Noah's Ark by Aurelio Luini
I have just created my website for my portfolio, titled "The Reality of Environmental Degradation in Myth and Folklore". All of my stories will be renditions of myth and folklore that I read for this class, except in my versions, you will see environmental conditions that portray the environmental challenges caused by man-made activity that we see today.
Check out my first story, Noah's Ark, and let me know what you guys think about the story and/or my portfolio site!
Read my second story, the Man in the Sun.
I love your storybook/portfolio theme of environmental degradation. I think it's cool to focus on the fact that people have been concerned about the well-being of nature for a long time. I read the Noah's Ark story, and I really liked how you put a connection between God and the earth. It makes the flood seem less like an impatient god murdering everyone and more like self-preservation. The one thing that I would question is breaking up the passage with the photos. I don't mind the photos themselves, but you might want to try a different layout that lets texts be beside photos, or maybe make the photos smaller. I was scrolling through really large pictures to try to get to the rest of your story, and your story should be the star of the page. Great job!
ReplyDeleteHi Arti, I really enjoyed reading your stories. My comments are going to focus on Noah’s Ark. I think you created a really unique story by creating the symbolic nature of God and earth; and how hurting the earth hurts God. Additionally, I think your story flowed really well. I like how you, in detail, described the nature and beauty of the waves and the rivers, and then showed how because of man those resources have vanished. I also liked the implicit environmentalist nature of Noah. I think you have done a great job by incorporating enough detail so that the reader is truly able to imagine the story (like a movie) in their own minds. For example, “One day, when Noah’s beard had doubled in length, they heard the rain stop.” The provides significant descriptive detail while at the same time indicating the amount of time that has past. Overall, I really enjoyed your story. I also appreciate the overall theme of your storybook—it is very important! I think your layout is clear and easy to use. It also looks very uniform yet creative.
ReplyDeleteHey Arti! I really enjoyed reading your stories, and I think your portfolio theme is awesome! It’s obviously something you’re passionate about, and man vs. nature is something we can all relate to on different levels. I liked how you’ve formatted your homepage, with all of the stories and the link to the comment wall on the bottom. I absolutely loved your “The Man in the Sun” story because it had a great moral. I understood that the point was that there are pros and cons to every type of energy, but I didn’t really get that with the part about the solar panel. What are the cons of solar panels? Was the house not able to get enough energy because it was raining/dark? If you just add a sentence or two to make that clearer, I think it would make more sense. It’s just that the other types of energy make it so obvious that they also cause harm.
ReplyDeleteWhat if you added wind turbines to the story? I don’t know a lot about them, but I love seeing them when I’m driving to and from Norman. I’d be interested to find out if they have any negative side-effects. I also understand that you’re limited by word count, and I like that your stories are longer; this is just something I wondered about!
Keep up the great work!
Hello Arti!
ReplyDeleteI find your pursuit of relating each story to an environmental cause-and-effect very impressive. I think you do a great job of adding vivid details and imagery into both of your stories, which is something I'm working on myself. I've written stories about each of the topics you have in your portfolio and I think your renditions are fantastic. I appreciate the creative effort you put into your stories and I like how they manage to tell the original story, in your way, but also open up the eyes of the reader to problems that we are facing in today's world from an environmental point of view.
There was a sentence I came across that didn't quite flow like the rest of your story. In the second paragraph of the Noah story you have a sentence that talks about how human activity heats up the atmosphere and causes God to choke. In this story you use very eloquent diction and I felt like using the word "get" here didn't quite fit in. Perhaps you might switch that out with "become" or rephrase the sentence to something like, "The intensity of the heat and humidity in the atmosphere climbed with the increase in human activity...". Other than that suggestion, I really enjoyed your work! I look forward to reading more in the future.
Hi Arti!
ReplyDeleteWhen I opened your storybook, I loved how your theme was apparent to me right away and SO creative!! The aesthetic of your website is very appealing to the eye and easy to follow.
