Unit 1: Introduction to visual language in art and design

Past postcard

My theme for this postcard is the moon landing which occurred at 02:56 UTC on 21 July 1969.

Apollo 11 was the original major spaceflights that landed humans on the moon. Mission commander Neil Armstrong and pilot Buzz Aldrin landed the lunar module Eagle on July 20, 1969, at 20:18 UTC. Armstrong was the first to stride onto the lunar surface six hours later on July 21; Aldrin followed him in about 20 minutes. They both devoted about two and a quarter hours outside the spacecraft, and gathered 47.5 pounds of lunar substance for returning to Earth. Michael Collins directed the control module Columbia single-handedly in lunar orbit while they were on the Moon's surface. They [Armstrong and Aldrin] took less than a day on the lunar surface previously to meeting with Columbia in lunar orbit.

In this image, I show an astronaut standing beside an alien that though is very different from a human, seems quite alike in a strange way and then far off in the distance there is an alien that doesn't look very similar to humans at all. It looks quite vicious and I chose this image because humans have an innate habit to fear the unknown. Lastly, on the other side of the image there is a N.A.S.A rocket ship that the astronaut is supposed to seemingly have come from.

I chose these images because I thought it was an interesting controversial topic and these pictures supported them well. I chose aliens that looked somehow similar to humans to make it seem more realistic. I chose a picture of the surface of the moon, and first merged the astronaut onto the scene. I did this by copying and pasting the whole image onto the original, using the edit tab I clicked the transform button and began to scale the image to a size that I would like it to appear. Next I used the quick selection tool and traced the edges of the astronaut leaving the background out. I clicked on the add mask button to merge these two images as though they were one. I did this with every picture that I wanted to blend into the image. The next step I took was to move things around using the scale tool and then I used both the blur and the burn tool to even out the edges of each image, then I added shadows using the burn tool.

The United States presidential election of 2016, which is reserved for Tuesday, November 8th 2016, will be the 58th quadrennial presidential election for the U.S.

Supporters will decide on presidential electors by voting for one of the candidates. The term limit established in the Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution averts the current president, Barack Obama who is of a Democratic Party, from being nominated to a third term. The 2016 election is expected to establish the 45th President, in addition to the 48th Vice President of the United States.

My theme for the present postcard is the presidential election for the U.S president because it is constantly on the news and social media despite being in a different country. Though this must be because of the saying "If America sneezes, the UK catches a cold." Out of the candidates there are always 3 that catches everyones eye, Bernie Sanders - Probably their best candidate, Hillary clinton - A known liar and Donald Trump - A man know for his idiotic and offensive talk as well as his hate speeches. In the image I have created, Trump holds a machine gun, Hillary holds a grenade and Bernie is looking quite terrified inside a barrel between the two.

I chose these images because I thought it was a stimulating debatable subject and they depicted this appropriately. I selected the image of trump mimicking a gun because he talks about guns quite a lot and it was also an easier way to make him look as though he was holding one. Then, I picked an image of Hillary standing with her fist up, this was an easy position to edit in a grenade, however I had to edit another hand (from another image of Hillary holding a mic) on top because there was not an image of a grenade that would work perfectly enough for it to look as though she was holding it. Next I googled a picture of Bernie, I knew I wanted him to be in the middle and so I found the perfect picture of what someone’s expression would be if they were caught between two madmen. At first Bernie was going to be on the ground however I changed that decision to putting him on higher ground by making him hide inside a barrel. I chose a picture of a deserted battlefield with fire to show the damage that these people could do, and I first united Hillary into the scene. I achieved this by copying and pasting the entire image onto the background picture. This was done using the edit tab, I clicked the transform key and started to scale the image to a size I would like it to seem. Afterwards, I used the quick selection tool and traced the edges of Hillary leaving the backdrop of her image out. I clicked on the add mask button to fuse these two pictures. I did this with every image that I wanted to put into the scene. The next step I acquired was to transfer things across by making use of the scale tool and then I used the blur and the burn tool to level out the edges of each image, and then I enhanced shadows exercising the burn tool.

society collapse

In popular zombie movies 28 Days Later and I Am Legend, an overwhelming epidemiologic plague stretches through civilization, altering individuals into monotonous, unfeeling monsters with cannibalistic predispositions.

