For this assignment, what i did was find an old image of an event online and use that as my background. If the photo isn’t black and white or sepia that can easily be changed with an everyday photo editing app. Next I had someone take a picture of me in front of a white wall so that I can easily crop myself into the old photo. That’s pretty much it!!!!

First off, I’m Jewish! It’s ok. This post could be considered offensive, consider this a way to start a dialogue about horrific events, a social commentary, a part of the grieving process, or just a plain old joke. Whatever makes you feel satisfied. There are no safe spaces, no trigger warnings, and no apologies. At the end of the day humor has a role in everything, and I’m just here to explore that. The world is too sensitive, and sometimes you just have to offend some people. BUT IT’S OK! I’M JEWISH!

This assignment is The Forrest Gump Project where essentially the task was to edit yourself into a historical event. This was worth 4.5 stars.

This utilizes two software programs, the first is Microsoft PowerPoint (for the coloring) and GIMP for the editing. While I wanted to utilize PowerPoint as much as possible (to show its capabilities), there is a point where you need dedicated editing software. A free program such as GIMP will work.

1. Put the pictures you need into photoshop. I put the background picture in as well as a reference to recolor. PLEASE NOTE I USED TWO PICTURES AS I WAS UNSURE OF WHICH I WAS GOING TO PUT IN. You may only have one picture in yours. IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.
2. Next, you must remove the background. Select the picture of you, and on the ribbon select “format” and “remove background.” The deleted parts will turn pink/purple, and you can move the edges to better get it. You can also select “mark to keep” and “mark to remove” around the fine points to further focus in. IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.
3. After these backgrounds are removed, you click “keep changes” and go back to format. At this point you can edit the picture to match your background using “artistic effects” and “coloring.” For this, I used “film grain” under artistic effects, and “grayscale” as well as “black and white” under coloring. IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.
4. Once you have the background matched up you can adjust the brightness as well, then SAVE THE PICTURES OF YOU AS A .PNG. This will keep the background clear as you move everything to GIMP. (If you do JPEG, it will make the background white).IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.
5. Now, you need to open GIMP. Make sure everything is saved first as separate .png files, and open GIMP and drag the files into there (do the background first). If you do not have GIMP, you can download it from here.  IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.
6. Now the picture is in, but unerased. While what you will have to do will vary, but my biggest concern was fitting it in. There are several ways to do it, but I chose by erasing. To open the eraser, click “tools” and open the toolbar. To get the options for the eraser click on “windows” and open the tools dialogue box. At this point, carefully and slowly erase yourself that is infront of all the foreground objects (the wire and the people). Do small strokes, so if you go to far you can undo it (control + z, or edit then undo). IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.
7. As you are nearing it, you can also edit darken or brighten the objects using the burn/dodge tool, and sharpen/dull it using the sharpen tool. To get the wire, I also used the eraser to erase the area around it, and used the opposite eraser to put back in right around it. To use the opposite of the tool, select the tool and hold alt. IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.
8. To finalize it, select “export” from the top, and export it as a JPEG. Enjoy! Follow these instructions and you’ll finish your project quickly and it will look amazing! And once again :IT’S OK, I’M JEWISH.