"Animanipulations" Photoshop Project

Check out this awesome photoshop project by one of my 7th grade students! The project was made using Pixlr (as a free Photoshop substitute) for layering and blending techniques to combine two animals into a new species. After that, we named our new species and made it a logo design!

Digital Self-Portrait

In this lesson, 6th graders learned photoshop editing basics and were able to work from home for free using Pixlr to create their own digital self-portraits. Pixlr is a free to use photoshop equivalent that is great for school work because student can continue to access it and explore it more themselves at home! Check out some of the things Crystal said were her interest and hobbies that made her who she is!

Digital Photomontages Project

In our David Hockney inspired photomontage project, students learned all about Photoshop basics such as resolution sizes, image sizing, canvas sizes, and layering layering layering! 8th graders who really went above in beyond in this project got creative when it came to timing and photo manipulation or were also really considerate when choosing their subject matter.

Here are a few examples from the project, to see more check out my student gallery at BillVaughnArt.com

By Elina

By David

By Kenny

By Long Nam

By Mike

By Jessica

Ostagram

Check out these fun photos made using Ostagram.ru - a fun resource that lets you create computer generated photo combinations making one photo a filter to be applied over your original. The free version let's you make as many as you want but they take longer and longer to make each one as you go. It's still fun to load up and play around with though! Check out a few of these example combinations I made!

Here's an example of a Google Photos generated creation. The one on the left is the original photo I took and on the right is a suggested filter edit to give it a new look. If you like it you can save it to your photo stream, if not dismiss it and wait and see what Google Photos makes for you next!

15 Hidden Instagram Features

Some of these I knew, and some I am just finding out about, but if you use Instagram you should definitely check this article out!

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/instagram-features-tricks#sm.0017ci4g0dtddup10nz1wiihkehu0

Google Photos

If you know me well in real life, you've probably heard me mention Google Photos, then proceed to go on and on about it at some point. Google Photos is one of my favorite Apps & Features and in my opinion is the one thing I feel everyone should have, but no one really seems to know about.

Google Photos is an online storage and synchronization tool, like Google Drive, except it is geared specifically around photos and videos. The thing that makes Google Photos so great is that unlike other online storage spaces like iCloud, Google Drive, or Drop Box - Google Photos can allow unlimited storage space! Now the only "catch" to this is that you allow Google to reformat your images to slightly slightly slightly lower quality, but honestly, I can't even tell the difference between the originals and the Google modified version.

If you are like me you might want some photos to use them for reasons where you need them to remain high quality, like an art portfolio. The way that I manage this, is by taking those specific photos I want to stay high quality, and uploading the originals to Google Drive but also backing them to Photos. This allows for a quick ready view version, as well as a back up of the highest quality file.

I was going to make a video of this myself for Google photos, however I think this video does a great job of explaining the way to maximize your Google Photos use between your computer, devices and phones.

While it might take a little bit of trial and error, I urge you to take some time to play around with it and find out how you want to use it. Google Photos has been amazing in that all my photos are always at hand and searchable in my pocket, and best of all is it's all free!

Guggenheim Museum releases over 200 Art Books online for free!

Just last week, the Guggenheim Museum released over 200 art books from it's collection online for free! These can be viewed online or downloaded in ePub or PDF formats ready for your computers or devices - all for free here at the internet archive!

Akira Kurosawa - Composing Movement

Check out this fantastic video explaining what makes master filmmaker Akira Kurosawa's films so special!

Smartphone Camera Tricks!

The iPhone is the most used camera in the world today, however many people don't do too much outside the box thinking when it comes to using it for taking photographs. Check out this awesome video below for 7 photography tips & tricks to get the most out of your smartphone camera!

3D Printing

If you haven't heard about the developments taking place in the field of 3D printing in the past few years, strap yourselves in. In my opinion, ten years from now 3D printing will become the next big big thing becoming increasingly a part of our everyday experience. Today, artists and engineers are using 3D printing to print out artwork, products, food and even biological organs and body parts. Check out the video below to hear more about what's happening with 3D printing today.



The great thing about 3D printing is that more and more places are opening up where you can send in your blueprints to have printed out in a variety of materials. There are lots of different resources for designing things to be printed and many of them are free! To take a look at some options for 3D design check out this link about the 20 Best 3D Printing Softwares Available Today

Copyright Law & Art!

    Copyrighted material can be a tricky thing to understand when it comes to art. Especially when there are methods like appropriation and parody that seem to break the rules, yet are still completely ok for art. Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano from http://langwitches.org/ created a first-rate flow chart to help explain if your work is within the bounds of copyright law!

