Presonal Project Evaluation

Evaluation

The Assignment brief was to create a either graphical or photography based piece based on certain social issues.

The topic I chose was Depression as I have experienced a small level of it myself; I understand what people are going through and therefore know how (in a way) to deal with it.
I also think that I can use my experience to help others and inform others of what it is and how it effects things.

The research I did as part of this project was the following:

Primary Research

As primary research, I made a survey on survey monkey...
This had a few questions on it which were:

• What is you name?
• What is your age?
• Have you or anyone you know suffered from Depression?
• Do you think that my subject of depression is suitable?
• What would you change about my blog or is there anything you'd suggest I could talk about?

Below is a Screenshot of my Survey on survey monkey

Secondary Research

The secondary research that I did was go on Google and look up images of inspirational quotes that I could use in my final piece.
I also when on the NHS website to find clinical symptoms of Depression, for future reference.

These were the images I used to create my final piece, which is below:

I also created something completely original too:

This poster has quite a lot less on it than the one before it; though I think it's quite easy to get the message that it's trying to convey.

I decided to use the grey scale effect in my work because it puts more of a sincere look to my work, this way- people look at it more seriously than they would if my work was in colour.

The way I got my images on my project was by going on google (for the first final piece), and I usse both images off Google and one that I took with a camera.

The tools I used in Photoshop were:

• The Magic Wand tool.
• The Eraser tool.
• The Marquee tool.
• The Magnetic Lasso tool.

I mainly used the Eraser tool because there were large areas of the picture that would take a long time to get rid of using the Magic Eraser tool… I generally used the Magic Eraser tool to remove areas of the image that had patches of colour that were the same, the Marquee tool that I use was also for erasing large areas of the picture without taking time like the Eraser tool does, finally the Magnetic Lasso tool I used was the perfect tool to use… this managed to get to the areas of the image that nether the Magic Wand nor the Eraser could get to without deleting parts of the image I wanted to keep.  

I haven't developed any new skills, all the skill I used to create my final pieces were ones I had already learnt.

My time management was not the best, if I'm honest I didn't really stick to the schedule...

As a whole, I'm quite satisfied with my poster, though I think I could have added more of my own pieces to it rather than use a load that I had found on Google...

The second piece I made is a better representation of what I really wanted to make; I am not completely sure why I put so little effort into my final piece, but regardless, I thought that it was okay.... It had a lot of pictures and not a lot of information rich text.

Next time (if I was to do it again), I will try harder to add more of my own stuff rather than other people's, add more information and less pictures, also associate the NHS with my work (as it is a clinical thing that can be treated)

I didn't really have any particular problems with my poster or any of the software I was using to create it.

But sometimes I would have problems with the computer I was using and would have to go and gwt a laptop so that I could do what I wanted without the worry of the program crashing or going really slow, although going and getting the laptop may have wasted time, I soon caught up with work and managed to get on top of it. The main issue seemed to be the extreamly slow performance of the computer I was using and the very frequent crash of Adobie Photoshop as a result of it..... I would usually get highly frustrated at this.
Luckily I had a good friend to help me and calm me down and the fortunate fact that the collage had a few laptops that multipul students used. I swear that on of those laptops could have had more processing power than all of the computer in the class combined!!

Depression- Conclution

Conclution

To conclude my Personal Project, I have created a Powerpoint Presentation that I will have to present in front of the class, although I won't find this easy (at all) it'll boost my confidence alot once I've finished so for that reason alone I am looking forward to doing it.

Above are screenshots from My Presentation, I order of the slides- each screenshot is ordered in the same way. I also created the PowerPoint Presentation in the same way, starting from the first slide and ending in the last slide (like you're supposed to).

The first slide is just the title of the Slide Show, the second slide is what subject I have chosen and why, the third page is research page; stating what research I did (Primary and Secondary), the fourth page is the Production page; where I talked about what I made. the fifth page is the "How did it go" section; stating basically how it went in my opinion, then the seventh slide is the Peer Feedback slide; showing two different opinions (Male and Female) on my final piece, which is below.

Personally, I think it is a decent piece; but I thing I should have put a bit more writing on it and less pictures... to give readers more idea of what I was talking about and also added more of my own work too instead of using a lot off the internet.... :-(

I found the NHS website to be the more helpful of my secondary research.
The less helpful was looking on Google and image of some of the warning signs/ symptoms of Depression, I found what I was looking for but the diagram I chose wasn't very clear on my final product, I could have created my own version of it but I didn't really think about it at the time, although I found quite a few good quotes to use; I didn't incorporate all of them into my poster.
My primary research was quite useful because, everyone said that they knew someone they'd known had gone through depression.

Depression- Personal Project

Depression

Depression is something that 1 in 8 teens experience in their lifetime.

This is a mental state of constant sadness as a product of many things that may have happened (or not happened) in a person's life.

Depression is mainly identified as something teenagers go through, one reason behind depression may be because of the bodily changes occurring as the transition between a child and a adult begins, loads of hormones, chemicals and other elements that define a adult from a child are constantly racing round the body and "mood swings" occur. 

"Mood swings" are when a person's mood changes from one state to the complete opposite, sometimes the time frame can vary, sometimes it only takes a matter of seconds to change from for example: happy to sad, sometimes though it can take a matter of weeks or months before a person changes back from happy or sad.

The long periods between becoming happy from a state of sadness can be draining and sometimes can seem impossible to cope with.

A sense of hopelessness, can play a part, with feelings of anger, hate, remorse, anxiety, sadness, hurt and fear are some of the many feelings I experienced during this period.

