1. Take a professional photo of yourself and replace the original background with a simple yet professional background image. Then you will resize it and save it.

Computer Science

Your task of creating a business card involves three steps:
1. Take a professional photo of yourself and replace the original background with a simple yet professional background image. Then you will resize it and save it.
2. Use a logo or brand that relates to your education, major, or career field to cast over your photo as a watermark.
3. On the combined (step 1) edited photo of yourself and (step 2) new brand image, include your business/contact information.
4 Example Photo:

Please log into Canvas and look at the photo of prior Head TA’s, attached to this homework assignment under Assignments!Autotutorial 1. They appear to be in front of a type of pattern even though that’s not the original background of when the photos were taken. There are also example photos of what watermarked photos usually look like.
Where/How to get an image:

First, you will need to find a photo of yourself or go out and take one. It is best to use a good quality brightly-lit photo with a solid background. You will be editing yourself from this photo onto a new background, which is easiest when the photo has minimal activity (not too many people, no crazy poses…). It is also recommended you use a photo of yourself that is larger than the background picture you use to avoid distortion during your editing. For a background image, you can just find one through a simple Google search. Again, you could always go out and take a picture. Try to make the background image professional, a pleasant neutral pattern, or stage curtains, a business building, etc.

What to use: You will be using the online photo editor called Pixlr. To access Pixlr, simply Google Search ‘Pixlr’ or type ‘pixlr.com’ into your url bar. Once you are on pixlr.com, choose “Pixlr Editor”. You will be able to do all necessary photo editing through Pixlr as long as you have internet connection. See below for help with using Pixlr.
Project Steps:
Placing your Portrait on a new Backdrop:
1. You will need to open your picture of yourself in the photo-editing program.
2. You will need to mask the image and delete the existing background (there are many different ways to do this).
3. You will need to apply the new background image.
4. You will need to resize the image and canvas to 252x144 or 504x288 without distortion
5. Now, you will need to save the image as a .jpg and .pxd (Layered Pixlr Image) and name the two files “EditedImage.”

Watermarking your photo

1. First find a logo that you believe relates to your professional interests. This can be anything from a UC Davis logo to a symbol that is well known in your field (like a stethoscope for those interested in health science).

2. Take this logo (appropriately sized for your photo) and watermark it over your photo at an appropriate size, location, and opacity.

3. Save the image as a .jpg and .pxd (Layered Pixlr Image) and name the two files “Logo.”

5Adding text to your business card

2. Career or education title (Ex: Undergraduate Student, Technical Assistant, Financial Analyst Intern, etc).
3. Major
4. Address of School or Employment
5. Phone Number
6. Email
• All of this text needs to follow the typography guidelines listed below.
• After following all the typography requirements, save the image as a .jpg and .pxd (Layered Pixlr Image) and name the two files “Final.”
Typography
Typography is “the visual component of the written word”. Typography includes differences in font, font size, letter spacing, and placement of text. For text on something such as a business card, you want to keep it simple, straightforward, and clean. The guidelines for the font and font size of your business card are:
• Stay in between font sizes 10-14.
• Use one of the following fonts: Times New Roman, Helvetica Neue, Courier New, Arial,! Palatino, Cambria,(or(Calibri.
• Your text should not take up the whole business card, but only a small section of it.
To learn more about typography, here is a great resource.
Project Resources:
So, now you need to learn how to do things in Pixlr. Pixlr is very similar to photo editing programs such as Photoshop or GIMP, but here are some tutorials that specifically cover aspects of Pixlr.
1.This tutorial is a fantastic tutorial that takes you through adding layers, using layer masks, and goes into great detail with adding and styling text. Though the portion of the video that covers styling text is NOT required for this assignment, feel free to experiment with these tools if it interests you: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hs2LtAp99n0
2. This tutorial covers the concept of masks and shows how you can alter a photo’s original background while keeping the foreground the same. This works really well for when you want the main focus to be the foreground or if you want to add a more artistic twist onto the photo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfB7m8uzoLE
3. Watermarking: This tutorial covers the basics of how to watermark over an image. It works the same for text and pictures: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlTr37Z9ByM *** Although these tutorials are available, do not feel constrained to do the assignment only using these methods. If you have pre-existing knowledge of how to mask layers in image editing, feel free to do what works best for you. You may also use any other tutorials of Pixlr you can find.
6
What you need to submit:
You will need to submit your business card file, edited image files, and the original image files, for grading on Canvas (seven files total). Please use the following names for your files:
a. Original.jpg = The original image of you with the original background
b. EditedImage.jpg and EditedImage.pxd = The edited image of you with a new background
c. Logo.jpg and Logo.pxd = Your edited image with the watermarked logo over it
d. Final.jpg and Final.pxd = Your final product including text, logo an