Reflective process
Abandoned direction
I first wanted to create a publication collecting all my research and covering different themes that came up throughout my work. I was work around the idea of a touchstone, something all my other work could be compared to/referenced with. I abandoned this idea because of time and It felt too stiff and cold for taction. Below are a couple of spreads I made and an outline I created with a bit of writing.
I bounced around on ideas for a bit after that, I thought about creating a poster with the thermochromic powder or an embossed accordion book.
Part A
I shifted to the idea of games and tact. Tact comes from the same root as taction, meaning to have skill in something. I thought it was fitting since throughout these projects I've tried to learn new skills. Tact also reminds me of games, that's something that has been in the back of my mind since the beginning of the semester. I was drawn to the idea of fate predicting games and fortune telling, to reflect how my end products for this class was unknown when I started it. And how receiving my word was fate/chance.
For one part of my reflective I created a set of 16 oracle cards. One side of the cards has a collage I created using images from throughout this project: process, abandoned directions, inspiration. There's even a couple sunset photos I took while staying late to work at school. It's divided into 4 corners, one for each of the projects.
The other side has writings about each of the projects. The text is covered by thermochromic paint reactive to heat, so its black until you touch it. In tarot card reading you typically lay the cards out in a specific order, sometimes it's chronological. If you lay the cards out chronologically they connect to form the whole image.
I printed this on textured paper so the printed version has this distressed look. That was wasn't intentional but I think its so taction. Also I'm not fully happy with how the thermochromic pigment came out, it's a little streaky and patchy. I was paint it on the night/morning before crit so I rushed it a little.
Part B
I wanted to do something extra for my reflective, and going with the game theme I created these fortune tellers. I used to love making these as a kid, I started thinking about them as I was creating the projection screen for my 4D. I used to make them just to keep my hands busy, like how I treat hand stitching now. They go perfectly with the tact, connection/contact and touch meanings I've gotten from taction. They require touch and to be present in the digital world to make them, and they're a game you play with others.
In designing this I took the 4 main meanings I've gotten from taction and created questions based off of them. These are things I've been thinking about throughout this project and Ideas I'm going to take into creative work in the future. Pulling from concepts I learned about in texts I read for this project like ocularcentrism and memories associated with senses.
I added photos in black and white with a textured grain to represent each word. I used a humanist serif and added bodoni dingbats for an extra maximalist tactile something. Every serif typeface I've used in this project has been a humanist/oldstyle typeface because they have remnants of handwriting in them and look natural. I included instructions as well.
I printed them out to have people take a critique, only a couple people took them. But I gave them to my friends after crit and they started folding them and answering the questions. I loved hearing people's responses to the questions, like how feeling their feet impact the ground makes them feel present or how someone else remembers playing soccer barefoot as a kid.