Steven Parry (1013022) Research, Development & Positioning (EGRD6001)
Brief Research, Development & Positioning In order to be able to gain a better understanding of our skills, strengths and where we see ourselves in relation to the industry of Graphic Design we were given a brief each week for six weeks. We were given a list of twelve creative stimuli and asked to pick one each week. The first week we were all allocated the same stimulus—Position Yourself.
Requirements For each week we were expected to research our area, experiment, suspend judgement and reflect via the blog. We were expected to develop ideas that worked and reflect on ideas that didn’t. We were also encouraged to look into practitioners within our fields of interest.
Output Emphasis was not placed on producing a finished polished piece of work, but more about gaining an understanding of different working practices and finding the practice(s) that best suited ourselves—so that we could have a better understanding of our positions with in the design industry. The final weeks were to reflect and evaluate our positions and re-position ourselves also to develop one of our projects even further.
The creative stimuli
Position Yourself
Appropriation
The Everyday The Archive
Dance
Time Memory Colour Ruins
Failure
Nature
Chance
Contents Week 1 - Position Yourself Week 2 - Colour Week 3 - Time Week 4 - Dance Week 5 - Failure Week 6 - The Everyday Weeks 7-9 - Review & Develop Week 10 - Evaluation & FMP Draft Bibliography
Position Yourself My position in the first week of the semester. Initially daunted by the seemingly openness of the instruction of the first brief I felt pretty lost to be honest, however I took the opportunity to start mind mapping various ideas and feelings that I had. I listed how I felt my position was emotionally, metaphorically and literally—this led to some pretty interesting experiments that got me doing things.
Left to right—noting down how I felt and trying to visualize them got my creativity moving
Research I read the text to the left from the recommended book ‘Situation’—I found it quite motivating how someone took the idea of moving a mountain and tried to achieve it. I think these kind of things plant seeds in my mind and inspire me to be open to ideas no matter how crazy or hard they seem.
Left—Text from the recommended book Situation
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Research into Richard Long I reflected on the works of Richard Long—his work felt relevant to this project as he is an artist who uses his surroundings and literal position to make artwork. It got me thinking of things like tracking my movements literally with a sat-nav and seeing what patterns it would produce.
Above—Pamphlet from the exhibition of Richard Long Tate Britain
Influenced by Long On a visit to Brighton I started to see the beach a metaphor for how I felt (a small pebble amongst a million!) I also decided to use the surroundings to create a mountain from the pebbles as I felt I had a mountain in front of me.
Right & below—Pebbles Brighton beach
Week 1 - Situation
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Developing the metaphorical position On returning home I looked at how I could develop the images of the beach to further emphasise my kind of ‘lost’ position. In Photoshop I played around with various filters to get effects of sketching and used colour to isolate a single point.
Left—Using the threshold filter then simply painting a red pebble to show my position
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Developing the literal position As the idea of mapping my sat-nav position wasn’t really practical in the few days I had with this project I used a map to show my literal position in Brighton—I purposely blurred it so that the position wasn’t really clear.
Above—Sketch idea of mapping my position
Above—Literal position in Brighton
Week 1 - Situation
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Developing the emotional position Taking all of the words that I felt represented the way I felt, I thought it would be interesting to see lines pointing to the words that seemed most common to me—by taking the words away it reveals a haphazard sort of confusion.
Above—Photoshop experiment to visualize feelings
Taking this further I quite liked the result of this, even though the graphic is basic, this could be developed maybe with colours inspired from the different emotions and a difference in intesity of line weight to express the intensity of those emotions.
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Above—One of the quotes I thought of whilst doing this brief visualized
Reflection on week 1 The crit was positive it was felt I was experimenting and trying a variety of things out. I feel that research is key—especially when I feel stuck, looking at others work and reading helps to bring out ideas. I looked at position in different ways—literal, emotional, and metaphorical. I feel this week was a warm up. I think that keeping ideas flowing is important—no matter how weak they feel they kind of lead to other things. I felt more confident by the end of the week.
