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Over and Out

It seems bizzarre to think that I've passed my first year on the BCT. I've never been so exhausted, but strangely, the studio still holds a certain allure. It's only just occurred to me, as I ponder what I'll be doing over the next few months, that I may very well need the ruddy place to keep me wrapped up in my own little world.

All in all, I feel that I've come a long way in terms of my studio practice following on from the first half of the year. This was most noticeable when I was completing the first project of this semester, aptly named 'Transformation'. As my first group project since the difficult 'Syntagm', I felt that I had a lot to resolve. Although I had a hand in each aspect of development, from conceptualisation, to programming, to fabrication of the physical control scheme; by far the most enjoyable part of the brief was bringing it together at the end. Finding a way to resolve the project when nothing seemed to be working was a great buzz. It's given me a good deal to think about in terms of the direction I'd like to take over the next two years and how I'd like to build my portfolio in terms of production roles.

Moving beyond our first project, the BCT threw another curve ball with the exploratory process driven project 'Sonic Appropriation'. As a conceptualite, 'Sonic Appropriation' was most definitely not my forte. I spent a great deal of time agonising over fabrication and the short turn around for each mini-project. Despite thinking I would take absolutely nothing away from exploratory studio practice, I was blindsided within the first week. My obsessive efforts with collaging yielded one of the most satisfying results I've had with a project all year. It was a revelation to realize that refining my cutting technique could put an entirely new spin on my concept. It was like getting your eyes tested and finding out you need a pair of glasses. I didn't realize how limited my creative vision was until I spent hours tearing my hair out over fine-detail cutting. Perhaps most brilliantly of all, the experience has just about convinced me to take a sound-based elective next year! I feel reformed and chastened.

Although I've seen the value in hands-on studio practice, and I will certainly employ it in the future, by the time we hit our third and final studio project, 'Uncanny', I was honestly feeling worn down by the 'make to educate' campaign. It takes me a great deal of time to complete projects because I believe they should be done well and documented accordingly. I have reiterated numerous times on my blog that I take no pleasure in slap-dash jobs. The two exercises we undertook in the lead-up to 'Uncanny' were rather awful in this regard. I don't feel that they facilitated a descent learning experience, particularly as few of us had the software we needed to achieve the desired outcomes.

Having expressed my disappointment at the way project three started, I am pleased with how it's ended. The last four weeks of term have been worth their weight in conceptual gold. Moreover, I've had the chance to use many of the studio practices I learned during 'Sonic Appropriation' to achieve unconventional outcomes. I'm looking forward to seeing how I can continue to develop these skills in order to extend myself over the coming year.

#Project 3 #Semester 2

Conceptual Statement (+ Retrospective)

The past four weeks have been exploratory in nature and process driven. Our group was strongly influenced by the work we completed for our previous project, Sonic Appropriation. This resulted in a great deal of experimentation and research that must be contextualised in order for our concept to be understood. In essence, our project is a manifestation of the lessons we have learnt through studio practice.

Statement of Intent - Retrospective

We started by looking at how we categorise the world and make distinctions between creatures and objects. The divisions between these categories are often hazy. We are not always able to perceive where something ceases to be an entity in and of itself and instead becomes classified in relation to us. Researching this area enabled us to better respond to the uncanny valley.

Our interests centred on industrial practices concerning the production and distribution of meat products. We saw this as an interesting example of the themes touched earlier in the semester during Transformation. Although many of us consume meat products, and prefer not to dwell on where they come from, our senses inform us that it was once alive.

Rather than develop our animatronic around a loaded icon, such as a meat product, we attuned organic and inorganic associations surrounding production and consumption. In our society, consumption is a process. The conveyor belt doesn't stop at the factory. It continues through the blip of the checkout, the sizzle of the pan, the bleep of the microwave - all leading to a blank moment between plate and mouthful. It was our thesis that the idea of the semi-living could be applied to the cycles and processes that occur within patterns of consumption.

Conceptual Statement

There is a sense of general uneasiness when we probe what lies beneath the skin, where our food goes, and the sense that we ourselves are meat, bone and gristle. Our final product levergages the revulsion we feel towards our inner selves, using deconstructionist techniques to explore the uncanny through a second nature; one that exists beneath the skin.

Animatronic

The animatronic was designed with clear ideas of the uncanny in mind, drawing heavily on Sonic Appropriation to discern a suitable exploratory approach. The process of layering became part and parcel of the character's conceptualisation. We were informed by our sensory responses to various textures as we felt this better enabled us to achieve an organic mentality throughout the process of fashioning a tactile entity.

