drawingboxx*

veralam. digital studio for phot-306-f090. " the future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. " eleanor roosevelt

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final project / through max's lens

Through Max's Lens is a video installation that explores the world of canine vision.The video is film and recorded by my very own dog, Max, which is then altered to fit the vision of canines (the colour scheme, the brightness levels, etc.) The camera was situated on top of Max's head and the camera moved along with his motions: side to side, up and down. This video not only serves as a visual understanding of the dog's vision, but also a very meditative video from a point of view that we do not usually see things in. It explores a different space in terms of our normal vision. (For example, the feeling of seeing a field of grass in a right side up position, parallel to you on a wall rather than staring down onto the ground.) For this project's purpose, I have chosen to hang my installation on the wall, about eye level. (Please refer to my previous post for installation images.) But for the ideal presentation form, I would like to have a lit screen that is relatively big that people can step on and watch the video by looking across the ground. This video is also very portable, meaning, it can be screened anywhere as long as you have internet connection. It is also a very experimental video you can bring along with you to explore different vision adjustments by placing it in different viewing areas.

I have chosen to work with my dog once again because I feel that every time I work with him on a project, I learn something new about him and, of course, he learns something new as well. Through this project I was able to explore the vision of canines as well, received the opportunity to see how my dog really sees the world, and most importantly, how he sees me.

Link / http://youtu.be/eJ2qWSZzQDE

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project process / 4

I was experimenting with different ways to put up my work if it was situated in a gallery space. Julianna was very helpful with being my model as well, giving me very constructive feedback with the space.

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project process / 3

From the posted video I was working on, this week I have altered the colour and added sound. The sounds are recorded from a different walk. The colour of the video has also been edited to portray the vision of the dog.

Video / http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKGGKE2JiEI

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week 10 / william pope l. & walid raad

001 / William Pope L. When I saw the first video, Tompkins Square Park Crawl, it reminded me of Orlan's piece where she used her body as a ruler marker to mark the distances in galleries. I thought they both played a very interesting idea of using your body as part of a tool to make a piece of work. But in this case, they're using their body as the only tool to create a piece. The Black Factory website had a comical twist in it, yet it was very powerful. I really enjoyed the little audience-click-interaction on the splash page. I've always liked pieces where audiences become a part of the project.

002 / Walid Raad For this piece, the polariods reminded me of film stills. (Much like Cindy Sherman's work.) As well, the subject seemed to be submerged as a part of the landscape or location they are situated in. I felt like these are to be looked in a way where you can hold them close to you or something you can keep in your pocket. The way they were captured felt very intimate. 

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project process / 2

So I bought a new camera for my footage recording with my dog. This time, it was much easier as the camera was smaller, and it was strapped right on top of Max's head. Therefore, every time he turned, the camera would turn as well. I personally really liked the parts were his nose was insight because I feel that is what his real vision probably is, just like how we humans see our nose as well, only we chose to ignore it. The second footage is longer, and is the footage I will be working on from this point on. I will be recording an indoor footage as well before I edit them according to the dog's vision standards. Also, there are temporarily no sounds because the originals didn't record with sounds, sadly. Therefore, I will probably be using the sounds I recorded on the walk with my phone.

So enjoy as these are much more better than the last ones I did! I purposely slowed down the video because it was much faster when we recorded it. Also, if you're wondering why it's all of the ground, that's because Max likes to sniff around a lot. Therefore, most of the time he's staring at the ground.

Video #1 / http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26ssEVR4-FE&feature=youtu.be Video #2 / http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbni8XnhMeU&feature=youtu.be

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week 9 / ryan trecartin, matthew barney, miranda july

001 / Ryan Trecartin Trecartin's piece was another funny one to look at. He seems to focus a lot more on dialogue and interactions between the actors as well as actors and the camera. He also plays a lot with video effects, meaning like the transitions from scenes or even joint scenes. There were also some different techniques like really close closes-ups. I found his videos quite random, and sometimes it didn't make any sense to me, but nonetheless it was quite enjoyable.

002 / Matthew Barney  I loved Barney's work! He has a very clean and modern aesthetic to his pieces even tho it may portray a different era. His videos, if paused, can almost be a photograph itself. His costume work for his pieces are also very extravagant and beautiful to look at, especially the headpiece in Cremaster 5. His website was fun to navigate as well!

003 / Miranda July I liked the little interaction between visitors and her page at the very beginning. It was a fun way to get the audiences attention. July's pieces plays with a few elements that repeats throughout her work, one being lighting and shadowing and the other would be monologues. My personal favourite was The Swan Tool. She used a projector against a white backdrop behind her to create a visual for her story rather than using real props or an actual image of a car. (It was a soft image of a car form.)

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project research

After my meeting with Merritt, I decided to do some research on animals vision and perspective to further go-about with my project on my dog. Did you know that dogs aren't exactly all colour blind? Commonly, we hear that dogs are colour blind and can't not distinguish any colours at all. But did you know, dogs can actually see a spectrum of colours, all except red and green.

Image Credits: http://agilitynet.co.uk

The reason being is that human beings have three different cone types: trichromat, where as canines only have two: dichromat. Each cone contains a photopigment that is sensitive to a different wavelength of light. These photopigments are what makes colour vision possible. Dogs can see approximately the same colours as human beings, except red and green. They are unable to separate the greens from the yellows. Also, their range of brightness level also differs from human beings. The dogs brightness levels are near static through-out.

This is a comparison of the vision between human and canine.

