From Checkbooks to Lipstick

A little glimpse into Blair’s life. Be Prepared, or Scared, or both……

For 3 mandatory stars, we had to create some type of bag for our character (What’s in Your Bag?), and spread its contents out. Now as you all obviously know (since you’ve read up on my character Blair). She is a mysterious woman, with a dark side. Below is a picture of her bag, as well as the contents of said bag.

Blair's Bag

Now, the details of her bag get a little obscure, but bear with me.

Her black purse is her favorite purse. Not only is it big enough for all of her belongings, it is big enough to hide her secrets when she needs to. She is somewhat of a klepto, and she likes to steal things from crime scenes. There is an old saying that girls are either purse girls, or shoe girls. Well, Blair is definitely a purse girl.

Now, you would think a checkbook would be used to document bank statements and uses of monies. Well not in Blair’s case. She uses her checkbook to keep track of all the items she has stolen from crime scenes. She is very organized, and has never forgotten to log anything. She puts the date, crime, and location, making sure not to make any mistakes.

Her trusty pen is always on hand. She uses this pen not only to write in her log book, but to do everything else that requires a pen. She refuses to use someone else’s. This pen writes exactly the way she likes. Blair is a lefty, so pens tend to smudge all over her hand when she writes. This pen, however, does not. It is perfect.

Next is her wallet. She never goes anywhere without it! Inside you will find the usual– License, Credit Cards, Debit Cards, gift cards, store bonus cards, pictures of her kids, some cash and a picture of her birth parents, folded in 4ths and tucked in the back. She found that picture online, but no one knows she has it. Her wallet contains everything she needs to get by when she is out and about.

Blair never leaves home without a pair of sunglasses. She has perfect vision, and she wants to keep it that way. She wears them even when it is not sunny, and she tends to push them up to rest on her head when she is inside. These glasses were given to her by her neighbor, as a gift for watching their cat, Puffles, when they went on vacation.

One thing Blair is obsessed with is her Berry Red lipstick. She puts it on before she leaves in the morning, and reapplies hourly. She has been wearing this same color since the death of her husband. Before she would wear a solid red, but now she feels as though the berry does her face justice.

What woman leaves home without a mirror? Mirrors are vital to check for blemishes or make up faults. Blair also uses her mirror to check behind her when she is trying to eavesdrop. This mirror is small enough to make it seem like she is just trying to fix her makeup, but it really has an ulterior purpose.

Her pocket knife is for protection. Living in Detroit, you come across some questionable people. She likes to have this on her in case of emergency. It is also part of her stolen items collection. She obtained this knife from a house which was robbed. She was cleaning up and found it laying on a table. She swiped it, and recorded it into her book. She has never had to actually use it yet…

Diapers. When you have 5 children under the age of 10, (3 that are 5 and under) you would have diapers too. You never know when you are going to leave the diaper bag in the car, or when one of the kids will have an accident. They are also VERY absorbent and can be used many other ways if you think outside of the box.

She obviously carries her crime scene investigator badge. She is not allowed on scene without it, and she sometimes uses it in ways she is not supposed to, especially to get what she wants out of people. While she is only responsible for clean up, she doesn’t have to  tell other people that. CSI is CSI.

Her house key is attached to a lanyard made by her oldest child Charles Jr. He made it for her at school during recess. While she thinks it is the ugliest creation, he was so proud of it that she couldn’t say no to putting it on her key. It does help her keep track of it.

Blair carries tissues, like a typical mother. Tissues can be used for your nose, for your mouth, to clean a table, etc. They are very handy and should be in EVERYONE’S bag or purse. You never know when you are going to need one. She only uses kleenex brand, though. She feels as though the knock offs dry her nose out, and she’d rather spend a little more to feel a little better.

Gum is something Blair lives off of. She always has a piece in her mouth, no matter where she is. It helps to calm her down. It also gives her rhythm to follow when she is walking. Another benefit is that it keeps her breath smelling fresh, just incase she comes across someone to be interested in.

This picture is something she found at a crime scene. It was in a frame hanging on the wall above a dead woman. She took it out stealthily and keeps it in her purse. Why this picture? No reason. She saw it. She liked it, and she took it. She does this often at houses she enters. This is the only one she has ever kept in her purse. The others are in an album inside her drawer of stolen items.

Lastly are a pair of skeleton keys. These keys came from the first crime scene she ever cleaned up. They were laying outside on the sidewalk next to the trash can. She saw them, and immediately took them. These are the reason she became obsessed with taking things from crime scenes. Every piece has a history. Every piece has a story that she wishes she knew the words to. She keeps these keys on her in hopes that one day she will find out what they open.

 

WOW. This assignment was rough. I used gimp to place all of the objects and bag in one place. It took a lot of adjusting, and resizing and moving and rotating. I must be a GIMP expert now….but really not. I got very fed up at the end. I then uploaded it to flickr and boom! I had given her an iPhone until I realized that didn’t really fit into her time period, so I decided against that. Her bag really tells a lot about her, and you can see that most of the items are normal, but a lot of them hide very dark secrets about Blair.

