DWRL Lesson Plans - Avatars

Using Photoshop to Create Persona-Avatars for Class Blog

OyP — Thu, 06 Sep 2012 18:00:32 +0000

Author:

Image Credit:

Chris Ortiz y Prentice

Brief Assignment Overview:

This lesson uses Photoshop to manipulate creative commons images found on the Internet into an avatar which represents the persona or ethos from which the student will write on a course blog.

Type of Assignment:

In-class Exercise

Homework Assignment

Assignment Length:

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Creative Commons

Multimedia

Software

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Allow students to develop a sense of self on the class blog; an ethos-creation project which facilitates better (because more committed) class conversation.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Adobe Photoshop

Google Images

Timeline for Optimal Use:

First Day/Week

Full Assignment Description:

First, I deploy a little litmus test and ask the students, “Who has used photoshop before?” A couple hands go up. I ask of these, “Who knows how to use the selection tool and how to select layers?” Most hands lower, but about four or five stay up. I distribute these students evenly amongst the class. The beauty of this lesson (as with many which involve teaching students how to use a new program) is that it depends upon peer instruction.

I give a short (fifteen minute) lesson to start class. I discuss creative commons, point towards the GoogleImage filter “labeled for reuse” and the condition “modification,” and show the students some online resources to find images (such as, http://archive.org/). Then I show them how to save the image to the desktop, bring it into Photoshop, rasterize if necessary, select what they want, and delete the rest.

I tell the Photoshop-familiar students that in addition to creating their own avatars they must also address their peers’ problems and help them learn the Photoshop basics. I say that I hereby deputize you to act as mini-instructors for the day, and then I encourage the other students to make use of their peers’ knowledge, not to let these deputies “do it” for them but rather make the deputy show you how to do it yourself. After

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

I recommend that the instructor have some familiarity with Photoshop before attempting this assignment. Best way to do that is to make an avatar of your own; once you get selecting, rasterizing, and sizing (and maybe some theme manipulation), you’re good to go! You’ll also need a course blog. You can check mine out here: http://texastalksvideogames.wordpress.com

Instructions For Students:

Today's assignment is to create a ‘gravatar’ for your profile. Think of this image as your calling card on the blog. (If you'd prefer not to make a gravatar--since it links up to your email and shows up anywhere you post to the internet while signed into that email--make an avatar image, but don't upload it to your profile. You should still complete the second part of the assignment.) You'll need to use Photoshop to combine at least two images, resize the image, and upload it on your profile.

Next, write a post and tell us, in about one hundred words, why you selected and made your avatar as you did. Title the post with your username, and upload an image of your avatar in the body.

Click here if you'd like some more pointers on selecting images in photoshop.

Evaluation Suggestions:

I grade this assignment on the basis of completion. I require all students to upload the image in a post which explains its significance to them.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My class is composed of juniors and seniors and were very responsible about helping one another with the new technology. I myself learned some things about Photoshop as concerns arose (such as why you need to rasterize certain images to manipulate them). The students stayed on task and really got into making persona for themselves. The class I use this for is about the rhetoric of video games, so my students are probably predisposed to like the idea of creating an avatar, but the lesson should port well to any class with computers in the classroom, which uses a blog and is interested in digital rhetoric.

Additional Resources:

Computers in the classroom; Adobe Photoshop (CS4, CS5); should also work with opensource photoshop programs

Course Type:

Intermediate Writing Course

Course Description:

RHE309K, The Rhetoric of Video Games investigates how video games make arguments. For instance, does BioWare’s 2010 Mass Effect 2 argue that as long as cultures remain distinct, constant warfare is a law of nature? Does the game then suggest that a more peaceful world can come only through the assimilation of all cultures into one? Or does the game argue, conversely, that a multicultural nation’s greatest resource is its capacity for tactical alliances between identity groups, and that the assimilation of one culture by another therefore weakens the union? As these questions indicate, even commercial video games make serious arguments about the world in which they are produced, exchanged, and played. In this course, we use the skills of rhetorical analysis to investigate how and what video games argue. We will pay special attention to procedural rhetoric in games and analyze how games model economies, geopolitics, war, even interpersonal relationships. In order to better understand the effects as well as premises of games’ arguments, we research the critical controversies about video games, and we consider the audiences games address. Finally, students use the skills developed over the course of the semester to conceive of and propose persuasive games of their own.

Tags:

Diagnosing Digital Literacy via Student-generated Avatars

Scott Nelson — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 21:04:56 +0000

Author:

Scott Nelson

Image Credit:

Scott Nelson

Brief Assignment Overview:

This assignment is purposefully simple because its serves as a diagnostic for students' levels of functional digital literacy in programs like Photoshop and Jing. It also serves to familiarize some students with these programs, and with the processes necessary for maintaining their class blogs.

Type of Assignment:

In-class Exercise

Assignment Length:

Partial Class Period

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Ethos

Visual Rhetoric

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

The pedagogical goals of this assignment are to determine students' proficiency levels with screencapturing and photo editing programs. I use this diagnostic to determine the depth of later technology lessons.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Computers for all the students; Jing or some other screencapturing program; Photoshop; a class/student blog or website.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Useful Anytime

First Day/Week

Early in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

I begin the lesson by directing students to a South Park avatar creator such as the ones at South Park Studios or SP Studios (two different sites that yeild similar results). I then give students abour 20 minutes to create their own South Park avatars using the applications on those sites. The only restriction I give them is that their avatars are created on a solid background, for easier cropping later.

