Problem Solving and Problem Seeking

1. Go find a problem
2. you solution
3. past solutions
4. tansformed and renewed solution, ie like the Eames chair.
-taking the surrounds and making them intresting, like from nature or museums

"Good Problems"
Have: Signifigance, consequences (socially responsible, eco art), understanding your problem, expirimentation, ambitious but reasonable, authentic, unique perspective.

"Strategies"
convergent thinking: pursueing a predetemined goal.
1. define
2. research
3. determine objective
4. stratgey
5. execute
6. evaluate (repeat if nessesary)
like the sciencetific method. remember to set a reasonable deadline.

divergent thingking:means determine the end, open ended, results are difficult to predict. requires expansive and unfocused research. Its seen as more inventive, while convergent is more effiecient.
brainstorming:making lists and exploring ideas. using reasearch, a thesaurus, ect. KINDS>EFFECTS>CAUSES, use to see where things lead.
Use maps! I love these. They help you explore and make connections.
VISUAL research such as sketch thumbnails and 3-d mock-ups are very helpful. Like little prototypes.

Series are variation of a theme.

"Methaphorical Thinking"
"my love is like a red rose." its not really, but it sounds beautiful that way. ie, by abstracting Guernica, Picasso focused more on the emotions and meaning of the event rather than its apprearence.
Being well rounded, like a rennissance man, is helpful. well versed in Chem, bio, math, ect.

My opinion? We're starting to delve deeper into the less obivous of things. metaphorical meaning for me was the most difficult to understand, but by connecting it to the english equivilent of poety, i can't make that transition from written metaphors to visual metaphors. the organiztion thing was obivous. but i really did enjoy the story about the Eames chair, I see that thing everywhere, its so 's commonplace, but I didn't know it was recently made in the 40s and it was a huge deal. I really enjoy making visual sketched of things before I make them, so I totally agreed with that part, and the scienctific method was old news, I know how to do that. but it was intresting to apply those same principles to my art making process.

Aspects and Elements

WARNING: WRONG CHAPTER READ. (If this doesn't make any sense.)

Basically it said we need to understand the purpose of our art. A burning question every art student needs to face. function and beauty is key as well as form. There's all kinds of work, 3-d, 2-d. lines are very important. how much volume the art takes up. Art has texture, color and dimension, and the way we present it with lights and display slant its meaning also.

This is important for our art because as budding students we need to know, why we create our art, the choices we make in the creation, working process and finishing touches all affect it. Especially presentation. For photo or video when you present something, does it hang in the air? project onto another textured surface? come from a TV? all mediums digital artists must consider. There is so much to keep track of while creating your art, thats why we must keep orgainzed!

The Orginaztion chpt. of Launching the Imagination

This was a very appropriate chapter for our first reading in Time Based Media class. Basically through the entire chapter, they discussed how to be organized and not to bog yourself down. Creativity cannot be manifested at a moments notice, but it can be cultivated. One must try to find the balance between being super safe, and risk taking, outgoing but introverted, open to new ideas, but able to be closed and focus to your own. All were very helpful in drawing attention to the kinds of traits I need to be an accomplished artist. It went on to give a way to find out what kind of artist you are and how to categorize and organize your goals through post-it notes. The method included making four categories and putting your post it notes into them. The end of the chapter went on to discuss collaboration and how artist must discuss ideas with each other and cooperate well with each other to create lets say 20 ft pieces of transitioning drawings.

I found the post it note thing very helpful and new. It was definitely not something I had thought of before. And the collaboration thing too seemed helpful. Its imperative we learn to communicate ideas well, because out in the real world that's all we'll be doing is talking back and forth about our work, fixing it, changing it realizing it in full form. I also liked the circle-graphs that lead to improved self-confidence- it definitely looked like a Disney influence "confidence builder" thing.

My question; While I though the post-it note idea was great. It was a way to relieve stress and set reasonable goals. BUUUT it seemed like it required too much of my time to do. I don't think I have enough time or space to have that anywhere. It's too structured and unstructured at the same time. Would there be better alternative?

Shoes Idea

There's more photos to come. My internet connection couldn't handle any photos bigger than this. :/

Stop motion videos the cheerful, and then the not-so cheerful

Out of the videos we watched today, the Quay Brothers were definately the strangest. They left me in a wierd funk after I left. I can't get those creepy doll things outta my head. Their movement clothes appearence, all of fasinately distrubing. The point of it was definately confusing, something like that city was as dry as crocodiles... The use of light was important to direct the viewers attention, and to create an eerie darkness around most of the others pieces in the set. The quick moving camera angles when they would move from place to place was so very clever. Not to mention their memorable characters, like those dolls, the hero (im assuming) the little boy, lightbulb guy and statues of women fondeling themselves. It was definately wierd.

The Whitestrips music video was also pretty cool, especially with the repition of the drum beat and the instruments they played. You can tell a lot of work went into that video. And a lot of money, since I'm assuming they bought all those copies of those drums. Which actually was a thought that started to bother me near the middle, "What are they going to do with all those extra drums they made especially for thi video?" The repition of certian pictures was helpful too and it was trippy when the girl changed herself around each of the drum sets. Another AMAZING thing though about that video was the syncing. That was very impressive.

Automatic Writing by William Kentridge was also very cool to watch. The way he just layered each thing on top of or out of the previous drawings was magnificent. His work seemed very poetic and romantic. For his interview I can't believe the fact he was just an artist because he was buing his time. I loved how the forms of the letters formed into body parts and buildings through out the piece.

About Me

I'm a second year photography major. I love video, watching and recording. Somthing I like to do is to mesh the careful thought and composition that goes into photo and put it into film. I enjoy the thought of taking something beautiful from a photo and adding that 4th dimension of time. This runs along the lines of things like Sunrise Earth and Planet Earth, both funded by Discovery. Those films and that footage I consider art. Even though I am intrigued with things of that subject matter, I mostly dabble in satirical and sarcastic videos. I'm excited to hone my skills this year!

First day of class blog about videos

My favorite out of the two we watched was "Le Voyage la lune." I'm just a sucker for old movies, the clothes, the misconceptions of the time, the architecture and the way they are filmed and produced. The best part is when they just 'fell' off the 'edge' of the moon. I'm not positive of technology at the time, but I'm sure they knew gravity wasn't in space. Well, whose knows. The camera never moved, it makes sense. The camera is frequentlt called an 'eye.' Which makes sense since it records what our eyes see. So naturally when recording somthing in the early 1900's they were going to record it the same way they had been viewing it, straight on from a chair, no close ups or movement or cut and pasted scenes. Despite the fixed position I still enjoyed watching the work of a pioneer of film.

The other video, the mash-up of other's works, whose title escapes me, was a little less enjoyable to me, probably because it was a little closer to home that the much older film was. To me the effects appeared cliche, but I know that at the time those were mind blowing effectss... just grossly overused. The theme though of global television, and this oncrop of mass media was well predicted. The chinese woman dancing in front of obvious United States icons came across more easily than other scenes. There was also a lot of dancing, I guessed they loved dancing at the time. Or were they identifying it as a uniting factor? The colors were very groovy as was the music. Nam June Paik, one of the first world famous artist, created a lot of very strange, thought-provoking commentaries on mass media, from sculptures of Budha sitting watching TV, to a TV cello that sounds horrible. I liked parts of the piece, especially those that made two different songs one in the same. It was cool. period.

First Day of Classes

First day of class, freezing cold outside. Found out my English teacher may be possibly brilliantly insane. Pretty good day.