Latex was used in large quantities to create a texture that could be mistaken for tissue and a curvaceous shape was devised to reference organic form. We looked towards affecting unconscious body rhythms, such as respiration, to abstract a placid, almost docile relationship with the viewer. At the same time, the probing motions triggered by the servo-powered extensions offset the familiarity of this motion, creating a chink of unease.

Film

Our short sets out to explore these associations through the use of various techniques we gained throughout The Syntagm (semester one, project two).

The music-box theme was chosen for several reasons. In the first instance, it creates an awareness of something winding down, associating the hues and motions of the animatronic with exhalation and release. Secondly, it sets up a juxtaposition between mechanical process (such as those employed by the animatronic) and organic rhythms (the motions we are attempting to affect). Finally, the soundtrack serves to elicit an unexpected tenderness towards the subject matter, thereby heightening the sense of the uncanny.

Visual elements also play a large part in the conceptualisation of the feature. Colour, texture and patterning greatly informed filming and editing. The short was influenced by research into mosaic, textiles, tessellating patterns and collage. In this sense, the effort was made to keep the editing process cohesive with the fabrication of the animatronic itself.

The intent was to soften the animatronic character through use of abstracted perspective. The camera blur was used to similar effect. While the animatronic was fabricated with tissue in mind, potentially gory shots were diffused through these experimental techniques.

Aphex Twin. (2001). Jynweythek Ylow. On Drukqs [MP3]. UK: Warp.

Animation

While ostensibly a motion study, Tissue Culture evolved into a complementary piece that explores our animatronic's relationship with the uncanny from a different angle. Whereas Terra-tology casts our animatronic in a familiar light, Tissue Culture seeks to set up an awareness a body primed for analysis, tuned into the buz and glare of a sinister fluorescence. While the rendered movements and form are similar, the viewer is shown the character in its entirety. Without the abstraction, the emphasis on texture and movement, our second nature does not attune. Our association with character veers away from the uncanny valley.

Exhibition

As our final product is the result of hands-on experimentation, and extensive reflection, we elected to present our animatronic in a minimalist space. Apart from the platform for documentation presentation, the plinth on which the animatronic sits serves as the main focal point. We felt it was necessary to position this as a satellite fixture in order to encourage audience interaction as they mill past the exhibit. Through utilising technology, our developmental process neither intrudes on nor qualifies the viewer's experience of the animatronic. Instead, the viewer is allowed to discover the artefact for themselves, thus achieving an organic interaction.

#Semester 2 #Project 3 #animatronics #Conceptual Statement

Tranquility

The State of Play

When is a weekend not a weekend? When a deadline is just around the corner. Sarah and I were both in the studio this early this morning, trying our best to sustain consciousness amidst a lethal combination of terps and too little sleep. Our plan to dissolve the latex-encased polystyrene worked surprisingly well. After a minute or two of knocking back the lethal brew without response, we heard the trickling sound of an interior cavity open up inside the mould. Before long the polystyrene was nothing more than goop, leaving a rather impressive looking latex skin. While it dries, I've taken the opportunity to dash out to James' place to acquire a pump so that we can breathe life into our creation.

Despite all the excitement, I was still very much in blender mode. My main issue right now is getting the armatures to work. Its my goal to have this in working order by the end of the day so that I can start rendering. I've found or just how long that's going to take over the last few days. I spent the better part of yesterday attempting to test-render a poor quality animation, even that took me well over an hour.

Cloth motion - The issue I'm having is allowing for the attachment on the front to stay rigid, while the backend affects an inflatable material. Although it appears to work here, the front attachment 'wilts' if it comes into contact with the planar surface.

In addition to this, I have to look into running our 3d model through iBooks Author in order for us to be able to execute our exhibition as we've planned:

The idea here is to situate a 3D model on the iBooks iPad application for our audience to navigate. Sarah and I feel it would be an excellent way to invite our audience to discover our exhibition for themselves without being led by the nose with a linear presentation format. This is particularly important for our exhibit because it explores natural responses.

Meanwhile, Auckland is hosting a triathlon that's effectively divided Queen street in two, making my journey out to chez James that much more interesting. The bus stop is my island of tranquility, but for all intents and purposes, it's also a perfect opportunity to get some blogging done. Such is the pace of iLife. Sitting here, however, I am distantly reminded of life beyond university. It's strange to consider passing a day without feeling like there's something you absolutely must get done, or going home at the end of the day and being able to switch of your brain... And is that terps on my shoe?

