Visual Analysis of Final Piece

When I first look at this piece, my eye goes directly to Trump’s face, more specifically his mouth. I think this is because his teeth are blue which is different than the rest of his face. Then my eyes extend through the rest of his face in order to see his entire expression and then I find his finger waving in the air, which really completes the expression and look. Finally, my eyes go down to the words and read those. This appears to be done on the computer using more of a graphic design method, therefore you can not see the hand of the artist in the piece. The piece is not entirely symmetrical because it is not centered and his hand throws off the symmetry but besides that, it can almost seem symmetrical because of that fact that it is a face. The piece is definitely balanced, however, due to the colors that are used. The color scheme could be triad but I think there is more just a use of the colors of the USA flag because of the presidential aspect of it. The denotative meaning of this is just that Trump is able to build a great wall and you should believe him to be able to do so. However, the connotative meaning is something completely different. This piece seems to be a play off of the Obama “HOPE” poster. Where in that poster the red, white and blue is used to mask the race of Obama, here it is just used to copy that poster because race does not need to be hidden because Trump is white. This seems to be making fun of Trump as a candidate in the election. Anyone who has heard him speak knows of all the stupid or rude things he has said, so this piece really points that out and highlights that. It also does this, not only by the words, which is a stupid quote from Trump himself, but also through the photo used. In the Obama one, he is extremely hopeful looking and it is a good positively promoting photo, whereas this one of Trump is extremely unflattering and embarrassing. The ideological meaning is meant to reach out to the voters in this upcoming election and to show them that Trump is really not fit to be president because he is seen as such a joke to so many people and even just through the things he says, he is not fit for the position. I think this piece does a good job at highlighting the flaws that Trump has by not only taking one of his not so smart sounding quotes, but also finding one that talks about an idea he plans to put into place if he becomes president, the wall to keep out immigrants. By doing both of these things and including the embarrassing picture, it really shows the amount that Trump should be down played and not highly thought of.

            

Final Piece Breakdown

I am doing a piece very similar to the Obama Hope Poster that Shepard Fairey did. Mine is going to be a play off of it in spite of the current campaign that is going on. I am making mine of Trump, only instead of a serious picture I m doing a funny/embarrassing one of him and I am changing the "HOPE" to make a joke of him and have it be something stupid that he has said. This is meant to be a humorous piece that is just a play off of what Fairey did for Obama during the 2008 campaign. I am working my first draft of what I did, however I am in the process of editing it so the slogan will most likely be different and possibly other aspects of the piece.

The Shape of Time

I was slightly confused when reading The Shape of Time article. I am not sure for what reason that was, I just feel like the way the writer was talking was not making much sense to me. But overall the writer was talking about how important timing is in an artist’s career. He talked about a lot of different points off of that one, but that being the over arching theme. The one the really shocked me the most was when he started talking about how talent was even that important to an artist, as timing is because is you are an artist during this “bad” entry time period then you will have no shot, regardless of how good you are. This was just kind of mind blowing to me because I was trying to compare this to other aspects of life and if you were to say that about athletes, for example, it would be a crazy situation. It would be saying that if you were born in a “bad” year for the sport then no matter how good you get and how hard you work at that sport; you will never be good enough to make it big time. This just seemed like an unreasonable thing to say because if you are that good at something, I think you will be bale to make it. I am not saying that timing does not matter, however. Timing is a very important aspect in just about everything. I know that with recruiting for sports, if you are a specific position and the team does not need that specific position for your year, they wont even look at you, so in that sense, timing is a huge part of what you are trying to do.

            I could not understand the Biological and Physical Metaphor section of the writing. I just could not follow what the writer was trying to say by any means. I did not understand how this section even really related to the rest of the article so far. The it started talking about the “history of things” and how depending on the things you pick, they will reunite ideas and come together.

            In the Scientists and Artists section, it started that there is nothing to learn from artists studying/pursuing different specialties and the same for biologists and chemists in different sections. I disagree with this. I think that there is a lot to be learned from people doing things that are not exactly the same as you are. There is always something that you can learn from someone else’s experiences. For example, in volleyball, I am constantly learning things from people who are not in my position (or specialty), and for this reason I am a better player. I think that if artists did this, rather than secluding themselves, they would be a better and more well rounded artist in the end. Sticking to one thing is very tough and I do not think it is the best way to go, you should always try to be a well rounded person, regardless of what you are doing.

The art of data visualization

I thought this video was extremely interesting because they were talking about the beginning of data and how it evolved. They started off by talking about how the first data was recorded through cartography and how the first map was scratched into a piece of stone. To me that is crazy how much it had grown to what we have today. How it went from drawing on a rock to the extensive system we have today of google map, which they reference in the video. Also, how the data that is provided for us is actually doing things and helping us now, especially through google maps, because it navigates for us and follows us as we go to help us get from one place to another. 

         The next part, about knowing if it’s a tiger coming toward you, was also something that was thought provoking to me. I was probably most interested in this part because it went more along the lines of things I am interested in learning about. They talked about how data visualization relates back to science. I have always been interested in the sciences, so this was right up my ally. The way that the human body analyzes the things we see and turns it into data is the very out side of ordinary thinking. Most people do not sit back and think about everything that happens subconsciously while going about life. However, as brought up in the video, there are so many things that happen in our minds that we are unaware of, like thinking if the grass is just moving or if it’s a tiger that’s going to come and eat us. The amount of things that happen in our very own minds that we don’t even know about is so crazy.

         The other thing that we don’t realize is how much of the data we take in comes from visualization. Just about everything we see in a day can provide us with some sort of data, whether it be using google maps, or reading the news or stocks, these things will be taking into our mind and processed in the form of data. But not only that, it may also come from seeing a certain group of people, which would then get processed as data and your mind will tell you what kind of situation you are in for example. The things we see are countless, therefore the amount of things our mind processes in a day is unthinkable.

         Overall, I felt that the video was very straight forward in what they were saying and it was not confusing. I agree with what the people were saying, probably because a lot of what they were saying, especially about the mind processing visual things into data, are things that I have thought about on my own. The only thing that slightly confused me was one of the guys at the end when he talked about the relationship between data and culture. The things he said were just confusing to me for the most part.