Websession: Kristine's entry for Work of Art Challenge #3

Before I start, here is the final result of this week's Work of Art challenge (see here for the rules). Thank goodness, there was no twist/turn/unforeseen additional component. I really thought something would pop up... after all, it was a pop art challenge! Anyway, as I was saying, here is my final piece:


I committed a whole bunch of no-nos during this challenge. The judges would've kicked me off for producing a piece of art that could be considered "derivative" (c'mon, inspired by Lichtenstein, with modern themes), I decided to use a technique I'd never used before ("how hard could it be??" kiss of death), I used a word no one has ever heard before, I used pictures of Emily (sorry, Emily)...

I guess I should start by explaining the "hoverweb" reference. 2-3 phone generations ago, when we used non-smartphones, we had to text via the annoying T9 system. That is, the phone has 9 keys, and so 2 = a, b, or c, and it attempts to autocomplete words for you. Well, whenever we typed "Inter..." it would automatically suggest "hover" as the word we were trying to write. Really? Hover?? I don't see how that's statistically more likely than, say, "Inter...net." So we added "web" to "hover," and came up with "hoverweb" to represent the Internet. Yay.

Now that you all know the history, I'll digress further. This evening Emily and I finally watched the last two episodes of Work of Art. I don't think our final projects could be further from what they've done so far! Huh. People do interpret the challenges however they like. And I can't figure out why the judges like the ones they like.

Back to my artwork! As I mentioned, I'd never tried this cartoonizing technique before. Armed only with pictures of Emily holding a cell phone, Paint Shop Pro, and various Photoshop comic effect technique tutorials, I was on my way. It didn't take long for me to realize that Photoshop tutorials don't translate nicely into Paint Shop Pro. Here were a few of the test alterations I tried before getting used to some of the more advanced design features:



I won't go through the entire process, but will note that I learned all about techniques like cutouts, posterizing, halftone, masks... look at me. Now I want to take a class on photo editing software!


In all, I created five pieces that were decent enough. Here they are, with my commentary:

I drew in the crazy hair on this one. Yay Stumbleupon! That site is crazy addictive. It creates zombies. (incidentally... Happy Halloween!)

This would have been better if I'd kept it simple. Too colorful. And Emily is NOT that tan.

Also overly complicated... and no, I'm not predicting that Emily will get dumped (by text or anything else). It's just one of those things you hear about these days.

This was the first cartoony image I attempted. It looked and sounded better as a concept. In reality, meh.

When I narrowed it down to my top six (one didn't make the blog) I sent them via the hoverweb to the nearest cheap photo printing place that came to mind: CVS. Huh, wonder what that acronym means... Ah, well, here are my final printed cartoon art thingies. The printouts weren't bad!


And, one last time, my final art project:


'Til next week! :)