Back on a train of thought that's actually going somewhere, Siyu's managed to come up with a fantastic solution to our pump problems:

It looks like it could be just what we're after, my only concern is that we don't have enough time to work out a decent way to hook it up to our animatronic. Moreover, if we still have to turn it on and off ourselves (as opposed to using an Arduino), it doesn't really improve on working a pump. If we had an extra week or so, I'm sure we could do something amazing with it. As it is, we have to focus on what we can realistically achieve in the timeframe remaining.

Research and Ideas

When I heard the polystyrene 'sinkhole' effect earlier, I was instantly reminded of my collaging project - cartographic anatomy. I'm not sure if it will work for this project, but it might be worthwhile investigating the character of an ecosystem in relation to the form our animatronic. I'm reminded of this every time I view the brilliant photo album Sarah's been making on our Facebook group.

#Semester 2 #Project 3 #animatronics

Plot Summary

The moments that follow. The fall and decay, faltering breath, the fragility of a moment written on the body. The response this triggers, framed over the motion of a single intake and exhalation.

Falling

Waxy contours descend; collapse into exhalation. Music presents; winds down. A mechorganic break; failing chronology, languid in sound and form. Slow. Laboured on the out. Expelled with finality. The burden released in quick succession.

Traversing

Topography. Recreating spaces; cavities; bodies; stretches; channels; shelves. Flexing, stretching. Loose skin, overhanging. Tissuescaping. Traversing a relationship. Scrutinise the landscape of the body; our understanding of the tangible and inherent curiosity. Both lovely and grotesque. Tenderly repulsed.

The uncanny emerges. Associations with motion and form, emulating action and growth. Oozing, foaming, flaking, moist. Wet, heavy, glazed, sliding. Decipher the properties of sensation. Wrinkled, crusting, weeping.

Rising

Familiarity. Gentle recognition. The sense of responsiveness. An understanding of the tangible and our material experiences through the partial-life; questions the wholeness of the body, its processes, its functions-

...

The condition revealed through compositional emphasis. Textures, tessellation, density of colour. On the margins of subjectivity, the image has a life of its own. The body; its motion; its makeup.

Deconstructed identity, no sense of totality, leading to the process of active viewing. Traversing this landscape on the border of life and decay; a sense of passage. The lens, more caress than scalpel.

Backstory

There is an ocean between us. A regular current, separated by gasps and sighs; the shallow lap of a thoughtless breath. Thoughts seem to ebb and flow; cough up the flotsam and jetsam, yellow and viscous. Ceaseless, regular. This is life. Well oiled machines until a burst, a snap, a tear in the fabric; at the seams. And then what?

Everything is turned inside out. What was once quite human is now on its way to something else. The passage of meaty hubris - life goes on, innards spewing forth, a victorious declaration of organic treachery. And what of the interior? The landscape below which threads and pulses; implacable, unhurried, apropos nothing.

Here, the reminder of what was festering inside, beneath the boredom, the panic; the pace of the day. Beautiful and horrific. This is where the soul is kept, rising in mutiny against rigour; the incessant thump, a ripe pustule fit to burst, before finally drying and flaking.

It was the inside of the mind, winding up. A fountain of blood that has at last ceased to flow. A waxy coating, plastic life. The consistency seems about right for death. Living to satiety, while time allows. But it's always keeping track, losing stamina and patience until the music fades and the skin greys.

A medium of perception, undulating beneath waves of experience and memory, swirling with each breath until the last. Blood-heavy from the richness of breath, flesh kibbles at the touch. Every body has a light that consumes and flickers.

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

Character Profile

Shallow now

Crackle in the chest

With each breath

Hills rise and fall,

Salt and iron,

On the tongue

My own chest

Still ragged,

Long claws rake

The stillness

Tightens, greys,

Falls

The quiver, the tingle

It catches in the throat

And expands along its path

My breath branches

Along a chain of mountains, jagged

Graceful and unhurried, meanders

Pools in the belly

Pulse

It travels through me

Each thought alights

And takes hold of the mind

Wrinkles devour

The old rush

Conscious of my anchor

Every square inch

Rushes over

Fills me up

Breathe in joy;

Sorrow;

Memory;

Each moment

I remember catching my breath,

And how I spoke of the cold without saying a word

The same breath, over and over

Corrosive, wearing

Rank and bitter

Dark flakes

Crust on the lips

Terribly aware,

Of each breath

A deep cavity

Opens

And collapses

Tension and rhythm

Sixteen or so at rest

Lower near death

Ascending and descending

An ocean to drink from

The current

Surges upwards to meet

The medium,

The highest bliss

Push it out,

Till there’s nothing left

一吸

一呼

掙扎著撲抓

震顫的觸角

視覺的衝擊

蠕動著對生命的探索

對新生的渴望

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

Cloth

The State of Play:

Friday, I can't believe it's Friday. There's really not much time left to pull this all together, but strangely the alarm bells aren't sounding. I don't think I would have set about this project any other way. That's a comforting notion.

