I N S I G H T
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this book documents the journey that led to the creation of this piece. written and designed by calvin ncube.
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section one research
this section will look at the research part of my project, thoughts on each piece & the influence they had on the project.
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Perception Etymology:
Illusion Etymology:
The dictionary describes perception as: ‘the act or faculty of perceiving, or apprehending by means of the senses or of the mind; cognition; understanding.’ The word has a long history starting from 1350-1400 and has evolved through different languages including Old French (percepcïon) and Latin perceptiōn which is a stem of the Latin word perceptiō. Understanding the word’s etymology helps me focus my research knowing the true meaning of a word shows that I have an understanding for it and this understanding should transfer to my research.
The dictionary definition of the word Illusion is as follows: ‘something that deceives by producing a false or misleading impression of reality.’ The history for this word begins in 1300–50 Middle English. It evolved from the Latin illūsiōn a stem of illūsiō, irony, mocking, equivalent to illūs ( us ) past participle of illūdere to mock, ridicule ( il- il-1 + lūd- play (see ludicrous) + -tus past participle suffix, with dt > s ) + -iōn- -ion.
“In order to better understand the context of my field of study I decided to dissect the words Perception and Illusion. This exercise was to help me better understand the words and their history in order for me to focus the rest of my research.”
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Perspective lego & terracotta army
LEGO Army is a piece of 3D street art that works from a fixed-point perspective. It is a collaborative piece from Leon Keer and a collection of other artists including Remko van Schaik, Ruben Poncia & Peter Westerink. The piece was made in Florida for the 4th Sarasota Chalkfestival. Its influence comes from the Terracota Army of Qin Shi Huang. “The beginning part of my project cantered a lot around perspective & also a lot around fixed-point perspective. This piece of art tied into this curiosity, I wanted to know how these pieces of art are created & study the process.�
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Perspective experience human flight
Experience Human Flight is a video created using a set of skydivers that filmed a series of jumps from a first person perspective. The video is immersive and gives a sense of what it would be like to be able to fly. Infinity List created this video for this purpose using a set of head mounted cameras operated by the divers.
“Whilst continuing research on perspective I remembered a set of videos created by Infinity List which I thought were relevant to the research in this project. The immersive nature of the videos was an aspect I wanted for my work & something I was willing to work towards.�
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Perspective cloverfield
peep show
CLOVERFIELD was an entire film that was filmed in the first person, it follows a group of friends as they attempt to escape and survive as a large monstrous creature attacks New York City. This film is filmed similarly to the classic thriller “The Blair Witch Project� because of this first person perspective. It creates a sense of involvement for the viewer, making them feel as if they are experiencing the events in the movie first hand.
The TV show PeepShow is entirely filmed from multiple first person perspectives to also show what each individual character may be thinking at that exact moment. Coupled with the first person perspective is an inner monologue that the characters may mention at specific points, all these factors work to create a more immersive program.
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Perspective reverse perspective
This example is a piece of video that shows how unnatural the world would potentially appear to be for someone if they viewed it with reverse perspective. Reference points are affected because far away objects appear to be larger than they are when it should really be the other way round.
“Whilst looking around on the web for examples of perspective based work i came across this piece which shows a design example of what the world could look like if it was drawn using reverse perspective. The concept is visually quite strong, it made me appreciate the power for perspective a lot more, further cementing it for me as one of the primary focuses of this project.�
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Perspective stance - bryan kelley
These images are from an editorial titled ‘STANCE’ by the photographer Brian Kelley for the HUF Autumn 2012 look book. They in a way force the viewer to look at the world in ways they are not accustomed to, creating a forced perspective that the viewer adjusts to after looking closely at the images & working which way is up. This is all down to the positioning of the models & the camera angles. It is a simple idea but it makes for a set of visually powerful pictures.
“I was aware of this editorial previously because I discovered it through Instagram. I knew that this piece of work would be relevant for my research so I decided to include it & studied it further as I paid more attention to all the images more carefully.”
