Identify Yourself - Reation

The website itself was a very interesting read. While the design and layout of the site is something I'd associate with the early 2000 it is deceptive. The site had so many embedded links and pop ups that it's simplistic layout merely hides how complex the and interactive the site is. I found it slightly disconcerting however that when scrolling down and reading one column the text and images on the other side would jump around.

The passage that I focused in on was the passage on The Body. This passage used the body to not so much describe the physical changes of the human form but rather as an analysis of the changing of communication that technology has lead to. How we interact with others and technology. It brings into light how fine tuned we are into technology, going as far as to even imagine technology's call. Technology has become a part of our body. It is like a phantom limb, you feel it even when it is gone. Society today has adapted technology and given text a form of it's own that is to be leaner just as body language is learned. How big is the disconnect between online interaction and physical? I'd argue that it is smaller than it was before especially now with present culture changing their bodies and actions to promote internet and technological activity.

Project Two - Tweedle: Anchor

Vector Project Update

With Original Image 

Without Original Image

Progress for the portrait is moving along slowly but steadily. Color was introduced and shading and detail on he hair, neck, and face was completed. The eyes still need work and the clothes still need shading and detail added in. The background has been started but still has a long way to go.

Vector Portraits - Basic Tracings

Original

Basic Tracing 

Asher Benson

Source 

Source

Asher Benson is an Illustrator/Vector Artist. She has been active in the vector community of DeviantART for the past 9 years and currently works as a contracted Vector Artist/ Freelancer. Her work focuses on around color and it's application of it line segment by line segment.[1]  Her favorite Adobe Illustrator tool/effect is Gaussian Blur.[2] She was featured in Adobe's Master Class: Illustrator Inspiring artwork and tutorials by established and emerging artists book published in 2012.[1] Being part of the DeviantART community she spends often publishes tutorials as well as various stages of her pieces.

Source

Source

Benson normally starts with a sketch and using that as a locked base for her work. It is very eye catching work that is apealing to the eye. Benson stated that her work with vectors "that complex and mathematical program" changed her life. "I was a person who was very afraid of color and mistakes, I worked lightly and hated the idea of permanence. With Adobe Illustrator, I have come out of my shell and brightened my drab and dreary world with explosive color and experimentation"
That color is seen clearly in her work. The play of gradients the shades. All of it is a way to bring a emotion to an seemingly boring and format. Her colors bring light and emotion even when using a more subdued pallet such as the piece bellow.

Source

Benson's artwork is amazingly detailed. Her manipulation of shading using gradients brings a great deal of depth to her images. Her layers upon layers of shading and detail to the body and it's accessories makes it so there is always something new to see when looking at once of her pieces. Despite the non-realistic style of her drawings the images still have an amazing control of anatomy and texture, whether it be jewelry or the folds of clothing. Her work takes sketching and then uses the benefits of vectors to give is more depth and detail than possible in another format.

Source

Source

Illustrator Tracing

Signature 

Line Drawing

Portrait Photos

Signature

Project One - Life's Story

Ryota Matsumoto

Ryota Matsumoto

Ryota Matsumoto was educated at the Architectural Association in London, Glasgow School of Art and University of Miami before receiving his Master of Architecture from University of Pennsylvania School of Design. Ryota Matsumoto's drawings develop and demonstrate the hybrid/multi-layered process where varying scale, juxtaposition of different forms, intertwined textures/tones are applied to reinvent and question the spatial conditions of architectural drawings. His work explore a hybrid drawing technique combining both traditional media (ink, acrylic, and graphite) and digital media (algorithmic processing, scripting and image compositing with custom software ).1\

the Light Breath of Wind at Dawn Source

Ryota Matsumoto's work gives the feel of an architectural design, an abstract representation of and area or an event. He seems to breath color into an idea or a design giving an visual image to an otherwise invisible concept. His work uses it's mixed media as a way to explain it's mixed influences. the piece above is inspired of a poem by Kurt Schwitters and the work, itself is also inspired by his later masterpiece, Ursonate structurally. There was a slew of archival releases of concrete and sound poem recordings by Henri Chopin, Schwitters, Raul Hausman as well as the last work of Antonin Artaud around 90's.2

the Indistinct Notion of an Object Trajectory Source

Ryota Matsumoto's is very appealing visually. His wide range of textures with-in a piece and even wider range of techniques used (when including all of his work) create a nice contrast of the multiple different kinds of architecture. His lines, curves and graphs join together to create a sort of controlled chaos. Some of his pieces such as the Light Breath of Wind at Dawn are more obviously mathematical in origin while the repetition as seen in the piece above, combined with the distinct textured brush strokes gives a more relaxing natural feel, Ryota Matsumoto's ideology behind his art and methods is not easily interpret-able to the untrained or laymen eye but his work marries texture and color in such a way this it is still enjoyable. 

before

after

Swimming in the Memories: Class Collage

A visual ode to Grandparents long past. 