Yesterday was brutal. Pure and simple. I must have spent most of the day rendering a 'flower' in Blender, only to find out I couldn't mesh it with the main body of the model. Even after numerous attempts at knitting the vertices together, the pair just wouldn't gel.

It occurred to me this morning that the two systems were modelled on different physics principals, which made joining them together even more of a challenge. The body operates similar to cloth, collapsing on contact with a planar surface:

One I made earlier

The 'flower' attachment at the end, meanwhile, has to remain rigid when it the body hits the surface. The idea would be to play the motion in rewind to affect inflation.

Unfortunately I can't seem to find a way to keep the two systems distinct upon collision. Wave motion could prove to be a viable alternative. In combination with weight paint, I might be able to jiggle the appropriate parts of the object...

It stumped me for hours today. In fact, it's still stumping me right now. It doesn't help that I've become obsessed with lighting and texture in Blender. Having watched numerous tutorials, I've ended up idealising my motion animations to such a degree that any tweaking of the physical properties is invariably accompanied by adjustments to the colour and texture of my models. I keep thinking about what I could add to our final hand in if I was able to produce hair-like textures, or decent armature movements...

Documentation is also getting to be rather painful. There honestly doesn't seem to be enough time in the day, which is probably why I'm still doing this at 1:30 in the morning. Got a couple of hours to go until my normal bedtime.

Tomorrow I could well be off to chez James to pick up a hand-pump for our animatronic. We're not fairing too well vacuum-wise. Apparently the one we're after is native to Christchurch (circa 1982), at least that's what Trademe's telling us. Siyu might have the answer to our prayers - a vacuum cleaner that blows and sucks with a special attachment for strange studio projects. We're waiting till tomorrow to get word on that. I have to prep for either scenario.

Research and Ideas:

It hit me at about 4:30 yesterday morning that I should really be looking into getting a DVD menu made up for Monday. It then occurred to me that I should learn how to use the appropriate software to produce this.

The plan was fairly standard - feature presentation, the making of (storyboards, etc), and animations.

After our talk with Pritika, I simply couldn't find a way to reconcile my animations with our vision for the short. I felt the film itself should focus on the elements of the animatronic itself, as opposed to leading contextualisation, such as the artery I'd spent a good couple of days creating.

It was a shame, but at the end of the day our focus is very much on the fabrication of texture and movement as a piecewise example of elements that function independently of the whole to evoke a response. However, the animations can still find a good home in the extras section.

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

Tissue and Art

We kicked off today with another chat with Pritika. As usual, she gave us great direction and distilled exactly what it was we're trying to say with this project. This was particularly useful for me as I'd been struggling to decide whether we should take a more literal tact with our video segment given that the animatronic itself is somewhat less explicit.

Our initial plan had been to draw on the avant garde to inform our filmic technique. Given that our conceptualisation has been strongly informed by deconstruction, it seemed to have a strong relational quality. However, after our talk with James, I'd become concerned that we'd be taking a risk by abstracting not only the animatronic, but our film as well. My feeling was they he wanted us to use the segment to contextualise the animatronic.

The feedback Pritika gave us convinced me that we were taking the right direction by allowing the audience to make their own assumptions about the characteristics we're trying to portray. This means that we'll be moving away from the use of overt medical imagery. I'm far happier with this as I feel the slick look of the animations I've been making in Blender clash with the textures Sarah's been modelling. That's not to say all my work will go to waste. It will always have a home under the 'Extras' feature of our DVD.

Research and Ideas:

In addition to helping us develop our film and exhibition, Pritika gave us a hot tip about an art collective that deals with similar themes to our own:

Victimless Leather- A Prototype of Stitch-less Jacket grown in a Technoscientific "Body"

The work the Tissue and Culture and Art Project does put our concept in yet another light. Everything seems to be interconnected. The ethics of tissue farming versus the reappropriation of traditions and cultural belief systems, and the fears bound up in the process of tissue harvest. There are so many angles to come from. In reality, this project could present a viable research option for next year's studio.

It all links back to the genesis of our conceptual process - the meat industry, but we've sought to refine and deconstruct each step of the way. Ideas associated with harvest, digestion, and process have all been incorporated back into our current project, and because of our reflection, we are able to see conceptual links with a range of issues relating to meat, tissue, growth and consumption.

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

SolidSnore

My Reminders App reads "Must write", and as I implicitly trust everything my iPad tells me, I'm doing just that.