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Perspective optical illusions
Here are two examples of Op Art, a form of art that uses patterns in order to create an optical illusion when viewed. These examples are two album covers for the group Soulwax, both the covers for ANY MINUTE NOW and NITE VERSIONS were both created by Trevor Jackson. Both titles can only be viewed from a distance away because of the illusion created by the patterns. “After a group critique session & some brainstorming I developed a new direction of research for the project. I started looking more into optical illusions and how they interact & affect the viewer’s vision.”
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Perspective bridget riley
Bridget Riley is a British born painter that is one of the main proponents for the Op Art movement. Op Art (sometimes called Optical Art) is a style of painting that makes a use of optical illusions. Optical Art is most of the time abstract and it gives illusions that include hidden images, swirling, warping, the illusion of movement, vibrations or swelling. “The journey through research led me to Bridget Riley, one of the most famous Op Artists. I found her work very interesting to look at & I also was very interested in the process that led to her painting illusions. I did not want to get side-tracked by looking into her history too much so instead looked at examples of her works.�
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Perspective dragon illusion
This video shows a video example of an optical illusion. The illusion works by fooling your eyes into convincing your brain that the dragon in the video is moving. This is the case because light is bent in a different way around the image and the point in which it enters the eye gives the impression of movement when in fact the dragon is actually static. “Exploring the way optical illusions worked made me a lot more interested in them and the way in which they fool the eye & brain. I discovered at this point in my research that I was still in fact still looking at work that worked around the idea of perspective.�
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Perspective mona lisa - leonardo da vinci An interesting phenomenon in the art world is that of the Mona Lisa. This painting is famous for its mystery, the subject Mona Lisa showing a little smile that has had people wondering what she is thinking & what kind of emotion or state has provoked that expression. It isn’t just famous for this however; the painting is known to have an interesting trick that people experience when they view it. It is believed that Mona Lisa’s eyes follow the viewer around the room & this is because of light, shadow and perspective. The person looking at the painting needs to stand in a specific place in order for the illusion to work and for the Mona Lisa’s eyes to follow them around the room & hence create the illusion.
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Perspective “why do the eyes in paintings seem to follow you someetimes?” by josh clark
“We all know that some paintings seem like they watch us, but how exactly does this happen? Why does it work for some paintings, but not others? It turns out that it has to do with the way a painting is created and a canvas’ lack of the third dimension we find in real life. Thanks to the elements of shadow, light and perspective, some paintings give us the uncanny feeling of being watched. It’s only fair, if you think about it.” – Josh Clark
This article explores how the painting illusion, similarly to the Mona Lisa illusion, works. It goes in depth to explain further to the reader how the process works.
“I used this article to further help my understanding as to how the Mona Lisa illusion works. After reading & absorbing the information I felt excited and wanted to create a few illusions myself as experiments.”
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Perspective light rain - troika
The eyes work by sending signals to the brain to give us a perception of the world. The ‘Light Rain’ piece by TROIKA plays with our idea of the world and the references we have within it. One of these references is the one of raindrops and water’s behaviour. The piece uses a series of powerful LEDs to provide the light & a set of motors to drive them. The light is then bent and manipulated using a collection of lenses to make the illusion of ‘light drops’ as oppose to raindrops. The idea of the piece is to make people reconsider the importance of the rain in a different context & environment. “I decided to look at TROIKA’s piece because I wanted a reference of work that was recent and also tied into my field of study. This did this perfectly & also made me consider a new avenue of study, which was play. This would be an important part of my project because I feel that the aspect of play encourages interaction.”
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Perspective ishihara test
The Ishihara test is a common test that is performed to check for red and green colour blindness. Generally it involves viewing a series of images that are made using coloured dot patterns. The human retina has colour detecting cells called cones which are sensitive to red, blue and green light. If one of these cells is faulty then the result is colour blindness because the person with the faulty cells is failing to see the coloured light properly.