 Check it out here


For more information about copyright law & art, you can read about it here

Microsoft Sway

It's been around for a few years now - but to be honest I am just finding out about Microsoft Sway. If this is the first time you are hearing of it too, check out the two videos explaining what it is and how it works!









Pretty cool, right? The best part about it is, like the best part of most things on the internet, is it's free to use, making it a great resource for schools. Make your own Sway presentation and check out more about it at https://sway.com/education/

Coolors.co

Here's a neat resource for Graphic Designers out there, Coolors.co is a neat free resource for generating different color schemes. These can be imported directly into Adobe software and are great for making your design color choices look sleak and modern.

You can try it online for three months free through the Skillshare community, or buy the app on the ios app store for 1.99$

Is this the future of Digital Illustration?

Digital Art Portfolios using Google Drive

Check out my latest video where I give a quick walkthrough of how I set-up and used Google Drive with my Middle School Art Class for creating collaborative digital art portfolios.

New Website!

Check out my new Artist & Educator webpage at www.BillVaughnArt.com !!

Art Assignment Bot

"Make an etching investigating the exploitation of punctures, due in 31 minutes." While that isn't realistically impossible due to the nature of etching, the concept behind this assignment is where all the fun lies. Meet the "Art Assignment Bot" designed by Jeff Thompson, an artist, professor and programmer. The purpose of Art Assignment Bot is to use code to produce a randomly generated art assignment using pre-selected words that teachers would typically assign. The fun part about it is the outside of the box thinking that happens when you are rolling the dice for different combinations. Some range from the absurd, to curious to actually pretty fun ideas! Assignments are tweeted every hour on the hour and some examples include: "Create a 3D rendering about your relationship to obligations, due on Sun, Apr 25, 2021." "Construct an etching with teeths, due tomorrow." "Construct a sound installation denying the exploitation of cats on the internet, due tomorrow."

"Build a photograph about your dream world, due tomorrow." 

"Make an exhibition about time, due in 28 seconds."

The tweets can be found under twitter handle @ArtAssignBot or you can follow the link here

Some people follow just to see what strange tweets the bot will generate, others follow through in bringing the projects to life. Jeffrey Thompson's webpage also provides a list of people who have submitted some finished assignments which you can find here

QR Codes

A QR code is like a bar code, but when scanned it will link you to a website online.  Using www.QRstuff.com I was able to create my own QR code which links to my new website @ www.BillVaughnArt.com

QR Codes can be a fun way to provide easy access to links for direct information about projects or resources. There are lots of different free QR Readers in the app store too, I use the QR Scanner app. Make your own QR code at QRStuff.com !

Amazing split-screen music video

Check out director Alex Courtès new music video for the French duo Cassius. The video isn't entirely school appropriate but the concept is super cool.


Cassius ft. Cat Power Pharell Williams | Go Up from DIVISION on Vimeo.

Apple Photo Editting Basics

A lot of people I've met have Macbooks but don't know that they're computers photo viewing app already comes pretty well equipped with the tools for quick & easy photo-editting. In this video, I go over some of the basic functions of using Apple Preview App for photo-editting as well as how I use it for making photos of my own illustrations look like they were scanned!

Steve Ciampaglia & Plug-In Studio

At this years NAEA conferences in New York I attended a presentation by Steve Ciampaglia, who is one part of the new media art collective known as Plug-In Studios along with Kerry Richarson. He also is a leader in the group's Street Arcade Project based in Chicago. Steve's presentation dealt with the growing field of contemporary video games that are designed to be art pieces and often address social issues.

I went into the presentation unsure of what to expect, but by the end of the presentation I was very glad I chose this talk amongst so many other interesting sounding options. The work that Plug-In Studios & The Street Arcade Project is a great reminder that the field of art is changing, and there are some amazing things coming along with those changes.

The video below outlines the general vision and goals of the project and also shows one of my favorite projects that he discussed in his talk. What on the surface seems like a zombie game is really a thoughtful commentary on race and privilege. Check it out below.

FIELDWORKS: THE PLUG-IN STUDIO, The Street Arcade from A Blade of Grass on Vimeo.

To learn a little more about Steve Ciampaglia and Plug-In Studio, check out the Plug-In Studio website at http://pluginstudio.net/

Stop Motion & Time Lapse Movies

One of my favorite free apps that I've found during my time as a teacher is iMotion. This app allows you easily create stop motion videos with manual capture and automatic capture functions. There are lots of videos already online that can help you with some of the basic features of the app, however I really think it's worth downloading and playing around with yourself to really get a feel for it!