I'm trying to recall the fruits of the last few days, however, my mind seems to have been scrambled by the vortex that routinely opens up between leaving the studio and crawling through the doors the following morning.

I spent the weekend experimenting with Blender, and to my concern found myself getting quite into it.

After SolidWorks, I was afraid I'd never quite recover from the festering mix of tedium and bordom I'd come to associate with CAD.

Having said that, for a brief, shining moment, I genuinely thought I was getting somewhere with that ruddy programme. I was able to manipulate curved objects and even assemble with something close to gusto. Of course, I then found out the programme wouldn't be able to model any of the movements I needed to animate, at which point my heart exploded. Blender picked up the pieces and from there, I've almost grown to enjoy rendering in 3D.

I began by playing with palpitations. What could be more fun than creating a oozy-whatsit, beating away in all its gory glory? The fantastic thing about Blender (apart from the fact that it's free) is that it allows you to take ideas you might have knocking about in your head and fabricate a virtualisation that can capture something of it. For sketchers it might not be such a 'wow' moment, but I found it rather enjoyable. I've decided SolidWorks is for the Practicals, where as Blender is for the Imagineers

My dalliance quickly turned into an obsession with rendering all things anatomical leading on from our plans to use SolidWorks rendering spliced with real footage as a take-off of the sort of information that might be provided on a medical documentary. I found myself up until 5 in the morning, trying my damnedest to get the correct lighting in the artery I'd whipped up so my blood cells would get the correct shadowing as they flowed through it. Try that on SolidSnore.

#Semester 2 #Project 3 #animatronics

Glazed and Confused

Well, what can I say about Blender other than 'at least it's not SolidWorks'. Last night I went home and promptly found myself overwhelmed, watching a ten-part series on how to render a human heart. I think I got to around video number four or five before I lost the plot.

If I only had a heart. Unfortunately an artery was the most I could manage.

I clearly have a lot to learn about this software, but at the same time I can't really sit around and watch beginner tutorials that don't target the outcomes I'm aiming for.

Part of the problem was that I didn't have a clear idea of our animatronic's final form. The rough sketch I'd drawn wasn't exactly ambiguous, but I knew the form could change considerably during the fabrication process.

"The base is inflatable, and the top has a bowl set into it. There are a number of petal-like projections on the top. These are attached to servos with fishing line or nylon. The servos wind one way and cause the petals to contract, and then wind the opposite way to release them. The mechanics would be the inflation and the petal contraction. If we have time, we could also get the nose tubes to pump a blood-like substance round the inflatable base."

"It's still related to the meat, but we've conceptualised it along the lines of a transplant organ. The 60 second short will feature the work fabricating it as well as the SolidWorks modelling, framing it as a medical doco. We're playing with organic motion (inflation, the petal-like structures and the ebb and flow of the substance in the tubes) and naturalistic textures." -- Our very lively Facebook group

By the time I arrived at the studio this morning, things had taken a significant leap forward. Sarah had realised that rather than fashioning our own moulds, it would be faster to purchase two of the large polystyrene balls available at Gordon Harris and slather them with latex over the weekend.

Not only would the latex cover the join, it would also be quite easy to slice a dip for the bowl out of the top for an overturned bowl to sit in. The servos would be concealed beneath this, and the animatronic petal-like structures mounted on top.

Research and Ideas:

A couple of quite long-ish videos that Sarah found, but well worth a look. The dressing of the roast chicken seems particularly relevant to the concepts we've been working with, combining surgical precision, consumables and process.

Steve Carr from Michael Lett

#Semester 2 #Project 3 #animatronics

Sleep the Clock Around

The State of Play:

By the time Thursday arrived, I'd hit the buffers. Thoughts of the end of the semester were hanging about like some off-season phantasmal humbug. Sleep deprived and loamy-brained, I was in no state to do anything other than tap caffeine straight into my system and wait for that sickening jolt into reanimated existence.

Sarah and Siyu were already hard at work when I turned up. Siyu was busy tinkering with the servo motors and experimenting with DC motor functionality. Sarah, meanwhile, was mixing up some latex prototypes using polystyrene moulds, as per her discussion with James. I whipped out SolidWorks, ostensibly to begin my descent into madness, but also to continue work on the flower-like structure I'd been working on.

It took me quite a while to work out how to sculpt and protrude curved surfaces, which was necessary in order to create anchors for the elaborate pulley system I had in mind to mechanise the model. I rewarded myself for each success with research into modelling the texture and form of the base. By all accounts, we were on track. Things were happening, progress was being made.

