Tuesday, December 22, 2009

The Magical Night

Adobe Photoshop Tutorial for  “The Magical Night”

(Click images for larger view)

Final Imagemagical wall

Tutorial:

Layer 1: Background1

 

Layer 2: Sky2

 

Layer 3: Base

3

 

Layer 4: Grass

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Layer 5: Stars

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Layer 6: Moon

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Layer 7: Plants

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Layer 8: Tree

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Layer 9: Lover Boy

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Layer 10: Lover Girl

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Layer 11: cycle

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Layer 12: Color Balance 12  Final Image (Large View)

 

Desktop:

Desktop

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Significance of mass-media research

Among the four methods of knowing (Tenacity, Intuition, Authority and science) , Science is regarded as the best method of knowing. Science is used in research as a method of investigation, which makes research a scientific process. Research is a method to find out fact or truth. Research is used in both natural and social sciences. Under social sciences we have communication research and mass-media research. To find out the significance of mass-media research, we must know relation between mass-media and research.

Research in mass-media is to find out fact or truth, to investigate something. Because science leads to errorless or less error results or conclusions, research helps mass-media to find out facts more dependently and systematically. Research becomes a very tool for mass-media. On the other hand mass-media research helps to find out about the whole media itself. About which way the media is running. Mass media research helps to evaluate past, situation of present and shows the way to move for future. It becomes the single way to find out about where the mass-media is going. Mass-media research helps to maintain the standards and make better ethics for media as well as informing what kind of step to be taken forward. Mass media research finds out the impact of mass media in human society. Thus it does research on human society.

If mass media research wouldn’t be there, it wouldn’t be possible to analyze the mass-media and its impacts on society or social impact on media. Research as a best way of knowing, mass media research gives the actual face of so many things about society and mass media itself. Thus the mass-media research is very significant.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Cultural differences in expression of emotions

 

Emotions are universal phenomena; however, they are affected by culture. While some emotions are universal and are experienced in similar ways as a reaction to similar events across all cultures, other emotions show considerable cultural differences in their antecedent events, the way they are experienced, the reactions they provoke and the way they are perceived by the surrounding society.

Bases of cultural differences

Self construal

The way a person perceives her/himself in relation to the surrounding human environment affects one’s emotional world. Collectivistic cultures emphasize the fundamental relatedness of individuals to each other, for example by valuing attending to others, fitting in, and harmonious interdependence with them. Thus the self in collectivistic cultures is interdependent, and the individual is focused predominantly on his or her relationship with in-group members or with the in-group as a whole. In individualistic cultures, on the other hand, individuals hold an independent view of the self and seek to maintain their independence from others by attending to the self and by discovering and expressing their unique inner attributes.

Subjective vs. objective emotions

The view of the self as independent in individualistic cultures leads to the perception of emotions as a unique personal experience. The emotional reality is therefore taken as subjective: different people are expected to have different emotional worlds, and to react in different ways to the same experiences. On the contrary, in collectivistic cultures, emotions are experienced out of relationships. They reflect the outer, rather than the inner world and are therefore taken as objective: it is assumed that all people experience the same emotion in a given social situation.

Self and emotions

The construal of the self affect the personal emotional experienced. The need to enhance the self and its independence in individualistic cultures leads to prevalence of emotions that stress the uniqueness and separation of the individual. In collectivistic cultures emotion relate more to the relationships with others and to the fitness of the individual to its social environment. Hence, the same situation might lead to different emotions in collectivistic and in individualistic cultures. In a research held by Mesquita (2001) it was found that achievements related to higher education in Turkey (a collectivistic culture) led to pride as a result of the honor brought to the family, while in Holland (an individualistic culture) similar achievements led to self satisfaction and content.

Cultural norms for emotions

Social norms exist for various aspects of emotions.

  • General emotional norms: what emotions are considered to be good or bad? Which should be more prevalent?
  • Feeling rules: how should one feel when encountering certain event (does being criticized lead to anger or embarrassment?)
  • Display rules: how should one act when experiencing certain emotion (does anger manifest as aggression or withdrawal?)

While individualistic cultures are loose regarding to the display rules (one can express one's feelings as preferred at the moment), norms for positive feeling rules in individualistic cultures are very tight. According to those norms, one should be happy and strive for happiness, and if one is not happy, that means one has failed to achieve life’s goals. In collectivistic cultures such as China, the feeling rules are rather loose: there are no strict expectations about how one should generally feel. However, the display rules are much tighter: there are certain expectations about the way one should show one's feelings in a given context. For example, Confucian cultures consider expression of emotions (both positive and negative) as a possible threat to the social order. Hence, the norms are of not-showing personal emotions. One may feel as one pleases, as long as one doesn’t express it.