In your Noah's Ark story, I thought that you did a really great job of using dialogue to portray emotion along moving the story forward. I really liked how you kept the story similar to the original because everyone knows this story, but I really enjoyed how you centered your story on the factors of the environment that led to the flood. I think that you are doing a really great job with your project so far, and I'm sure the finished product will be great. Keep up the good work!
Hello Arti, I thought your version of the original story “Man in the Moon” was absolutely great! I actually read this story at the beginning of the semester ad wrote my own version of it, so it was nice to see another person’s interpretation of the story and compare it to mine. I love the way you change the story from being about a blacksmith wanting to change his job, to a fire wanting to be a different source of energy in order to help people. I thought that having the change in energy source was really great because it connected the reader and help to understand the impact that different sources have on our environment and people. For your portfolio, I think that it is actually set up really well. I really like how you have the comment wall link really big, it really helps the reader to not have to search for it! Overall you’re doing great, keep it up!
ReplyDeleteHi, Arti! First of all, I have to say that I love the layout you have chosen for your website! It is so much fun to navigate and look at! I also agree with Devin in that I think your original version of the story "Man in the Moon" was incredible! It has been so much fun to read peoples interpretations of stories and compare the different ways that other students write them. I also love that you decided to make the main character of the story a source of energy instead of human. I have never seen someone change the main character from a human into something else, so that was a really nice change of pace. I definitely think that making the main character into a source of energy will get the readers to think about the environment and what they are doing to it. Overall, I think you did wonderful and I look forward to reading more from you as the semester goes on!
ReplyDeleteHi, Arti! In general, I adore the theme of your portfolio. I, personally, am a huge advocate for preventing climate change the best we can amongst my friends and honestly anyone I encounter. I have been raised with loving and caring for the each. My fathers license plate was "1Earth", which in Dallas is a sight for sore eyes. I asked him why one day to which he responded, "We have 1 Earth, 1 chance at life, its all we have." He had that on his car so that he could provide education to those who were curious enough to ask. Anyway, I love the theme. Also, the layout of your sight is unique compared to many others, so I enjoyed the easy navigation. While we are entering week 11, a ton of the stories that I have encountered relate to the earths beginning, so I am glad that you are using many of the natural disasters presented throughout the class. Nice work!
ReplyDeleteHi Arti!
ReplyDeleteThis is the first time I am coming across your portfolio and I think it is so creative! That is cool that you have thought of that theme and then found stories that can align with that theme. I just finished reading your Noah's Ark story and I liked how throughout your story there were pictures that related to your story. I like how you kept the story somewhat similar to the original but then gave your story it's own twist. That was such a good idea to change the reason why God flooded the earth to an environmental reason. That is a great reason for God to want to start over.
Great job!
Hi Arti! I am really glad to see that you did a story on Noah's Ark because that is what my storybook is based on. I am doing a completely different version that does not include God, so it is nice to see someone else keeping the biblical aspect of the story alive! I also love how you have decided to tie everything into the environment and taking care of it, adds some science to it and I am always for that! So far it looks like you have some interesting stories, I loved the The Man in the Sun, what a unique and creative story! You also have some really solid graphics. They definitely draw your attention. Keep up the good work.
ReplyDeleteHi Arti! I read the story The Man in the Sun from your portfolio. Without reading the author’s note, I could quickly tell this story was based on the Man in the Moon since I read that story as well and enjoyed it very much. I also really enjoyed your story. I like the theme of your portfolio in general since I think that mindfulness about the environment is important. As with your other stories, I think you did a great job with the environmental focus in this story. You provided a great amount of detail for each form that the man in the fire took to show the good things that came with each form, but also the bad things. The looping set of images you included on the story’s page was also a cool touch. Overall, I thought this story was great. I hope to read more from you in the future!
