Gallery Choices

If I had an opportunity to display my work I think I would choose the Bruce Nauman recreation. This decision comes from how well I believe the flow of the video works as well as how the music works well with the actions of the video itself.

Another project i would not mind seeing displayed is the final project. Perhaps not in it's entirety, but a couple of the final printed images and the kinetic piece. This form of kinetic art, in my experience, is very esoteric. I grew up with it and would like to share it with other people. One sees an image change right before their eyes with no machine turing the piece.

Finally, I would say the origami truck that I made. This was pretty difficult to make. the video was easy to follow in some places, but also required a lot of brainpower to decipher how a person folded in changed the paper at other times. There was also a very pleasant feeling to see my work move and in my mind was a complete success of the phrase movable origami.

What I Obtained From New Media New Forms

When I signed up for the class I thought this class was mainly about exploring photoshop and a little bit about the 3-dimensional printer (since everyone talks about it). I was really amazed at how extensive technology is and can be in the art making process. The class has given me the courage to approach different media and explore it and then potentially teach it. I really liked how Richard incorporated other parts of our program into this class as well by asking everyone to create lessons on a certain topic. This allows us to look back and use a lesson if need be. In addition, by having access to other people's blogs, if permitted, those lesson ideas can be shared as well.
Thank You Richard for a great class.

3d Printing and Printmaking

When we were first assigned the final project I was happy that I rolled familiar subjects. Printmaking, Identity, and Computers. I wanted to use a laser printer but known existed on campus. Well it took me a month to realize and after completing my final project that even though the lab doe not have a laser printer the lab does have an instrument that can create plates. That's right he 3-dimensional printer. I have made a test plate to see if the process works and it does. the printer gives great texture, but with a 10% fill breaks easily. Here are the results. Also side note; the stop motion gifs are of the printing process for this plate.

 the printed image

 the inked crushed plate

 the printed image

 the plate without ink.

I was told the fill can be increased to make the plate more durable and further testing is needed. I really like the honey combs. 

Slow Motion GIF

Thought I would try my hand at stop motion. I used my cell phone and it has the capacity to take 1000 photos or 5000 photos in a very short amount of time. this gif has 91 photos and sped up to a speed of 40 milliseconds per frame. It looks like a real video!

https://imgflip.com/gif/8inzx

This gif is made with 150 images and has the same frame rate.

Final Part 3: Discussion and Point.

My 3 dice were printmaking, identity, and computer. These forms were familiar to me all too well. After all, I have taken printmaking for over 2 years now, I have used a computer in one form or another since i was very little, and I have always known a great deal about myself. When I received these categories I thought it would be nice to bring an image from the digital realm into real life. I remembered learning that there are specific printers that carve the image for a person that has been pre programmed. One such printer is a 40W CO2 Basic Hobby Laser. After the image has been transferred to a plate of some sort, the plate can be inked, layer on top of a piece of paper, and then put through a press in order to receive an image. Needless to say we did not a 40W CO2 Basic Hobby Laser printer. I was sad. Then after doing some research about what people online thought printmaking was inspiration struck. These fellow bloggers mentioned that printmaking requires a plate or multiple plates to make a final image. I asked myself, "well why can't an image not be copied or scanned through a computer and then either reuse that piece of paper to have multiple images on it or combine the scanned imagery in photoshop to obtain the desired image.

This process actually works and is do able. I first thought of what I identify with. For the past 3 years of my life I have been painting candy bars and have gotten to know the wrappers quite well. I have painted the wrappers so well that when i bring chocolate in as a pick me up to fellow classmates, people say, "Of course you would". So as for now I identify myself as a person who loves chocolate and will use that idea for as long as it interest me.

Here is where the second part of the project came in. I had been collecting candy wrappers since the beginning of the semester and had the chance to use them in this project. I took various candy wrappers and placed them on a white piece of paper. In essence, this combined object became my "plate" for printing. This plate was not inked but copied and scanned as mentioned above. This picture shows what one plate looks like.

