cptmedboy-blog

[mercymaker]

ok so this is a massive fear for anyone who creates any kind of edits

but like... i see so many gifs these days that seem a bit.. uh, overexposed? and i’m not sure if it’s a new trend or something and i’m just being a boomer

oooooor.. is my monitor fucked and that would mean that everything i create is under-exposed? ?? ? ? ??????????

[mysticsparklewings]

Terrarium Nova

Would you guys believe this started out as me trying to practice trees & use up some leftover paints sitting in/on my palettes from other projects?   The tree practicing is for a different project I'll be doing later, and I'll share the specifics of then   But yeah, I have a good amount of leftover watercolor dried onto a couple of cheap palettes, as well as some acrylics paints in a palette meant to keep them fresh (but unless you monitor it and spritz them with water every couple of days, they will still eventually dry up) and I really hate to waste any of it if I can help it, especially when it's my slightly nicer stuff. (Some of it was, some of it wasn't) So I figured I'd try to kill two birds with one stone, and the end result ended up looking pretty cool, although I do still have some more paint that didn't get used here, so this may not be the last random-ish painting you see from me. Oh, and I was also recycling a little bit since I used the back of a giant piece of watercolor paper I had previously used as a protective mat for my desk. I started with the tree shapes, mostly inspired by Bonsai trunks, and that actually did use up pretty much all of the dark brownish paint I was using, so I was off to a strong start. Then I went in with some metallic watercolor that was leftover from my Butterfly Babe piece, which dried with more of the black and silver I had mixed into it on top for reason unbeknownst to me, so the first little hill/mound I made naturally came out darker and more silvery than the additional hills I added later than came out decidedly more gold. I think after that I added in the orange sun/planet (in my head it's the sun but a lot of the details here are very ambiguous in what they could potentially be) and an accompanying orange horizon line. Originally, I thought I was going to be making a very sunset-ish background with possibly a very red sky and mixing the yellows in more, but that obviously didn't end up happening. I was kinda just going with what I felt like and where the paint wanted to take me. So I ended up going in with the yellows (and later red and magenta) leftover from my $50 vs $4 Watercolors piece (these ones being the $50 ones, the $4 ones were put on a separate palette while I was using them so I wouldn't get the two mixed up) and ended up making many yellow hills to fill out the background some more, though admittedly the ones on the left kinda got away from me a little. And I'll pause here to say that I was using water brushes throughout this entire piece as opposed to actual paintbrushes, and every time I use those (at least when I'm getting proper water flow) I find that I tend to have a somewhat easier time getting certain watercolor effects, mostly when it comes to blending out hard edges. It's funny to me, as a lot of artists would say water brushes have a higher learning curve than regular brushes, and I'm sure some have a harder time with them. I think the main reason I have an easier time might be because back at the beginning of the year when I started re-discovering watercolor, the first set of paints that got (the Viviva watercolor sheets, for anyone who's curious) came with a water brush, and at the time I had never used one and was really excited to try it, as well as I just didn't have a ton of brushes at my disposal. Likewise, I spent a lot of my time learning watercolors on a water brush, whereas, naturally, most artists learn primarily on regular brushes. To be fair, I would like to one day invest in a slightly nicer set than the cheaper set of different size water brushes that I currently have, as these don't always flow correctly and at least one has a very slow leak where the top screws on, which hasn't caused any painting problems but is just kind of annoying because it very slowly gets my hand wet while I'm using it. Anyway. I then decided I hadn't used enough of that metallic paint and went in and added some dots of various sizes in the sky, since I didn't really feel like trying to make proper stars of any kind, but I wanted more up there and that seemed like a good place for more metallic paint. After that, the plan was to start on my red sky, but I started putting the red down and realized I hadn't cleaned my brush very good, so I got this interesting shimmery darker red color, and since I had already messed up, I liked the color enough I decided to make a moon out of it, which is why that red pot is hanging out over on the left side there. Why this "moon" and the "sun" are out at the same time, I couldn't tell you. Sometimes things just happen in art. That led me to the decision that instead of covering the whole sky in a color, I would just add some clouds, and I decided to got with the expensive magenta on my palette. Things were going fine until I grabbed more paint than water (as I was hoping for kind of pale/blended out soft clouds) and I ended up with some pretty nasty unblended lines one of the clouds and it was notably darker at the top than the others. And so I introduced the technique of "this one cloud got messed up so the rest of you have to suffer!"  