Week 1 - Situation
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Colour Opportunity to research and learn colour theory I started this week reading a passage from the recommended book ‘Colour’ by David Batchelor. The passage got me thinking what is colour, is it physical or just a reflection of light—an illusion? I find out there are no coloured objects just atoms and molecules that reflect certain coloured light like chloroform, which reflects green light. I took this week as an opportunity to learn some facts about colour, find out about colour associations with emotions and see where it ends up.
Research I find that visiting galleries helps me to generate thoughts and ideas. I try to analyse the images I see and take them apart to try and understand how they work. More often than not I don’t seem to have a clue on what the message is! But I note things such as the contrast with complimentary colours in the Bridget Riley image on the left—I noticed how the reds and the green create a sense of opposition and gives the image a sense of energy and conflict. Whereas the colours within the Jack Butler-Yeats image are highly saturated but blended with greys and are contrasting less with each other creating a much ‘quieter’ feeling compared to above.
Top—Bridget Riley—Nataraja Above—Jack Butler-Yeats—A Rose Among Many Waters
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A brief look at colour theory From the book I read, Understanding Color by Linda Holtzschue, I learnt some effects that can be created with colour like simultaneous contrast. This is useful to know as it can effect the colour a design appears (how certain colours cause the brain to see their compliments cast onto grey surfaces). Effects that are caused by the brain are interesting to me such as the effect created by fluting and got me experimenting. (Below right)
Anti-clockwise—Notes on colour theory and an experiment in ‘fluting’
Week 2 - Colour
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Trying out some things In reality there is no colour in objects as such (just reflected coloured light). I set out to photograph the actual Sunflowers painting by Van Gogh—It felt as if I would be capturing something ‘real’ from the painting (its light) that could be used somehow. I visited The National Gallery.
Above—My photo of The Sunflowers due to no photography being allowed I used no flash Right—After some brightening in Photoshop
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Left—the swatch of colours I sampled from my photo of The Sunflowers
Week 2 - Colour
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Developing This experiment really just started to evolve. I had no set vision. Now I had a colour palette sampled from the painting I felt it would be interesting to create a digital version of the flowers sampling from the corresponding area of the real picture.
Above left to right—developing the patterns for the flowers
Above left to right—trying different coloured backgrounds
Developing & Reflection I had to spend some time trying different colour combinations to get the effect that I was satisfied with in the flowers. Although the original painting seems very yellow there are so many browns and greens in it—for my graphic version I emphasised the yellows and oranges to make it ‘brighter’.
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The Sunflowers was a good way of getting started doing some making but I didn’t really think the result was striking—it could work better with more colours within it, maybe give it a bit more depth. I decided to leave this so I could try other things.
Harmony I experimented with the palette and organised it to create a harmony I felt even the jumbled palette had a sense of harmony due to the tones being similar. (Right & below right)
Week 2 - Colour
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Other observations and experiments I took a series of photographs of the portrait of Zaha Hadid by Michael Craig Martin—the colours are constantly changing and I sorted them into ‘moods’ to emphasize and contrast them.
Above—Angry to calm using the colours to show a change in mood
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Subverting the meaning Deliberately using colours with opposite association to the words—I feel that subverting the meaning could be a powerful way of gaining attention but it may cause confusion—testing on facebook showed that everyone understood the meanings.
Reflection on week 2 I feel this week was very experimental. I researched areas to do with colour, looked at artists and produced some pieces. After initial feedback and comments and further reflection I feel that I am not really taking an idea far enough maybe, but then again we only have a week. Regardless of time I think I would prefer to concentrate my next project and work longer with an idea. I would also like to bring something tangible to the world.
Week 2 - Colour
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Time Paradox—Time Travel—Capturing Time Time interests me—It’s scientific, abstract, logical, paradoxical (tomorrows is always coming but never arrives). To start I looked at the book TIME (1974) an old book but still full of things that helped steer my mind, measurements, ancient shadows, atomic clocks. After jotting some ideas down I decided to create a mini project with the intention of capturing the movement of time in stills and animations.
Photography Research I refer to photography books so I can get advice on exposure setting. To create the blurring effect to show movement I need a relatively slow shutter speed but then I need to compensate the extra light coming in by adjusting the aperture.
Photographing in Piccadilly Circus Using a shutter speed of 1/500 sec and aperture 3.8 to add more light to this dark first setting—I gradually lowered the aperture with each photo and slowed the shutter (as the shutter speed lightened the image the aperture darkened it) there came a time when no amount of compensation could account for the slow shutter and the picture just burned out.