But then disaster struck. It turns out that SolidWorks can't model bending. I'd accepted that it probably wouldn't be able to capture inflation, and prepared accordingly by reviewing information relating to flow models:

However, I was caught completely off guard by this, for the simple reason that SolidWorks allows users the options of modelling a range of materials, including rubber. I had, in fact, got so far as to change the material of my original sausage CAD design to rubber before the project got scrapped. It came as a complete surprise that the materials wouldn't be able to model their physical properties.

I asked James how I should best fulfil my role as the CAD operator when I couldn't represent the movement of our animatronic through SolidWorks. The compromise we make for organic motion is the use of Blender, 3D modelling an animation software that will apparently allow me to render a pulsating organ.

Research and Ideas:

Recently stumbled across a playlist from my last year of university (round one) and was reminded of this video:

Something's been nagging at the back of my mind for the past few days. Ever since I created the backstory for our original concept, 'process' is a word that's kept coming back to me. At that point I was concerned with the nature of industrial process and the consumer relationship with it. Meat was merely a way for us to examine the brutality of routine, transaction and procedure. The research I did into the anthropological studies surrounding slaughter houses was particularly relevant to this thesis.

Even though we've changed direction, 'process' continues to inform our conceptual development. This video deals with images taken from an industrial film on precise measurement. The footage is fantastic for two reasons. In the first instance, extreme close ups create an awareness of material function in such as way that 'process' is given an implicit narrative. Secondly, the director's use of forward motion complements the narrative by inducing a sense of linear dynamism. It's almost like being on a conveyer belt.

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

Cocoon

So much has happened in the last three days, it's going to be hard to remember exactly where everything fits. In the grand scheme of it all, things are coming together. Slowly, but surely, we're making our way towards exhibition day.

Our concept emerged from its cocoon early Wednesday morning. It was still a fairly ethereal thing. The longer you stared, the more you realised there were missing pieces in the imagining. In essence, however, our intention is to create an imagined organ that affects our own organic make up through movement and texture, while at the same time instilling a sense of unease. In a way, the ambiguity of such a creation hooks into the our associations, making it almost parasitic.

But as with all ambitious briefs, the question was, and is, where to begin. Despite all the hands-on work we've been doing, I always find the transition from the conceptual part of the brief to be like kicking of the blankets on a wintry morning. But it has to be done. We set about discussing the mechanisms we could employ to affect the pulsating quiver of a 'vital' process. We knew that one part of it would be inflatable. This necessitated a latex encasing and an entrance point for the insertion of a valve. As our artist and fabricator extraordinaire, Sarah elected to discuss the matter with James.

In the meantime, there was more than enough work to be getting on with. For my part, I was attempting to recreate the motion of our animatronic through SolidWorks. Despite having a steep learning curve, I felt that I was gaining ground with the software. Going five minutes without eliciting notification of an invalid action was so ludicrously rewarding, I found myself letting out little 'whoops' of joy every now and then. Having got so far with the petal attachments, I began by playing about with the form of the inflatable body. Creating a solid through revolved curves seemed to be the way to go.

It's my sense that we associate organic form with curves as opposed to jagged edges. I wanted to juxtapose the 'organ's' maleable undercarriage with something faintly threatening; almost probe-like. The plan is for the extensions to cover a domed surface, quivering as their nylon filaments are tugged by several concealed servo motors.

Research and Ideas:

While scouring the internet for information on mechanical petal systems, I happened upon this project:

The fact that it was the result of a semester long project by a bunch of MA engineering and design students made me feel marginally better about the issues I've been having. I did realise that it was folly to attempt to replicate such a sophisticated swivel mechanism. Nevertheless, I could see myself having a go at something like this when I have the time.

#Semester 2 #Project 3 #animatronics

Meatball

Another day, another idea. We seem to cycle through them at an alarming rate; but such is the nature of our group, and I really wouldn't really have it any other way. Sarah and I are quite similar in terms of the conceptually driven way we approach projects. That's not to say we're not mindful of practicalities, but we treat projects in a very holistic sense. I feel like I've already done the hard yards; jumping through arbitrary academic hoops in the hopes that a high GPA would validate my BA. This time around, I'm all about the process.

Our morning started with the posing of that eternal question: to meatball or not to meatball? Sarah had broached the idea of using said rissole as an alternative to the joint. I felt it was too late in the game to change our plans again, although I was inclined to bear it out. Having said that, I thought Sarah's idea to incorporate a music-box theme into the film and create a gingerbread man-esque sensibility to the short was inspired, weaving whimsy and fantasy into something inherently unsettling. The critter would make a mad dash for freedom, free-wheeling, DC motor style, before running out of steam and being skewered by a malicious fork.

