Multi Player Art
I just woke up this morning and thought about a java(processing) program that I wrote last night. I was really only looking to create a proof-of-concept for the midi connection but it evolved into something pretty cool. It really only became interesting when my girlfriend walked up to take a look, and she started controlling the brush settings as I painted on the screen with my Wacom.
Player 1 uses a drawing tablet. Their responsibilities are; controlling the act of painting and the direction/ speed of the brush.
Player 2 uses the M-Audio Trigger Finger. Their responsibilities are; Controlling the color, alpha & brush size using the sliders and knobs of the Trigger Finger.
The basic GUI displays the color selected on the bottom left. As Player 1 clicks the mouse or presses the pen to the tablet, the drawing is initiated. Drawing ceases when the mouse click is released or the pen is lifted from the surface of the tablet. While drawing is occuring, Player 2 may dynamically control the brush settings and color palatte.
The goal is to create a system that lets two artists combine specific parts of their talent to create a unique artwork.
If you consider the elements and principles of Design and Colour;
Player 1 is responsible for only the line and the direction in the elements of design. Player 2 controls the oscillation of shape, size, texture and value.
With the principles of design it is not so cut and dry. Balance in a design is created from a combination of line, color and shape. Player 2 contributes most to the balance through the color and shape but there is significant influence by Player 1. Gradation is a result of a color oscillation and is created by Player 2. Interestingly enough, Player 1 could create themes of gradation by careful placement of the brush. The creation of repetition in a work can be done by either player. Player 1 may create repetition through placement of the brush while Player 2 can create it through careful selections of color and line style. Contrast is created through the juxtaposition of opposing elements. With this system, there are infinite ways that contrast can be created when two people are affecting the same work. If the two players communicate a strategy for creating the work then pleasing contrast may be easily achieved. If the two players work against each other, it could quickly create chaotic, un-appealing contrast. Harmony, Dominance and Unity are much like Contrast in that they can be difficult to get right without communication between players.
It will be interesting to explore how this type of interactive art can be used by different people. I plan to connect this to Twitter for the art show!
When everything is said & done (& re-factored!) I will post the source code for anyone with a M-Audio Trigger Finger who wants to try it out.
Big thanks to Ruin & Wesen for their Java/Processing Midi Classes. Read about their amazing work at http://ruinwesen.com/blog?id=95
Skittles.com Social Media Widget
The Skittles.com webpage is not so much a site, but a gateway widget that leads the visitor to many different third party sites. This is an interesting technique that is reminiscent of the dreaded frame era but without the ugly frames. The team behind Skittles.com utilized modern browser technology to create a persistent widget that hovers around the browser handing out extra information. It is in no way intrusive like frames once were. In fact, due to most viewers having a reasonable monitor resolution the widget almost never obscures content. To further help hide the widget, a minimization option is present.
The idea behind the widget is a novel one that goes against the grain of what most sites aim for. For a business, one would think that the most impact would be made with the visitor spending time exclusively on the site. While this may be true in most cases, the Skittles.com team opted to walk their visitors through a course of user generated content to show how much people love their product. Not only does the widget ensure a constant marketing presence, the wiki pages and social media pages provide a wealth of user generated content and opinions that further reinforce the brand.
Way to go Skittles.com, you have developed an innovative way to tap into user generated content from all platforms.
Cube Tree – Form And Space
On Thursday I returned from a three day business trip and had to bang out a project for my Friday morning form and space class. I wasn’t feeling especially creative yesterday night and I was beginning to become worried that inspiration would not strike in time. With the impending deadline echoing through my head I suddenly remembered what Dave says about having to photograph a project with no inspiration in sight. When Dave is presented with this situation, he starts with the basic principles of capturing an image. Sometimes during this process inspiration will strike and the remainder of the job will be a breeze. If inspiration does not strike, at least you will walk away with enough material to satisfy your client.
The Cube Tree evolved from my lack of inspiration. As I sat in front of my mountain of building materials and attempted to determine the best approach I realized that I had no idea what I wanted to build. I desperately needed inspiration but I know that is not how it works. Suddenly, visions of my childhood Lego’s flashed in my mind and I knew what I needed to do.
I decided to begin my project with building blocks. I knew that I wanted to build an organic looking structure and I figured that if I had enough building blocks then something would happen. I cut up the dozens of large scrap board into small equal sized pieces.
