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`designgeek

Catherine
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retiring designgeek

Mon Apr 6, 2009, 4:52 PM


Hello, don't be alarmed I'm NOT leaving deviantart .. all I'm doing is changing my name! I've made a tough decision but one I think will actually benefit me in the long run.

My artwork and my professional IT identity have become too merged online and I feel that my IT professionalism could be compromised by being thought of as too arty (I've had negative feedback on this so it isn't imaginary). It hasn't happened from many but I've just been made redundant and I don't want the fact that I'm opening up into being a freelancer to hurt the fact that I'm first an IT specialist.

While I am a creative artist, I'm also very much an IT professional with 10 years of academics backing me and 7 years in industry at the same time as studying.

I want to make a clean break, so I'm retiring my entire designgeek online personality .. as a name I love it and it describes me perfectly. However in the social media world that name is now describing a lot of different people and how on earth would a potential client know it was me or not?! tricky one isn't it.

So I've re-branded myself and while I'm not going to share my new freelance business name, if anyone personally knows me from this account and feels like they will die without knowing my 'bright shiny self' then send me a note!

.

I've been walking in circles in my mind for a while now about leaving my digital name that I've had for the last 7 years and while it's heartbreaking in a way it's giving me a new lease on life. One that hopefully will have a finer balance between private and public .. when chatting with a friend I was surprised to hear him say 'spoken like a true artist' .. I guess its true. With our work being intended for the public, just how public should we be with ours lives along with our work?

I'll leave that for you to figure out for yourselves.

In the mean time this account's work has been privately stored and I've opened a new one at deviantart. All my other designgeek accounts spread through the internet will also be closed, yup, that means my flickr one too.

.

You know what my ego is finding hardest?! Leaving my 'senior status and the fact that this account clearly states I've been here since 2002. I've lived and loved and met so many great friends through this account. I grew tremendously as an artist and crafted the 'eye' that I now have and I'm going to continue to grow.

Wish me well on my journey, I've made great strides, you've seen me through two degrees and sweat blood to get them. You've seen me with a point and shoot, a D70 and now my D300. My first illustrations and pen strokes through to gradient meshes and my immortalisation of our dear Angie ;) .. my web design skills grew and then ebbed. Well now they are growing again and soon maybe as soon as 6 months from now I'm going to be kick ass again and I've got my learning plan all scheduled out for teaching myself all the latest things that occured in the web2 world since I started my masters degrees and finally finished the second one to a full MSc status. You guys don't know how freeing that moment was and I get to celebrate my freedom from academia education in a few months.

Now I'm a professional student of life, photographer, IT specialist and everything in between. While I'm sad to leave you as designgeek, I'm glad to have known you and have you know me.

Here's a recent project I joined and a quote that I want to leave you with.



Thanks and lets get cracking with the critiques and lets show the newbies round here just what dA was like back in 2002 to 2004.

:heart:

- designgeek



13 Comments
  • Mood: Optimism

Open Challenge + Keef's Competition :B

Wed Jan 14, 2009, 7:15 PM



Hello hello hellooooooo Internet!

So I've been chatting briefly to Keith, cause you know .. he's a busy boy. Gallery Director and full time job an all ;)

Anyway, I wanted to help anyone and everyone who reads this that is thinking of entering into Keiths Super Awesome Photography Battle Competition. To do this I'm am offering a critique of anyone's potential submissions to that competition. This way you can have an opinion on what could be improved (if anything cause you know your all great!) and then once your sure on your one submission per theme, you can submit it to Keith ^zerocomplex

So how about it and who else would like to offer their opinions and critiques. This journal will be the central place for it, or indeed write your own journal and offer the same to your watchers too :D


SO HOW ABOUT IT?! Take your photos according to the competition themes and rules and I will offer my humble opinion.




Disclaimer: YES I TOO WILL BE ENTERING THE COMPETITION and I will not give false advice to ensure that I win :evillaugh: cause I'm not not that kind of gal. So if you want to go it alone knowing that I too will be entering then all power to you, but my offer of a critique still stands. NO I'M NOT ONE OF THE JUDGES LISTED.


:bounce:


WHICH LEADS ONTO THE OPEN CHALLENGE! This challenge is actually the same as the first theme in Keiths competition. A self portrait! So you can use 'split personality' as inspiration if you want or submit an original portrait style of your choice.


:bounce:


Ok, NEW OPEN CHALLENGE!!