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I like the real flatness at the beginning of the sequence caused by the wide aperture, it made it feel really frozen in time and surreal. The motion blurring works to good effect with the traffic.
Below left to right—Two sequences taken at intervals
Week 3 - Time
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Developing the material I found out how to create a simple stop motion animation in Photoshop via an internet tutorial. I was interested to see the frozen stills in the same animation as the motion blurred stills—to see if the contrast created a feeling of time passing quickly.
Click on the still below to see the animation
Above—A still from my stop-motion animation link: http://steveparry.gd.socd.io/wp-content/uploads/ sites/118/2013/10/ANIM-4.gif
The animation depicted time more effectively than stills on there own. The speeding up of the animation in places was intended to show time moving faster—I think time could be depicted in a more captivating way.
Research For ideas on depicting time I looked at a number of artists who have used the theme of time in work.
Left to right— Woman Descending The Staircase —Gerhardt Richter Passage of time—Fong Qi Wei Opening credits Doctor Who
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Development from research The artist research led to some more experiments— using varying degrees of transparency, filters and blending modes created some ghostly surreal moments that showed different times at once. The vortex trying to depict movement.
Top to bottom— Various experiments within Photoshop
Week 3 - Time
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Developing the material I decided to use my sequence to sow the billboard animated, whilst keeping the rest of the image frozen—I’d seen a similar effect a while ago with a man reading a newspaper and thought it could work well here to show the contrast between time movement and stillness. I think this one works the best—It shows the contrast between time and stillness the best out of all. Click on the still below to see the animation
Above—A still from the animation link: http://steveparry.gd.socd.io/wp-content/uploads/ sites/118/2013/10/billboard-animation5.gif
Evaluation of mini project I got some ideas moving and developing and was able to look at the practices of a number of artists. I felt the project was becoming a bit stale and I wanted to produce something tangible, so I explored other time depictions.
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Taking the Time theme further I took the opportunity to explore some other ways of depicting time—looking at time in words (other languages, scripts etc.) The Arabic and Asian scripts are very beautiful.
Drawing the scripts was a nice exercise it got me out of ‘computer world’ and moving pencil to paper—other sketches and doodles resulted. I took the Arabic script for time and created an imprint in sand effect—a kind of abstract depiction for ‘Sands Of Time’. This idea ran its course and I didn’t feel anymore could be extracted from it at this time. Above—Experiments from my drawn scripts
Week 3 - Time
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Visualizing data for a calendar Taking an idea of splitting the year into data such as seconds—days—months etc. I felt visualizing this data made an unusual way of showing time. The images could be used in a calendar. My finished piece was printed—I used a square for each day of the year and coloured them to show the seasons.
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Reflection on week 3 The week enabled me to experiment with different techniques including non-digital, explore other practitioners work and push an idea to the point I felt it was exhausted. The crit was positive and I was really pleased that someone asked if there were 365 squares in my final image (above)—the colours of the seasons communicated well. I was happy to produce a tangible piece of work, this enabled me to practice some printing techniques.
Week 3 - Time
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Dance Decisions I felt dance could be an interesting area to look at visually. Its a language of its own that could lead to great inspiration for other forms. Dance to me is, in one way, a physical visualisation of music, I have an interest in visualising music and dance graphically.
Research I tried to see a dance show, I felt this may help get ideas moving but didn’t have enough time to book. My initial idea to visualize music/dance diverted when I saw a dance school website. I saw a page of comments on how dancing made people feel— recollecting how I used to feel when I used to be out on the club scene—I felt it would be an interesting project to try and visualize these quotes.
Above—The keywords from the quotes on how dancing made people feel
Researching visualizations of dance, I came across some effects to simulate flying using illusion—I saw this as an opportunity to capture some dance/ flying moves that could be hard to get on my own. The flying woman simulation actually had a guide on how to do it which was useful. Left—Illusions of flying (photos from the internet)
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The quote I will visualize: “It feels like floating and gliding into another world and my movements are being taken over by the music. It’s like being temporarily a part of the sound.”