Once everyone has created an avatar, I direct the students to Jing, a screencapturing program from TechSmith. Jing is free, but does require an email for registration. There are other ways to capture what's on the computer screen, but I like to introduce Jing as a possible avenue. Alternately, you could have students just use Command+Shift+4 on a Mac keyboard to define an area of the screen to be captured.

Now that everyone has an avatar created and saved in a file, we take them into Photoshop. The immediate goal here is to cut the avatar from its background. For this, I walk students through the Quick Selection, Magic Wand, and Magnetic Lasso tools. (There are numerous tutorials on YouTube on how to use these.) Using my own avatar, I show them the limtations of each selection technique and show them how to adjust the tolerance for the Magic Wand. After everyone has cut their avtars from their backgrounds, I have them save the files as a .gif or .png so the background remains transparent.Everyone emails me their avatar, and I make a composite image to serve as the banner to our class blog

For a final step, I have students upload thier avatar to the class blog in their introductory posts.I walk students through the process of creating a post on a Wordpress blog I've previously created, and show them how to put images into a post.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

To prepare for this lesson plan, instructors should familiarize themselves with basic Photoshop techniques, particularly selection tools. For an introduction to the different types of selection tools and what each is good for, I recommend this brief tutorial. For other Photoshop techniques I always recommend You Suck at Photoshop, as it's entertaining and instructive.

Techsmith provides a series of videos on how to operate Jing.

I use Wordpress for my class blog. For instructions on how to insert an image into posts, you can visit the Wordpress Support Site.

Instructions For Students:

For the pedagogial aims of this assignment, it's best to do this as an in-class activity, but you can provide them with these instructions should they wish to continue outside of class.

For this assignment, you'll be creating an avatar for our class blog. You'll need to create the avatar, save it as an image file, edit that image file to remove the background, and post the final image within your introductory blog post.

1. Go to either South Park Studio or South Park Avatar Creator. Using the applicaiton on that page, create an avatar by clicking on various options for body type, eyes, clothes, and the like. You don't have to create an avatar that correspnds to your real visage, but you can if you like. To make later steps easier, htough, you should only have a background of a solid color, and preferably a color that contrasts with the outlines of your avatar.

2. Once you have an avatar, open Jing. Use this program to capture an image of your avatar from your screen.

3. Open the image in Photoshop, and use one of the selection tools to select only the background, and delete this background. You should now have a gray-and-white checkered background (meaning it's transparent). Save this image file as either a .gif or .png.

4. Go to the class blog, and create a new post. Somewhere in your introductory post, you should insert your avatar image.

Feedback:

Students are generally positive about this lesson. It's fairly easy, and it's fun for most to play around with these technologies. I probably won't change this assignment in the future, as its simplicity is its strength (see below).

Some students are ay beyond the skills taught in this lesson, but the assignment gives enough flexibility for them to adjust it to their level of expertise.

Evaluation Suggestions:

This assignment isn't evaluated. In fact, this lack of evaluation is necessary for the assignment's pedagogical aims; it's a low-stakes assignment for a variety of reasons. My aims in having students do this exercise early are to get them playing with Photoshop and Jing, and to have them appraoch the technologies with an open mind. A grade for the assignment would add undue pressure to achieve, and run counter to the attitude toward technology I'm trying to cultivate. Later assignments in my class require students to alter images for rhetorical effect, so this assignment serves as an introduction to some useful programs.

During the in-class work, though, I pay close attention to students' skills in navigating the programs. I feel we often assume students come into the class with stellar computer skills, an assumption that overlooks the digital divide. By paying attention to how students move easily through the programs or struggle with their navigation, I can use this early assignment as a diagnostic for some students' functional digital literacy skills.

I take note of the students who either struggle or seem to fly through the assignment. Using this as a diagnostic, I can later pair those types of students together to harness the collective intelligence of the class. I match these students up so that peer teaching can occur.

If I see a student who is struggling with basic functional literacy skills sucha s using a mouse, I'm sure to reiterate to the class that getting better at these programs increases their skills at other programs they'll later encounter, and that I'm available to sit down with them one-on-one to walk them through the process.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

Some students are ay beyond the skills taught in this lesson, but the assignment gives enough flexibility for them to adjust it to their level of expertise.

Course Type:

Introductory Writing Course

Course Description:

The Rhetoric of Video Games

This course seeks to explore video games as a modern discursive medium. Far from being mere “mindless entertainment,” many video games make explicit or implicit arguments about gender and sexuality, economic systems, corporate practices, geopolitics, and both real and imagined societies. What arguments do these simulations and simulacra mount about how the world is? What arguments do they mount about how the world should be?

Much of the past and current study of digital rhetoric seems to look at the content of computers through applying older means of rhetorical analysis, looking at the text and images contained on computers rather than the processes through which this content is represented. What we seek to explore is a relatively new field—procedural rhetoric—and the ways this new field can inform video game criticism. How do the procedures inherent in video games make arguments about the world?

Tags:

Visualization Software