#ip02

I love video games. “Duh, who doesn’t?” you might think. No, you don’t understand - I love video games - not only playing them, but designing them. Having a vision of a game you want to make in your head and then working to turn that vision into fruition is such a rewarding process, along the way you encounter challenges that might change how the game works - for better or worse.

I’m a highly analytical person. It really comes out when I start analysing a game. I’ll be thinking what caused the developers to make the decisions they’ve made, storing that information for later use. You can do a lot with games and their design, but in terms of subverting tropes you really need to have a lot of experience with video games in general to be able to toy with your players.

IP02: Get a Book Out will Ya (Essay) 16947308 Integrative Practice, interpreting ideas and concepts from a wide range of sources.

Our goal is to explore and seek out issues, problems, and themes from different perspectives. Basically, we want to combine a variety of sources to advance our perspectives.

For me, I turned towards reading mostly, over the course of the year I have been in a constant exploitive state. I wanted to not only explore topics and themes that grabbed my attention but also look at other concepts I would not have considered before for inspiration. 
 I have explored ideas mainly from Golan Levin an American media artist in Computer Vision for artists and designers: Pedagogic tools and techniques for movie programmers, a book based on the history of Kandinsky and his artist influences by Hajo Duchting, a book on the human body called Adam’s Navel by Michael Sims and a three-part documentary on ballet called Agony and Ecstasy. These sources came from a list of many that I have been exploring over the past few weeks, I came across history documentaries on WWI, cotton candy making, typography and design, brain mapping and stress hormone development, whether this be explored in the #ctec503movement or integrative practice, I have been exploring across all papers. However, over the course of the last week, I have found these four topics the richest. I draw a lot from them personally and am looking forward to exploring them further after the assessment.

First I want to talk about the individual themes of these sources, their differences that make them stand out, from there I will link together the knowledge provided from similar themes I come across. Starting with Computer Vision for artists and designers: Pedagogic tools and techniques for movie programmers, I wanted to start with a technology-based subject as I felt it most applied to my passions. The article itself talks about computer motion tracking and interaction. [1] “This paper attempts to demystify computer vision for novice programmers, emphasising the use of vision-based detection and tracking techniques in the interactive media arts.” This stands out to me as the main themes are around movement and play, using those things to create something interactive and inventive. An example is one of my favorites referenced in the article [1] “Rafael Lozano-Hemmer's Standards and Double Standards (2004).” Which was fifty leather belts in the room that would turn towards the user.

Secondly, I want to talk about Kandinsky, I was drawn to this from my art history background. When you look at the world, when you look at works of Kandinsky’s such as [2] “Flood Improvisation” 1913 and [2] “interior” 1909 you can see that movement and technique is important here, the skill required to look beyond the composition and use colour and light to form a mood/story. [2] “The German fairy tales, which I often heard as a child, came alive” and, “the catalog told me it was a haystack. I could not recognise it as such. This inability to perceive was embarrassing. I felt the painter had the right to paint it unclearly”. These quotes were from Kandinsky himself, furthermore revealing themes such as movement, storytelling, bringing something alive using art and composition.

Thirdly Adam’s Navel, a book on the weird and wonderful parts of the human body, since this was a novel I wanted to focus on the overall theme using examples from my favourite chapter “Don’t Read my lips” because [3]“mobility is part of the very definition of lips, its absence can be noteworthy itself”. The reason why this chapter stood out to me is simply the fact that it talks about lip reading, the interpretation of expression. From that stories are told, speaking can form a situation just as not speaking can do the same, the main theme I draw from this would be the human body and how slight movements can communicate a story. The book went through many chapters going to part to part, offering a unique story.

Lastly, I watched a ballet documentary about the "behind the scenes" of a company [4]. It went through and showed the whole process before a performance, the practice, the stress the development and the finical issues. I always saw ballet as an art but what this documentary further revealed to me was this is was a sport as well, the artists have to be well trained to an athletes level of capability. Like it one sense in the swan lake, you see the stunning formations of the dance, but what this documentary also showed was the dripping sweat and clenched muscles of the dancers. All this work and technique though was all to once again tell a story through movement and the composition of the body.

So far we can already see the main themes are relating to one another, from these four sources I have drawn ideas about Movement and stories, how movement can tell stories. This was the main message I got from these sources to link them together. I guess over the entire semester I have just been reading and exploring in general but have never considered the link between the subjects and how using multiple perspectives could assist in my understanding. One subject is never only. It is a verity of information put together that is still stretching and growing. Ballet, Technology, Art and the Human body. Linked together with the similarities of using movement to tell a story, whether that be through motion tracking and manipulation, using composition, colour and brush strokes, using historical facts and meaning to add context to an existing artifact or using your body to formulate and tell a story through dance.  

[1] http://www.flong.com/texts/essays/essay_cvad/

[2] Book: Kandinsky Hajo Duchting

[3] Book: Adam’s Navel Michael Sims

In my opinion, music is certainly one of the most important areas in cinema. It’s used to provide depth and control emotion, to enhance storytelling, to create plot relationships, to comment on the time period, imply narrative support, to connect scenes, and to generally make the film a stunning work of art to behold.

Take for example the six minute opening scene of Edgar Wright’s new film Baby Driver (2017), seen above. The way the music is used to direct what’s shown on screen is not only intensely creative but also very interesting and refreshing to watch. 

