The student created a photo collage project using Adobe Photoshop to showcase family photos from their past. They scanned in old photos and edited them, adding effects like tints, to portray different emotions. The collage was arranged on three pages - the first showing all photos, the second describing each photo, and the third containing their evaluation. While the complex background exceeded expectations, weaknesses included time management, photo quality, and banner color coordination. The student learned the value of research, receiving feedback, and managing projects more efficiently.

1. Evaluation- Unit 21
In my unit 21 I would like to do photography for my personal project. The reason why I would like to
explore this type of media is because I think that this suits my ability the best because I am better at
doing the written work and explaining why I am doing it then doing a video because my skill on
adobe premiere pro (the software that we use in the
school) is not too great however I think that I am pretty
good with photo shop. I also have lots of creative ideas
that I can contribute towards this topic such as making
something look original and something that might shock
people when they look at it them and hopefully say
‘wow’. Looking at my spider diagram I would like to do a
personal photo. The reason why is because it will be
very interesting for me to explain why I chose that
picture and why I chose the background and effects for
it (for example black and white tint to make it
depressing. An light yellow tint to make it happy and
joyful etc.…) depending on what the photo is and it would be cool comparing the two photos
together and that I could adapt it because I know where they were, why they were took and how we
felt (like what as the situation at the moment in time)
To insert all of pictures in to the photo shop what I did was I
clicked on open the file the I got the correct photo that I
wanted (as shown on the screen grab.
Itill come out llike this. The selectec blue area has a padlock
on the end of it. We need to get rid of it befor we do
anything else so what I did is I double clicked on the
selected area untill this came
up
You need to click on ok so you can move it around and crop
it.

2. then I dragged it into the next file so it
got moved in to there. This is what it
looks like…
when you get to this stage you need to press “Ctrl+T”
this will enable you to change the size and change the
rotation of the photo. Hold shift so it doesn’t warp the
photo (looks like this)
to make it look more authentic of an amituristic collage put it be hind some other photos and
put a slight til on it aswell so it will look ike this
this will give it its finishing look.i did it this way because I wanted it to look
very authentic andi wanted it to have a messy look, the reason why is
because think that It would look licer then all the photos in a row and it also
show the impression of a normal clooage that abyother family could do
aswell so it also makes a tiny conection to the reader and maybe gives them
some inspiration to go recreaste photos of their own past.
I think that my pre-production went very well and that I almost worked to my full potential lacking
on the research bit (I could of done a more detailed annotations of the photos that I had found).the
time that it took me to finish the final pre-production
I was about 1 week (7 hours a week plus the time
that I stayed behind to do it so the overall time that it
took me to do this was 13 hours). In the power point
the reason why I picked the back ground is because It
reminded me of vintage photos and that the photos
that I am doing are vintage to me (because they were
took when I was younger) so I thought that It fitted
very nicely and it looked like a photo frame so it
suited the photo theme very well.

3. The photo that I found the most difficult is probably the wedding photo because of all the planning
and buying’s of the fake flowers, the white ties, the fake fringe(sisters hair) and the cleaning of my
mums dress. Also because I had to get the photos perfect because I wouldn’t be able to retake them
another day because my family would have been up to it. Overall we took 19 photos with tiny
differences between them so we could get the best photo possible.
As you can see the spirit of aloha isn’t on my final
piece. This is because I wanted to get it perfect
(get the same clothes and props) however I did
some calculations and I found out that if I paid for
every think I would of exceeded my budget by
£14.50 and I was only going for spending a
maximum £50 so I opted to change it to a picture of
were my mum and dad are on their wedding day
next to the car that they travelled in. I thought that this would a good photo to do because it is a
great convocation piece to have and it would be very fascinating to write and find out about, also I
thought that it would be relatively easy to do because I am already doing a photo where it requires
my mum and dad to be dressed up in their wedding clothes and we already have the car so we can
put it on the top of the garden so its overlooking the fields so it shows the true beauty of the
clothing and the car when the sun is shining due to the nice weather that we are having at the
moment (march).

4. (the points highlighted in blue are the adjustments that I went back on to improve the final piece so
it makes it more appealing to look at and easier to read as well)
I personally think that it came out better than I expected because when I planned it I
didn’t have the idea of the montage for the background and I was just going to have
the standard back ground of a vintage looking pattern in the background as shown on
the left. The reason why I changed the background is because I thought 1) the that I
showed hardly any relevance to the task apart from it reminding me of old vintage
photos and 2) the background makes the whole 3 page layout look more visually
appealing and that it gives a better technicality look and feeling to the whole project and therefore
giving it a higher mark maybe and a better experience to the audience when they are looking at it
name What they like? What don’t they like?
Will Matthews The background is creative and
original
Evenly spread time phases that
are included in this work
The writing is too small on the
second page so it makes it hard
to read
Luke hall The filter that you have used
contrasts with the background
nicely
The font is hard to read so your
have to concentrate what it
says
Nathan bland I like the collage/ background The “double trouble” photo
could have been better edited
Sophie Carey I like the tint of the background
because it doesn’t distract you
from the main focus of the
page however you can still see
the photos clearly
I don’t think the red banner at
the top because it doesn’t suit
the page theme
Mr. Drummond I like the complexity and time
that it took you to do the
background and the positions
that you placed them in
With the tint you can’t see the
backgrounds properly so it
wastes the time and effort that
you had put in to making that
so I would advise you make a
front cover with no tint so you
can see them properly