Title of your photo: Split Personality

Challenge Concept: The challenge this week is to present a self portrait of yourself showing a split personality in some way shape or form. You don't have to show your face if you don't wish to, I will be doing so but you still won't be able to recognise me that easily if you walked past me in the street! Feel free to use photoshop manipulation in your works, this one I really want you to stretch yourself as much as possible. You don't have to have taken a recent photo either, you can use previous photos from your photography archive, BUT they must be your own photos.

Make it as professional as you can, even as a beginner you have the power of forethough, planning, ideas to brainstorm and lots of household objects which can make your studio.

In your description you must enter what level you are..
and what tools you used to make the photo, including what happened during post processing.

Pro: DSLR and strobe / studio lighting.
Basic: Point and Shoot with household lighting.
Photoshop: show what techniques you used to do what you did during post processing.

eg. Pro: Nikon D70 + 30mm F1.4/800 iso 200 (or make sure you exif data is displayed). Strobe lit with softbox 45 degree angle on the left and bare strobe SB25 to the rear as rim light.
Basic: Sony T50, Priority Mode, +1.3EV. 40W table lamp no shade, used tinfoil to reflect light.
Photoshop: BW Gradient Mesh + Curves.

plus a link back to this journal :) Fairs, fair.

General Thoughts: Don't worry if your an absolutely beginner beginner beginner type person! We ALL were at one point or another. These are some general house hold items that you can use to play with lighting which is one of a photographers main tools. Wire coat hanger and toilet roll or kitchen paper to make a diffuser between your light and object. Kitchen foil to make a reflector or foil hat to wear while doing photography to make you laugh! Lights can be a flashlight / torch, direct desk lamp, kitchen counter under cupboard lights, lamps with shades on .. anything that emits light basically. Play with all the settings on your point and shoot camera.

Questions? - please comment on the journal and I'll answer.

Restrictions: - photography based only, no drawings allowed. Your own photos only, no manipulating someone elses!

Prizes? - just the satisfaction of accepting a challenge and giving it a go, plus getting a comment / critique that acknowledges your efforts and provides future tips and suggestions.

DEADLINE: Friday 12th December 26th January 2009


I look forward to your entries :bounce:


* * * *


Thumbs, thumbs, THUMBS I say!





. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Websites: Professional | Personal | Flickr | My Space | PRINTS
Photographer: OMP . MM | Model: OMP . MM






19 Comments
  • Mood: Zest
  • Listening to: David Allen
  • Watching: Eagle Eye
  • Playing: Classical Music

THE COMMENT REVOLUTION + browse feature UPDATED

Journal Entry: Thu Nov 29, 2007, 4:47 PM


The Comment Revolution started early 2004 and a little later in a journal `splat truly launched this community effort. [link]


Since then the following people including myself have been involved in trying to push for better comments, critiques and advice given from artist to artist. Here are the people who are running it:

`splat . `coshdaddy . `justthorne . ~ivyc . ~redpanda . `halfliquid . ~evilada . `designgeek

And the people who have contributed a helluva lot to it:

`leodadominico . `GoblinQueeen . ~TheDevilMyself . ~TrappedChild




. . .


You can read some of the best 'how to' guides on commenting provided at these locations:




Some ideas I have for and to help the revolution:

These are just my ideas and these are NOT things that are going to happen unless the DA staff like it and choose to do this. Can I make that any clearer .. I think not ;)

Browse by Critique Levels (No critique, Critique Welcome and Advanced Critique Desired)

Every deviant out there has the option to define what level of constructive critique that they want. Detailed advanced critique, normal comments and critique, no critique or criticism at all and then finally no comments full stop.

These deviants are then sat waiting for a random person to come along and give them advice. They are wanting it , yearning for thoughts from their peers. Why can't we find them? Well their work that desires a higher constructive critique beyond 'nice work' or 'cool work dude' has marked their deviation 'advanced critique welcome' but can you find them when browsing? Of course not they are hidden within all the normal, no critique and no comments deviations.

Its insanely obvious to me that if we can't even find these works then the chances of giving good comments in a comment revolution is going to difficult at best and so people give up. At worst people are going to be leaving their well meaning constructive criticism with those who don't want and are not able to tolerate advice from others. So we get shouted at for leaving an opinion on how to improve in the future or why this particular colour or technique didn't work but here's one that could. Slammed for trying to help.

