Sunday, December 9, 2007
Maya Architecture
The final project for my 3D modeling class was to create a 3D architecture and this is my work.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Motion Study
For my final imaging project I decided to further my studies of the human body in motion. This time i took a different approach. Inspired by the photos Edward Muybridge took I wanted to get a much older looking, over exposed, and grainy photo. I wanted the pictures to have an aged look about them and if I were to print them out I would probably get an old photo material.
Monday, November 5, 2007
Monday, October 29, 2007
Visual Analogy Project
For my visual analogy project I chose to combine the like qualities of a gramophone and a flower...I don't really feel this needs much explaining and I hope that I didn't even need to tell you what the analogy was, because if I did then my project apparently sucks. But anyways here it is...
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Midterm Project
So I haven't posted anything new in a while because I just happened to have all my tests and projects due on the same week. So I have been busy making art and attempting to study for chemistry for the past 2 weeks (mostly making art). Anyways, for this post I am just going to be talking about my midterm project for my digital imaging class.
For this project everything was totally up to us: the subject, the method, the style. All we really had to do was use either Corel Painter X or Photoshop. I had an initial idea to make my pieces about how busy my life was and how much I was juggling. I made my initial sketches and I wanted the style to look like a collage that would be found in a scrap book. I wanted to make an environment of scraps of paper and things pertaining to my life. For example one piece would focus on my marathon and I would use elements such as my running bib and my medal. Another would have to do with my homework and classes. Well regardless I ended up trashing that whole idea when it came time to take my pictures. I just had a realization that nothing would end up turning out right. So I began to stress out because I haven't really had to put an idea together quickly in this class yet. I ended up just taking some pictures of myself and began to improvise in photoshop. The only thing I was really inspired by was images of Hindu and Indian gods that had many arms and bright colors. So I went with that and my first image represents that idea well. Then instead of keeping with the Hindu god theme I began to take the idea in my own direction. The project became much more about movement than anything else. I was fascinated by the movement of just one arm and begand to ponder what other movements I could emulate. So for my second piece I forcused on the movement of a back dive. I worked in photoshop and did some overlaying of the different poses and I ended up pleased with the results. The most exciting parts are the portions that overlap. I had to go in and erase certain portions so that the piece was more easily read and looked better but where sections intersect I feel is really dynamic. Finally, for my third piece I focused on an even more dramatic motion; the motion of drowning. The fear, the stress, the whole overall feeling of being completely helpless. This image is very different from the second and third one because there is no set motion for drowning which made it a lot more difficult to put together. With the backflip the bodies slowly moved to the left, there was no other way to put them. But for drowning all the images were overlapped over eachother, and without at least some space they ended up just being a jumbled mess. So I had to think a little more about the composition and how i could successfully piece the different bodies together. There were two head shots that i thought worked well together so I decided to just delete the rest of the heads and keep only the arms and torso. This immediately made it simpler to put together. After that I just tried to make that flailing arm feeling and motions of stress become realistic. In the end I felt happy with all three images.
