On behalf of the class of 2006, the second graduating class of Digital Arts at George Cogswell College, we would like to welcome you. It is an honor for us to have you here to celebrate this special day with us. This is the last day of our school year and the beginning of our professional life. It is also a day that we have worked very hard for and we know we could not have done it without your help.
We have studied diligently in these past three years and experienced many changes in the digital technologies. Some of us had no idea what we were getting into. We had to deal with both the creative side and the technical side of the digital arts. The creative side was always fun! We had fun designing characters, and then animating them. We had fun analyzing filming and audio techniques, we had fun listening to each other's scripts. Acting class was most amusing!
I will never forget our storytelling class. We came up with various weird and fascinating movements for our classmates to act out. But when we applied all of this creative fun stuff digitally, the technical side tormented us.
There was always new software to learn, especially in animation programs. Our 3D animation classes were excruciating; we had to memorize more than a generous amount of technical terminology and a myriad of short-cut keys.
We had to learn to think in 3D, to understand the relationship of our model from top view to side view and front view and pay attention to every detail; practically everything from modeling to material, texture, and animation. If we were not careful, our character's hands and feet would disappear into cyberspace!
Besides that, there were computer problems to worry about. Some of us had experienced system crashes through power outages during the storm season. Others experienced file corruption a few weeks before the finals. There were many sleepless nights. In fact, one of us broke the school rules and stayed overnight just to get some work done, disregarding the alarm in the hall. After this incident, every night at closing time, the on-duty instructor walked around the computer rooms many times to make sure that no one was hiding under a table.
I'll never forget those moments. (Now the school has installed alarms in all computer rooms at the new building; there just is no excuse to try to stay over night.
There is a huge industry dedicated to animation and creating entertainment like movies, cartoons, video games, and educational software to deliver a message, tell a story, and/or educate the masses. Animation is the process of creating a continuous motion and shape change illusion by means of the rapid display of a sequence of static images that minimally differ from each other. Anyone who as ever turned on a television, gone to the movies, seen a commercial has been exposed to an animation style at some point. Some love animation and some are not so interested in it, but regardless it is a booming business that started out simply and is evolving at a rapid pace. Animation today is very advanced and it is amazing what goes into putting things into action, especially when it comes to current animated features and video games. Creators have been able to make fictional characters appear as if they are real and have extraordinary detail, take three-dimensional animation for example. With some 3-D animations it is hard to differentiate if it is indeed an animation or a film with real actors. Scenery can be just as detailed as its real counterparts and characters, although still cartoon-like, have very realistic detail from facial muscle movement to pigment in their skin and eyes. There are some two dimensional works that are exceptional as well. Many are created by drawing out each individual scene and combine in sequence. One can see that 2-D animation today has seamless transitions, compared to jagged transitions exhibited seen in earlier animations. This is due to the thriving technology that animators have at their disposal. From black and white, flat and jagged with poor audio quality to vivid colors, three dimensional...
Students, faculty, family, friends, on this exciting day, I speak to optimism, laughter, and grins.
I cursed under my breath and grabbed Annabeth and dashed through the hallway to get to our advisory. I opened the door just as the tardy bell rang and sighed in relief.I slid into the seat next to Annabeth just as the announcements started. I zoned out until our principal yelled through the intercom ,“ We are going into a code-red lockdown, we have a break in!”
I'm sure everyone here has seen a picture of a mother duck leading her ducklings. Imagine the mother duck taking her ducklings up some stairs. The mother duck easily climbs the first stair and waits for the other little ducks to climb up. The first duckling stretches its wings as high up in the air as it can and stands on the tips of its little webbed feet. With a little help from its beak it manages to barely make the first step. Sometimes it requires a little help from mama duck to boost itself up. Despite the cute and rather funny part of this picture, it is possible to learn a lot from the ducks. The two ideas we can gain from them are leadership and following. In life each one of us is a leader and a follower at some point.