Any plate following this one were made too to fit around the image. After copying this image. Other plates were copied onto the same piece of paper. This process resulted in a semi success. It showed that the plate could be directly scanned and printed in one go and then quickly prepped for another plate. The process resulted in the following picture. 

In this picture I did mess up the orientation of how I placed the paper in the printer and a second test was conducted with the appropriate insertion of paper, which resulted in this picture:

These pictures told me two important things. The first was I did not want there to be any overlap of wrappers in the printing process no matter how cool it may look. I am referring to the dove wrapper with the M & M bag. The second thing is that takes away any spacial reference a person might have. I decided I needed to manipulate the image in photoshop to improve upon the idea. A scanned image looked like this picture.

Images were then compiled in photoshop. When combined with another image in photoshop the image underneath was completely hidden. The merge function merges layers but did not provide the necessary function of merging pictures together. There was also the opacity level of each image, but then one image was faded. Using the knowledge I learned from my digital foundations course, I created a mask and then selected the eraser tool to reveal the layer below. This action provided the following image. 

The image seen here was printed on 8.5" X 11" ultra glossy paper in the Meyers Studio Lab, but this was not the first paper I tried. I first tried a bad 8.5" X 11" glossy paper and regular printer paper from my printer. The glossy paper smudged and the printer paper was soaked with ink. Printing on 4" X 6" ultra glossy paper worked with my printer though. The other results can be seen in Part I of the Final Project. 

The problem with a small image is that one may not necessarily see all the detail. However, the bigger an image becomes the question of how does one store it comes into play and if that is really what one wants. I like the smaller versions for postcards and thank you letters. I think the glossy paper adds a necessary shine for chocolate bars. 

Thinking I was done I approached my teacher, Richard Jochum, and fellow art students. I was given some insight after explaining that here is what I have and done is there anything else I can add to it? Richard suggested bringing he images back to the audience and trying to make the image relate to them. I thought about this for a while and realized that although it is a great idea it is not the audiences identity, but mine, not a self centered comment, but that is how I viewed the identity part. The fellow art students suggested I take the above image and add Dove wrappers throughout the whole piece. I liked that suggested, but did not go through with it because I like the break up of space at the ends.

Finally, in order to try to bring the image into the viewers realm, maybe not so they relate to piece but have to do something else besides stare at the images, I made a kinetic piece of art. This requires four images to show a progress of how the image changes as one walk around it. 

This project redefines what the printmaking process is and shows an effective way to use that process. The process is redefined in how the plates were made and possibly in it's final form. After all plates are not usually scanned into computers and prints are not usually placed on an accordion like piece of paper although they can be cut up and re-organized. 

Final Part 2: Final Form

                                                                       Kinetic Artwork:

Final Part 1: Pictures.

I am separating the pictures out from my description of the process to see if people can understand the process in which was taken to achieve the finished product. I believe this is important because when someone walks into a gallery and sees someone's work I believe they should come with an open min and be blown away by the artwork's beauty. The viewer should come in with no knowledge of the work before in order to have a more personal experience of what is being displayed.

                                                                          plates:

Reused Paper Copies:

Scans:

Final Image: Different Pieces of Paper:

Printer Paper

                                                                             
                                                                       Matte paper  

                                                                       Glossy Paper

Final Image on Ultra Glossy Paper:

New Media in the Art Classroom

At the beginning of the semester I will admit, I did not have a good idea of what new media meant. My vision was clouded by photoshop and from my ineptness of the program. This is not to say that I was against teaching photoshop or any new media. Just that it is difficult especially if you are not taught well and only have background knowledge of an intuitive program like kid pix's or Mario paint (this statement is a jab at photoshop and how un intuitive it is). I would say any form that has the potential for art making deserves a chance in an art room due to how creative a child can be with that material or medium. However, this depends mostly on how one is taught about the art form itself. Most schools would focus primarily on telling a student in a lecture how to do something, but that takes the fun away from exploring. Granted there are things that need explaining, but without that first explorative step I believe a child could be lost forever in ever learning an art form. If i were to implement new media i would ask the students to explore the medium first and then tell everyone in a discussion what was learned. Then if further explanation of certain tools is needed i would proceed to do so. This method can be applied to photoshop.