Experiment with Illusion photography Positioned on the floor I took a sequence of shots and manipulated them in Photoshop to emphasise the feeling of flying—I like the silhouette feel mainly because you can’t see its me! but also its just a bit more mysterious. MirrorBall Image—http://motionworks.net/mirror-ball/
Week 4 - Dance
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Creating the illusion of flying
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It took a while to get the framing right so that I fit in the shot, but when I did I managed to get a number of shots in different positions—I then weeded out the most effective and started creating effects with them in Photoshop. The development of the top row didn’t work as I kind of got lost in the lines. The middle row I liked the sketch feel—different to what I intended—I could have taken this further but wanted to carry on with experimenting with other images as they had more of a flying effect.
Week 4 - Dance
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The Image I decided to develop This was a good exercise—quite challenging I fell off the chair once! I decided to work with one picture to visualize the quote about flying—this image was the most effective as I looked suspended, as if I was gliding—It seemed to fit the quote.
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Week 4 - Dance
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Developing the image into a graphic
(Above) Using Lines to enhance the sense of movement and trying different backgrounds.
(Below) I tried using a positive and negative background to give the feeling of moving into another space which fitted the quote. The problem was the figure looked a bit dead so I addressed this by adding another arm and positioning it upright. I also tried out the dance floor graphic to make it more ‘dancey’.
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Week 4 - Dance
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The Image I think worked best The Image that I think worked best out of the exploration was the more simple graphic (below). I added lines through the body moving upwards to enhance the feeling of lifting—I was influenced by Mark Farrow who is a designer who has done a lot of the Pet Shop Boys artwork—I really like the minimalist approach in some of his work, clean, simple and just works in a clever way like the electricity graphic (right) for the album Electric. I took this opportunity to look at Mark Farrow’s website and was very captivated by the clean designs - Up my alley really!
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Visualizing other quotes I took the opportunity to explore some creativity with type design and started designing fonts based on the word ‘electricity’, as one of the quotes to visualize used the word electricity.
Above—Sketches and experiments to try and get over electricity in a typeface—I looked at lots of images of electricity for inspiration
Week 4 - Dance
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Potential for a book of quotes Above is the finished version of the font for electricity created from my initial sketches—I felt this worked the best out of my examples as it has the movement and energy that is associated with energy and electricity. With the plan of turning these quotes into a book I created a final image and a typeface for the cover (right). I tried to express movement in this typeface using an optical illusion effect. At the crit it was felt this didnt get over the connection to dance, I would consider animating it. I published the few pages on Issuu to see it in a book format.
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Above—The cover for the book of dance quotes—click on it to go to the publication
Reflection on week 4 I feel that I am more comfortable working digitally—I feel less restricted working on computers and more confident—however this week I did choose to do some traditional non-computer based work which helped develop ideas in a different way. I enjoy composing layouts, experimenting and seeing what works. My preferred style is clean and simple minimal but I think I am versatile with my approach and like to try new things. I can see myself in a position composing layouts.
Week 4 - Dance
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Failure What does it feel like to fail? My starting point was to look at my own feelings and fears of failure—then to look at some things that have failed that became successful due to their failure, like the Leaning Tower Of Pisa in Italy. This week was an opportunity for creating purposeful typographical failure but in order to do so I had to learn some typographic rules.
Observing and highlighting some failures
Above—I corrected the ‘failure’ here in Photoshop
Above—Using blending modes and separate images taken from the internet I composed this comment on the recent ‘failure’ in the design of London’s Walkie Talkie building. (Photoshop)
These little observations and experiments didn’t lead to an end point but they got me moving which lead to other things.
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Observing the body language and depiction of failure I felt it would be helpful if I were to try and depict failure in some way to look at gestures of failure, success and ways in which they are symbolized. Everything that fails seems to have a downward slant. It was interesting to see the opposite emotions next to each other—they enhance each other.
Right—A mood-board of failure—separate images from Google (composed by me)
Week 5 - Failure
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Developing a never ending subject After spending some time looking into the concept and depictions of failure it felt as if I wasn’t really doing much making—it was turning into what felt more like a psychological study! I decided it would be more directed and beneficial to focus on specific failure to the design field so I looked into Neville Brody and his work. Brody technically ‘failed’ his course as his work was considered too cutting edge for the establishment at the time. However he went on to become a successful designer.