5. because it may give extra details of wheat we (my family) looked like that the other photos don’t
give so they can really get a proper depth of how much we have changed over the 10+ years.
Strengths Weaknesses
One of my strengths in this project was
improvising. What I mean by this is changing
items from the original plan (the background) I
think that this is a good strength to have because
this means that I can improve on my work
whenever I can.
One of my weaknesses in this project was staying
on time. What I mean by this is it has taken me 3
weeks to take the last photo ( the wedding one)
because of lack of communication between my
family and I because whenever I planned to do it
one of us had make other plans that we couldn’t
back out of
Another one of my strengths was getting
constructive criticism. What I mean by this is
improving the little things (the font, the size of
the text etc.…) by asking my peers to give my
one good and bad point and looking at them too
see if I can improve it better. I think that this is a
good strength to have because this meant that
you can take the good and bad points of other
people’s points of view so you can improve your
work as much as you can.
Another weakness that I had was getting side
tracked with other things (booking out the
camera, editing the photos that I was doing for
the background etc.) and also I kept on loosing
concentration because I am can get easily
distracted.
Another weakness that I had was that I could of
edited the photos to make them more retro, like
I could of added a tint to it to make it look more
authentic and to make it look more genuine so I
could maybe capture the essence of the whole
project (trying to make them as original as
possible) this would of made the final piece
better in my opinion because even though it
would have been more time consuming it would
have been worth the effort.
I think that I came out fairly well because it exceeded my expectations because it of the amount of
detail that went in to it and I am proud that I stood by it and wanted to make it as good as I possibly
can. I could be improved by the quality of the pictures however because I had a budget to stand by
and a dead line to keep to so I couldn’t make it 100% accurate but I do think I did an ok job on
making them fairly similar. If I was to do it again I would
1)organise my time better and write special points on ways to make the process of my time
management easier and how to run it smoother so this would give me a maximum advantage on
how to make the whole project faster, better and easier for me so I would hopefully have more time
to make the photos look better
2) Make communication between the people in the original photos (mainly family) clearer so we can
get the dates and times of when we were going to take the photos because one of the biggest
problems in this unit was getting everyone to do the photos on a free date but everyone was either

6. busy with school work or out with other family or friends so I would of made it clear to everyone
when we were going to take the pictures
3) do more photos so there is more of them to look at and read about because it could have been
more interesting to read about and analyse when looking at I and seeing the changes that the two
photos have (now and then)(
One of the things that I like the most about
this project is that I like the background and
the tint because it shows a whole depth of
how my family act, live, socialise and it really
shows the bond that we have as a family. I
also think that this really finishes of the
whole project because it is quite unique and
really fits in to the whole project as a whole
because it’s to do with my families younger
years and how I have changed so having pictures of the past as the background gives it another
whole range of depth and meaningfulness also it more interesting then looking a single set colour
canvas background because that would look too boring and basic also it would show a wider range
of skill in this unit.
I also quite like the 3 page spread out because it has a fair amount of work done to it and it also
evens out the reading and pictures so its not to much to do at one time. I was origenly only going to
do one page (the middle one) however because I wanted to write about the photos I made a second
page describing what they are and som extra detail about them. Then when I stated my evaluation I
one of the comments that was said is that they cant see the background due to the pictures on top
and the tint so I then had a suggestion from my teacher to make a front page so the audience can
see all of the photos and I have now turnt it in to a little booklet. This is better then my origenal idea
because it isnt as boring then just one page and that it gives a better look when people are looking
at it.

7. One thing that im not too keen about
is the colour of the banner because it
looks to plane and that it contrasts too much with the tint of the background. I was going to change
it however there was there was no colour that I really liked so I just left it the same because that was
the only on that looked half decent and I also ran out of time to do something different so If I could
do this project again I would like to do a different tint maybe or do a bit more research on magazine
style banners looking at the colours, edges and the shapes so maybe it would of given me some
inspiration to make it look better.
Over all I think that my unit 21 went well, because I really found it intreresting looking at my family
photos and that I quite liked the over all layout of the whole project. I have learnt how to take
contructive critisism and learning to improve on all of the bad points about the work. I have also
learnt how research plays a massive role when making a media unit because these gives you great
amounts of inspiration and amazing ideas to work with.