When I was eleven years old, I got admitted into these Saturday morning classes--extra education for gifted kids, they called it. That surprised me and my parents and everybody. I remember going there, and they had things like anthropology and geology--various historical things. But the thing that really appealed to me--'cause I was kind of a shy kid--was mime and creative drama. The teacher was this guy called Brian Taylor, who basically took me under his wing. I walked into the classroom, and the first thing he showed us how to do was the wall in mime. And for me, there was something magical about creating an illusion that people respond to. And that was kind of key for me. Something inside me went, "That! That's what I should be doing! That's what I wanna do. I wanna be able to create that kind of
Let's take a moment to think back to the people and times that shaped us the last four years. Every teacher deserves a "thank you" for helping us to reach our goal of graduation. The love and support of our families has been greatly appreciated. But truly, the main ingredient of our high school experience has been our peers. We all faced hardships, but we were able to overcome them, together. And now, here we are once again, together.
It amazes me that we are finally here! Throughout the years, I have often thought about this moment. How it would feel to be with all of you, in our caps and gowns, finally graduating. I remember as a child, thinking about what I would look like when I was "all grown up," how I would act, who I would love and what kind of person I would become. And now here it all is, we're ready, we're done with high school, and I couldn't be more thrilled or scared! We go through this twelve-year metamorphosis, and then one day, we wake up and its over, our ascent into adulthood has come. We're ready to face all that life has to throw at us, to make a life for ourselves, outside of school and childhood, to go to college, take a year off or get a job. Yet at the same time, it can be terrifying to complete...
The most important class of my high school career has been “Spark! Technology Solutions,” a selective, district-wide program run by the Parkway School District in which a small group of students isare immersed in a professional environment, solving real world problems and working on client-defined projects and tasks for real businesses. In this class I have spent the last two years doing independent study in numerous areas of technology, including graphic
Today I have been asked to speak about graduation past, present and future. My first graduation occurred when I finished kindergarten. This is often where we learn the most basic of principles. This is what I learned:
In the high school art classroom, technology brings students to the 21st century. Art, while still valued, is becoming a disregarded subject as the world moves forward into technology. I would like to create a digital art classroom that not only helps students learn up-to-date artistic methods, but also teaches them relevant life skills. Carefully integrated technology pulls art students into twenty-first century design careers. It also teaches digital citizenship and builds an effective, relevant learning community. While I integrate technology into my lessons I must consider the effects it has on both the artistic process and my students.
It was the start to a normal day: getting to school, then getting in trouble. I could swear that none of the faculty members liked me. Once they even yelled at me for having one of my shirt buttons undone. They could find anything to yell at me for, whether it had to do with me or not.
Computer animation is a fast increasing field, and production studios and computer graphics studios are normally the best companies that employ computer animators. They use these computer animations to produce movies and television shows. This has been a lifelong vision of mine to put my imagination, with my creation and characters, into life in computer graphics in such ways as video gaming with a three-dimensional displaying as well as loud animation with exciting story that call not just to myself, but also to others. My animations would reflects much of my thoughts, my passions and characters that have wanted to done since I was a kid. Education has appeared in various methods. Major scholars have continuously acknowledged the worth of academic study and research. Instructors, too, have always operate to form a chosen belief, data, and actions. Animation can provide additional support where it is required. Animation is a sequence of still images. It could be of pictures, objects, or individuals in countless locations of incremental society. Nevertheless, when played back, it produces a stream of continuous
“It’s time to expand our notation of education and extend the chance for these transformative experiences to all children. I’ll be the first to shout ‘Bravo!’” (Artifact A) said a 21st century skills report. At this time, digital technological advancements are being taken place in order to advance not only our society but also our school education system, economically, politically, and globally on a worldwide scale. These advancements create new avenues and relationships between the arts and culture, but need to take place within the classrooms to account for the shift towards a digital society. Also, new job opportunities will surface in the job market for tomorrow and currently, both on a nationally and global scale. Moreover, the new advancements will benefit our society if the education can grow and advance with society as well.
Congratulations class of 2012! From the bottom of my heart, I wish all of you a shining future! Thank you for having me this special moment.
My first real experience with computers, as we know them today, was while I was in the Navy. Once we learned to use commands called "Dos", we could make the computer do unbelievable things. I became obsessed with learning as much as I could abo...