Although deceased beings can't arise back to existence, specific viruses can stimulate or provoke such destructive, zombie-like conduct, experts say in the new National Geographic Channel documentary The Truth Behind Zombies, premiering Saturday at 10 p.m. ET/PT. (National Geographic News is part of the National Geographic Society, which part-owns the National Geographic Channel.)

For example, rabies—a pathological disease that contaminates the central nervous system—can push individuals to be brutally irrational and eccentric, corresponding to Samita Andreansky, a virologist from Florida who also takes part in in the documentary.

Fuse rabies with the capability of a flu virus to extent rapidly through the air, then you could have the ingredients for a zombie apocalypse.

Is a Rabies Virus Modification Conceivable?

Contrasting film zombies that convert to reawakened virtually instantaneously following infection, the principal indications a person has rabies, which are; bewilderment, anxiety, paralysis and delusions, —don't characteristically show from ten days up to a year, as the virus develops within the body.

When rabies situates in, however, it's lethal within a week if it is left untreated.

Considering the possibility that the genetic code of the rabies virus faced sufficient variations, or mutations, its incubation time can be diminished radically, scientists voice.

Countless viruses have instinctively elevated mutation frequencies and continuously alternate as a measure of escaping or avoiding the immunities of their hosts.

There are numerous techniques in which viral mutations can transpire, e.g. via mimicking faults in gene duplication or impairment from ultraviolet light.

"If a rabies virus can mutate fast enough, it could cause infection within an hour or a few hours. That's entirely plausible," Andreansky revealed.

An Airborne Rabies Could Produce A "Rage Virus"

Nevertheless, for the rabies virus to activate a zombie epidemic similar to that in the movies, it would additionally have to be significantly more contagious.

Humans usually catch rabies subsequently to being wounded by an infected animal, typically a dog—and then the infection generally halts there.

Thanks to pet vaccinations, people seldom contract rabies nowadays, and even scarcer individuals die from the disease. For instance, in 2008 only two cases of human rabies infection were reported to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A nimbler fashion of transmission would be through the air, this is also how the influenza virus circulates.

"All rabies has to do is go airborne, and you have the rage virus" similar in 28 Days Later, Max Mogk, head of the Zombie Research Society, articulates in the documentary. The global nonprofit is dutiful to "raising the level of zombie scholarship in the Arts and Sciences," corresponding to their website.

To be conveyed by air, rabies would have to "copy" attributes and mannerisms from alternative virus, a dangerous example would be influenza.

Altered rituals, or strains, of the identical virus can interchange fragments of genetic code through procedures titled reassortment or recombination, said Elankumaran Subbiah, a virologist at Virginia Tech.

But extraneous viruses merely do not hybridize in nature, Subbiah told National Geographic News.

Similarly, it's scientifically unnoticed of for two drastically diverse viruses such as rabies and influenza to appropriate traits from one another, he said.

"They're too different. They cannot share genetic information. Viruses assemble only parts that belong to them, and they don't mix and match from different families.”

Is Engineered A Zombie Virus Possible?

It's hypothetically conceivable—though tremendously challenging—to generate a hybrid rabies-influenza virus exploiting modern-day genetic-engineering methods, the University of Miami's Andreansky said.

Using research, I have created a postcard that allows an explainable future through mutation of genetic code; in my postcard I have showed not only a virus that causes zombie-like states but also one that would slowly mutate the host itself. To create this card I used a similar process as the others, however, I also wanted to create a hologram like effect to my futurist scene. I used various modes of the paint brush tool to create this effect and burned the images edges when i was happy with the outcome. I placed them in specific areas to make the scene more realistic, some further away than others and one even on top of the stairs. I also make some more faded than others for a more sufficient end-result.