Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone! Today Art Honor Society is canceled so you can go out and rock the candy or whatever teenagers do for Halloween, enjoy!

Classes today will be work as usual...

Digital Media: Video Game Character Design

In Digital Media class we began work on our Video Game Character Designs yesterday in Adobe Photoshop.  Each student should create 2 character designs with at least 3 different perspectives and a full body drawing as well as the name and a short bio of the character on each page.

Here are some professional examples of character designs from the Simpsons to use as a reference.  We are not drawing as many perspectives or showing how the characters move and articulate but it's helpful to consider it before beginning your video game.

Celebrating #GlobalMakerDay in digital media class today by #drawing our original #videogame characters using the @wacom tablets on @Photoshop for games we will be #coding next month! pic.twitter.com/V3U01mZEQm

— Tim Needles (@timneedles) October 29, 2019

AP Art: Science and Art collaboration

Today the AP Art class will continue our Science and Art collaboration with a Google Hangout period 6-7 and we will work with a local artist and learn about the program.

National Art Honor Society: Spooky Hallways

National Art Honor Society had a great time at Spooky Hallways running a photo booth, an augmented reality drawing station, and doing face painting!  Here's a few photographs from Friday's event.

NAHS Spooky Hallways

Today is our Spooky Hallways from 3:30-6:30 at High School East and we'll be running a photo booth and drawing station.

National Art Honor Society: Spooky Hallways

In National Art Honor Society this week we will be preparing for Spooky Hallways tomorrow by creating signs, drawing areas, backgrounds, collecting candy and toys.  The program runs tomorrow from 3:30-6:30 and we'll be in front of the library.

The National Art Honor Society will be participating in the Spooky Hallways #Halloween event this Friday, #NAHS will be running an #AugmentedReality dance & photo booth with face painting and candy! pic.twitter.com/TnRRGHrYvb

— Tim Needles (@timneedles) October 23, 2019

Studio Art: Augmented Reality Pumpkin Carving

In Studio Art will will again revisit the craft of Augmented Reality with some virtual Pumpkin Carving with Quiver to support this week's Spooky Hallways program on Friday.  We will create a series of virtual pumpkins the will adorn the photo booth for the visiting kids!

AP Art: Artist Research Project

In AP Art Class we are beginning our Research Project this week. Below are the basic outline of the project which you can create in Google Slide and submit via Google Classroom.

Google Slide Presentation:

• Cover page with artist, image of artist, name/class/year
• Birth/(death) date with 10 bulleted facts about the artist & link to where you got the bio info
• Famous painting with 5 bulleted facts about it and reference images
• 15 full size, full page images of the artist's work

Here are the artists to research with links to biographies:

1. Hannah- Johannes Vermeer, Amy Sherald
2. Alexia- James Victore, DAIN 
3. Gianna- Sandy Skoglund, Peter Max
4. Ashleigh- Dima Drjuchin, Daniel Danger
5. Payton- Tristan Eaton, Yayoi Kusama
6. Kiersten- David Hockney, David Carson
7. Allison- Swoon, Andrew Wyeth, 
8. Erin- Andy Goldsworthy, Claes Oldenburg
9. Alexandra- David Salle, Henri Matisse
10. Julianna- Tara McPherson, Beau Stanton 
11. Kelsey- Wayne White, Marjane Satrapi
12. Megan- Alphonse Mucha, Esao Andrews 
13. Nethmi- Marilyn Minter, Chuck Close
14. Needles- Robert Rauschenberg, Edward Hopper

Pep Rally 2019

#SmithtownEast #spiritWeek concluded today with our #peprally, its always fun & impressive to see the students showcase their skills at @SCSD_HSE! #EastIsBeast! pic.twitter.com/tHLR9bPpdH

— Tim Needles (@timneedles) October 19, 2019

We held out annual Pep Rally on Friday and here are some of the highlights that I edited together, there were some really impressive student performances.

