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In the project I used charcoal to create an image of mountains while using different techniques to create various patterns and textures to my work. While looking at this you will see 3 mountains overlapping one another and a single pine tree in the very front, with a shaded sky. There isn’t really a story or anything that I wanted to convey, I just really wanted to draw some mountains. Originally for this project I wanted to draw a tree, or flowers, mostly a tree so that I could play with techniques and create different textures for each part, but in the end I decided to keep it simple and went with mountains.

In order to create this project I first started of with a smooth piece of paper after creating my sketch. I used a pencil to create a simple outline for my drawing, then I took a conte crayon and used it to create a bold outline for my mountains, Mistakenly adding very harsh lines that acted as snowtops. Then I began to fill in the very back mountain, i began by using a charcoal stick. I rubbed it along the paper and then would use my finger to spread out and shade the mountain, on the left hand side I wanted to be a little adventurous so I took a watercolor brush and some water painted part of the mountain. In the middle of the back mountain I made my attempt at a crosshatch texture. It created a look that made the back mountain darker towards the bottom and somewhat of a gradient to the top (but it was completely colored in). I then shaded in the rest of the mountain and used my finger rather than a smudge stick. For the mountain on the right I tried to do a wider crosshatch look but it didn’t really work out so I used a charcoal pencil and shaded it in with my finger while going in circular motions so it didn't look so boring.  This ended up being the darkest of the 3, I used a kneaded eraser to try to get rid of any excess but it still appeared very dark. Next I drew my Pine tree using a charcoal pencil and a charcoal stick, this also came out too dark, but I used a white charcoal pencil to help lighten it up. In hindsight I should’ve made my tree bigger, it is rather small and useless and wasn’t very thought through at the time. For my last mountain I used the stippling technique mostly for fun and testing a new idea. I then shaded it in to add more color, because this would be the lightest of the 3. I personally liked this effect, even though it is more of a technique for pens or pencils, it worked with charcoal also. After I finished  everything I decided to Make a slight gradient in the sky, using a charcoal stick  because I found it to be the easiest to shade and work with. After that I finished off my piece by spraying it with a setting spray so it wouldn’t smudge.

This is the first time I’ve done something like this, it doesn’t really relate to any of my past work/ doodles. I could somewhat relate to pencil drawings that I’ve done and shaded in instead of colored, I never used charcoal or smudge sticks, just a pencil and my finger.  I feel like I could’ve taken more time to learn and test  new techniques to try, and come up with a better way to use and show them, but I'm not upset with what I did. New techniques are important because they can add more depth and tone to your work, for me personally I really liked the stippling technique and will probably use it more. It is a lot of tedious work but I enjoy the overall look of it and it can add more pizazz to a drawing.  Using this technique and crosshatching are probably what i’m the most proud of because I feel like i can incorporate this new ideas into future work and use them to add more texture instead of everything being so flat.

I wouldn’t mind doing this project over again, I can always try again but with my original tree idea and learn even more techniques. I feel like my final project came out alright, it's not my best work but i like the somewhat simplistic tone of it. I can learn more as a person who has an interest in art and only get better through experience and learning more and more.

Our video is a PSA of water pollution. It’s basically me and my group members speaking on the topic and how it can be resolved. We chose this topic because we believed that water pollution is an important factor that we should know. We use water everyday and we can die if we don’t have it. Water is important to everything that is living.

What I contribute to the project was by giving ideas and editing the video. I believe we could’ve done better in recording more for our video and adding more information. The most meaningful part of this experience of creating the PSA is learning about water pollution and how it can affect us and ways we can prevent it.

Cristian Fernandez

1/19/17

In the video we described the issue of lead poisoning in Philadelphia, and how it impacts a lot of people. We describe how it mainly affects children developmentally and can also harm adults. We describe the politics that go into how lead is dealt with and how it can be treated properly, but it does take time and money. We make sure that people understand that lead isn’t only in the paint on our walls, but also in the water we drink, older plumbing could have been made with lead. For this project I was the editor of the video, and worked with everyone to put the video together, including being in the video. We all worked on the questions and making the video itself (filming). I feel as though I could have helped more on the script. My group did all of the script and I just edited some of it when we were filming mine and others parts. I think we all did a good time managing the time we were given, it seemed like a lot of groups were not on task the whole time and I feel like we worked with all the time we were given and made a good product as a result of it. I think the most meaningful part of creating the PSA was approaching the display of the points we had to someone who has no knowledge of the topic. This required us to go deeper into depth for our research and develop different ways of understanding it, which makes it more impactful to me,