Project 2: Refined Transformation Ideas

Since I'm pretty into the idea of creating something colorful and then making it explode to start over, I looked into the transformations of stars, massive stars and the eventual explosion into a supernova or black hole. I really like this idea and think it can translate over to processing and the original thoughts I had about this project. I want the circles/swirls of color to grow and get brighter as the user continues to play with the mouse and continuously overlap what they have already created. Once finished, ideally I would like hitting the spacebar to be the command for the explosion and start over point. I think starting over should be just as fun as beginning.

My only issue is that this may not be a huge transformation? Yes? No? As stated before, my goal is to keep this fun. My challenges in processing I think will be the colors and mouse control. For some reason I don't think it should be too hard to make it explode but only time will tell.

Project 2 Inspiration and Initial Ideas

I was reading about the background of processing and how the creators wanted a program that was simpler to use; like the days of building with legos when they were younger.


Photoshop and even processing a bit remind me of more complex versions of Kid Pix, which was an early bitmap drawing program aimed at kids. I remember spending a lot of time in computer classes when I was little just playing. The program was great; the tools were easy to use and the sounds were fun and appropriate. If you were done with your creation, you could blow it up using the dynamite eraser (very satisfying) and undo any actions with the "undo guy" who would say different things as you took step backwards. My favorite tool was one of the wacky brushes that created fireworks of rainbow colors that you could layer forever. The sound for this tool was a sparkly, twinkly sound. It looked cooler the more layers you added.

I want to create something that was as fun to use as Kid Pix. I don't want it to be overly complicated and I want the experience of the user to be a priority over interest or beauty. Inspired by my favorite tool I want to make something very colorful and easy to layer. With the mouse I want to create something with negative space. In my head I see the user being able to click and erase part of what they have done, but the eraser will be a shape, a stamp of sort. So I guess I just need to get sketching and figure out how to do this in processing.

Project 1 Reflection and Notes About Transformation

From project 1, I obviously gained a better understanding of processing (loops! pi! comments!). Browsing the sketches on open processing really motivated me; seeing such cool sketches made with such little code was very inspiring.

As for next time, I think I need to focus in on my concept, or theme. For this project I did a lot of exploration, but I think for project 2 I need to pick a concept and explore within that concept rather than messing around with a bunch of different ideas.

Transformation:
- I use photoshop quite a bit, and it is nice being able to make patterns so fast in processing
- Didn't really think about how interactive processing is. Quite a bit color than flas (I hate flash and it's hard to use and it alway crashes without fail).
- Computers rely so much on our commands. I never thought about how robotic they are.

My final four wall papers. These are jpegs, blogger cannot upload PDFs. I am pretty satisfied with how they came out. Based off my favorite sketch, I made the series into a progression through repetition, color and transparency. While working on it I began to think it was too simple, but I realized that that's the beauty of optical illusions and the creation of color. I became quite interested in the negative space the arcs create. My only bit of unhappiness is with the last two. Printed out they look a little too similar. I wanted to keep the same base colors to connect it as a series and progression, but the result for the last wallpaper was a little too repetitive of number three. Additionally, my light yellow background is almost non existent when printed but I really can't afford to make the changes and print them again.

The final developments involved a lot of playing with weight and transparency until the wallpaper looked a little trippy while aesthetically pleasing.

I gained a better understanding of loops while creating these and I really liked adding comments to my colors so I could figure out which colors went were. The comments proved to be pretty helpful.

The open processing links for these wallpapers can be found here, here, here and here.

Paper Sketches –– Interim Presentation

1. My first two sketches are based off of the optical illusions of Stanley William Hayter, a surrealist artist.

2. This sketch was inspired by the way Stanley William Hayter would overlay colors. I was also inspired by the marks coffee cups make...and what it would look like if repeated.

3.My third and fourth designs were inspired by real life patterns. I drew these more out of curiousity than anything. This design was based off a stained glass window at a friends house. I also drew some inspiration from some of the doodles and shapes I draw in some of my other classes.

4. My last sketch was inspired by a cat, Ginger who frequents the balcony of a friend's flat. Probably my least favorite of my four. I don't find it particularly appealing, but it was fun to create nonetheless.

Goals: achieve cool looking wall paper, obviously. But I want it to be more than something to just cover the wall. I'm interested in optical illusions and blending and overlap of colors because I feel like they make you stop and stare for a moment. I want the wall paper to be a point of interest, not an afterthought. Next week, when translating these sketches, I really want to do them justice in terms of color and texture.

Cool Sketch

Browsing the sketches, this was one of my favorites. I understand how she made the shapes, but I'm really not sure about the animation. The mouse click commands make a little bit of sense, I realize that the while, if and else commands are directing how the pattern will form depending on how the user utilizes their mouse. I understand what it does, but not necessarily how it works. It sounds a bit like one of those complicated math word problems I had to when I was younger.  I tried to change a little of the code and shapes, but it had no effect I could notice (or I created problems and it wouldn't play).

The one thing that really surprised me about this is how short the source code is. I'm used to dreamweaver where code can go on for pages. It's inspiring to know you can make such cool things without overwhelming amounts of code.

So Many Lines!

This was the optical illusion I tried to make. It was inspired by the work of a surrealist artist Stanley William Hayter who made some crazy patterns and paintings that question your own perception.

I think it's definitely my most interesting sketch. It took me longer than I would have liked but I'm satisfied with the results. I think making this sketch helped me really grasp the concept of making lines and working with the slightly different x y axis. 

I feel like there's a lot of room to modify this sketch, in terms of colors and maybe spacing. I made repeating arcs for the curves, I'm wondering if there's an easier way to go about doing that because it took me a while and got quite boring. The open processing link is here.

project 1 inspiration and such

When we started talking about patterns, the first thing that popped into my mind was the album cover for Merriweather Post Pavilion; the most recent record by Animal Collective. I've mainly been playing with my patterns with not too much intention, but at this point I think I'm ready to start planning things out more, and I would really like to make a pattern similar to this, one that messes with perception or seems like it's moving.

First Patterns

These are my first three patterns:

                               The open processing links can be found here, here and here.


The first was just playing around with shape, color and fill and is probably my most beautiful (but beautiful is a little bit of stretch) just because of its repetition.. For my second pattern, I tried to make it a little more aesthetically pleasing and attempted to learn bezier curves. I really like the teardrop shape I made for the sketch (I combined a square and triangle) but it was hard to calculate how to move the two together as a whole shape. I think the colors probably make it the fanciest. The third was based off of the sketch done in class. The sketch reminds me of the stairs in super mario brothers. I thought it would be really cool to have a brick background like in the actual game, but didn't completely understand the directions on how to upload background images.