The Avril ingredient

Welcome back! I usually prefer taking my own photographs for class but since Avril is nowhere near Durban, I had no choice. My graphics teacher asked us to design a cd cover that folds in three ways. We had to do one for any musician, amd I chose AVRIL LAVIGNE (hope I got the spelling right). I know I did :) I think her whole rebel/ rock look is a great element to work with when designing. Normally I would have made the surface black instead of white, but lately (for some time now) Avril has shown a gentler more sensitive side. She's (in my opinion) wearing more skirts and less Sk8er boy PUNK! Avril is more sane/ incontrol than most perfoming artists in her genre (I think). She's not only GREAT but stable at it!



HOOKED ALIVE has a character: Sally. She's a bit inspired by Avril sk8er appeal, lets call it Hooked Alive's Avril ingredient. (maybe I should also dye Sally's hair). Recently I've stumbled upon a 2d animation package (Crazy talk Animator) that promises to help me accelerate in my Hooked Alive animation. I'll tell you more about Crazy Talk Animator in my next posts. For now, check out their site, and you can even download the FREE trial for yourself now!

Thank you for reading the post guys! As part of project I made up the track names for my Avril Lavigne - incomplete Album. None of the tracks are real, not even the album (so dont get excited fellow fans). I'm done, and currently playing... Avril's My happy ending :)

Zimbabwean Poetry [Part 1]

Welcome back to my blog. (I hardly take photos of myself, the one above is my most recent on :) During last week I worked with a poet called Elsa Kamsoda, and her producer Tinashe Nguluve (Logunn). Together we made some poetry videos based on Tinashe's poems, perfomed by Elsa, and the filming and directing was done by me. tafadzwa Tarumbwa. Here is the video's link http://vimeo.com/26571696

In this image you can see Elsa Kamsoda the musician/ poet that I recently collaborated with in the making of two poem videos namely Dream on, and World. The poems were written by Tinashe Nguluve (Logunn) and perfomed by Elsa, the two then hired me to direct and film the "Black poetry Whispers" Album, and so far 2 poems have been filmed and edited. Arrangements are being made to showcase the work online.

I really enjoyed my holiday back home, and hope to resume all my pending animation and photography work. The good news is thanks to our hard work, Elsa, Logunn and I now have 2 videos to parade with in the marketing of the "Black poetry Whispers' Album" coming soon! Thank you for reading my blog, cheers!

Watch Elsa in action, in her video titled World:

http://vimeo.com/26571696

Shall we play... again. As promised I've finished the "Shall we play?" technical breakdown


Recently I uploaded this photograph, and promised to create a rough breakdown of how I got to my end result.



The image below shows a plan of the room I took the photograph in, firstly one needs to know that even though you only need one photo. You must learn to explore your subject and take dozens and dozens of shots. After that you are free to choose the best one.



The diagram above have two windows in it. Both of them  were open and letting in light when I photographed the Playboy product. The red X marks where I was standing. Window A was letting in the most sunlight evident in the shadow you will find on my first/ finished image above. The highlight on the Deo's side also shows that window B was also letting in light, causing that appealing shine.




Image B above shows the natural photograph that anyone could have come up with using basic photo skills. Its not exactly  flattering is it? Image C goes to show how much I hate using Flash light. Its (in my opinion) horribly exposed. Image A however have some contrast in it, just compare it to image B and see what Microsoft office picture manager can do. I have Photoshop but for some small jobs I just right click my images, go to "Open with" and select MS Office picture manager and work some quick magic. Like turning images into black and white quickly, or adjusting the photograph's contrast levels.



Using Microsoft office picture manager I achieved the results below. The image below shows the basic photograph which is not too bad. The second image shows a comparison between the edited and unedited photographs. Thanks to Microsoft office picture manager I achieved the results which can be seen in the third image below. The finally image you see was also refined in photoshop using its photomerge function. Good luck in similar projects you might one day do.

nudge it network: I Love GOOD street art!

nudge it network: I Love GOOD street art!: "artist: Inti location: Paris images by Yoyolabellut via unurth.com"

Quick update - Illustrations

I made a recent post on Peter Birch School of art, and now I've decided to upload two of the illustrations I drew in my time at that motivating art school.

Check out my website www.totally2d.org

Peter Birch's School of Art welcomes you

Now that I'm back in Zimbabwe, I was finally able to visit my former school Peter Birch School of Art. This Art college is were I refined my skills and learned how to paint. Now I'm studying and Style Design College in SA Durban. Below is a photograph of me and my classmates.

 Jovante, Cay, Dave, Rasa, me, Ange, Trent, Aj, Jenna, Cisca, Khumoyo, Sims and Ant. Below you'll find some oil paintings by the great Peter Birch. These oil on canvas works are something you have to see with your own eyes, the man is a great painter formerly lived in London and came to Zimbabwe before i was even born, my mother might have been just a baby then (that is if she was even there). Despite his age Peter Birch is at a level most can only dream of, unfortunately most of his works were not on the premises when i got there.

Above are some of the tools Birch uses in his works, brushes and all. I got there and found them drying in the sun. With the classroom empty. I've learned a lot from this man, by the time I decided to take these photographs he had also gone home. That's it for our brief tour of Peter Birch's School of art. Cheers!

Shall we play?

Hello there!

Most of the time I do 'artistic' photography. I say artistic because I'm an animator and I don't always follow the photography rules if situations call for it I over expose my photographs just to get that.... that feeling. I did that in Addicted to jeans I'm still a student in this wonderful art of photography, and yesterday I found myself taking a series of Playboy's Amazon...

I really really enjoy making photographs like these. I say "making" instead of taking photographs because you have to set the mood when you're doing a photo-shoot. That involves lighting amoungst other things.

For this image I coined the phrase "Shall we play" to give this Playboy deo an appealing feeling that suits well (in my opinion) with its target market. The room I worked in was not as dark as the photograph suggests. I was actually in my room, on my bed, and believe it or not with all curtains open. Using my Sony F282 I think I captured a good mood. I wont say more for now, I will be posting some technical information on how I created this image from the camera to Photoshop and other small apps. To see the camera I use visit http://www.outbackphoto.com/reviews/equipment/sony_f828/sony_f828.html

Feel free to go over my other photographs on this blog, you might find a wallpaper or two for your computer. I thank you for reading my update. Come again soon!

Tafadzwa Tarumbwa
www.totally2d.org

A little hope

 

A lot of things are happening in today's world. Natural disasters, wars, hunger, and various illnesses that come over net and kill hundreds. This photograph is about being sorrounded by all those challenges and still having hope, faith, and the strength to keeping fighting for a better world.

The photograph above features a plant that's sorrounded by dead leaves and concrete but despite all that its pulling through all that.

Thank you for visiting my blog, I'll post another update as soon as I have new images, illustrations or random stuff to share.

Have a blessed day, if you know anyone who needs the boost email them this post/ images. Cheers, until next time!