And I also kind of had to be okay with none of the blending and layering on them turning out super smooth or nice for consistency's sake. And you know, it's not fine art or anything, but it doesn't look as terrible as I thought it was going to. (Though that could really be said for this entire piece. ) I also ended up adding in the purple-y mountains in the foreground after feeling bad that I'd neglected some of the paints I'd originally been intended to use the most, and I think in the end it adds a nice contrast and kind of ties the magenta clouds into the piece as a whole more. I knew I still wanted to do leaves on my trees, which were still just bare trunks and branches by this point, but I wasn't sure what I wanted to do for them yet, so I did this kind of dome thing for the sky, after acknowledge I did not want to have to try and get a smooth, consistent blue wash around everything else I'd already painted in. (Yes, I once again forgot the principal rule of painting--put the background in first) While that dried, I took a break to ponder my next move. I hadn't used any of the acrylic paints that I had leftover (more than I originally would've had too, as I ended up making a sign for my mom that I haven't decided yet if I want to post or not) and one of the colors was green, which is a very basic choice for leaves, but I already had so many other strange colors going on that the basic blue sky and some simple green leaves didn't seem like asking too much. So then I just had to decide what the leaves were going to look like. In the end, I went with using the back end of a paintbrush to dot on some of the green and some of this pale, yellowy color, and a little of a mixture I made using those two colors together (originally for the sign, not this), and I tried to place the dots in mostly realistic places for leaves. And admittedly I could've done a lot more leaves and really filled out the trees, but I felt like it looked better with more of the trunk and branches showing. I also went with the dot thing partially to carry over the dots in the sky. I'm not really sure what kind of theme that is, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. And then last but not least, I signed it with a purple gelly roll, trying to balance in both color and placement just a wee bit. Funnily enough, the most tedious part of this process was actually what came after it was finished. Because I was working on a giant piece of watercolor paper that was previously a mat for my desk, and I wasn't really sure how this was going to turn out, naturally I wasn't really thinking about what size I was painting at while I was working. And wouldn't you know it, my poor painting here ended up being too long to fit in my scanner all at once.  So I had to cut it out of the giant piece of paper and then scan it twice; once to get one end, and then a second time to get the other end. Then, of course, the two pieces had to be stitched together in Photoshop, which wasn't too bad. I then spent more minutes than I care to admit trying to figure out how/to what extent the best way was to single out the little oval-ish shape of the painting, as I thought that would be much nicer than leaving the ugly bits an pieces of white scanner background. I tried to keep the actual edges smooth, though I nixed the idea of having it be a perfect oval shape right from the get-go, mostly because of how much of the edges would get cut off in one area or another. So the shape itself is very imperfect. Still, I think in the end everything turned out pretty nice. And admittedly after how the later part of last week went for me, it felt really nice to just kind of go in and not really worry about the details or if everything was turning out exactly right or whatever. Sometimes you need to do something that's just loose and has very few rules to it like this. Personally, I think I really needed this at this time in particular, and for as unplanned and simple as it is, I'm really happy with how it turned out. The title is a little random; the shape and what I did with the sky kinda reminded me of a terrarium, and much like a nova is the birth of a star, this was a pretty spontaneous birth of a...planet, I guess.  I almost called it "Terra Nova" (roughly "earth star birth") but upon Googling that because it sounded familiar, I decided I did not want to name it after a movie that came out in 2011 that I know nothing about and have no affiliation with. Anyway, things might be a little slower on the art front this week, as I have a bit of a tall order to-do list, but for the foreseeable future things are going to be somewhat interesting here; I finally ordered a gouache set I've had my eye on, and it should be here by the end of the week, as well as the tree thing I mentioned at the top of the description, and another project I've done some preliminary work for...Jeez, I have an awful lot to try to squeeze in before Inktober starts, don't I?   Perhaps I'd best go and get started on all that. ____ Artwork © me, MysticSparkleWings ____ Where to find me & my artwork: My Website | Commission Info + Prices | Ko-Fi | dA Print Shop | RedBubble |   Twitter | Tumblr | Instagram