NASA's All Female Spacewalk Today

Today is NASA's All Female Spacewalk so we will stream in it class while we work on our water conservation projects, our sketch notes are due at the beginning of class on Monday.

LIVE NOW: Tune in to watch the first #AllWomanSpacewalk in human history! 👩🏻‍🚀

Starting at approximately 7:50am ET, @Astro_Christina & @Astro_Jessica venture into the vacuum of space to replace a failed power controller. Watch: https://t.co/2SIb9YXlRh

— NASA (@NASA) October 18, 2019

National Art Honor Society

We will be celebrating spirit week this week by working on our Wyland mural, Spooky Hallways, and T-shirt designs as well as voting for the Media Art Honor Society president and VP.

Digital Media: Water Conservation

We will be collaborating with Smithtown West HS, Wyland, and National Geographic on a series of projects supporting water conservation.  We will begin by researching water conservation and animals that are effected locally and globally in order to create art such as mural designs.  We watched some of the National Geographic video resources and will will incorporate the National Geographic framework in our work.  In our research we should answer the following questions using sketchnotes (answer the 3 questions and draw at least 3 related animals):

1. Why is there a need for water conservation (on Long Island, nationally, and globally)

2. What water conservation efforts are occurring on Long Island and what can we do to make an impact personally?

3. What aquatic life is impacted by the water issues locally (and globally)?

I'm working with my #art classes in a collaboration with @WylandORG, @NatGeoEducation, local artists & science teachers in my district like @williamsocnwld to explore ways to use our #creativity to help educate our community about water conservation! #K12Artchat #AspireLead pic.twitter.com/gYXWEY8pJM

— Tim Needles (@timneedles) October 11, 2019

Digital Media: YAM Flag Due Today

This week we created 3' x 5' flag designs for Youth Art Month in March addressing the theme of Take A Journey Through Art which are due today. Before you submit your final design be sure to self-assess and reflect on the work using the rubric below before handing it in for a grade and to the competition.  Use the following checklist to know if you are ready to self-assess:

• Is the theme “Take A Journey Through Art” clear in the work?
• Did you include the name of our state (New York) in the design?
• Did you include the current Youth Art Month YAM logo?
• Did you make sure that any Lettering or logo is ¼” from the border?

Insight Education Conference, Manville NJ

Columbus Day weekend I presenting on STEAM learning at the Insight Education Conference in Manville NJ and shared some insights and projects from my upcoming ISTE book.  We learned a fun and engaging interdisciplinary augmented reality project and discussed how to support the STEAM mindset to encourage creativity, critical thinking, and innovation! 

It was great getting to connect with so many terrific educators and work with them over the weekend- below are the resources for the presentation.

Digital Media: Digital Self Portrait Drawing

last week we learned some techniques in Adobe Photoshop to create digital self portrait drawings and this week we will create a layered background incorporating type and other images to give our portraits a unique sense of our personality.

Add some colors to the base drawing and incorporate any handwritten or computer created type or drawing elements to your image.  The examples here from students in class show the early stage of the process.

National Art Honor Society

Today the National Art Honor Society will meet to vote on our new president and organize out field trips, induction, and upcoming art shows including the NAHS juried show at NAEA headquarters.  We are discussing going to see the new MOMA Museum in NYC as well as seeing the highline and the new Kusama gallery exhibit.

AP Art: United Nations Sustainable Global Goals

We began the school year in AP Art and drawing class by participating in the Goals Project.  We collaborated with classes around the world to learn about the United Nations Sustainable Global Goals. We talked with students around the world, each of which focused on a different goal and worked together to create a project.

Here's a look at the stop-motion animation we created together to represent our goal, Global Goal 17 Partnerships for the Goals. Each student in class created a hand-painted puzzle piece and we created the animation with a voice over to illustrate the goal.  The GIF above shows a clip of our final film which will be posted online.

Digital Media: Using Virtual Reality for Training

We will soon be exploring Virtual Reality in class so I thought I'd share this article on how it's being used now for employee training with a number of companies.

