While a portion of this work was successful, the largest weakness was linking the measurement sheet to the doll made from the pieces of yarn I used to measure my body. Many people were not able to link them together due to too little information/data provided.
For suggestions given for this, there was suggestion of a diagram of a body with the text next to each portion and in the color of its designated yarn. Also indicating what the measurements are would also help to connect the chart to the doll.
For me, I learned how much of a fight I really have with my body. This project mainly taught me of what my body does as my numbers constantly got bigger and smaller in the process of recording information.
I think it’s possible to continue with this work, but I am not entirely motivated to do it due to my mental state when it comes to my body and how small it is.
There were both strengths and weaknesses pointed out for this project by my peers. For strengths that it had was the usage of animation to help tell partial of a story, along with the strength of displaying the different homes in the different styles and animating them to go away and appear. Although the work did hold weaknesses as well. For the first weakness, it was hard to follow for many of my peers to follow what exactly was going on due to many weak areas. Some said the lack of audio made the narration fall apart while others said there was not enough within the animation to give information about the story.
There was feedback for the animation as well. One of the tips given was to add more visual information for telling the story of moving from location to location. Another suggestion was to add the dates to each home to give an idea about the time period. Another idea given for narrating the animation was to actually do a voiceover and talk about my family during the animation.
With choosing to make this an animation, I learned a lot of new tricks with both Adobe Illustrator and Adobe After Effects. I also learned more about the speed of working with these programs and also understanding how time-consuming it can be.
But overall, I could see myself doing something like this again in my own free time. It would be more spaced out and more thought out as I feel the limited time to create this was a major factor in many of the flaws that it had. I would use the same software again, but possibly try adding in some other ways of animating, like using the gif system in photoshop or making a page by page animations in Open Toonz. Next time I try this, I will definitely also make sure to not overload myself with work to do as well.
For Identity, I did receive mainly a lot of positive feedback on the work I created, but suggestions and some areas of improvement did come up.
For starters, many people made comments my work would be a lot easier to take in if I were to give at lease one-fourth inch margins in between each canvas. Not only would this make the work breathable, but it does not come off as overbearing to the viewer. There was also feedback that this piece may work better if it consisted of more panels so it would take up more room on a museum wall and hold a larger presence.
For tips on what could also be possible for this piece that I found to be fun and definitely areas to explore is making a larger series of this that is interactive. One of the suggestions for this idea was to set up a large square box with only one frame missing and a working system where each panel can slide and move within this wooden frame. It seems like a great idea and something I do hope to try at some point. Another tip I was given is trying to make it more three dimensional with some panels sticking out more than others. It is a possibility to try, but am still tentative on.
The critique for this project was informative and helpful, letting me know my strong points and weak points. People stated that simplicity and text bring a simple but strong message across. Placement of specific texts also helped to show off how there are degrading phrases for all body types due to the words’ contrast. Another strength that was noted is how the body isn’t exactly female but can also be interpreted as a male due to a lack of breasts. For weaknesses, one mentioned a bit was that the figure could’ve been larger in areas so it didn’t look so thin. Another weakness pointed out was how some text was neatly stacked and didn’t work with the messy stacking of text in other areas of the figure. Another weakness is the size of the piece as it is too small to feel as if it is an actual body.
There were suggestions given to the work as well. One was that instead of a painting, I should project the artwork from a projector onto a white wall. Not only would it then be cleaner and adjustable in size but interactive as well as people could stand in projector light and see the words on their own body to make it a more inclusive piece for those who are affected by body shaming daily. Another suggestion was to create a cut out of words that is lifesize, making it a sculpture. A third suggestion was to actually turn the image into a series, creating more artworks following the same concept of bodyshaming words creating them. For all of these, I feel all are great to implement and do as all can be combined when in a series.
From this project, I learned the use of a new medium and also got a lot of insight into more I could do with my initial idea. I gained the knowledge of properly using rubber cement and ways to use it without damaging paintbrushes. Also, with critique from my classmates, I learned more ways I can help to spread my message about body shaming issues in different ways.
I believe with this project, it would definitely be something I would continue doing and creating. With how I would continue it, I would gather research on social media, following body tags and also viewing pages about body positivity and body shaming to find more areas on how people shame men and women for their body types. With the suggestions above, I would work in different mediums and techniques while continuing this series as well.