Honestly my opinion of how something should be taught in the classroom did not change from the beginning of the class. This is related to the main question of whether new media should be taught in the classroom because an art teacher cannot have one without the other and depending on how something is taught can make all the difference.

I would also say the wikispace argument that was posed and asking people to reflect on the debate is biased mainly because the class was divided to have certain opinions during the debate and not their own.

A quick side note: kid's pix or at least the 1990's version had interesting sound effects and clips for a simple action. This made the experience all the more fun for students and children at home. Mario paint provided a similar experience, but expanded to music and mini games.

However, in hindsight in my mind the word paint should be reworded or redefined. When one painted in mario paint, in kid's pix, or even photoshop the area enclosed was slowly filled in with "paint". I put paint in quotation marks because i personally believe the creators of the game were trying to market it as a similar experience to the real thing and could not find a better word for using pixels to color in an image with their program. Perhaps I am just being overly critical of the process. It is a less messy experience and probably in the long run more cost effective too.

I am curious would a person who has no painting experience and learns to "paint" in photoshop still retain and be able to use that knowledge in painting on a physical canvas? would the same be true in reverse?

Physical Computing and Lesson Plan

To me Physical Computing means to be able to hook up one thing to some sort of software device. A major invention in recent years is the idea of creating something prosthetic, such as an arm, leg, bionic eye, or nose. There have been breakthroughs. For example, now a person can hook one's brain to a robotic arm and command the attached arm to move. having the arm look like an arm is up to artists, but one step at a time. Simply having a device controlled by one's brain is a major accomplishment. Here is a link to the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppILwXwsMng

This is a pretty tough lesson to make.

Lesson Idea: Through making a prosthetic limb, using a 3-d printer, tinker cad, students will learn their ideas can be added onto their bodies and become more aware of what disabled people have to live with.

Light Up Necklace.

As a person who has created necklaces previously I thought it would be a good idea to create a necklace out of the materials used in the workshop this past week. I was wrong. It was a great idea. The design is pretty straight forward; a person is just wearing a simple circuit that turns on and off with the opening and closing of the snap clips. I thought if men were to wear the necklace the design should be spartan and contain no additional fabric while for women multiple sleeves could be created for the necklace. There is a slight weight problem with the battery. It continues to fall from the back of one's neck to the chest area. This imbalance causes the light to be moved constantly. The other problem that occurred is the cross of wires from time to time, which cause a break in the circuit and the light does not turn on even when the circuit is closed.  Since the material is a string the necklace becomes entangled quite easily and storage of the necklace becomes a slight problem. Here are pictures of me wearing the necklace.

100 Post Idea

In an effort to rally 100 people to contribute to an idea I posted to my wall on Facebook to send me a picture of a person's candy bar. The message said,

"Friends as an assignment in new media new forms we have been asked to create an idea that everybody can connect to. I hear by put forth the Candy Bar Protocol. I ask people to take a picture of a candy bar they recently bought and send it to me. it could be you eating the candy or just the bar or even a drawing. You could post the bar here or even send it to me in an email.

Even though I have 495 friends on Facebook, not everyone apparently checks their Facebook news status everyday or says, "hey lets look at Lowell Wynn's wall. Let's see what this guy is up to". I have obtained 30 pictures of various candy bars and "candy" related items. I was flexible in what could be sent as someone did send me vegetables and this was to let people feel included. I did want this to be related to facebook strictly and not in reality mainly to see how effective it can be. I think a problem that some people had was the way in which this sentence was phrased,  "I ask people to take a picture of a candy bar they recently bought and send it to me". People probably interpreted it as send a candy bar to Lowell in stead of a picture. I would have liked people to also send me their pictures on Facebook and post them to the wall so others could see what was being done, but that was not the case. All in all This was a good experience because it shows how precise one has to be in wording a project. If I had more time I am sure this project would eventually reach 100 images. For now I have included a link to the flip book of the candy bars.

http://www.youblisher.com/p/879738-Candy-Bar-Protocol/

Here are the images as well if the link can not be seen.