Cultural effects on emotional aspects

Culture and Life Satisfaction

Culture affects the subjective well-being. Well-being includes both general life satisfaction, and the relative balance of positive affect verses negative effect in daily life. Culture directs the attention to different sources of information for making the life satisfaction judgments, thus affecting subjective well-being appraisal.

Individualistic cultures direct attention to inner states and feelings (such as positive or negative affects), while in collectivistic cultures the attention is directed to outer sources (i.e. adhering to social norms or fulfilling one’s duties). Indeed, Suh et al. (1998) found that the correlation between life satisfaction and the prevalence of positive affect is higher in individualistic cultures, whereas in collectivistic cultures affect and adhering to norms are equally important for life satisfaction.

Shame and culture in the work context

Shame is an automatic involuntary response to a personal failure attributed to the self. The failure is relative to other’s expectations, thus shame is a social emotion that involves self-consciousness. A study examined the effects of shame on salespersons in Holland (an individualistic culture) and the Philippines (a collectivistic culture). They found that bad experiences with clients led to similar shame emotions in both cultures. However, the responses to this shame were opposite: shame caused Dutch salespersons to withdraw and to perform poorer on their job, apparently because they directed most of their mental resources inwards, to defend the self. Filipino salespersons felt shame all the same; however, the shame caused them to put more efforts in building relationship and thus to perform better on the job. Moreover, Filipino salespersons demonstrated more Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (OCB) after experiencing shame. The reason for this is that in collectivistic cultures shame signals that social harmony has been hampered and that the individual should act to rebuild it.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Democracy & Journalism

 

Journalism and Democracy are considered interdependent because Journalism acts as the

  1. Source of information for democracy
  2. Watchdog
  3. Mediator/representative
  4.  

1. Journalism as source of information for democracy.

imageIt is generally accepted that democracy contributes to good government only when it is well informed. According to Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: “Democracy is a form of government in which supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodic free elections. It implies universal suffrage, competition for office, freedom of speech and the press, and the rule of law.” In a democratic state people vote for all kind of reasons, as is their right, and not always on the basis of rational thought or careful deliberation. But from the normative perspective the democratic ideal is one of informed choice to which the outputs of political journalism are key contributors. Journalists provide the key information on which citizens become able to judge between competing candidates and parties.

2. Journalism as the Watchdog.

In order to prevent the leakage in democracy, journalism is charged with monitoring the exercise of power. Is government competent, efficient and honest? Is it fulfilling it’s responsibilities to the people? Are there programs and policies based on sound judgment and information, and designed with the interest of society as a whole in mind? In its capacity as watchdog journalism sees the activities of governors, on people’s behalf. Journalism plays the vital role in functioning of the democracy accurately.

3. Mediator/Representative

Journalism plays a role of mediator between citizens and politicians. People’s voices are heard through media. Media gives citizens direct access to the public sphere, in the form of open forums, talk shows, live phone calling programs, studio debates about public affairs etc.

The representative function of journalism is today enhanced by the availability of fast, interactive technologies such as e-mail, text messaging, blogging and many more. All of which provide new ways for citizens to communicate with politicians and participate in public debate. These technologies fuel the democracy to become more developed.

Media itself wants to become free therefore it always supports the democracy. On the other hand the government also needs to communicate with people. It is only possible when there is a well functioning democracy. If we look back to the history of Nepal then we find press took growth after the introduction of democracy in 1951. before it Gorkhapatra was the only medium for government to reach peoples. But later when King Mahendra took the power and declared Panchayat system the right to press freedom was violated and private sectors were restricted. In 1990 after the restoration of democracy Press got flourished and today also it is believed that it was press which took the positive change and growth. Similarly during Janaandolan-2 King Gyanendra took power and attacked Nepali press. Lots of foreign news channels were banned to broadcast in Nepal. News papers were not allowed to publish against the government and F.M. radios were not allowed to broadcast news. After Janaandolan-2 again Nepali media got its freedom and it was possible only because of democracy. If we look at the media of Myanmar then we can find less freedom for press and press working as the mouthpiece of government. It proves that democracy and journalism are both interdependent. Neither journalism nor democracy can be imagined separately.