Digital Media: YAM Flag Design Contest

This week we are creating 3' x 5' flag designs for Youth Art Month in March addressing the theme of Take a Journey through Art which will be due Friday 10/11. Your submission should address the following questions:

• Is the theme “Take a Journey through Art” clear in the work?
• Did you include the name of our state (New York) in the design?
• Did you include the current Youth Art Month YAM logo?
• Did you make sure that any Lettering or logo is ¼” from the border?

The winning entry will be made into a full size flag and hung at the Art Educators annual convention. The student will win YAM prizes and the class will receive free art supplies. Above is an example of the winning entry from our class 2 years ago. Below is the logo that you should incorperate into the work.


When you are finished with the work, use this rubric to self assess you piece before you hand it into Google Classroom to make sure it has all of the necessary elements.  Feel free to make any changes to improve your grade before you hand it in.

NY Comic Con 2019

This weekend is NY Comic Con and there are a number of great art and media panels and events happening locally.  If you are attending, make sure to take some pictures and share some of the pertinent information that relates to what we are doing in class!  I will see you there!

Wyland National Art Challenge

We will be participating in the Wyland National Art Challenge this month in conjunction with National Geographic and the entries will be due on December 1st, 2019. The theme of the Art Challenge is conservation, especially water conservation. Teachers are invited to encourage their students to explore today's environmental landscape and participate in a classroom mural contest, as well as an individual art, and photography contest. Digital images of your artwork are submitted for judging, not the actual artwork. Images will be uploaded to wylandfoundation.org/artchallenge/ beginning October 1st.

Three areas to win: 1. Classroom Mural: Work together as a class to create a 4-foot by 8-foot (or larger) mural. Three classrooms will win $500 for art supplies. 2. Individual Art Supporting the Class Mural: Individual pieces of art, in any medium, supporting the theme of the class mural. One 11th or 12th-grade student will win a $500 scholarship. Additional winners from each grade level will receive a $50 gift card for art supplies. (mural participation not required for individual art entries) 3. Individual Photography: Capture a moment of nature. One 11th or 12th-grade student will win a $500 scholarship. An additional winner will win a $100 gift card. For our research in advance of the mural will will incorporate the National Geographic framework and answer the following questions: 1. Why is there a need for water conservation (on Long Island, nationally, and globally) 2. What water conservation efforts are occurring on Long Island and what can we do to make an impact personally? 3. What aquatic life is impacted by the water issues locally (and globally)? We are going to draw out the answers using sketch notes we can use to help design our mural.

AP Art: Heckscher Portfolio Nights

PORTFOLIO & CAREER ADVICE NIGHT - October 3 Paul Lipsky, artist; Charlee Miller, director, Art League of Long Island; Lisa Mack, director, Huntington Fine Arts; and a School of Visual Arts representative discuss careers in visual arts; and how to prepare a strong portfolio.

PORTFOLIO REVIEW NIGHTS Bring your portfolio for one-on-one evaluations by admissions counselors.

October 10* California College of the Arts The Cooper Union School of Art Five Towns College Molloy College Montserrat College of Art Purchase College Rhode Island School of Design School of Visual Arts St. John's University Suffolk County Community College * Colleges are subject to change. Visit Heckscher.org for an up-to-date listing. October 17* Adelphi University Boston University School of Visual Arts Center for Art & Design, The College of Saint Rose LIU Post Harford Art School, University of Hartford Maine College of Art Maryland Institute College of Art New York Institute of Technology Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts Pratt Institute Ringling College of Art and Design

AP Art: College Board Payment

Payment for the AP Art exams is due by October 11th, 2019. The following are the fees due for the exams:

• All regular AP Exams , excluding AP Seminar & AP Capstone will cost $94.00

Checks/Money Orders may be written out to "Smithtown Central School District" and Cash payments will also be accepted.  Please put the student's full name and the AP course in the memo section on the check.  Students should turn their checks in to their AP teachers before October 11.