Keristin

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I chose to do my mask theme on track because that is my favorite sport. People say I am a very gifted runner and since I have been running track, I have been very successful in it. I started running Hershey Track and Field when I was in 4th grade. I have ran from that point on. During my freshman year, I won 34 medals just from invitationals. I ran into many issues with completing this project. I never knew I was so good at problem solving. When I started the project, I took tiny rubber pieces from the track and designed a runner out of them. After that, I knew that I needed to put it on a background, I had a few ideas in mind like putting it on a window, or a poster, or even a cardboard box. The poster wasn't a good quality idea because it would bend easily and not last very long, and cardboard wouldn't be very nice because I would have to paint it and then figure something out to make it look good, so this is why I chose to use a window. It will last forever and I could put things under it and even over it. Once I picked out a nice window to use, I had to wipe it down many times to get it clean, then I realized it was too loose so I had to fold up little cardboard pieces and put them in between the window plastic and the frame. This helped a lot to keep it more sturdy. When I went home one night, I gathered some things that had to deal with the topic of track and field. I found a lot of medals just from my freshman year, I found my varsity letter and pin, and also took my sophomore picture of the team and myself and brought them in to see if I could use any of them. I decided to use the picture and put it behind the window's plastic, then I had to make a decision whether or not to put the medals evenly around the frame or make it like a collage of medals in one spot. Mrs. Ruggles helped me and made me realize if I wanted my picture off centered, which I did, then I shouldn't have my medals all neat and collaging them would be better. So I got my medals superglued on and my picture in place, then I needed to do something with my mask. It already had a shape of a runner on it with the track pieces but it looked very plain and I needed to do something with the outside which was at that point white. I decided I wanted to add some texture to it so I superglued the whole outside so it had a "rough" feeling to it. I wasnt sure what color to paint it. I either wanted it gold and glittery, or green. I ended up painting it a forest green. After it dried, I put it on the window and thought it looked to plain and everything else on the window looked so professional then I had this really blahhh mask on it which was supposed to be the main point, so I framed the runner with gold glitter which brought out the color in the medal. So by now I had the medals superglued on, and the mask ready to put on and I had the picture on and the varsity letter ready to put on. Another issue I faced was what to put underneath the window for a background. It was either going to be white tissue paper, which was way to light, black tissue paper or green, which was to dark, or gold tissue paper and glitter. The gold wasnt too dark or too light so I used that and I superglued everything to the window and I was finished, or so I thought. Mrs. Ruggles told me that it would be really cool if I tied the mask in with the background, so I put track pieces on the corners of the window, but when I hot glued it, everything just fell off, so I used thick elmers glue instead and I was officially done with my mask project! My mask really is a finished piece of art. Everything turned out really good and because of this, I wouldn't do anything differently. The track on the window evens out because I glued it in one corner then to even it out I did the same in the opposite corner. I also tied the mask in with the background by adding the track pieces to it. Even when I thought I was done, I realized I could do more to make it look good so I did it until I was all the way done!