So why not turn a lose / lose situation into a win / win situation? By being able to give people the chance to find those who actually want a constructive critique and we won't be slammed by the ignorant and ungrateful. The beginner is grateful and the critic feels good for being able to provide support.

Even though its my own deviation that I'm linking to, at the bottom when you are about to leave a comment you can see that it clearly states in CAPITAL - ADVANCED CRITIQUE WELCOME: [link] so there you go, that is the only way a person can currently see if this piece of work will welcome an advanced critique. How can you tell this if you only see the thumbnail? Well you can't! :|

. . .

We are a massive 'trillions of deviations' art community that is turning more and more into a purely social network where the masses aren't bothered about art.. well this IS an ART SITE!! Let’s try to get more involved with each other’s art, those who want to help, those who need help. We are a massive community with some absolutely astonishingly talented artists. I've been here five years now and I've learned a lot from being able to ask questions and analyse for myself how these artists are doing their work.

By giving a critique you are actually helping yourself too!! Sounds amazing and untrue but really :nod: giving a constructive critique helps your own art because you've had to structure your own thoughts and think about something. You've generated your own opinion and provided it in a way that helps another. That can only be good for your own work having your own opinions of things. :D


Here are some extra ways to show your support:
:bulletblue: Create a journal and spread the word about this idea, you already have the links to everything within this journal. The Deviation [link] , The Journal [link] AND the Forum Thread: [link]
:bulletblue: ~K-Sin had a good idea. How about creating a piece of artwork support this browse by comment / critique level . Then within the description post a link to the forum thread asking for people to show their support for the idea.
:bulletblue: Put a link into your signature and make sure its retroactive so that every time you comment you are still supporting the idea.


People say that they are only a single voice and can’t do much, well I say their wrong, one voice is plenty and those voices combined are a revolution.

1 person can leave 10 critiques taking approximately an hour every week, this means that at the end of the year they have left 520 critiques / comments and if two of those comments were for one artist, they’ve made 260 artists happier that year.

62 people can leave 10 critiques taking approximately an hour every week, this means that at the end of the year they have left 32,240 critiques / comments and if two of those comments were for one artist, they’ve made 16,120 artists happier that year.

782 people can leave 10 critiques taking approximately an hour every week, this means that at the end of the year they have left 406,640 critiques / comments and if two of those comments were for one artist, they’ve made 203,320 artists happier that year.

Lets be realistic here, we are a huge huge millions strong deviants community so if only approximately 1% of a million people, equalling 10,002 people can leave 10 critiques taking approximately an hour every week, this means that at the end of the year they have left 5,201,040 critiques / comments and if two of those comments were for one artist, they’ve made 2,600,520 artists happier that year.

That's just you reading this now. Then add me, and add the many dozens and hundreds out their like us. Our community would definitely improve.

:community:



. . .


Below is the deviation which shows how this browse feature could be accomplished






SHOW YOUR SUPPORT FOR THIS IDEA AND TO HELP THE COMMENT REVOLUTION!
DO YOU WANT TO BE ABLE TO FIND THOSE PARTICULAR ARTISTS WHO WANT HELP AND TO FIND THEIR WORK?!

:spotlight-left: New Browse Feature: browse by advanced critique welcome :spotlight-right:



:blowkiss:





. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Websites: Professional | Personal | Flickr | My Space | PRINTS
Photographer: OMP . MM | Model: OMP . MM






16 Comments
  • Mood: Obsessed
  • Listening to: my keyboard rattling from typing
  • Reading: Amy Henry - Making It
  • Playing: Annie Lennox - Songs of Mass Destruction

3 Inspirations Feature: V - Z

Sun Apr 30, 2006, 7:31 PM


3 LITTLE INSPIRATIONS

These pages are devoted to those who give me inspiration and hopefully will also inspire you.

Have fun browsing their galleries, but to get you started, here are three of my favs from their work.

:heart: :community: :heart:






Thank you.
:kiss:

2 Comments
  • Mood: Inspiring

3 Inspirations Feature: S - U

Mon May 1, 2006, 8:29 AM


3 LITTLE INSPIRATIONS

These pages are devoted to those who give me inspiration and hopefully will also inspire you.

Have fun browsing their galleries, but to get you started, here are three of my favs from their work.

:heart: :community: :heart:






Thank you.
:kiss:

4 Comments
  • Mood: Inspiring
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