“Looking at the Ishihara test tied in with the work I was doing outside of university at the time. I was working in a branch of Specsavers and was able to get research from my work colleagues about an interesting test that showed if the viewer was colour deficient. I thought this tied in with my field of study so I included it in my research.�
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Perspective neil harbisson
“If we extend our senses, we will consequently extend our knowledge.” – Neil Harbisson.
In this talk Harbisson speaks about his experience with colour & how he is able to see different colours using the prosthetic head piece he calls ‘Eyeborg’ that gives him the ability to see colours using sounds to identify them.
“I feel that understanding colour blindness is useful for me as a designer because having this knowledge is useful when creating a piece of communication. I feel that understanding the whole audience that could be potentially viewing my work (including people that are colour blind) and taking their perspectives on colour into consideration will make for a stronger piece of design.”
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Perspective how to build a bionic man
How to Build a Bionic Man was a documentary that followed Bertolt Meyer as he explored the advancements that are being made in the world of prosthesis. What stood out of this whole programme was the retinal implant & the ability it has given to people in order for them to see.
“The part of this documentary that jumped out at me was this aspect of sight & the restorative nature the retinal implant can potentially have for people without the ability to see. I wanted to tap into the restorative nature of the retinal implant so continued to research the implant through out the duration of the project.�
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Perspective deus ex: human revolution
In the world of Deus Ex, people can augment their bodies and be fitted with hardware components. These ‘augments’ can be used to gain an advantage when performing a certain task (playing the piano) or gain a new perspective on their world and share it with everyone else (taking a photo with the eyes). This is the work of fiction but considering where the human race could potentially end up as technology advances and breakthroughs are made was relevant to this project’s field of study.
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Design Research karel martens
Karel Martens is a Dutch Graphic Designer and Teacher, he specializes in typography mainly but he also creates free noncommissioned work that ranges from graphic to 3D. Some of his 2 dimensional pieces are made using a technique that involves adding a lot of small elements to (circles for example) together to make a large piece. Each element has a part to play, when you step back from the image it appears to come together.
“Martens’ work is very visually strong & when I first saw it the work jumped out at me. This is most likely because he set a very clear set of rules for himself when considering making a new piece of art. This shows in his work, it looks very precise & refined. I used his work as inspiration for some experiments because I wanted to know if there was a chance I would be able to replicate it using New Media techniques.�
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Design Research david hockney
David Hockney is an English artist that specializes in many fields including photography, painting & stage design. He is mostly known for his oil paintings & photography; the latter is what I am deciding to focus on. Hockney’s work is inspirational to mine because it follows a similar idea. His Polaroid pieces work similarly to a jigsaw puzzle in the sense that he takes a large series of images which all come together to form one large image when put together.
“The idea of having a lot of images coming together made an idea come up in my mind. I wanted to bring an aspect of Hockney’s Polaroid idea to my piece in some way but not exactly like Hockney has done it before. Instead of full images I was aiming to use pixels.”
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Design Research hard coded memory - troika Hard coded memory by TROIKA is an installation that was shown in the London Design Museum. The installation ‘celebrates forgetting in the digital age.’ The visual aesthetic of the installation interested me most & tied in with what I was intending for my project. The way the projected beams of light make an image makes a unique visual aesthetic. This aesthetic could be an abstract representation of sight & it could quite possibly be used to represent the way people with a retinal implant would see.
“After seeing the inspirational work that is being one at the moment to restore sight, I knew the way forward for this project would be to visualise this in some way. After seeing this piece I felt as if a switch was flipped in my head that began to point me in the right direction.”