Above—An advertisement for Nike (Neville Brody)
I was inspired by Brody’s work and definitely felt like breaking away from my so considered approach! There is a place for going a bit ‘punk’! I guess its knowing when!
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Research into typographic failing Using the book Thinking With Type I read and noted the many do’s and don’ts of typography and kept them in my sketchbook (below)—I now have some good knowledge on what rules to break.
Week 5 - Failure
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Left—Failing with pixelation—wrongly positioned words to make it deliberately awkward.
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Right—Using fonts deliberately out of context to the words.
Week 5 - Failure
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Using typography to correct a failure Deliberately making the important words small and positioning the words so that they are not in order, I tried to correct it using different shading.
I felt most of them didn’t differ too much but the result effect was more interesting than just plain old headline text. I think the top right is the most readable as the ‘is’ that is in the wrong order, stands out from the rest. Hopefully making it easier to read it right.
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Finally (above) I tried to highlight the typographic ‘failure’ of text rivers—using the shape of the Thames.
Reflection on week 5 I learnt a lot through my research and was influenced to break out of the rules but I felt like the work wasn’t moving anywhere. I prefer to have a set goal or idea to visualize. Just breaking the rules for the sake of it didn’t feel rewarding—although it was good to see some results as they were interesting. I think using typography creatively though is something I’m very much drawn to.
Week 5 - Failure
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The Everyday Focusing on the everyday you see things you may miss. I like to think there is something extra-ordinary in the ordinary If you look long enough! If its not there you can just add it! (Flying saucers). I started this week looking at Martin Parr’s work and noting some of the techniques he uses in his photography of everyday situations. My research also led me to the films of Andy Warhol (Sleep) that forces the viewer to focus on the everyday—that’s something that I feel could be interesting.
The everyday in film—Experiment 1 I went on an everyday journey and took photos at 15 second intervals with my camera round my neck, I aimed to wander taking random snaps of people secretly so that I could get natural behaviour. There was a problem with this—my camera made a load shutter release noise, and fires a light for auto-focus, not good for taking candid photos. I did some research into my camera and found out how to rectify some of these problems. I found a good website were I got tips on taking candid photos. I produced an animation from the resulting stills. Click on the still below to see the animation. http://steveparry.gd.socd.io/wp-content/uploads/ sites/118/2013/10/evryday-journey-2.gif
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Top to bottom—a selection of stills from experiment 1
Week 6 - The Everyday
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Evaluation of experiment 1 I got a handful of images that caught the everyday moment in a natural way that I would not have captured taking photos in a non-candid way. I have a better idea on how to position the camera—how high to go around my neck—also I have a better idea of how to get a more controlled observation, sitting down and waiting for something to come into the view of my prying camera.
Development - experiment 2 To develop the project I went to central London, aiming to get some moment of everyday life on the tube/trains etc. and document a journey that would normally be forgotten.
Right—Trying to storyboard the journey to the station
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On the train—recording conversations I took more candid shots (left) this time I positioned the camera on my leg and set it on a timer—I could get a controlled position like this—I also recorded some conversations as I felt it may be interesting to use them in some typographic form later.
Filming I set the camera to film and wandered about my everyday business—I got some interesting scenes on the tube (scenes that normally I take no notice of like someone eating an apple). It was interesting to see the everyday in film media—a media more associated with the extraordinary maybe? Click on the still below to see the film
Above—still from the 20 minuet film—Link to the film: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=2MT7rO6dROg
Week 6 - The Everyday
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Evaluation of experiment 2 I felt more confident and less conscious this time and was a little more experimental than in the first experiment—the conversations maybe interesting to visualize.