[tokyomagic-blog1]

Blog Post 2

Hello blog!

Recently I was part of an audience when playing the brand new video game Red Dead Redemption 2, by Rockstar Studios. I played this game for roughly 10 hours the first day it came out, on October 26th. My girlfriend was angry that for a few days, I didn’t want to hangout as when I had free time, I just wanted to get lost in the vast world that the new game had to offer. Instead of getting involved in petty arguments, I should have just referred her to the five categories of needs. These needs include cognitive needs, affective needs, integrative needs, social needs, and escape (Oct 18th lecture). In my case, escape was the reason I was choosing to spend so much time on the game. After finishing my weekend shifts as a mechanic, I am tired. Being tired from a 9 hour shift, I find I can put my mind at rest by kicking back, and playing an exciting video game. Some people think video games are stupid, and a waste of time. I find that the same people that say this, will usually watch hours upon hours of Netflix and feel that they are superior to gamers. At the end of the day, they are both entertaining forms of escape that allow us to unwind in a relatively healthy way. I tried to explain this to my girlfriend, who has no problem with hours of Netflix, but seriously dislikes video games. This could have all been explained to her with the 5 basic assumptions of the uses and gratifications model. This model basically says audience are considered active, and media use is directed toward particular goals of the individual. The audience member takes the lead in linking need gratifications with specific media choices (Oct. 20th lecture). As an audience member, my needs are always changing. Sometimes I want to sit back and watch sports, sometimes I want to watch informational videos, and sometimes I want to watch The Joe Rogan Experience (well maybe more than sometimes, I haven’t missed an episode since 2015). It all depends on how i'm feeling, and what gratifications I am looking to achieve. After finishing a long day at work, I wanted to play the new video game I have been anticipating for years to unwind, and the model of uses and gratifications shows that there is nothing wrong with that.

While playing this game I often find that I am at a moral crossroad. The main character of the game that you play as is named Arthur Morgan. Arthur is a cowboy in 1899 America’s wild west. He is part of a gang that is on the run, and makes their money from various crimes. Arthur is a ruthless criminal, with the occasional soft spot here and there, which makes him extremely likable, even though he commits bad crimes. As an audience member, I feel that many who play this game feel the same way about Arthur. Bandura’s theory of moral disengagement comes to mind when thinking of Arthur. The theory of moral disengagement states that viewers use rationality to either excuse immoral behavior or redefine it as moral (Sullivan 2013). When it comes to playing Red Dead Redemption 2, I feel that I use moral disengagement often. Even though it is just a video game, I find myself so wrapped up in the game that my emotions are heavily involved. For example, in the game you have the choice to make good and bad decisions. I often find myself feeling guilty when I am forced to make a bad decision. When I feel Arthur has done something morally impermissible in the game, I find myself justifying his bad actions with multiple reasons. These reasons consist of the fact that he is doing bad things to help feed and clothe his gang who took him in as a little kid and took care of him. I also think of the fact that he had a terrible childhood, and how that led to him making bad decisions. Even though it is just a video game, I get just as invested in a character as one would with a television series character.

