Friday, April 5, 2013

Week Seven: All Done!

Words cannot describe how happy I am to have that TED Talk done. I have never liked speaking infront of crowds, and speaking on a stage did not make it any better. My painting on the stage however did break the ice for me. Before I was even ready everyone was laughing, and I was too which calmed me down. After that I was ready to go!

I feel like my TED Talk went smoothly even though the sound didn't work on my video. I was able to improvise for that. The prezi went well and everyone seemed to enjoy the painting and the video!

Grading:
Visual Component: I had a prezi for my presentation that had some words, pictures and a video but did not control my presentation. It was more of a reference for me to point to and to show examples with. The sound for the video did not work though.
Inspire Through Your Passion: I think that I showed the audience that giving up on something is never a good option because if I had given up on painting like I did when I was seven, I would have never known I like it.
Show Your Product: I had my final product on display and I also had a video of me completing it.
Explain Your Process: I explained how I talked to my art teacher and did research to figure out which type of painting I wanted to learn. Then I talked about the different techniques I learned and showed the different paintings I did to practice the techniques. I also explained the process of the final product.
Purpose: My purpose was to teach the audience how patience can help you find something you love and I believe that I got that across well.

The TED Commandments:
Dream Big: I honestly think this has been one of my best presentations that I have done. I was able to make the audience laugh while also being serious at the same time. I grabbed their attention before even beginning to speak which made my presentation even better.
Show the Real You: I talked about my past about being impatient and talked about my passion. What I said came from me but I had to reference to my note cards a few times.
Make the Complex Plain: I gave examples of my past and the process. It was easy to follow and pay attention to.
Connect With the People's Emotions: Before I even started talking I had the audience laughing!
Don't Flaunt Your Ego: I talked about the negatives along with the positives.
No Selling From the Stage!: Nothing was for sale during my presentation and I didn't ask for anything!
Comment on Others': I did not do this but maybe I could have to connect to the audience better.
Don't Read Your Talk: I did not read from my note cards but I did refer to them a couple of times to make sure I was staying on track and I did not miss anything important.
End Your Talk On Time: I did not go over onto anyone else's time I think...
Rehearse Your Talk: I did rehearse my talk but not infront of anyone other than myself. I usually don't because I have never been comfortable with giving presentations and speeches. I could have done some more rehearsing.

All together I would give myself a 28-28.5/30 because I could have done some more rehearsing and not have had my notecards. This would have shown that I know my topic well and I should because it is my passion. I think that reading from notecards makes speakers lose a connection with the audience which is a big part of presentations. Without this connection you lose interest and respect.

If we could do this project every year I would. I found this fun and made me relaxed because I got to do something that I now love to do. Even the presentation was fun to make because it was about something that I like and not something that I'm being forced to know. I am happy that we did this project and I hope we get to do one in the future and future gifted classes will get to do this as well!



Monday, April 1, 2013

Week Six: Voila!

It took a while but I finished my final product! The process required a lot of layers, paint and washing of brushes. Listening to music helped me concentrate while I was painting and drowned out what ever was going on around me. It took me about four-to-five hours to paint the piece, but in the end it was worth it because I am happy with my piece.





I have learned from this experience that patience is a key part to painting because of the different layers of colors that are needed to create depth. Before this, I didn't really have much patience which is why I gave up on paint-by-number when I was younger. After completing this I know that in the future I will be able to be more patient when I am working on projects or tasks.

While I was painting I would decide to go back to something that I had already worked on and redo it, or add to it because I did not like how it looked. This was easy with acrylic paints because of how quickly they dried. Sometimes this was a disadvantage because when I would want to blend shading I couldn't.

The book that I have mentioned in previous posts, Acrylic 1, was a huge help when I was painting the faces because it talked about and showed techniques about making the faces look realistic. The book also gave good tips about layering the different objects in the painting and the colors for individual parts.

This is the final piece!!