Development - experiment 3 I want to explore the idea of candid filming further. I went to London and filmed on the tube. I stared recording someone opposite me secretly and decided to do a number of journeys and film different people for one stop—It was an interesting observation, looking back at the film afterwards I can see how awkward some people look, I can see people glancing at me which led me to think I may have been caught out. Mainly everyone just seemed to be in their own little worlds, either sleeping, reading, or in Ipod land—just an everyday journey. I would like to edit the clips, trim them up and position them in a grid so that they are all playing simultaneously—seeing all of the individual stops at once would maybe make the ordinary a bit more extraordinary and also depict the busy manic nature of the tube.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_ embedded&v=qLbHKrgK8C8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_ embedded&v=I2oWP-AFdS8
Click on the still to see the film A selection of the single journey clips I filmed—the you tube links are at the bottom of the frames. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_ embedded&v=sayfTc15Nrg
Week 6 - The Everyday
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Evaluation of experiment 3 This experiment had the most interesting results, seeing the body language and behaviour of people, however there is an issue of privacy that has been raised and also filming on the tube. All of these I will consider if I take this project further. I also started noticing everyday things that could be considered for visualizing—seat cover and even litter!
Trying out another idea I attempted to visualize the conversation I recorded earlier to see how this would look and see if it had any potential for development.
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It was difficult isolating the conversation from the noise but I got the gist of it. I tried to depict the different speakers with colour and typeface differences. I think this idea has room for development and could be used to depict something everyday in a more extraordinary way.
Reflection on week 6 This week I developed the most. I took an idea and went with it all week and it became more interesting. I do feel that I am quite strong in coming up with ideas and developing them. I found that I am drawn to photography or even filming which I hadn’t considered. I now want to develop my film editing skills as I think I’d like to take this project further.
Week 6 - The Everyday
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Review & Develop Interim Review Presentation I designed the presentation to get across the first six weeks as journeys as I saw them as a journey of discovery. I feel that at the end of the review I noticed a lack of exploring practitioners and maybe my research could be a bit more in-depth—I tend to rush into an idea as soon as I get it. I feel I know where my strengths lay a bit more—I am definitely digital minded and I like laying things out and typography. I like to experiment with new things. I feel that I may explore further education and have been looking into this. I am considering internships and looking to find practices that I could fit into. I’d like to do voluntary work within a magazine to start with.
The Presentation • I got over everything I wanted to present and finished two seconds before my five minuet limit • It was noted that I had tried to make the presentation a ‘design’ and was given positive comments on this • I took notes of the comments and reflected on the advice
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Left—My presentation
Weeks 7-9 - Review & Develop
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Developing Developing The Everyday I feel this project has such a huge scope. I want to create a film with my findings on the tube and create a book. I realized how much I enjoyed creating my book last year. I think a book would be a good accompaniment to a film. This project has possibilities for digital illustration, photography, layout, typography and book making—all things that I feel are my strongest and most enjoyed activities.
Exploring I took to the tube again and looked for different things that may be of interest—the banal etc. Seat covers and fittings—noting how there is a pattern for each tube line and a colour code.
Clockwise—Results of exploring the tube for everyday things of interest
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Focusing on the signs of stations (below)—I took lots of pictures and then positioned them together seeing them in a different format.
Weeks 7-9 - Review & Develop
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Privacy and filming on the tube I was concerned that the project may be difficult due to some issues raised through discussions at the crit—I done some in-depth research and looked into privacy laws. I found out I that I would need a permit to film on the Underground and therefore contacted the Film Office for information. I also looked into ways of dealing with the privacy issue—I felt more confident after this research.
Above—Email from London Transport Film Office
Book Fair & London Transport Museum As I am planning to make a book, if this project was to develop into FMP, I visited the Small Publishers Book Fair and got some great insight into the different styles and ways of producing books. I visited the London Transport Museum and was inspired by the designs relating to the tube, all fuelling my interest.
Above—Taken at the LT Museum
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Film editing training I aim to take the clips of passengers I filmed in week six and stitch them together into a split screen of single journeys—this is to somehow get over the busyness of the tube which isn’t evident in the single shots—I embarked on learning Adobe Premiere Pro and took notes.
Above—Notes I took from my Adobe Premiere Pro training
Weeks 7-9 - Review & Develop
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Editing and effects Creating a quad split screen as a test run—I managed to do this then took it further by splitting the screen into more sections—I got creative with this as I got more confident with the software.
Below—my split screen video can be viewd at: http://www.youtube.com/ watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ZnY5U7aNkVU
Click on the still below to see the film
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Weeks 7-9 - Review & Develop
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Further development Now more confident with Premiere, I thought of ways I could show sequences of mundane actions such as escalators going up and down, tickets in and out. I made some plans for a quad screen format, orchestrating and timing the clips so they kind of lead on from each other this may be interesting.
