Sound Intro and Hearing Loss

Sound travels in waves. You can measure sound in Hertz (Hz). One interesting fact I learned from the Sound Video was that if you change the shape of the room you're in, the sound waves bounce differently and create better, clearer sound.

The Today Show video was about hearing loss. It featured a guy who had lost most of his hearing due to loud noises and loud music. He went to a doctor and found that there are new hearing aids that are nearly invisible and help amplify sounds that he hadn't heard in years. The doctor still recommended that people wear ear plugs in loud situations to protect their sense of hearing, though. I don't think this video applied to me too much because I don't usually do the things that were listed in the video as bad for my hearing. I might look into getting ear plugs in case I ever am in loud situations, like concerts or big get-togethers.

Ethics Reading Post 2: "Samples of Retouched Photos"

I liked this article because it showed me the examples of photos that have been edited. It showed the original photo(s), and also the final edit that was published. Along with telling me, it showed me exactly what had been changed about the picture. Although all of this helped me see why people might have been mad about the edits, it still did not convince me that any of it was morally incorrect. Certain photos that completely change the meaning of something in a negative way or made up photos are not okay, but there are others that do not seem like a big deal at all. The OJ Simpson photo, for example, had a filter on it that made it seem darker and more evil. It said some argued that it could have sent the racist message that "blacker is more sinister," but that is not a solid argument at all. Anyone can make up any crazy opinion like that about any photo. One could say that because a main female character in a movie is dumb, the movie is sexist. But that isn't necessarily true. It's just one person's opinion that cannot be backed up. The other photo that doesn't seem like a big deal is the one of the British soldier that had been edited so that he was pointing a certain way. In no way at all does the edited version of the photo change the meaning negatively. So yes, maybe it is against the rules of the magazine or newspaper to edit the photo, but was it morally incorrect? No. Overall, the messages of these articles did not convince me that every edit is against ethics. I now know that there are strict rules to prevent it, but I don't believe it is always a bad thing.

Ethics Reading Post 1: "Digital Photography"

The first two paragraphs of this article discredit the author. First of all, unless he has some kind of super power, there is no way he could tell from 100 feet away that the cover picture on a newspaper had been tampered with. This automatically makes me think this author will exaggerate about everything else in the article, which he does. Second of all, the article states that the artist who made the picture made it very clear that he tampered with it in Photoshop. The rest of the article does not explain why it is wrong to tamper with a photo if you have made it blatantly obvious to the public that you have tampered with it. Thirdly, the examples of magazines that the author provides with edited photos on the cover are not strong enough to sway someone who doesn't already see photo-editing as wrong to believe it is a horrible thing. It seems as if the author is angry about photo-editing, but does not have enough evidence or credibility to back up his opinion.

Final Photoshop Blog Post

We learned how to do a lot of different things in Photoshop. One thing we learned that I thought was cool was how to remove objects from a picture using the Clone Stamp tool. First, I would take a little picture of an area around the object I chose to take out. Then, I would click on a spot on the object and it would mimic the look of the area I took a picture of. I was able to take out all of the balloons from this picture.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d1/Great_Balloon_Race.jpg

 

 

We also learned how to cut objects out of a picture and move them to a different background. I used the lasso tool to trace the frog in this picture and moved it to a white background. This is useful because I learned that I can move any object, such as other people, to a different type of setting.

http://www.thecitrusreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/orange_frog.jpg