If a person feels there is no way to escape apart from hurting/ killing themselves thoughts about these things can start to plague the mind, subsequently making the person feel even worse about themselves than they were previously...

This is a brainstorm of all the things that could be in connection with depression.

There are many different ways that people deal with depression, some people prefer to draw back from friends and family in order not to pull other people into their grief, some people use the words that the person is singing and use that to sum up how their life is going, these may include lyrics about how people don't care about you and your feelings (this is of course not true).

A lot of people think that asking for help is bad because they feel like if they ask for help, everyone they know will think of them as a wimp or a failure or anything negative that they can think of.

If they have good friends, they could talk to them; but if they really don't have anyone around, it is a very good idea to talk to  someone. because if you do that you can really let stress out, get rid of people who might be bullying you or just to get things off your mind.

You need to ask someone as soon any of the Depression Warning Signs (as below):

Or I found a few things that might be symptoms of Clinical Depression on the NHS website

"Psychological symptoms include:

• continuous low mood or sadness
• feeling hopeless and helpless
• having low self-esteem 
• feeling tearful
• feeling guilt-ridden
• feeling irritable and intolerant of others 
• having no motivation or interest in things
• finding it difficult to make decisions
• not getting any enjoyment out of life
• feeling anxious or worried 
• having suicidal thoughts or thoughts of harming yourself

Physical symptoms include:

• moving or speaking more slowly than usual 
• change in appetite or weight (usually decreased, but sometimes increased) 
• constipation 
• unexplained aches and pains
• lack of energy or lack of interest in sex (loss of libido)
• changes to your menstrual cycle
• disturbed sleep (for example, finding it hard to fall asleep at night or waking up very early in the morning)

Social symptoms include:

• not doing well at work
• taking part in fewer social activities and avoiding contact with friends
• neglecting your hobbies and interests
• having difficulties in your home and family life"

Source :

http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Depression/Pages/Symptoms.aspx

I find this page really helpful, not only for myself but for other people; so that when you do come out of depression, you know what the signs are and therefore help other people if/when they get depressed, from there you can either: report it to a teacher/ tutor/ responsible adult or try to help them out yourself (or both if you're felling brave)...

As the picture says, there is no shame in asking for help, asking for help thing someone can do to help themselves; but knowing when to ask for help can be the most difficult of all....

You need to ask someone as soon any of the Depression Warning Signs (as below).

Or I found a few things that might be symptoms of Clinical Depression on the NHS website

There are lots of famous people who have suffered from depression too!

Here is a list of some of them:

• Buzz Aldrin, one of America’s most famous astronauts, flew to the moon in 1969, but later suffered from depression and alcoholism. He worked his way through, and even served as chairman of the National Mental Health Association.
• Actor, Marlon Brando experienced chronic depression throughout his life
• Jim Carrey openly discussed his history of depression and being on Prozac on “60 Minutes” in 2004.
• 
  

Personal Project- Depression- Proposal

Depression

·        What theme you have chosen and why?

      Depression, I decided to choose this over the other subjects is because I have experience in these matters and I know what it's like to be in the situation that a lot of people are currently going through.

     The general idea was that I was going to use my blog and poster to help other people rather than myself because I feel that not only teenagers can look at this and I hopefully will encourage them to seek help or to tell someone what's going on; it would also inform parents that this CAN happen to people, it is a REAL THING and that something can be done about if it is dealt with sooner rather than later, because the later you leave it the worse it gets (I would know this, because it was me who decided that I wanted help rather than someone I know mentioning it to a responsible adult, mainly because I didn't want to tell anyone and still don't feel comfortable telling people how I feel). 

·        What mediums will you be using to create your work?

I    might do something graphical because I'm not very good at taking photographs. I would use Photoshop to create my poster.

·        Describe how you want your work to look.
I want to create a A3 poster to display pieces of information and advice to help advise and inform people of Depression, it's effects and it's symptoms.

 

I like this because, people with depression sometimes don't know when they need to go and ask for help, some people don't want to; which is why they might need help asking for it.

I decided to choose this picture (below) because I has a very good interpretation on the signs of depression, I know this because I experienced/shown at least of these signs.
In my opinion this is a very good interpretation of all the signs of depression.

Below is a brain storm of some of the things that might be associated with depression (this was created by me)

I also created my own poster too as part of my production;

·        Describe what initial research, pre-production work and audience research you will undertake while completing this project.

My primary research was when I created a survey on https://www.surveymonkey.com

My secondary research is when I went on Google and search for images on depression and some helpful sayings, things that might encourage people with depression to tell someone and get help because in my opinion there is no shame in asking for help.

Also I went on Google and looked through various pictures and photographers, I looked for words of wisdom to show people (rather than just tell) what I'm talking about.

·        Describe how you will present your final piece/Pieces.

I will be using a A3 piece of paper (that I will print off), it would be created on Photoshop and will have quite few images, some text and other different things that might help towards teenagers who are suffering from depression.

   My Favorite Artist

Robert Chew

He is a concept artist that I found whilst on the internet.

He make concept are of "mechanical rhinos, lions, and vultures (although the poachers have some robotic tools of their own)"

Robert Chew is looking to turn the series into a book to benefit the International Anti-Poaching Foundation

I like the style of his work because he makes his pictures realistic but adds his own take to them, by making the animals look surreal by placing patterns on them.

Source: http://io9.gizmodo.com/10-concept-artists-who-should-be-working-on-their-own-m-1530717946