My last project. Kiss it goodbye.

Let me just think.
My senior year.
I think everyone has thought about graduating, whether you're a freshman, sophomore, junior, or senior. My senior year flew by. I didn't expect that. I always said I wanted to get out of this hell hole, but I think I'm trying to bury myself here. Burying myself here would be the proper thing to do. That would mean that I would be stuck here forever. Deep inside that's what I want, or what I think I want. The truth is I'm scared. Graduating high school is a big step and I'm not ready. I feel like I've wasted my time. I didn't take advantage of what I should've, I didn't try hard. I just assumed everything would come easy, and it doesn't. Art was where I never had to try. And now, trying is killing me. Art is a combination of everything I love vs. everything I hate. If I tried harder, I would probably have been good at school, but I'm not, and I'm ok with that. If I was good at school that would mean that I followed the rules and I did what I was told, which is a total lack of creativity. I'm not saying that I'm the most creative person in the world, because I know I'm far from that, but I have a problem with rules, which is an issue with my power. Believe it or not, I'm powerless. I think I'm the one having a problem believing it. I always knew I was weak, and I just put a front up, which is the best acting I've ever done in my life.
I've been known as the photographer forever. I was nine years old sitting in a photo studio saying, "this is where I want to be for the rest of my life", but when you're young, you're juvenile and you are unaware of what it really means to grow up and to have a job, which is where I'm getting to. I'm really really close. When I was nine years old in that photo studio, I was a lot happier than I am right now; the constant flow of ideas and the time you had, is what kept you going. As a child, you think that anything you do is amazing. A simple  flower drawn with Crayola crayons turned you into an artist. Sure, thousands or trillions of kids have done that, but you were unaware. If you told a kid, "You're not original. You're not the only one doing this. Other people have done it better," I'll bet you my life that the kid will grow up hating what they do. We're still kids. I only have a limited amount of time to still say this, but I am most definitely still a kid. Telling me what I'm doing isn't good enough basically, it takes a toll on you. It killed my inspiration.
I'd like to take my fucking camera and toss the piece of shit out the window on the top floor of the Empire State Building. Everything I loved about photography has been stripped away. Between planned photo shoots, people I had to research, and the pressure to be better than I am, it all made me collapse. I will forever hate the people who did this to me. The sad part is that they're the closest people in my life and I don't think I'll ever forgive them. I was shoved behind a lens. I always liked to put myself there, but I got shoved once, then again, then again, then again, then again, then again, then again, and yes, again.
No research, no studying. No looking up how to do something, no listening to how it should be done. These are questions & problems that I can figure out. My art isn't produced for someone else's opinions. I've never worked like that. I did everything for myself. I knew it was a mistake to bring my collage to school. Honestly, how fucking dumb am I. It was perfect until it was commented on and criticized. I was satisfied with it and I considered it one of the best things I put together. Now I stepped into shit and got stuck with this as my last, final, supposed to be the best, supposed to be proud of, should be unforgettable, senior year, graduating year, project. My collage looks pretty shitty now since I stabbed it with a knife after school.
Yes, I'm angry. I'm angry at a lot of things. When I needed the guidance, I didn't get it. Now that I'm on my path, suddenly there are voices telling me to turn around. I don't need a map. If I wanted one, don't you think I would have photographed or collaged one by now?

Expect another post.

-ashleycoppolino

Wreck This Journal

I've wanted Wreck This Journal by Keri Smith for a while, but I finally bought it.
It's basically a book that tells you what to do and on each page is a different task. It will tell you to do things like rip pages out, scribble over the instructions, and stomp on it with your shoes.
I'm going to treat this like my daily practice. I will have the book with me at all times and I will try to complete it. One of my issues are organization and remembrance, whih probably explains my OCD and passion for photographing every moment of my life. But this book goes against both of my issues. That's why I'm excited to complete it.

I'm going to be documenting it.. Probably because I want to remember it. I'm a contradiction, I know.
Destroyingthejournal.tumblr.com

-ashleycoppolino

I need to have a post on Andy Warhol.

Andy Warhol.
The documentary clarified a lot that I didn't know about Warhol.
What I love about his work is that it's so distinct that you're able to tell right away that it's him. It also brings something that everyone has in their kitchen cabinet, like a can of Campbell's soup, and makes it art. Those are two of my three favorite things about art: distinct style and unintentional masterpieces.
The third thing I love about art is what we all know about me. I love photography.
I almost fell out of my chair when I realized that Andy Warhol is actually considered a photographer. His Marylin Monroe pieces were photographs. I don't know why it never hit me before. But when it hit me this week, it felt like a bus charged at my brain.
Andy Warhol has always been one of my favorite artists. In fact, one of my favorite quotes is one that he said: "The best thing about a picture is that it never changes, even when the people in it do." Only now did it just realize as I was typing his quote, it makes complete sense that he's a photographer.
The documentary was more of an eye-opener than I expected. I don't exactly know what I thought Warhol was before the film.

-ashleycoppolino

"i'd like my main course with a side salad, please."