ReplyDeleteHello there Arti! Your portfolio site really caught me off guard. It's beautiful! I love how your stories are like banners on the front page and kind of fade into each other like a gradient. You wanted to focus on the environmental side and having great visuals is the first step to drawing your audience onto your mindset. More props to you come from me when you added audio. WHAT! I'm actually mind-blown by the commitment shown in your portfolio. I can't believe this is the first time I'm coming across it and I'll definitely be back to see it later on. Now for your stories themselves, I do like your writing style. It was hard for me to go through sentences on my own a little ways through because of the amount of commas at each sentence. I don't think you need as many pauses as you think and you may be able to break them up into separate sentences too! This is mainly from the Daughters of the Oasis story. I'd also love to see a more bold separation between your story and author's notes! It would help the transition of the reader I think c: Other than that, well done!
ReplyDeleteHey Arti!
ReplyDeleteI think your topic choice for this portfolio is great! The site itself was so pretty and very well organized. I think it was easy to navigate and finding your different posts was very easy. I also liked how easy it was to find your comment wall. The topic choice is also one of my favorites that I have read this semester. I think it is really cool how you focused on the connection that people have had with nature and their care for the environment from so long ago. I am a huge fan of environmental studies and I did not expect to see something like this in this class! You have clearly put a lot of work into your portfolio and it shows! Great job!
Hi Arti. Right of the bat I want to compliment you on the way that your site looks. It is very sleek and the images compliment the stories very well. Your introduction does a great job at explaining your project and the little note that you have on your comment wall is also a great add on to that! I love that you have an audio recording of your first story, this makes it very approachable for people that struggle with reading for some reason, maybe it is because they are dyslexic (like me), hard of seeing, or simply just prefer audio. I wish that you had included this with all of your stories but I also know that they are time consuming to make.
ReplyDelete- Anna Margret
Hey Arti! Now that you have pointed it out, there is absolutely a common theme among a lot of the readings I have done this semester about nature vs man. Right off the bat, the banner image you chose for your homepage is absolutely stunning. I love it so much! The way you linked to your stories from the homepage with little strips from their own banner images was really neat too. I didn't know that could be done. Overall, your website design is simple and beautiful. The one critique I do have is that you may want to consider having more of a visual split between the stories themselves and their author's notes. I think the recording you made of your first story was really cool! I'd be too nervous to put my voice out there like that, so props to you for that! You've done a fantastic job with your portfolio. Great work!
ReplyDeleteHi Arti,
ReplyDeleteI read all four of the stories on your portfolio website. I thought it was very interesting how you were able to relate each of the various stories in your portfolio to the environment. I thought your story about "The Man in the Sun" had an interesting message about how the fire/man/dam/etc. could never be satisfied with what it was, since each form of energy had its negative effects. In your "The Daughters of the Oasis" story, I wondered what happened to the girls that walked into the water. I think it would be interesting if, like in the "Maidens Who Broke a Drought" story, the girls were transformed after their sacrifice instead of just dying. Perhaps they could become some of the vegetation around the oasis? Overall, I really enjoyed reading your stories and thought you chose an interesting topic to use to tie the stories together.
Hey Arti,
ReplyDeleteJust got through reading your rendition of Noah's Ark, and I really agree with the message you send. It is true that a great flood replenishing the Earth could be a monumental change, and quite probably for the better. I was wondering though if you considered what comes next? As I said, I agree with the message of humans defiling the Earth and Earth not only being God's creation, but God being the Earth itself, but could humankind really return to such a state as to live without electricity, without warmth, without clean water? It's a grand idea to wipe human pollution off the planet with some great disaster, but it makes me wonder if humans could actually survive in such a scenario, especially with so few remaining. Then again, Noah is the chosen man of God in this story, so perhaps through God's guidance and wisdom flowing through Noah to the people, it is possible humanity could begin again, better this time. Great story, great writing, no writing critical notes here. Enjoy your winter break!