For this project everything was totally up to us: the subject, the method, the style. All we really had to do was use either Corel Painter X or Photoshop. I had an initial idea to make my pieces about how busy my life was and how much I was juggling. I made my initial sketches and I wanted the style to look like a collage that would be found in a scrap book. I wanted to make an environment of scraps of paper and things pertaining to my life. For example one piece would focus on my marathon and I would use elements such as my running bib and my medal. Another would have to do with my homework and classes. Well regardless I ended up trashing that whole idea when it came time to take my pictures. I just had a realization that nothing would end up turning out right. So I began to stress out because I haven't really had to put an idea together quickly in this class yet. I ended up just taking some pictures of myself and began to improvise in photoshop. The only thing I was really inspired by was images of Hindu and Indian gods that had many arms and bright colors. So I went with that and my first image represents that idea well. Then instead of keeping with the Hindu god theme I began to take the idea in my own direction. The project became much more about movement than anything else. I was fascinated by the movement of just one arm and begand to ponder what other movements I could emulate. So for my second piece I forcused on the movement of a back dive. I worked in photoshop and did some overlaying of the different poses and I ended up pleased with the results. The most exciting parts are the portions that overlap. I had to go in and erase certain portions so that the piece was more easily read and looked better but where sections intersect I feel is really dynamic. Finally, for my third piece I focused on an even more dramatic motion; the motion of drowning. The fear, the stress, the whole overall feeling of being completely helpless. This image is very different from the second and third one because there is no set motion for drowning which made it a lot more difficult to put together. With the backflip the bodies slowly moved to the left, there was no other way to put them. But for drowning all the images were overlapped over eachother, and without at least some space they ended up just being a jumbled mess. So I had to think a little more about the composition and how i could successfully piece the different bodies together. There were two head shots that i thought worked well together so I decided to just delete the rest of the heads and keep only the arms and torso. This immediately made it simpler to put together. After that I just tried to make that flailing arm feeling and motions of stress become realistic. In the end I felt happy with all three images.
Monday, October 8, 2007
Visual Analogy Research
For the visual analogy project we were told to first research and find some examples of artwork that use visual analogy. So here is what I came up with:
The first piece takes a very obvious approach and puts a strawberry pattern on the shape of the lips. It works successfully because we know both lips and strawberrys to have a wet and shiny texture and an almost similar color and shape. When these are put together it really makes sense and makes you think.
Then there is work that is less literal. This piece, for example, doesn't have to be anything really. But what I see is some sort of snake figure or possibly even a scarf or cloth. The shape of the piece brings out a lot of ideas on shape and form.
This piece makes me think of a donut or a tire perhaps. However the texture used and the twist in the form could make it be something else. Possibly a spring of some sort.
This last image definitely has an underwater sea life feel to it. When I look at the figure I see a shell of some sort because of the flowing colors, smooth and wavy shape, and the simplicity of the figure.
Next we were to take pictures of patterns on real life forms and man made objects.
These are some of the textures I found around my room:
Carpet
Leather Chair
Wood Grain
Shoe Texture
Speaker
Wall
Fan Cover
Seat Cover
The first piece takes a very obvious approach and puts a strawberry pattern on the shape of the lips. It works successfully because we know both lips and strawberrys to have a wet and shiny texture and an almost similar color and shape. When these are put together it really makes sense and makes you think.
Then there is work that is less literal. This piece, for example, doesn't have to be anything really. But what I see is some sort of snake figure or possibly even a scarf or cloth. The shape of the piece brings out a lot of ideas on shape and form.
This piece makes me think of a donut or a tire perhaps. However the texture used and the twist in the form could make it be something else. Possibly a spring of some sort.
This last image definitely has an underwater sea life feel to it. When I look at the figure I see a shell of some sort because of the flowing colors, smooth and wavy shape, and the simplicity of the figure.
Next we were to take pictures of patterns on real life forms and man made objects.
These are some of the textures I found around my room:
Carpet
Leather Chair
Wood Grain
Shoe Texture
Speaker
Wall
Fan Cover
Seat Cover
Friday, October 5, 2007
Photoshop Project
Before I get on with my project related journal entry I have to go on a little rant first...
So i was talking to one of my art buddies about what else, art. And we were discussing a little bit about the Digital Arts, which is my major. Digital Arts is a totally different breed of artist than your typical Fine Arts major. Some people still don't really consider these people to even be artists at all and frankly I have to agree on a certain level. When you get into these classes there are really two types of programs you will learn: easy programs and hard programs. That's it. Easy programs are ones like Photoshop, anyone can come in and learn the basics of this program, put a cheesy filter on a picture, and think they are an artist. In fact I've seen plenty of people who are filter crazy and let me tell you, it is not original and you did no work. On the other hand there are the hard programs such as Maya and other 3D animation and modeling software. These programs have so much to them that it can't be picked up in one day. Someone could work on a project for a week and still have it turn out like crap even.