On a different note, you could consider the Birth of Dr. Manhattan series of scenes from Watchmen (2009). Listen closely to the sound as you’re watching and consider how you would be feeling if you used a different track, say for instance the same scene but with a track from Nolan’s Interstellar (2014). The difference is night and day.  While I think that the score fits well, the original Watchmen score is better. The score in the actual movie is frightening and reaches it's heights when you see what Dr. Manhattan is capable of and the reaction to his manifestation in the film. There's a strong sense of fear and wonder that borders on chaos. "Stay" (the track from Interstellar) feels too human for the scene - the track is totally focused on the emotion between Cooper leaving Murph in Interstellar, while in context while this scene from Watchmen is about the loss of emotion and humanity. There’s an extremely interesting dichotomy between the two pieces and how they affect the scene from Watchmen.

Culinary Interpretation... Scrambled Eggs

I can’t believe I am posting about scrambled eggs on Tumblr but here I am. Sticking with the theme of interpretation I wanted to show what I meant by interpretation shown through cooking as I expressed in my break down of    The Great New Zealand Cook Book. While I don’t believe scrambled eggs is actually in the book, I thought I best stick within my comfort zone to show what I mean.

 Before you are two dishes both variations of scrambled eggs. Your more traditional version being scrambled eggs on toast made by my girlfriend and then my Mexican take on scrambled eggs. As you can see the outcome is vastly different yet the main component (the eggs) remains the same.

 This is where the whole thing links back to religion and the Bible. The scripture never changing yet what is taken from it by different people can be vastly different in outcome. While these two variations of scrambled eggs are far from the heavy messages in the bible the same principle of interpretation applies. Both of us having our own likes and dislikes when it comes to food, we were both able to create something that we individually would like to eat. This is what I found reading through the cook book, many of the dishes were variations of simple traditional dishes but with an own individual twist to them.

 As I have said before I am guilty of being a MasterChef fan, in particular MasterChef Australia [2] (don’t ask me why) … You can almost take any episode and you can see this concept of interpretation come to life. Each chef using their own individual flare to bring their own interpretation to what they have been asked to create. And you often see when it comes down to judging, it is the dishes that bring the most wacky and weird interpretations of what has been asked to the table that have the greatest impact.

 It becomes more about the individuality of the dish and the story behind it that sells the dish. A profound theme within marketing. As the quote says “Both religion and marketing sell stories”.[3] While a large part is about the food the taste the techniques used in creating a dish, it is also the story behind the interpretation that makes it what it is.

references:

[1] Thom, M. Harper, T. (2014) The Great New Zealand Cookbook: The Food We Love from 80 of Our Finest Cooks, Chefs and Bakers. PQ Blackwell Limited.

[2]Didnt know what one to reference but here is a link to MasterChef Australia season 9 episodes: https://www.tvnz.co.nz/shows/masterchef-australia

Final Sound Composition/ Edit

This soundscape includes many things that are nostalgic for people of a similar age, 90′s children. It includes sounds from toys, especially the Tamagotchi and music from TV shows. This is a basic reflection of my childhood. The first part of the sounds are more harsh and dramatic, it the gradually becomes softer and more melodic. This is able to give off nostalgic and calming effects.

31/08/2017

I find it very ironic how Paul made a video about reading tips that basically summarizes how to condense and comprehend written text yet he makes a 6 minute video that could have easily been condensed down to a 2 minute video.

Get to the point. 

Stop talking to me like I’m five. 

Stop repeating yourself over and over again. 

Learn to edit a video.

It appears that the tips and tricks in comprehending written text that Paul is demonstrating is more or less for non fiction books rather than fiction. I admit, I generally never go back and re read a book that I have already read and perhaps he’s right, perhaps I have a much lower comprehension rate than I would have thought. The sixth step I will test and utilize, however every other step is literally just how to read a book... 

You can’t read a book that contains vocabulary that you don’t understand and attempt to comprehend the context and meaning behind it. 

You can’t memorize lines and lines of text without a self condensed version of what the authors trying to convey.

You don’t believe in something someone is saying without any key supporting evidence or justification unless your faith is out of whack.

You don’t read a book like how Paul describes most people does unless you’ve never been taught how to read.

This paper has been quite different from what I thought Creative Technologies would be like. Though at first I didn’t quite understand what the point of it was, looking back at the projects and what we’ve done I have summed up what I think the point of each assignment was.

#IP01 I think the first assignment was to get us to look at things differently. To push the boundaries of what people would normally do with everyday objects and come up with an outcome that uses methods of a creative technologists. I personally had trouble at the start of this project as I didn’t know what to use for an object, but found that I came to enjoy thinking outside the box and playing with different ways to interrogate objects. I think that this forced us to creatively think about what to do and what methods to use. And in the end enjoyed seeing how everyone else interpreted this project and seeing their outcomes.

Neurology: Healing ADD - Daniel Amen

Technically, ADD is a neurological disorder. Neurology isn’t very far from dealing directly with Psychology, because the make up of your brain will determine how it functions mentally. However, for the purposes of this project, and the direction  took it in, I’ll be listing it separately.

In this book, and in the supporting talks by the author Daniel Amen, the subject is the Neurological disease, Attention Deficit Disorder. Breaking it down, Daniel lists and describes the symptoms of 7 different and distinct types of ADD (in this new revision book. There were 6 in the original version, and as such only 6 in the older talk by Daniel Amen). He lists probable causes and citing actual experiences with his clients with ADD and others like them around him in his life. He also dispels common myths surrounding ADD, as well as finally listing the broad steps for each individual type of ADD in order to reach their healing.

Sources:

Amen, D. G. (2013). Healing ADD from the inside out: the breakthrough program that allows you to see and heal the seven types of attention deficit disorder. New York: Berkley Books. 

https://www.elevatedexistence.com/dr-daniel-amen-healing-the-7-types-of-add/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItieANAruo8 (Older Talk)