During my time teaching I've used in creating stop-motion projects and also as a tool for documenting their process. Time-lapse videos and stop-motion are things I found all students knew of, but didn't quite understand the specifics behind how it all worked. iMotion was a fantastic way to talk about things like how animation works, how things can be slowed down or sped up and frame rates.

Like most of my favorite apps, one of the best features about is it's free so it's accessible to anyone with an apple device!

Here are two examples with a warmup project I did kicking off the year with 8th graders. For this, they worked in a group collaboration creating a symmetrical design which they would fill with zentangles and paint the negative space with gradations. To get them used to the digital integration components of the class they were to collaborate using iMotion app and Google Drive in putting together a stop-motion (or time-lapse) movie showing their process





This was a project I did my first year were students storyboarded their own stop motion movies and then took the finished videos and created music that synced up to them in their music class. Unfortunately, the files I had backed up got lost in a computer getting fried before I backed up regularly to google drive (lesson learned). Lucky for me, at least I had this video saved, even if it is without the sound!



If you try out iMotion for yourself and have any questions about it feel free to comment and I'll help you out anyway that I can!

Google Docs Basics Tutorial

In today's video I go over some of the basic features of Google Docs. Once you get the hang of it, it's a super powerful tool for collaboration & is one of the handiest word processors around!

Video Screen Recording

So before I started this blog I didn't know how to do something that you see on youtube all the time - a video recording of what's happening on your computer screen. I found out how to do it, and if you have a Mac it's actually super simple!

Step 1 - Open Quicktime Player
Step 2 - In the top left corner go to file -> New Screen recording

Step 3 - You'll get a pop-up for a box with a red record button icon in the middle. If you want to make it so that you can record your voice also, click down on the arrow next to the record button. If you have your own microphone set-up you can use that, or you can just use your mac's internal microphone like me!

Step 4 - After you hit record you have two options. You can either A) click and drag on the screen for the section you want to record (it can be adjusted before you start the recording), or B) just click anywhere on your screen and it will begin to record your full screen.

Step 5 - This part held me up for a little bit- after you start recording, it's not so obvious how to stop. Eventually I found a stop button in the top right corner of my screen that hadn't been there before!

Step 6 - After you stop your recording, a quicktime movie player of your new recording will pop-up. Be careful though, it doesn't mean it is automatically saved! To save the video you can click File -> Save and then enter in the details for your save box. 

Optionally, you can select File -> Export ->    .. and you will see some extra options for saving at different qualities and sizes.

And it's as easy as that! No need to get any new apps or installations, the capability is there for you already if you have a apple computer.

As a teacher, this is a great resource for making videos to give walkthroughs for students, for making videos in a flipped classroom setting, or it can even be used to record a small section of a video to have it saved for your lessons and presentations!

Hope this was as helpful for you as it was for me!
-Bill from Blogspot

Google Drive Basics

Hey again everyone! So this is gonna be the first of many posts related to the Google Suite & Google Drive. I'm going to be covering a lot of ground here but thought it would definitely be best just to run through some of the Google Drive Basics.

If you are already using Google Drive, this probably isn't the video for you. However, I know many people with Google / Gmail accounts who don't utilize all the awesome free features of the Google Suite at all!

For this video, I'm gonna talk about some of the most basic, basic functions such as the Google Drive features, folders, uploads, downloads, docs & sharing.

Intro & Tech Survey

     Ok internet, here's the first of many videos of me talking to myself to come.

     In this video, I discuss results from a survey I conducted in my first semester at Brooklyn College that received with some information about how art teachers are using tech integration around the world. This is a general overview of what future videos and content hope to explore and cover.

     The video displays a general outline of my research from the 60 participating teachers across 18 countries. The original presentation was a little bit longer, however I felt this is a good place to start as I list off some of the most common uses of tech integration that I will be exploring within this blog!

Hello Internet

     Hello internet, my name is Bill. I am currently a student at Brooklyn College where I am working on a Master’s Degree in Art Education. I’ve been working in the field of education for about 4 years now with 3 years of teaching art at the International School of Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.

     My aim for this blog account is to compile & share some technology related resources, tricks & tips I’ve picked up over the years and continue to accumulate. My posts will be filtered through the lens of an art educator but I still aim to share some tech tips that can be useful for everyone.

    Through this blog I'll be sharing some posts from my Instagram account @ArtRoomTech & I'll post a link to my youtube channel coming soon!

A post shared by Bill Vaughn (@artroomtech) on Mar 25, 2017 at 7:49am PDT

  Feel free to comment, request or add questions to any posts or you can shoot me an e-mail at ArtRoomTech@gmail.com

-Bill from Blogspot