Week 6: Seeing Is Believing

This week in class we discussed the importance of visual literacy, an abstract term used to describe our ability to take visual cues in place of reading actual words. For instance, if you were to travel to a foreign country outside the realm of Romance languages in which you could sound out the men's room, you could default to finding the stick figure not wearing a triangular dress. The male and female figures that indicate restrooms act as substitutes for words and have become completely mainstream in the worldwide thought process. In order to sharpen our skills to be visually literate, we had to complete an exercise in Photoshop.

One of the most important tools in the journalism industry right now is Photoshop. While the ethics of using it has come under much scrutiny, its usefulness for optimizing photos for the Web and for design has played a huge part in the media industry's success in the 21st century. In every journalism class I've taken thus far in the University of Florida's J-School, there has been at least a few mentions of Photoshop, if not a project or hands-on application of it.

However, like I said, the ethics of using Photoshop in a journalistic environment is a major conflict within the community. Where is the line drawn between enhancing reality and warping it? Lightening an image to increase the quality or to give the illusion that the photographer did a better job than he or she did? What about editing out undesirable background clutter? It's all up for debate. In this video for the Dove Real Beauty campaign, it is shown how Photoshop is often used in advertisements and magazines to edit celebrities and models.



Sara Solano realizes she could've been giving herself green eyes all this time. Stupid color contacts. 

Week 5: People Still Do That?

I thought people stopped making webs after the FCAT.

However, mind-mapping tools have expanded from the strictly pencil-and-paper to online tools like the ones we covered this week in class. While we stuck to using Webspiration, many others like bubbl.us and Gliffy have gained popularity. Using the tool to explain various online tools such as social networking, blogging and video hosting to further the field of journalism can be found in the previous post.

This same week, bubbl.us was mentioned in my Communication on the Internet (MMC 3260) class. While many are so interested in jumping straight into design, the mind-mapping tools can make it easier when trying to lay out a complicated website. If there's one thing I've so far taken away from that class, it's the importance of an easily navigable site for the best interest of the visitors. Without taking the proper steps to outline, a website could wind up being convoluted and awkward, which would instantly turn away potential customers, readers, etc.

Another website of the sort is Mind Meister which does many of the same functions as the others, but in a more advanced level. Users can also collaborate to make real-time sessions.


Sara Solano is the Magellan of the Internet. 

Bonus Blog: Webspiration

Bonus Blog: Disney Explains It All

I chose this video from YouTube because of its really creative way of explaining what a copyright and fair use is. Instead of merely lecturing, professor Eric Faden of Bucknell University opted to splice Disney animated films together to explain the concepts. It also goes into the detail of using copyrighted materials for parody, critical commentary or its commercial impact. I also found it interesting that he chose to use Disney animations in particular to prove that even a company so "intimidating" in its ownership of its content, fair use would dictate that it still could be used as educational material.



Sara Solano wishes she was Belle.