The objects were really hard to come up with. I don’t usually carry a purse, so I didn’t know what to put in it. I looked over Blair’s bio, and that is mostly how I came up with everything and their backstory. I love that she is a klepto at crime scenes because it allows me to expand on so many things, and make so many sub-stories. I really enjoy her character, and what I have begun to build with her.

It was a crazy adventure, but I definitely put way too much in her bag. If I ever did this again I would max it at like 4 or 5. Writing about each item became tedious, but I didn’t want to give up. I just got over anxious and really excited about making something meaningful that would relate to her life. Blair has become a part of me (which is a little creepy, but I can dig), and she is like a child right now. I can’t wait to come up with more things and make her story even bigger.

This puts me at 8.5 stars with 1.5 to go! Yippeeee!
(Also I’ve hit my character quota)

Golden Art Poetry

3 Stars

ds 106 visual A

I choose this poem because it is one that I have liked for a long time, and is one of the first poems I even memorized. I love Robert Frost’s work. For the background art I knew I would need two different extremes… life and death, spring and winter. The poem starts with the new and to me that meant a nice flowery, spring photo. But since its a short poem it quickly transitions to the death element. That is why my background changes so rapidly. But the glory with this poem is even thought it dies at the end you know the cycle will repeat, and spring will come again.

Glitched the Favre & Carve Way

Glitch Art    Unit 3 AssignmentSTARSTAR

Superbowl Sunday is coming up and WIX is promoting it’s website tool with former NFL stars with the slogan “It’s that easy”.

output_2sCbtvA Wisconsin born girl – my blood runs green and gold. Brett Farve even with the controversy is still one of the greatest Packer players. The Farve and Carve  spoof website has already drawn lots of views. True to #ds106 it employs audio, video, visual, writing – a nice example in itself.

For this visual assignment I made an animated GIF that is Glitch.  VisualAssignments1239

Glitch art is a genre of art based around digital artifacts. A digital artifact is the unexpected result of when a technology breaks. An artifact could be sound of a CD skipping or pixilation on a highly compressed Youtube video. Glitch has been called the “art of the artifact” and stretching the intended use of a device or file.

This is done with the assistance of a coders tool from the glitch generator. Running the original picture thru the generator and downloading the different results.

I then imported them into gifmaker and rearranged to create the gif. It probably would have been good to add another untouched picture in the loop to give the viewer a little more time to see the image before it gets glitchy.

For some chuckles take a listen to the product pronunciation page in which audio clips are placed saying items “the Brett Way”. And as one looks at this set up  – it is a digital story with a lot of nice techniques to keep in mind for future creations of my own.

Thoughts?

Survivors Will Be Bit Again!

This Visual Assignment is worth 3 stars. It is all about Creating a Warning Poster. Basically what you had to do is create a warning poster for whatever you wanted. I decided I was going to make one that was posted outside of my character Blair’s house. I had mentioned that she had a foxhound named Copper who was VERY protective of her and her family. You can read a little more about Copper in my 7-character Story from week 2. I decided to make this warning poster in order to scare away intruders. Here is the final product:

Beware of Dog1 copy

The making of this poster was not hard at all. Now I downloaded GIMP thinking I would be able to do everything on there. Turns out it isn’t as straightforward as I thought. However, I’ve been using Word for who knows how long, and it hasn’t failed me yet! I was able to use the publisher in order to make this. I started out with the words, and I downloaded some new fonts from DAFONT. If you’ve never used this website, you are totally missing out. Well after I figured out what I wanted my poster to say, I needed to find a picture of a fox hound. Now while fox hounds don’t necessarily look super scary in real life, the outline could be somewhat intimidating. I then decided he would look scarier with blood dripping from his mouth.

I then added the top and bottom border. The bottom is basically the same paw copied over and over. The top is just googled dripping blood. I thought that it gave the poster a scarier effect. I stuck with a red and black theme for a few reasons. Last semester in my Elementary Literature Class, I learned that red is a statement color, and that it very important in the picture world. I felt as though carrying that to this class would be a plus, and I plan to try and use that throughout the semester. To be honest, I would not want to go anywhere near that dog, and I think Blair’s point is taken away from this VERY accurately.

This makes me at 5.5 stars with 4.5 to go!
(Also with 3/5 towards Blair.)

Like Silk

This assignment is a ‘Visual Assignment’ for ds106 and is worth 2.5 out of the required 10 points for the week of 1/26 to 2/01.

I was drawn to this assignment due to the unique title (‘Shiny Like Silk’).

I wanted to make something that would mesh well with the colors on my site. Pale pinks and blues, paired with black, are quickly becoming my new favorite color combinations.