Now that your caught up on the basics let me tell you what my situation is. Most digital arts majors are people who like art, but are also concerned with getting a job after college. When my friend said this to me it really struck a chord, because I didn't want to me put into the same group as some of the people in my classes. I don't want to be some random artist who likes programming more than getting out into the real world and actually being inspired. I simply replied to my friend that I don't want to pursue a career in the hard programs. At one time in my life I thought I wanted to design video games and create characters, but when you actually get into the class you realize there is a lot less glitz to it then that. If you are actually going to get a job like this you will most likely lose all creative control. You will be put on an assembly line for game design. One person will handle the lights, one person will handle arm movement, one person will design the face, and so on. The bottom line is I don't want to have a boring job in the digital arts just because I am really good at lighting or 3D modeling. To me that isn't being an artist. I want a job because I am the most creative person in the bunch and I am always coming up with new ideas. That is why I would much rather pursue a career in an easy program because if you can stand out in a program that virtually anyone can use, then you must truly be an artist.
Anyways, back to my project journal. For our third project we were told that we would be creating two images in Photoshop. The good part was that the project was completely open ended. (This can be the bad part for some people). Most people like at least a little guidance so that they know where to start, but when a project is wide open its hard to pin point one good idea out of the millions of bad ones you probably have and will try. We were to take photos or scan objects for this project and no Internet images were to be used. The idea that came to my head immediately was to do something with my marathon pictures and video. So when I came into class with some movie stills I started to mess around with them but soon realized that because I hadn't taken any of the pictures or video myself that it would be too hard to do. The pictures just weren't good enough. So then I stayed on the idea of running and though of a running motion, or to do a project about motion with silhouettes fading into each other. Then from that idea I thought it would look really amazing to just make a self portrait out of silhouettes of myself.
So I got to work, I took 16 pictures of myself in different positions and i had to select and cut myself out of each one so I could create the silhouette. This process alone took one whole night of work, but after this was the fun part.
In the next day of class I took out the picture of myself an turned down the opacity to create a type of tracing paper as a guideline for my silhouettes. Layer after layer I applied the silhouettes until I had a rough outline of my face. Then I would go back into each layer and tweak the color so that it made my face pop out a little more. As far as the color scheme went for this project I wanted to keep it bold and simple to go with the simplicity of the silhouettes. I chose a colored background and tried to stick mainly with its compliment or close to it for the silhouettes. After about 2 long days of layering I finally had my first finished project and it looks amazing. However, I was so beat from the first project I almost couldn't handle a second. To give myself a break I was a little more open with the second piece. I knew I wanted to do a mushroom cloud but I wasn't going to constrain myself to a picture. I just started laying on the silhouettes and eventually drew an outline of a mushroom cloud. Thereafter, I filled in the cracks and colored them in. It was much easier than my first project but I still felt like it was just as interesting and powerful. I had so much fun with this project I actually hope to do a whole series with them in the future.
So i was talking to one of my art buddies about what else, art. And we were discussing a little bit about the Digital Arts, which is my major. Digital Arts is a totally different breed of artist than your typical Fine Arts major. Some people still don't really consider these people to even be artists at all and frankly I have to agree on a certain level. When you get into these classes there are really two types of programs you will learn: easy programs and hard programs. That's it. Easy programs are ones like Photoshop, anyone can come in and learn the basics of this program, put a cheesy filter on a picture, and think they are an artist. In fact I've seen plenty of people who are filter crazy and let me tell you, it is not original and you did no work. On the other hand there are the hard programs such as Maya and other 3D animation and modeling software. These programs have so much to them that it can't be picked up in one day. Someone could work on a project for a week and still have it turn out like crap even.