My piece is about perception, about how you see yourself and how other people see you. Most of the time, you have empathy for others that you prioritize over having empathy for yourself. It takes a lot of courage to see yourself as you actually are, both the good and the bad, and it’s hard to get to that clarity. I layered all of the voices and rhythms in an attempt to replicate the confusion of figuring out who you are and what you want to say with your life. The voices I used were mainly pulled from comedians and comedic productions because they produce media that handles human interactions without flinching.
I applied a bass track with the computer keyboard input to give a low hum to the work; however, I ultimately found a loop that served the same purpose and was more rhythmic than the one I produced so I swapped them out.
I applied the megaphone plug-in to change the vocal tone quality of an audio track, which was a little pitch-y beforehand and lacked emphasis until the plug-in was applied. I also manipulated a loop to carry a different meaning when I copied and warped a section of the loop and placed it in another section of the track.
I wanted the audio to feel more like a conversation at the beginning of the piece, but as the piece went on, I added more layer voices to create a confusion that still resembled a conversation, but now the conversation involved up to 5 voices that were not listening to each other anymore. I underlined this with lighter instrumentation at the beginning and heavier sounds as it neared the end.
In the parts of the work with many layered voices, I used the pan tool to create an effect where the voices were alternating from using mostly left speaker versus mostly right speaker. I also used the pan on repetitive effects to drive them from left to right and back again. Another way I tried to create audio space was in the use of the reverb tool on certain vocal interjections into the main discourse of the work.
I used vocals for the high end and mid range audio, with both male and female voices. For the low end and the bass, I pulled some EDM tracks and cut them down to 4-count or 8-count sections that I could then manipulate. The audio textures came from the used of reverb and plug-in’s, as well as bass loops I pulled from GarageBand’s library.
I think the most successful element of my work is the building of the voices to the cacophony to show the confusion of human perception, fading back out at the end to just one voice. I think this lines up really well to represent all the influences you have for your individual voice as a human. Another element of my work that I feel is really successful is the transition from the linear conversation to the multitude of voices in the second half, reinforced by the change in beat and tone.
One of the elements that needed to improve in my piece is the layering of the voices for clarity while still representing the confusion. I tried to fix this by using the pan to create separate out the voices and worked on tweaking the volumes of each interjection. Another element that needed to be worked on was the inclusion of some of the tracks that I had dropped into my piece near the start of this project, like the use of the “RnB horns” loop and the “Middle” excerpt. I realized that since I had added other things, the horns didn’t fit in my piece anymore so I took them out, and I remixed the “Middle” excerpt to have smoother transitions from clip to clip.
I'm going to be dramatic and say that this is the defining moment in my time as an art student. That midterm review was... I have no idea. About anything. Anymore. I go in, sit down, compliment Professor's Pacific Rim poster. The dude asks if I want his spare poster. Already I'm thrilled and confused. We go into my time machine piece. The color scheme is everywhere. We go into my grades. A on my first one. Professor says its professional quality and ready to print. F on my second one. Just a huge disaster. It was about what I expected. He tells me I'm better than that. I got a U for the semester. Understandable. I can pull it back. He calls my business card professional quality. Says my lines and shapes there compared to my actual piece are beyond compare. I thank him, I leave, I cry in the car and sob for thirty minutes afterwards at home. I'm still sobbing. Not because I'm sad. I don't know what I am. I'm feeling so many emotions right now that its all coming out as tears. I have no idea what to do, but at the same time I know exactly what to do. I want to work now more than I ever have, but I'm scared I'm just going to make a bigger mess than I've already got. All I know is that I want to work. More than I ever have. For the last two weeks I've just done nothing. I've dragged my feet and fallen behind. I don't ever want to be that way again. I've never felt this much at once. This is going to be a defining moment. I can't believe it took me until my senior year to have one. I owe my professor big time. God, I'm a mess. I don't care though.
There were some good comments from the class, starting with the fact that I printed it waaaaay too small. The second I put it on the wall, I knew it. Its the smallest print on the wall. I'm not allowed to get 8.5x11 prints anymore. I need to work bigger. Anyway, that was a thing, then there were some great suggestions about how I should separate the girl from the base of the tree and the hill so that she pops. I'm gunna put her on a tree swing~ Won't that be so cute?!
I am really 100% amazed that my professor just ate this piece up. He even loved the sloppy texture work. Oh man. I hope I get an A. He praised me so much. It feels like an A, but to be safe I'll call it a B+. Great start. So great. So rad.