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Design Research robots - dunne & raby
Dunne and Raby have got a very distinctive style when it comes to their videos for the 2007 piece: Robots. The aim of the project was to imagine a future in which robots are an integral part of our lives & the videos are a visual aid that allows the viewer to see how each robot would behave with the user. The videos are very clean and minimal; this is mainly because of the infinite white space coupled with the amount of objects that are on the screen at the one time. This minimalist effect creates a larger focus on the user and their interaction with the machines.
“I am aiming for a similar feel to the videos for INSIGHT. The focus should be on the interaction and the piece itself. This is because the computer is being personified as the person with the retinal implant and the user is therefore getting an insight to what it would be like to see the world in this way.�
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Design Research scrubs season 8 ending sequence In order to get the right feeling for the video I created for INSIGHT I had to look around for different references and one that instantly popped into my mind was the ending sequence in one of the episodes of Scrubs. In this sequence the character is looking at a sheet which at the same time is having images projected onto it.
There is a part of the sequence that does look like it has been manipulated using visual effects however. This isn’t a deterrent though because I decided to pursue this effect for the video.
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section two development & experimentation development of insight is included in this section; screens & notes are documented here.
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Development & Experimentation pinhole camera
At this point in the project I was looking at the similarities between the eye & cameras. This is what motivated me to create a camera, take some shots & analyse the results. Having no experience with making a pinhole camera, the process of this experiment was collaborative. My girlfriend and I created the pinhole cameras using a matchbox, electric tape, colour 24-exposure film, scalpel & an empty film reel among other materials.
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Development & Experimentation stereoscopy
I looked at perspective & as the research went on I managed to find some work that inspired me to create a piece of stereoscopic imagery. The purpose of this experimentation was to see what I could take from what I had learnt doing the experiment & implement it into the rest of the project.
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Development & Experimentation video aesthetic
In order to understand the visual language I was intending to create with INSIGHT, I needed to test it in multiple forms. Moving image I thought would be very appropriate since this piece is meant to display, visually, what it would potentially be like to have the world viewed through a retinal implant. I decided to create a half an hour experiment in order to just see if, with work, the message would be communicated effectively using video. I took a short journey throughout my house & filmed it using a mobile device. The footage was then edited using the After Effects suite in order to appear as if it is in fact the vision through the implant. I knew I was onto something with this visual aesthetic & also that it could be pushed further so I used the video as inspiration to go further with the design of INSIGHT.
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Development & Experimentation insight eye iteration
“Developing this piece’s visual language required me to experiment a little with the code that I had created. An idea that I had was to create a visualisation that worked not just with two colours but also with a much larger spectrum in order to create a bright visual outcome. The code shows a lot more detail in what it is displaying, this is because of the multiple colours that are on the screen. Objects appear a lot more defined with facial expressions & subtle cues standing out a lot more in this iteration in comparison to the 2-colour iteration. Upon reflection this would be a good idea for another application but it didn’t fall into what I wanted to achieve with this piece of work. The piece of code has been saved for another day.”
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Development & Experimentation video & book design
“Various iterations of the opening credits for the video had been created in order to give the right feel. I wanted an overarching design language that ran from the video to the book so a similar typeface and colour palette were used throughout. This decision made it easy to identify the link between the piece of motion graphics and the booklet that accompanied it.�
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Development & Experimentation insight eye
“I worked on a Processing sketch that read the brightness of a room using the webcam and displayed it using a set of ellipses on the screen. The result is a piece of motion graphics that’s adaptive & changes to each environment. I decided to develop this idea further, save all the previous versions so if I needed to then I would go back & edit them.”
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“Various iterations went into the design for the INSIGHT eye. I had to establish a balance between creating a nice aesthetic look for the piece without going too far to compromise its message.�
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Development & Experimentation filming for the artefact
I decided to utilize the photography studio in order to get the desired feel for the short video that showcases INSIGHT. Using the photography studio allowed me to be able to use a wider range of lighting effects, a key part that is needed in order for the application to work. Overall this part of the project was one of the most enjoyable because light does tend to be unpredictable at times. This unpredictability uncovered some unforeseen opportunities to showcase INSIGHT’s abilities.