As for my main project, I have joined with Andrew to make a movie. As I posted before, we drifted away from a music video, mostly because of me, but he willingly agreed to make some other sort of film.
The idea we constructed is basically a student gets bullied and loses it on everyone around him. He's thought to be crazy, and then he starts to believe it, but a girl convinces him that he's not crazy. It's underdeveloped, but that's what we have right now. We're writing the script currently, so I will update you on what goes on.
*****IF ANYONE WANTS TO ACT, LET ANDREW OR I KNOW! THANK YOU!*****

As for my side salad, with the end of the year approaching, we are in need of a STAC Montage. I decided that this would be a great thing to occupy my time. I actually love making slideshows, so this is perfect.

I'm going to take on two side salads (if I have the time). My idea is to take photographs and paint parts of the actual photo white. Then I will use my abstract designs to cover the photo. I love photography and I love dabbling in abstract designs, so I decided to mix the two together.

That's all for now. That's all for my senior year.

-ashleycoppolino

Independent (although not really) Project

Senior year is coming to an end. It's hitting me that every decision I make is final. No decision goes unheard right now in my life.

I was planning to make a music video to Remembering Sunday by All Time Low (no hate please), but I'm not going to. My reason for that is Remembering Sunday has been my go-to song for all rough situations in my life for the past five years. Making a music video whether I'm proud of it or not, would completely throw out the songs meaning to me. I don't want to change what is already perfect.

I decided that I'm going to tackle making a movie. I won't be doing it alone. Andrew and I are going to try to complete this together. Right now, all we know is that it is a movie. The rest will be written.

-ashleycoppolino

Enneagram Test - 2012 Version

Well, despite what I believe in myself, the survey that I answered honestly does not lie. Therefore, I am bound to believe that I am Type 6. With consideration of the wings, I would be a 6w5.

Being a 6 pretty much focuses on the fact that my anxiety is high. This I know. What I do not know is why now? Two years ago, when my anxiety was worse than it is now, I scored Type 8. Type 8 is like what I am now: the "take charge because they don't want to be controlled" type. I believe most of you will agree with me. If anyone agrees on my Type 6 title, let me know. I'm pretty eager to know why.

My guess is that it's my mental state at the moment. There's too much going on in my life right now that has me on edge, which definitely kicked up my anxiety.

Have a good night. Hopefully I see you all tomorrow.

-ashleycoppolino

Q3 Individual Written

I’ve been in the photography workshop for the past couple of weeks now. I didn’t want to be in it, but then again, I didn’t know what other intensive I’d belong to. So, I took on the photography with as much passion as possible.

Elisa, Michelle, Matt, Anika, and I were given the necessities to work. The necessities consisted of: flash unit (three lights, the power pack, a grid, a soft box, and two umbrellas), two stands, remote flash triggers, a backdrop, and Luke’s Canon 20D. I’ve never actually done studio work, so this was new to me too. I did know the techniques we used. Below is a photo of Jei where half his face is lit and the other half is in shadow. To set up this shot, the camera is placed in front of Jei with the light directly to his left. This style is called split/hatchet lighting. It’s more commonly shot on males, but it happens to be my favorite for anyone.

The first few days with the set-up, we focused mainly on lighting, but as we were getting used to it, we lost it along the way. We started to become preoccupied with personality. There’s a huge difference between a good photo and a bad photo. A good photo has good lighting and personality as two major components, as a bad photo lacks those two qualities. Below (photo on top), you could see how the lighting was off and basically how the photographer kept clicking the button without any thought of positioning the lights or making the background and subject look good. To the right you can see how the background is perfectly black, the light was positioned specifically for this shot, and you are still able to get a personality for the subject. For the shot shown on the bottom below, we placed the grid over the light, which is used to diffuse the light so it’s not as harsh. The diffuser gives the photograph a softer feel and reduces the chance of “washing/blowing out” the subject. We use the term “washing/blowing out” for when the light is too harsh and eliminates the skin tone making the photo white washed.

After using the photo techniques we’ve learned with the lights for our photo intensive, a few of us decided to make our individual project based around natural light. I’ve battled with photography a lot recently, mostly because I feel my passion drifting away from me, but doing photography outside the studio reminded me why I love it so much. You’re given the ability to freely walk around with a camera, which opens possibilities rather than being stuck with an artificial light within four walls. We also used color, which changes the factors. I feel that when you use black and white, you have no choice but to capture the personality, as apposed to color where you capture fashion, location and a smaller percentage of personality.

I used my friend, Jaclyn, as the model for the “rebel out of school” theme. Don’t be fooled by the good photos we decided to display, because we did end up getting photos with harsh light such as the one on the top (shown below) and photos with not enough light on the face, like the one on the bottom (shown below).

Michelle did the photoshopping on the final four photos. I don’t have a copy of photoshop, so my skills were limited when it came to editing. Photoshop can take practically any photo and transform it into a masterpiece. The top (shown below) is the before and the bottom (shown below) is the after. Michelle photoshopped the strands of hair that were in the way, she dyed the roots of the hair back to red, she removed all blemishes to the skin, she reconstructed the corner of the eye to delete a red shape, added the effect to make her skin look like pearl, and saturated the photo to enhance the overall shot.

-ashleycoppolino