This piece is actually a compilation of sixteen different images; each image from a scan made by a class member as well as one of my own. The scans are from the previous Scanned Images Project. I took bits and pieces of these sixteen images to create the collage presented above. To create this piece I used photoshop on a Mac with the help of a tablet. It was a time consuming but ultimately fun project.

Scanned Images

Below are a multitude of images that I created by manipulating and moving a diverse amount of objects as they were scanned into the computer. After the images where scanned I edited the resolution of the image and file type so that they could be posted here. 

Text Edit - Images

Ever wonder what would happen if you edited the code of an image? Well neither did I, until today, that is. Using TextEdit on a Mac I simply moved around bits of code on an image I took off of google. It yielded some interesting results. Melanie Willhide got her distortions by happy accident (theft, happy accident, same thing really). This was distortion on purpose, even if I wasn't sure exactly what I would do. Bellow is just one example:

Original Image: Link

Edited Image

Chasing Butterfly Pixel GIF

I'll have you know that this would have looked awesome in the 80's.

24 Hour Technology Log

Before posting my log I have to say keeping track of when I used any form of technology was an interesting experience. I'm glad that I have gotten over my embarrassment of how much of my life I spend on the internet and my abnormal sleep habits or it would be extremely difficult to actually publish this information. My internet time was probably cut down from normal only because the internet went down over campus for a few hours. On top of that the lack of interaction on my phone wasn't surprising considering my lack of a smart phone and distaste for talking on phones in general.  

This log starts at 10am on January 25th and extended until 10am on January 26th. Please keep in mind that the time table is in military time.  

SUNDAY JANUARY 25TH 2015

     1000 – Start iHome Alarm

     1030 – Refrigerator

     1035 – Electric Teapot

     1133 – Phone (Text)

1139-1144 – Browse Internet (Laptop)

     1145 – Phone (Text)

     1146 – Refrigerator

1200-1225 – Stove Top

1228-1237 – Watch Internet Videos (Laptop)

1300-1503 – Watch Movie (Laptop)

1330-1405 – Microsoft Word (Laptop)

1505-1610 – Read PDF(Laptop)

1525-1535 – Phone(Call)

1655-2320 – Browse Internet (Laptop)

1813-2046 – Skype (Laptop)

     2225 – Printer

MONDAY JANUARY 26TH 2015

0115-0125 – Browse internet (Laptop)

0125-0211 – Microsoft Word (Laptop)

0215-0230 – Browse internet (Laptop)

0230-0248 – Skype (Laptop)

0250-0302 – Browse internet (Laptop)

     0303 – Freezer 

     0304 – Refrigerator

     0304 – Microwave 

     0305 – Toaster 

0315-0400 – Browse internet (Laptop)

     1000 – End iHome Alarm

*NOTE: Some of these technological uses were together

Douglas Davis

Douglas Davis Source

Douglas Davis is most well-known for his art in the 1970s that used the relatively new tools of video camera and satellites to break geographic boundaries when presenting his art. This work started as early as 1971 with the Electronic Hokkadim which was and interactive broadcast performance from the atrium of the Corcoran Gallery, Washington D.C.[1] But the most notable piece was in 1977 when Davis joined with Nam June Paik and Joseph Beuys for The Last Nine Minutes? which was the first live international satellite telecast by artists, transmitted from Documenta 6 in Kassel, Germany to twenty-five other countries.[3]

Clip From The Last Nine Minutes? Source

Davis' work continued to transform with the technology available using mediums such as the World Wide Web. The participatory project was called The World's First Collaborative Sentence that started in 1994  but continued and grew for six years.[1] In the end the piece including text from 200,000 individuals. The sentence is still available here as the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York modified the coding so that it could be compatible with the modern day websites in an attempt to continue the endeavor indefinitely.

For his work Davis was trying to forge a connection with his audience, his viewers in a way that would create a sort of conversation and debate whether it was about the technology he used and what it could be used for but also what it should be used for and why. He challenged the way the medium was seen.

 "Television is usually considered a public medium, but because of the way it is experienced — in a personal space — it is in fact quite private. When I began to work overtly with the medium, I acted out of the same sense." -Douglas Davis[2]

Davis' work called for an active viewer as he used a medium (television) that normally called for passivity.

I believe that Davis made a remarkable start in easily accessible interactive art. Ideas such as his were the building blocks for such sites as YouTube. His work didn't start a community as much as the latter but it started a dialogue between the artist and the viewer that up until that point could only be reached by performance artists; who were hard to reach.  The intimacy that Davis talks about can be viewed as even stronger than that of a in person performance artist because despite the fact that there is a screen between the view and Davis he is, in a way, closer to the view than are performance artist can manage. It is that degree of intimacy that makes his work so compelling because it not only calls for the viewer to participate but it makes them want to.  

[1]"Douglas Davis Timeline." Timeline. Web. 21 Jan. 2015.

[2] "Douglas Davis Biography." Electronic Arts Intermix. Web. 21 Jan. 2015.

[3]Paul, Christiane. Digital Art. New York: Thames & Hudson, 2003. 18-21. Pdf.