The website where I created this was a bit difficult to figure out, but nothing a bit of clicking around couldn’t fix. Altogether, the process was quite soothing, and reminded me of a similar site where you can make your own nebulas.

Both sites are super helpful when one is stressed out. They’re even better than a stress ball, because art is created in the de-stressing process!

silk assignment yay

ShakesPierre

Worth 2.5 stars, for one of my visual assignments I decided to do Shakespearean LOL Cat. Basically what you had to do was take a picture of a cat and put a quote from Shakespeare that had to do with what was going on in the picture.  This one was fun. I really love any assignment where I can feature my main man Pierre. (Back story/side track: He is going to be 15 in February. We found him back in 2000 in a rainstorm behind our outdoor gas tanks. He was covered in fleas and ticks and my parents didn’t think he would make it through the night…but here we are 15 years later. It’s okay to count a pet as a sibling if you’re an only child right?) Anyway. What I did was use a photo editor on my phone called InstaSize. I uploaded the picture I had of Pierre from Christmas, used a black and white filter, and then added the Shakespearean quote: “To sleep, perchance to dream – ay, there’s the rub” from Hamlet. Here is the final product!

pierre-speare

This assignment wasn’t too challenging, minus finding a quote that matched the picture. 2.5 stars down, 7.5 to go! (Pierre is also a half noir cat….that makes him more special right?)

Watch Out For Shadow Man!

Warning Poster- 3pts

– Here is a warning poster for my character, Shadow.

Warning-Shadow

Call Me Dora ‘Cause I Got a Backpack

What’s in Jota’s bag?

DCIM100GOPROG0080557.

 

For this visual assignment, you have to take a picture of what your character would carry in his or her backpack on a daily basis and then share a little info for each item! Jota (My character) seems to be tech savvy and a bit risqué.

List: (No order)

iphone 6 Plus: Have to stay connected with the world and stay ahead of the game all while doing it in style. Also great for calling mom whenever Jota needs some advice

Wallet: Credit cards, ID’s, cash, Insurance cards, Miami Top Golf membership card. Business cards. All essentials, all neatly organized.

Keys: Car keys, house key, NightClub master key, bottle opener

Extra Cash: Jota, also known as J-Money by his closest friends, always carries around some extra bills just incase life throws him an unexpected curve ball. Too drunk to drive you and that gorgeous lady back home from the bar? No worries, Jota is always prepared.

Oakley Sunglasses: Haters gonna hate so always carry some hater blockers. Also, Jota is a fashionable guy, always looking sharp and classy!

Pens & Sticky Pad: When you live life in the fast lane, a lot of information is spat at you on a daily basis. Jota will make sure he doesn’t miss one detail in that conversation he just had with you.

Versace Cologne: Life tip from Jota… Smell good. Your scent might make a lasting impression on that lady you met at the bar.

Condom: Like I said earlier… Jota is always prepared. Be safe.

Ipad: Nothing says business man more than a tablet with all the apps to wow anybody… or waste some spare time playing your favorite ipad game.

MacBook: If Jota doesn’t feel like wasting his time on games, he is prepared to get some work done for his new nightclub. From reading emails to typing proposals, Jota is a busy man.

Breathalyzer: Is Jota an alcoholic? lets hope not…

Flashlight: Being left in the dark is no fun. Jota’s dad told him to always have one handy. Never know when you could save the day with a little extra light.

Police Baton: This is considered a deadly weapon. This is meant for self protection. This item is to be handled responsibly and maturely. Other than that, no comment.

 

 

10-Step Photo Challenge

The 10-Step Photo Challenge is a visual assignment worth 3 stars.  It included taking 10 steps in one direction and taking a picture with each step (obviously the pictures had to be different).  I chose this assignment because it seemed like a fun thing to do because there aren’t many new things to see by taking just 10 steps but obviously from these pictures, there’s multiple angles and different ways to see things making so much more to look at. Here is the collage of my 10 steps!

10 Step Photo Challenge

I took the ten steps in my backyard, coming right out from my back door.  There’s not really anything interesting in my back yard but there’s more things to look at back there than there is in my front yard!  I like assignments that make you look at perspective like this one did.  I don’t think anyone would’ve guessed I only took 10 steps and gathered these pictures if they didn’t know what the assignment was.  It’s pretty cool to see how much of a difference perspective and what not can make to a simple collage of pictures.

Two and A Half Points of Abstracted Olly Murs

Sometimes all you need is to put your headphones in with the volume on high and get lost in a good song. While sifting through the assignment bank I found one where you were to go to http://weavesilk.com/ and create an abstract digital painting. I found this to be very therapeutic and relaxing, especially when I would close my eyes and blindly create the piece to the beat of my music. I ended up enjoying the process so much I made about five or six different pieces. Below I have shared my favorite out of the bunch as well as the song I listened to while creating it.  Also below I have given the link to the original assignment, which was worth two and a half points.

Here is the finished product!

ollymurs

http://assignments.ds106.us/assignments/shiny-like-silk/