One reason I really like this game as well is the violence. I think the textbook describes pretty well why video game players would enjoy violence in a game. The textbook says that “media functions as a form of “play” and place for self-enhancement and entertainment. This world of play allows viewers to confront difficult real-world issues in the refuge of a safe, virtual environment. It can also allow a viewer to explore the darker side of humanity”(Sullivan 2013). I think this is completely true when it comes to video games. I am the least violent person, so these games allow me to experience things that will more than likely never happen to myself. I also think these video games are a great place to release any energy that is not positive. If I was stressed, I’m sure playing these games would help me blow off steam (I haven’t really had the opportunity to try it, I’m rarely ever stressed!).

When I am really hooked on a video game, I experience a great deal of intertextuality when consuming other forms of media. For example, I was just watching the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. When watching this movie, I couldn’t help but constantly think of Red Dead Redemption 2. Everything was triggering connections between the two. The Texas landscapes, the cowboy clothing, the southern accents, almost everything. Comparing the two made me so eager to play the game. It was my first time seeing the movie, and I found it quite corny. I was not a big fan. This could also be because I was so focused on getting home and playing my game. Anyway, I find that this happens quite often when being really invested in a game, and it can get very annoying. When I am in a situation when I am consuming media, I keep making connections and its all I can think about. I guess that’s just how the mind works when you are really set on something.

My involvement as an audience member can be explained by the four modes of audience engagement discussed in the interpreting and decoding reading. One of the modes discussed in the article is the transparent mode of audience engagement. The transparent mode is when “audiences read the “text as life”. The individual may suspend his or her disbelief and get “lost” in the fictional world of the text” (Granelli, 2016). I can completely relate to this when it comes to playing Red Dead Redemption 2. For example, when I kill an innocent person, I am so wrapped up in the game that I actually feel pretty guilty about it. I definitely relate to getting “lost” in a text. Playing for hours, getting more and more lost in 1899 Texas is something that happens quite often to me. I wouldn't have it any other way. There is something so fantastic about getting so involved in a game, playing for hours, and feeling emotionally invested in the characters and the story.

I think video games overall are a misunderstood form of media. I think many people are coming around to bashing the stereotype that video games are a waste of time, and only nerds/lazy stoners play. However, there are of course people who still believe this. Video games have been an integral part of my upbringing. Playing for hours with my older brother as little kids will always be memories I cherish. I have amazing memories of first moving to Canada in the fifth grade. I thought it was amazing that these friendly Canadian kids invited me to play the Xbox 360 online with them. Those early days of online multiplayer gaming allowed me to make a group of friends who I am still extremely close with to this day. They allowed a kid to who felt like an outsider in a new country to find belonging. Luckily, my mother was always supportive of my video game hobby, unlike some other parents. She always told me she did not mind me playing at all because I could be out somewhere making trouble instead. I can’t thank her enough for this mentality when it came to letting me play, because I had friends who were extremely monitored when it came to the amount of time played. This led to them acting like crack addicts when it came to playing, and it's all they ever wanted to do, constantly trying to sneak in some extra time. It's also all they ever do now, since they moved out. Since I was allowed to play whenever, I got a healthy relationship with playing, and didn’t much care if I couldn’t play for a couple days. I always would choose playing outside, or hanging out with friends over playing. I think the parents micromanaging their play time heavily affected their process gratifications. Process gratifications are obtained from using media (Sundar and Limperos, p. 510). Since their parents affected their process gratifications when it comes to video games, I have seen some friends quit jobs, and drop out of school over a bad video game addiction that most likely stems from their parents. This is the sad part of gaming, but it could happen with almost anything in the world. Everything in moderation, even moderation.

Being a part of the audience that played Red Dead Redemption 2 has been extremely exciting. If only my girlfriend understood the uses and gratifications achieved from playing such a game! Oh well, I will always be a part of some video game audience, so it is something she will have to deal with. Writing about this topic makes me wish that everybody could experience the joy I have throughout my life as a result of video games. Audience members of video games are often misunderstood, but I am confident that the old way of thinking that surrounds them is disappearing.  I can’t wait to share my love of them with my children, but don’t get me wrong, they will be playing outside often!