In truth, our concept has meandered, but it's matured at the same time. The important thing is that each of our ideas have retained core elements of their precursors. These iterations have greatly informed each stage of development.

James popped round to check in on us, which was fantastic because we were in need of a critical eye and artistic know-how. The critique enabled us to see the glaringly obvious commonality between anatomical forms we'd been experimenting with over the past day and meat processing, reframing the joint as an organ. I had allowed for the possibility of a tumour-like attachment to the joint, but I was very conscious of the fact that inflation mechanism we wanted to incorporate might not be achievable in our timeframe. James came to the rescue again, showing us an exhibition he staged using readily available materials to affect inflation and deflation. That's all it took to convince me. I'd been interested in synthesising body rhythms, such as breathing, from the get go; the one thing that had been putting me off was the feasibility of affecting this through animatronics.

James also reiterated that the purpose of the sixty second short was to contextualise the animatronic in a such a way that skewed the audience's perception of it as a standalone piece. We were left with quite a bit to mull over. I wanted to make sure Siyu was comfortable with our direction before we finalised anything. A group project such as this necessitates mindfulness of the work you're creating for your team members.

With the all clear we set about trying to work out what to attack first. the stomach movements seemed the most practical. It gave Siyu something to start mechanising and Sarah something to start fabricating onto. Sarah and I paid a visit to the 3D lab to gain some direction. At first it seemed as though we might be able to synthesise the shell of our animatronic organ out of polystyrene, but it quickly became apparent that any attempt to do this would likely end in a crumbly mess, even with re-strengthening. That left us with two options, Papier-mâché or the rapid prototyping lab. We decided on the latter simply because of the fast approaching deadline. Unfortunately, this close to the end of term, the 3D printer is coveted by all and sundry. With a wait of at least a week, it was most definitely out.

That left Gordon Harris, the design student's one-stop shop for desirable, if financially crippling, suplies. Sarah an I ended up mulling things over in its pleasantly artsy environs. It wasn't long before inspiration struck. I started dreaming up an organ with sail like attachments that would furl and unfurl, a sort of mirroring of the breathing mechanism. I imagined motors could be attached to nylon, causing webby by pieces of latex to curl over. The best part of it was that the mechanisation was fairly simple. It seemed like a more like a conceptual evolution than a compromise.

Two small holes in both ends of this clip, add some nylon and we'll be away. The perfect light-weight pulley system for some toy servos to manipulate.

#Semester 2 #Project 3 #animatronics

The Conceptual Grinder

I spent the better part of the weekend considering our options and getting exactly nowhere. It was like the perfect storm of artsy pretension and B-grade horror. Nothing says death by concept like mince tentacles turning a meat grinder. In the art world, shock-value is the last refuge of the unimaginative

Three shots into Monday morning, and I barely had enough energy to crawl through our Maths and Art debate. I was jittery as anything, but it was better than passing out mid-summation. With that booted to the sideline for the rest of the semester, we were back to Maggie for guidance and concept therapy.

It quickly became clear that the issues we were having centred on the multi-faceted nature of the brief. Part character piece, part contextual film, part exhibition; lean too far one way and you run the risk of creating a caricature; too far the other, you wind up losing character focus to abstraction.

The meat grinder was the sticking point - was it our character, or a forced contextualisation? Perhaps it would have worked as an exhibition piece, but it almost seemed tacked on in terms of characterisation. It had to go.

Despite this, Maggie gave us good feedback and said that she would back us on a more experimental angle. With that we turned our attention back to deconstruction, although, by this point it had become less a concept and more a process.

We arrived at meat and bone by way of the textural associations of the medium we've been working with over the past week. It occurred to us that we could look into our responses to the movement of joints in an animatronic context.

The mere idea of tendons snapping and bones grinding against each other evokes quite a visceral sense of repulsion. It seemed like an incredibly rich area to draw from. We began by looking at joints we could potentially abstract, sticking with the amalgamation as a theme.

#Semester 2 #Project 3 #animatronics

End Times

Today at our concept sustained a killing blow. I can't say I was expecting it. I honestly felt that both our concept and characterisation were well developed and researched. We were aware of the potential for it to tip into PETA territory, and had thus focused on process as a lifecycle and its relation to consumer ideology. But whatever our intent, it clearly didn't carry across.

Maggie's key concern was that we were in danger of making a cheesy, poorly done campaign for animal welfare, something that had concerned me from day one. I would have agreed with her, were it not for the ideas I developed through the crafting the character profile and backstory. We were, after all, broaching the creation of a creature of process; an entirely new creature, divorced from Daisy. However, the sanctimony had obviously stuck.