Now that your caught up on the basics let me tell you what my situation is. Most digital arts majors are people who like art, but are also concerned with getting a job after college. When my friend said this to me it really struck a chord, because I didn't want to me put into the same group as some of the people in my classes. I don't want to be some random artist who likes programming more than getting out into the real world and actually being inspired. I simply replied to my friend that I don't want to pursue a career in the hard programs. At one time in my life I thought I wanted to design video games and create characters, but when you actually get into the class you realize there is a lot less glitz to it then that. If you are actually going to get a job like this you will most likely lose all creative control. You will be put on an assembly line for game design. One person will handle the lights, one person will handle arm movement, one person will design the face, and so on. The bottom line is I don't want to have a boring job in the digital arts just because I am really good at lighting or 3D modeling. To me that isn't being an artist. I want a job because I am the most creative person in the bunch and I am always coming up with new ideas. That is why I would much rather pursue a career in an easy program because if you can stand out in a program that virtually anyone can use, then you must truly be an artist.
Anyways, back to my project journal. For our third project we were told that we would be creating two images in Photoshop. The good part was that the project was completely open ended. (This can be the bad part for some people). Most people like at least a little guidance so that they know where to start, but when a project is wide open its hard to pin point one good idea out of the millions of bad ones you probably have and will try. We were to take photos or scan objects for this project and no Internet images were to be used. The idea that came to my head immediately was to do something with my marathon pictures and video. So when I came into class with some movie stills I started to mess around with them but soon realized that because I hadn't taken any of the pictures or video myself that it would be too hard to do. The pictures just weren't good enough. So then I stayed on the idea of running and though of a running motion, or to do a project about motion with silhouettes fading into each other. Then from that idea I thought it would look really amazing to just make a self portrait out of silhouettes of myself.
So I got to work, I took 16 pictures of myself in different positions and i had to select and cut myself out of each one so I could create the silhouette. This process alone took one whole night of work, but after this was the fun part.
In the next day of class I took out the picture of myself an turned down the opacity to create a type of tracing paper as a guideline for my silhouettes. Layer after layer I applied the silhouettes until I had a rough outline of my face. Then I would go back into each layer and tweak the color so that it made my face pop out a little more. As far as the color scheme went for this project I wanted to keep it bold and simple to go with the simplicity of the silhouettes. I chose a colored background and tried to stick mainly with its compliment or close to it for the silhouettes. After about 2 long days of layering I finally had my first finished project and it looks amazing. However, I was so beat from the first project I almost couldn't handle a second. To give myself a break I was a little more open with the second piece. I knew I wanted to do a mushroom cloud but I wasn't going to constrain myself to a picture. I just started laying on the silhouettes and eventually drew an outline of a mushroom cloud. Thereafter, I filled in the cracks and colored them in. It was much easier than my first project but I still felt like it was just as interesting and powerful. I had so much fun with this project I actually hope to do a whole series with them in the future.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
3D shoes
This was my project for my Intermediate 3D Modeling class. We had to create a pair of shoes and I chose my Converse slip ons.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Digital Converse
For my second project in my Digital Arts class we had to make a narrative piece that was composed of 5 different pieces. The project was extremely open ended so all we really had to do was tell a story some way. It didn't matter how, just as long as it made some sense. So when the teacher was explaining this project an idea popped into my head immediately. This was a good thing because usually I don't get very into school art projects and have a hard time coming up with what to do that actually fits into the requirements. So whenever I get an idea right away it gets me excited and that helps me to complete the project to the best of my ability and make the best art I can because I actually get into what I am doing and want to make the art as good as possible. So when I heard we had to make five separate pieces and make a story I thought of all the Converse shoes I had ever bought in my life and how I could make a story about the path my life has gone on. So I then decided that for every shoe I would think of a place in time that I was with that shoe. For example, my first shoe is an original black Converse, and I set that at my grade school because that is where I wore them the most. So, in the end my narrative shows a variety of my shoes progressing through the places that have impacted my life...
I call this: A Walk In My Shoes
I call this: A Walk In My Shoes
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