From the middle of the semester until now I have become immensely more knowledgeable about Photoshop, InDesign, printing, etc. At the beginning of the second half of the semester I had no idea how to select printer profiles or anything, but now I am relatively comfortable printing. I have also become much better at asking for help. There are many times when I don’t know what I’m doing, and the old me would just try to figure it out on my on and fail. Now I look for my own answers, and check with someone that knows to make sure that I’m on the right track.

I feel as though I used a lot of time to practice, but not enough to practice everything. At the beginning of the sequence project I was nervous about using InDesign and Photoshop. So, in order to get better at it I would come to the art room around 10pm or so and work on my Photoshop images and how to do different functions. Then I would transfer them to InDesign and try to find out how to cool things with that. I did try to work on printing more, but I had trouble making time to get to the labs when they were open. In class I would take notes and pay attention, but the notes would make me more confused. So after class I would try to decipher the notes that I took. Eventually I began to understand what to look for and how to set up the printers.

I love getting feedback, especially constructive feedback. This is because I am completely new to the technological side of art and I know that I need help. So, when someone tells me that I need to change something I thank him or her and implement his or her input as soon as possible. I have learned that by listening to feedback, instead of getting defensive allows for you to learn faster. I always got feedback on my work from the people who helped me and friends who wanted to see my progress. Whenever I gave feedback to peers it was to help them think about different possibilities. This would sometimes come in the form of a question, to get them thinking. More often than not I will ask them to consider a different approach or to focus less on some things and more on others.

I have spent an enormous amount of time and effort working on my book. There have been days when I work on editing images for 5 hours strait, before eating. With all my art I put in everything that I want out of it. I know the janitorial staff that comes in the building to clean at 3am, because I am always working on art. This is my way of distressing and expressing my emotions, and myself so I believe that one can’t rush art. The necessary time must be put into one’s work in order for it to be good.

I have started many more projects based on what we have learned over the course of this semester. This has been the first time that I have ever used Photoshop and Lightroom. I love using photo-editing software and make any excuse to use it. However I haven’t really made more attempts to try and master InDesign outside of this project. I have worked hard to get more experience with specific applications, I just wish that I had spent more time this semester working on InDesign or trying to learn Illustrator.

I wouldn’t use the word sacrifice, because that would imply that I didn’t enjoy the art, but I did give up eating, sleep, friends, and games to work on my art. Throughout this whole semester I have received tons of feedback, all of which I have tried to incorporate into my art. I have stayed up until 5 in the morning working on my project because I was in the zone and didn’t want to lose momentum. As soon as I learned how to use Photoshop I worked on making images and pictures for friends and family. I’ve tried to at least work on one project outside of class that uses what we are learning, so that I can have a better understanding. I believe that I deserve an A, or at least a B+. I say this because I have spent an insane amount of time on each project and learning how to use the applications.