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Development & Experimentation final artifact reshoot
After filming for the first artifact, I got feedback, which led me to rethink the idea for the video. In order to better communicate the idea of how INSIGHT works. The new storyboard contained a singular character going about their day-to-day life, the perspective then shifts from third person to first person; this shift then shows off how the implant works and how the world appears through INSIGHT. The photo on the left is a still that was taken during the shoot. The image looks different to the final video because after the footage was shot, I edited and colour corrected it in order to give it a certain look. This decision was made in order to make sure that the video’s aesthetic followed that of the two accompanying books.
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bibliography a list of all the sources that inspired this piece.
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Infinity List: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSouHGE5Fbc&featu re=share&list=PLE3FCC68B166F990E Cloverfield: http://www.horrorphile.net/images/cloverfield-lizzycaplan12.jpg Peepshow: http://img838.imageshack.us/img838/2687/ peepshow8x05chairmanmar.jpg Reverse perspective: http://vimeo.com/12518619 STANCE: http://hypebeast.com/2012/11/hypebeast-magazinehuf-2012-fall-winter-stance-editorial?_locale=en Bridget Riley Portrait http://images.npg.org.uk/800_800/2/3/mw84423.jpg Bridget Riley Painting http://www.metier.co/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/ IMG_1587-1024x768.jpg Mona Lisa http://www.paristraveler.de/wp-content/ uploads/2013/01/mona-lisa-Paris.jpg
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Troika Light Rain http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEa_3Q7qFOA Ishihara images http://calvinncubeexpandedinterface.gdnm.org/ files/2013/02/ishihara1.jpg http://calvinncubeexpandedinterface.gdnm.org/ files/2013/02/ishihara1.jpg http://calvinncubeexpandedinterface.gdnm.org/ files/2013/02/ishihara3.jpg Neil Harbison – I listen to colour http://www.ted.com/talks/neil_harbisson_i_listen_to_ color.html?embed=true Karel Martens Images: http://payload.cargocollective.com/1/0/128/1020/ martens_3.jpg http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ls4xz23Op61qbpp5u. jpg http://arredoeconvivio.com/wp-content/ uploads/2011/07/MaharamPrint_Karel-MartensDutchCloudsjpg.jpg http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8354/8317762376_45b15 97ac4_b.jpg Karel Martens Portrait: http://en.etapes.com/system/images/682/full_width/ karelmartens-detail.jpg
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David Hockney Portrait: http://www.lalouver.com/resource/hockney_bio/ portrait.jpg http://eamonnmccabe.co.uk/gallery/artists/view/davidhockney/b.jpg David Hockney bio: http://www.davidhockney.com/bio.shtml David Hockney Images: http://aintnohothouseflower.files.wordpress. com/2011/01/hockney_pearblossom.jpg http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tLI3fGpM-as/UO3zjj1NQ6I/ AAAAAAAAAGE/qMd2nj8oVaQ/s1600/01a-cameraworks. jpg Obama Photomontage: http://annesavagephotography.com/Artists/27411/ Images/20102012162047491_forward_main.jpg Mario ascii: http://i34.tinypic.com/1zl5fsn.png Open Processing Sketch – Dot Mirror http://www.openprocessing.org/sketch/10480
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Deus Ex Retinal Augment Photo – http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_ embedded&v=UG_oThcYsn0 Hard Coded Memory / TROIKA – http://www.adafruit.com/adablog/wp-content/ uploads/2012/09/Troika_HardcodedMemory_lr04.jpg bionic man – http://boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/ IMG_2209.jpg dunne & raby / robots – http://vimeo.com/2611597 Storyboard Mock Imagery – http://artathenaeum.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/ postcard3.jpg Scrubs JD Image – http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/6300000/ My-Finale-jd-and-elliot-6333817-624-352.jpg
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2013