Image credits: Atlantic Coast - Veterinary Specialists

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week 8 / coco fusco & guillermo gomez-pena

001 / Coco Fusco A particular piece I'd like to focus on is Better Yet When Dead. I came from a Chinese background; therefore, the idea of portraying 'dead' people or photographing dead people has always been a big no-no for our culture. It's considered disrespectful and some people think if they were to play a dead person, they, in turn, will be dead soon as well. But in this piece, I felt a weird sense of serenity.  Fusco performance made me feel very peaceful for some odd reason. After reading the descriptions to some of her pieces, I feel that she finds very powerful topics to do a performance on. For example, a few that stood out to me was the killing of singer Selena from Better Yet When Dead, and the focus on Latin women, food and sex from Stuff.

002 / Guillermo Gomez-Pena I found his work quite funny to look at. He had an interesting twist and lots of dress-up as well as exaggerations in his pieces. And I like that, he or his models are often portraying a different character. Most importantly, I feel like that his expressions are the key connection between us and the pieces. He gives me the feeling of 'truly getting into character' as some performers, no matter how hard they try, they still feel awkward between their scripted role and their real selves. But in Gomez-Pena, I see the two have combined into one.

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I got some photos back from using the fisheye camera! However, for some reason, there was a lighting problem, so a lot of my photos didn't show up. ): However, I kinda like the effect the fisheye lens gave my images. :D

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My rough sketch of the finished product! :) I want it to be in a box, so the viewer can extract images and footages directly from Max's 'head', mimicking the idea of looking through his point of view.

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I bought a fish eye camera! Gonna shoot some rolls in from Max's angle and see how they'll turn out!

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project process / 1

My project focuses around the point of view of my dog, Max. I wanted to capture how the world is and how we are from his point of view. So for our first trial, we decided to record our daily walk from Max’s point of view. We strapped a camera-recorder onto his collar, so it recorded everything Max saw. However, it only recorded angles where he is looking straight. It doesn’t capture in a 180 degrees matter. You can see the camera set up in the previous post.

**Warning / Videos may cause some dizziness.

Video 1 / http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o05WdW6jsPI&feature=youtu.be Video 2 / http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kwm4okpg-2A&feature=youtu.be Video 3 / http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXnFvoiVpZQ&feature=youtu.be 

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Testing out the gadget for my project!

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week 5 / stellarc & leigh bowery

001 / Stellarc I felt that Stellarc's video was much more like, not only a performing piece of art, but scientific discoveries as well. I really enjoyed his idea of the body, which was "not only as a medium of expression, but also as a mean of experience." I think Stellar was really brave to have experimented with different methods during his 'Suspension' piece. (The one where the hooks were dug into his skin stood out to me. I couldn't help but cringe at the idea of it.) For some reason, I felt like this piece was going against the law of gravity. As if somehow he was trying to display the body in empty space. I also like how he regards the body as an architectural piece with no specific gender. I think he's quite daring to use his body as the main medium in his work. 

002 / Leigh Bowery  I was watching the performance video first and my immediate reaction was it reminded me so much of Lady Gaga! The way the make-up and costume went, as well as the daringness of using such themes in the performance piece really connected those two together for me. Bowery, like Stellarc, using the body as well, but Bowery decorates his body with different costumes and almost covers up his face most of the time. He sparks the most outrageous forms of the appearance of the body. His work is very comical as well.  

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I came across a video on the internet that is quite related to what I'm working on at the moment. This video is about a Corgi, Riley, who had a camera tied to his collar. The footage was captured from this perspective on the run at Runyon Canyon, LA.

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week 4 / william wegman & tehching hsieh

001 / William Wegman I remember watching Wegman's pieces in another class and I loved his work, especially his pieces with dogs. I really enjoy artists that work along side with animals because I think the relationship between the human and animals is phenomenal. They somehow spark a very unique feeling towards audiences and viewers. One may think animals cannot function like a human being, but if you watch Wegman's piece, Spelling Lesson, it almost appeared as the dog fully understood what Wegman was saying. One of his other piece, Stomach Song, was also a piece I really liked. He really intergraded his body into the piece very well.

002 / Teching Hsieh Much like Wegman, Hsieh uses his body to perform in his pieces. What I find very impressive of Hsieh's work was his duration of each performance. Each piece was presented with a statement, a witness as well as a poster. There are also supporting images as proof to each of his performances. I find his determination and attitude quite admirable as his pieces had strict rules, like being locked up in a jail cell, being attached to another person as well as having to stay outside. And the duration of all these pieces lasted for one entire year. 

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week 3 / marina abramovic & joan jonas

001 / Marina Abramovic I had millions of questions going on in my head as to what was the purpose of this piece when I first saw it. I thought it was some sort of speech practice for performers. Although, I'm not quite sure what the exact purpose may be for this video, I found the relationship between two performers quite crucial. I noticed nearing the later end of the clip, the two performers almost looked like a pendulum, as they took turns swinging in and out of the frame. I thought that was a very interesting movement to the piece. Also, the repetition of the word "AHH", made me as an audience that went "AHH" as well. It reminded me of Acconci's piece except, it wasn't as hypnotizing. It was more "contagious" for a lack of better word.

002 / Joan Jonas I was really dizzy as I watched the images fly through the screen. And I also find the banging notice rather annoying. It was much more difficult to watch compared to other videos because not only was the visual quite uncomfortable to the human eyes, the banging noise also appeared quite annoying as well. I had to stop a few times to eventually finish the piece. But I did find that, despite the banging noise being annoying, it sort of became a beat or a rhythm. The connection between the two pieces of Abramovic and Jonas, I think, is the use of repetition sound in their pieces. I think this serves as a pretty powerful element the performance videos.