Above—Screen shots from some films that I want to use in a sequence
Reflection I have been able to push my project further; do important research, gather more ideas and take up some training to help me deliver what I want to achieve. It is something that has potential for a FMP I feel. Right—A photo I took outside Earls Court station
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Weeks 7-9 - Review & Develop
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Evaluation Putting it all together My work has gone in a direction that I didn’t expect (filming). Throughout the weeks I have been very active in photography, experimentation and idea generation which I feel are strengths. I’ve learnt a lot about my way of working and feel I sometimes rush too quickly into a piece of work without researching enough, however I do visit lots of galleries and exhibitions and have found films to be very inspiring—these activities definitely lead to richer ideas. I find discussing my ideas really helps to inform them, and have taken advantage of leads and recommendations which have led to projects developing in ways that they may not have (e.g. the viewing of the film TimeCode has led to my development of ‘The Everyday’ turning into a more interesting experiment). The blog record has been new for me and I’ve found it to be an aid to reflect and keep a note of interesting things that I can turn to when needed. The six weeks has been good for experimenting and I’ve tried new things like illusion photography (flying) which if nothing else has expanded my mind! I think it’s hard to say what I didn’t like as most things that I try, that are new, seem interesting and productive. I think that I have a reasonably wide skill set but would probably like to work more on layouts and typography, I feel comfortable in these areas and appreciate the effects and beauty that can be realised with layouts and typography. I feel that I am strong in coming up with ideas and do like to suspend judgement. In terms of practice I feel that I probably wouldn’t be suited to a ‘high end’ agency. I think I would suit a environment with variety but can see myself composing layouts and helping with idea generation and realization. I feel I want to learn more and have just scratched the surface so I am looking into further education as a possibility. I have what I think is an idea for FMP that has potential—It’s a project that I can use some of the skills I have already developed whilst embarking on learning some new ones (film editing—storyboarding) I have already started to lay the foundations for the project and have done research which is leading to a permit for filming (LU). I have some training set up that I will need, and have time to get some research underway on printing and bookmaking.
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Final Major Project
FMP
For my final major project I aim to explore further my Everyday project on the Underground. I want to capture some interesting footage of passengers and mundane events that happen in the everyday and orchestrate these so they are more interesting. I aim to produce a book that backs up the film with stills, quotes and maybe interviews. I also can see some interesting trivia on the underground in this book visualized, things like station depths etc. Really a coffee table style book bringing the everyday into a format that gives it more attention and hopfully interest. At present I have some foundation material and ideas that I wish to explore further and build upon. I am in the process of acquiring a licence to film on London Underground and have plans to explore the system over the Christmas break—to see things of interest that may enrich and expand this project. I also plan to start looking into book designs over this period and further develop my film editing/effects knowledge to fit with my aims. I hope to have my raw material gathered by the beginning of semester two. Week 10 - Evaluation
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Bibliography
Books
Situation (Documents of Contemporary Art) by Claire Doherty Colour by David Batchelor Understanding Color by Linda Holtzschue Adobe Premiere Pro CS6 Classroom in a Book Time by Amelia Groom Van Gogh Paintings: The Masterpieces by Belinda Thomson Thinking With Type by Ellen Lupton The Graphic Language Of Neville Brody 2 by Jon Wozencroft Type & Typography by Phil Baines
Films
Billy Elliot (2000) dir Stephen Daldry TimeCode (2000) dir Mike Figgis Total Recall (2012) dir Len Wiseman Legend of Leigh Bowery (2004) dir Charles Atlas
Television
BBC Horizon—Infinity BBC Horizon—Time Travel Stephen Hawkin’s Universe Century Of The Self
Exhibitions
Paul Klee—Tate Modern Art Under Attack—Tate Britain Poster Art 150—London Transport Museum Collider—Science Museum The Photographers Gallery Mira Schendel—Tate Modern Painting Now—Tate Britain
Talks
David Pearson—Typographic Circle
Shows
Blam!—Peacock Theatre
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Bibliography
67