, we found that pressing a coin into the ice would make a high pitched squeak/hiss noise, and I wondered why that was. I asked Andrew and he told me it was because the heat from the coin was causing the ice to turn to gas more rapidly, therefore creating vibrations between the coin and ice that cause the noise. Once the coin got cold enough, the noise stopped and the ice began to get cold and get some frost on it. Below are some photos of what that looked like Last week we were asked to write about a place we love in the style of John Steinbeck. This week, we were asked to revise that. The button below will link you to my piece.
3/17/2017 0 Comments WEEK 9In chemistry this week, we did an experiment where we took different elements from the periodic table and burned them to see what color they would burn. We learned that each element has it's own specific color that it burns, and that's how you can identify an element. This week we also picked out project roles to help move the project along. The role that I chose was the Travel Agents. The travel agents plan and organize field trips to go get photos. We gather information, create the permission slips, and accept or deny field trip ideas. This week we made a calendar of the rest of the year, and wrote in school events, such as staff days. We also practiced taking landscape photos this week. We walked around the school and took photos of the scenery. After taking our photos, we processed them on photoshop. As I said before, in chemistry this week we watched Andrew burn different elements from the periodic table to see what color they would burn. The elements we used were Sodium, Boron, Potassium, Copper, Strontium, Lithium, Magnesium, and Iron. Since they all burn different colors, if you're not sure what's in something, you can burn it and use the color of the fire to identify the elements. After doing the experiment we were asked: what is light? Andrew then showed us a video, which said, "Different atoms emit different colors of light, if we can measure that light, in principle we can determine what an object is made of, even if we can't touch it." In humanities, we were asked to write an essay about a place we love in the style of John Steinbeck. I wrote about the swimming pool that's a part of my apartment complex, because I love swimming and water in general. I wrote in a third person point of view, because i noticed that's how Steinbeck wrote. I also tried to be very descriptive, because I think that's what makes Steinbeck's writing so lovely. Unfortunately, I ran out of inspiration about halfway through, so my piece is not where I'd like it to be. Below is what I've already done.
Dipped-in toes and little bugs cause ripples on the pale blue surface, and the ever-present smell of chlorine washes over with the gentle breeze. fluffy white clouds float past blue skies, and between them you can see birds gliding by merrily. Bees and dragonflies gravitate to the flowers, while green scarab beetles fly clumsily past the (often unfollowed) rule board. Below the rule board there are brown reclining chairs, weathered from use and constant exposure to the ever-changing climate. Directly to the left of the board is the gate, which is locked to keep out those who are undeserving of the serenity of the clear blue water. The chill of the water can act as an escape from the thick heat of July, or perhaps a place to drown away the worries of life. Some days you may see children splash and play about, as already wrinkled and sun-dried men soak in the golden rays cascading down upon them. Other days, you may see a woman floating on her back to watch the birds fly past, with her ears under the surface to melt away the sounds of the world. Also, we did work in our project groups. My group made big project calendar of all the months left in the year. We wrote in important dates and already planned field trips. There weren't many, but we wrote them in anyway. We also made a form to fill out for people who want field trips, shared by google drive to everyone on the team. Our group is important because we're in charge of all the field trips for the entire team. This project requires lots of field trips and planned outings, so I'm glad I can be a help. 3/12/2017 0 Comments Week 8This week we planned our field trips for our landscape photos. Maddie, Lourdes, Dani, Tiera, and I went to Cowles Mountain and we plan to go again next weekend for even more photos. We also developed photos. Andrew bought more chemicals for our developer, and it ended up being slightly different than the one we were used to working with. Because of this, we had to figure out the problem and adjust what we were doing. We learned we had to expose the photos for a couple second longer, and keep the photo in the developer for longer. A problem we haven't solved yet is an issue with brown spots appearing on our photos. We don't know what's causing the issue as of now, so ext time we'll pay extra attention to try to pinpoint the issue. In Andrew's we're developing independent projects. A group of my friends and I decided that we wanted to make bath bombs. Bath bombs interest me a lot, because I have no idea what makes them fizz or what makes them hold their shape. I'd like to learn what causes the bath bomb's reaction to water, and learn how to form them correctly because from what I understand that's very important to the functionality of the bath bomb. Linked below is our project proposal. In Mike's, we were asked to write a 250-350 word essay about a panorama photo of our choice. I chose the above photo of Yosemite. Below the divider is my 250 word essay. In this photo of Yosemite, I see very vibrant colors. The trees and other plants stand out against the grey of the mountains and blue of the sky. I like how you can see all the distant mountains. I think it’s cool that you can see the texture of the jagged points fade away. I love all the details in the plants and mountain ridges. I think I like this so much because makes me think of a Bob Ross painting, due to how beautiful it is. The composition and depth of field is perfect for this photo. The fade of the sky into the mountains, and the mountains into the trees make the picture feel very clear and coherent. I think I was attracted to this photo because I love color, and the way colors clash and complement each other. There's lots of green in this photo, but I think the neutral greys and browns of the rocks and mountains balance it out, along with the bright blue sky. Speaking of the sky, the mountain peaks and clouds add a little bit of texture to break up the brightness and solidness of the sky. Another reason I feel like this picture is very well taken and beautiful is because there's not necessarily a particular subject, so your eyes get to wander and take in the whole photo. There's nothing specific to focus on, and I think that allows you to take in more of the details of the photo.
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June 2017
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