After gluing the pieces into cube’s I was left with my building blocks. I started with the “trunk” blocks that were two inch by two inch cubes. Each new segment had to have a joint that angled the new piece of the segment in a different direction than the segment under it. By only using a joint on one side and never placing the next joint on the same side, I was able to create a semi-organic shape that is composed out of non-organic shaped segments.
With the “trunk” of my tree in place, I was ready to build the branches. At this point of the project, I had the understanding that I was working towards building a tree like structure. I believe that this is the moment that inspiration took over and allowed me to create a project that I am truly proud of. The “branches” evolved quite easily and the “tree top” became the natural choice for an anchor element.
When the skeleton of the structure was assembled I decided to wrap it in handmade colored paper to give it a unique, finished look. I am pleased with myself that I was able to begin the project without inspiration and still accomplish something that I can be proud of.
Accreditation Makes Me Giggle.
Breaking news: I have just learned from an inside source that EDMC, the parent company of the Art Institute family, will be conducting on-campus evaluations regarding the relevance of AI-Sunnyvale’s programs.
I believe that this process is VERY OVERDUE and I hope that as a result of the visit, there will be some changes for the better. I have long been weary of the information that my school deems to be part of some “core competency”.
I want EDMC to explain to me why I paid $1600 per unit to have a teacher instruct us on TABLE BASED DESIGN taught from an outdated textbook.
Read my review of the school on Yelp. If you are a student, I encourage you to post your own review. Please remember that we are not trying to bash our school, we just want to highlight inconsistencies that impede our learning in hopes that they will be fixed. Slander is NEVER ok.
Form & Space Generative Art
Control Point Decline ↓
Sine Wave Ocean ↓
These two compositions are explorations of a single concept. For these pictures, I was exploring drawing multiple lines with a changing control point. The “Control Point Decline” project was the beginning of the line exploration. The concept was simple; what would a design look like if we drew many, many lines, beginning and ending in the same place but modifying the control point with each iteration. The first acceptable generation I achieved involved a very precise structure with little “personality”. The evolution of that piece generated some very interesting deconstructions of the dome structure. The final stage of the piece distorted the control point so greatly that the lines begin to define the frame of the canvas. Two iterations of the final stage are displayed side by side and much larger than the dome structures.
The “Sine Wave Ocean” project was a variation of the “Control Point Decline” project. With this variation, I select random points for the beginning and end of the lines but the control points are distributed based on simple algebra equations. The image shown here is a composition of multiple iterations of the “Sine Wave Ocean” code.
Recursive Triangle Construction ↓
The above piece, “Recursive Triangle Construction”, has generated some truly interesting visuals. The concept for this was simple. I wanted to see what a composition would look like if we created triangles stacked with each new shape smaller than it’s preceding shape. Each new shape would also be rotated slightly. In the larger image on the left, I added a random variable in the placement and achieved this interesting shape. The three small structures on the right explore the de-evolution of the structured shape.
These artworks are created in Adobe Flash using the ActionScript 3.0 language specification. I have included the code necessary to recreate the larger triangle image. To set up this project; create a new Flash As3 project and set the document class to RecursiveTriangleConstruction. Save that file somewhere and then create a new Actionscript file. Copy the sample code into the Actionscript file and then save it next to the project file, name it “RecursiveTriangleConstruction.as”.
Compile and enjoy! Click on the stage to generate a new iteration.
Were just getting warmed up.
This is the beginning, the middle and the end. We are just getting started but we have been finishing for ages. Youth represents a constant state of flux and we are caught up in the ebb and flow of our obligations and responsibilities. The world changes very fast in this modern time. It changes at a pace that our ancestors could never anticipate and a large cause of this can be attributed to recent developments in technology.
The world is a different place every day. Yesterday we were using XHTML, tomorrow we will be using HTML 5. Programming is becoming more accessible and the tools we use to create are more powerful than ever. I hate to use this quote when there is so much controversy about who authored it but I feel that it is a fully accurate description of the power of computing.
“Computers are incredibly fast, accurate and stupid; humans are incredibly slow, inaccurate and brilliant; together they are powerful beyond imagination.” -Author Unknown
Welcome to AI is OK. Here we will explore why I love code and why I can’t wait to graduate. Stay tuned!
-miles