That's not to say Maggie couldn't see any positives. She was especially interested in the deconstruction and texture of our medium. Her feedback encouraged us to reevaluate the nature of offal as an amalgamation. At the same time she wanted us to be more aware of the character as focal point, with traits that set it apart from an exhibition piece. This is part and parcel of what makes this brief such a challenge - avoiding the cliches of animatronic characterisation without abstracting beyond reason.

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

Gliding O'er All

The Prezi I've created is reasonably impressionistic. It is at once a character backstory and a profile, detailing the meat industry's 'manufacturing' process. Our group felt it was important to remain detached, as the journey from farm to grinder is a highly emotive one. Our brief was not to create a campaign, but rather a character in and of itself. It is the process that is put under the spotlight, rather than the animals. I attempted to inform myself by reading exerts from interviews with the individuals who act as conduits throughout the various phases of 'production'. I then sought to balance this with poetry that I felt affected the journey from life to death. This was very fruitful, as I find I more readily attune to the interplay of words than I do the visual arts.

The exerts I looked at gave me instant direction, particularly Walt Whitman's poem Gliding O'er All:

Gliding o'er all, through all, Through Nature, Time, and Space, As a ship on the waters advancing, The voyage of the soul--not life alone, Death, many deaths I'll sing.

While I'm sure Whitman didn't have the slaughterhouse in mind when he wrote this, it inspired me to develop the idea of a character born out of death. There is also the idea of the birth of the individual centring on the demise of the collective. If it all seems a bit profound for a sausage, remember, offal is the amalgamation of numerous animals and body parts. Bits of bone, brain and heart are all part of its essence. It struck me as bizarre that there could be this neatly packaged bundle of death on a conveyor belt, zipping off towards a kitchen somewhere. It almost seems like an entirely new lifecycle begins in the factory, and ends on our plates. The character we are trying to create exists within this time frame. It's the frightening reincarnation of what came before. The senses still bristle.

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

Foodstuff

With the sausage idea locked down, day three was all about getting some direction with our character's concept designs. I felt we needed to get a few sketches underway so that so that Sarah could begin work on the character designs. At five A3 pages, it's not the sort of thing you want to leave till the last minute. Meanwhile, Siyu and I needed to start planning the mechanics in more detail. However, given that we had a crit with Maggie first thing Friday morning to discuss the character backstory and profile, these were necessarily the first thing on the agenda.

Some interesting points were raised surrounding the way in which we had each interpreted the character and its movements. Sarah saw the character as a rebellious figure; a herald of change and a champion of agency. Of course, there was the tacit acknowledgement that there would be an element of humour if we were to take this approach. I saw the sausage in a completely different light; a helpless character, one had a limited range of motion and was only just coming to terms with its own sentience. Slow flexing would reflect the futility of the character's predicament, and the inevitability of what was to come. Over the course of the 60 second short, the character's movements would become increasingly jarring, the way a blind, newborn animal might respond to the uncertainty of its situation.

Another interesting discussion arose with regards to how we saw the character as a manifestation of consumer identity. Sarah saw strong colonial overtones, associated with the traditional preservation goods and knowledge of home craft that sits along side this. The association are important to acknowledge when considering how your audience will react to what you are putting on the show. Again, I envisaged something quite different. My first thought was of mass marketing, commercialised produce and industrialisation; particularly surrounding the drive for commercialisation of the home following the Second World War. My frame of reference was the emergence of the nuclear family in 1950s and the promotion of kitchenware and processed foodstuffs.

Sarah and I both felt that it would be more interesting to focus on the profile as an amalgamation of the influences surrounding the textures and movements involved in the creation of our character, while the backstory could effectively be our research into the meat industry's production process.

Having tackled the backstory and the profile, I was keen to consult Kim on the mechanism I had in mind. After a brief chat, I felt more assured that we'd be able to pull the design off, the only issue we had to bear in mind was the space of the cavity we were creating inside the sausage.

Kim emphasised the need for experimentation with our medium involved in bringing our character to life. As Sarah pointed, as far as maintaing a healthy reflective practice goes, it is necessary for us to gain a degree of familiarity with our materials. It all adds to our reflective process. This is, perhaps, more important for us than some of the other groups as characteristics are trying to portray necessitate the use of only a limited range of motions. This could come off as unambitious if the animatronic is poorly executed. To avoid this, we must show the greatest sensibility towards the materials we're working with. Our plan for the next few days is to experiment with sausage meat in the lead up to the creation of our own sausages that have the appropriate dimensions for our server motors.

#Project 3 #Semester 2 #animatronics

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