Meanings:

 

I choose the word rain due to the recent flooding in Louisiana as well as the flood we had in South Carolina this past October.  I decided to represent the falling rain and the raised levels of rivers and other bodies of water as well as the amount water inside buildings.  Also, I wanted to express how flood victims feel when faced with such a tragedy.  My house was not flooded, but my roof incurred several leaks.  As a result, I sympathize with the people affected by the flooding in both Louisiana and South Carolina.

 

 

Process:

 

I used LunaPic to create my graphic.  I began by creating a new blank image.  It was resized to 200 x 200 pixels.  The paint bucket tool was selected to change the canvas background to blue.  Then, I added the border with a bevel edged height of 10.  The water filter was added next.  The last steps involved using the text tool with cloud pattern to individually add each letter.  When something did not produce the look I wanted I used the undo history feature to go back the desired number of steps.  Likewise, when I had issues saving my image I redid the entire process.  As I write and edit essays I read each paragraph before moving on to the next one.  Also, I sometimes read from the beginning to make sure it flows.  In the process, I am making the necessary changes to improve my essay.  The same is true with creating this image.  I kept modifying it until I was satisfied with the final product.

 

 

Choices:

 

I wanted to illustrated the heavy or excessive rain that causes flooding. I initially selected the pouring rain animation.  Unfortunately, I could not save the image as a jpg due to the animation feature.  As a consequence, I tried other options until I was pleased with the look of the water filter.  In fact, I switched to Photoshop to see if it had better filters.  It did not so I returned to LunaPic.  To accomplish the meanings of the things I wanted to convey I used the color blue (feelings, sadness), the water filter (flooding), a bevel edged border (water levels), and the text tool with a cloud pattern (cloudy skies, rain).  In addition, I arranged the letters diagonally to represent the falling rain.