prosthetic knowledge

Datamoshing the Land of Ooo: A Conversation with David OReilly

Interview with the great animator David O’Reilly about his Adventure Time episode:

DR: Were there any restrictions and/or stipulations on what you could do with the show?

DO: Creatively, Pen really wanted me to do my own thing. The writers on the show are really good, and I would have been happy to animate one of their storyboards—but he really wanted me to do all that stuff myself. I can’t think of a precedent for that. It may be the only animated show in history to let a total outsider write and direct an episode. As far as restrictions, there were a few because ultimately it’s for children’s TV. A few jokes were cut or toned down, which was frustrating at the time, but I’m proud of what made it to air. 

Worth reading, which can be seen here

Clouds 

A Kickstarter funding project to create an interactive documentary of contemporary computer artists:

Over the last year we have captured interviews with over 30 new media artists, curators, designers, and critics, using a new 3D cinema format called RGBD. CLOUDS presents a generative portrait of this digital arts community in a videogame-like environment. The artists inhabit a shared space with their code-based creations, allowing you to follow your curiosity through a network of stories. What does it feel like to think with code? How can emerging technologies enable us to actualize our dreams? How has online sharing transformed the way artists collaborate?

More about this interesting project can be found at it’s Kickstarter page here

New Media - New Environments

This was my entry for the Transfer3D - Speed Show WROCŁAW, an experiment with Autodesk 1234D and a televised interview from 1967 with technology theorist Marshall McLuhan:

Brief:

Create a piece of work for the Transfer3D SPEED SHOW WROCŁAW, around the concept of 3D

Idea:

Advances in 3D imaging and technology has provided interesting possibilities to explore. In particular, there is a service which can convert multiple still digital photographs into a virtual 3D object called Autodesk 123D Catch.

With some understanding of the principles of how it works, it somehow lead me to connect to one of the most important figures in technological thought of the last 50 years: Marshall McLuhan. Having ideas with no single fixed viewpoint, employing ‘Probes’ to understand technological phenomena from various angles, and an influence from the texts of James Joyce and the concepts of Modernism, a connection can be made between both the thinker and the machine.

In 1967, he undertook a televised interview, sitting in a revolving chair in the centre of the stage, surrounded by an audience asking questions from all angles (see video embedded below):

Herbert Marshall McLuhan @ CBC 1967 from Sergey Teterin on Vimeo.

I took various frames from the footage to form the necessary collection to help create a potential model, all from various angles and different levels of proximity.

The results are a product of matching images and manually places points connecting the images to one another on particular key features of the person.

(See animated gifs above)

Result:

Admittedly, I was hoping to produce a virtual sculptural bust of Marshall Mcluhan, but the 1234D Catch service is designed for colour photography - the images I have used are black and white, grainy, and have been processed from original recording, to video, and eventually digitally processed onto online video services. Also, the subject must be completely still - it is difficult to find exact poses from various angles from someone who is in conversation with his audience throughout the recording.

Many of the attempts are, in relation to my initial plans, extremely disappointing in a representational sense, as well as some questionable orientations - upside down or positioned to the side as opposed to standing upright as would be expected.

My only consolation with the various outputs I have collected are that they still connect to the ideas of multiple viewpoints, abstract forms created from various points and time - machine vision generating pseudo-Cubism virtual sculptures.

The project should be considered a fully-finalized product, more of an experiment which, in theory, could provide other objects with continued practice, trying out different frames and combinations.

You can check some of the examples on my Autodesk 123D Catch profile here

dvdp:

xxl interview with me at societeperrier.com

A worthwhile read, not only because his work is so satisfying, but also alludes to creativity and Tumblr, and why it’s a great mix.

Max Capacity Interview For Empty Kingdom 

Max Capacity is from the East Bay.  Where lots of awesome things come from.  He’s done some really cool things with older ‘antiquated’ media of many different kinds lending relevance and style to ‘found’ media.

…

What about older media, video tapes in particular, do you find interesting?  How has your attachment to that media influenced the content you choose for your work?

The price is right! I grew up with VCRs, taping things off of my TV. I’m totally obsessed with the same stuff, even still. One of my favorite things is watching old commercials on taped television broadcasts. Now everyone is throwing all that stuff away and it’s easy for me to get my hands on.

How do you choose the colors in a piece?  You use a lot of loud, neon colors, what’s the reason for that?  Is there something in particular that such loud colors say to you?

I guess the world is kinda grey and boring. It seems like my memories are more vivid than reality. Plus I’m probably influenced by old punk and new wave art and skateboard and video game art. Also cartoons. I was a kid in the 80s.

Read the whole piece here

Netstyles - Update 

Triangulation Blog has spotted the Net Art / Fashion project has updated it’s very limited and exclusive range with new T-Shirts, and interviews the project’s founder, Stirling Crispin:

Can fashion and digital art mix and match?

Yes they can! Thanks to new media artist Sterling Crispin and his digital fashion project called Netstyl.es, you can now wear digital art. A few months ago, we already talked about the project (see here) but the good news is that Sterling is now launching a second collection of six limited edition t-shirts. This time, the six artists invited to make their digital art become physical were Alex Gibson, BodyByBody, Dora Budor + Maja Cule, James w Magnum 3, Parker Ito and Sidian Ersatz & Vans. We had a little chat with Sterling about his project and the link between fashion and digital art. See more;

Did you sell all the pieces of the first edition? Do you know who are the people who purchased the t-shirts?

More than half of the first edition of shirts have sold to a diverse international audience.

What is the idea behind Netstyles? How did this project come to your mind and when did you start it? Where you inspired by the bad smelling boy tumblr or other artists?

Netstyles is a digital aesthetics fashion line which translates virtual art into physical form. The clothes act as hyperlinks in physical space to emerging concepts developing in contemporary culture. I launched Netstyles on February 6th of 2012 but had been researching and doing tests since at least August of 2011. Many artists working today have adopted a post-internet sensibility and create far more digital objects than physical objects. Netstyl.es was created to provide a common platform for contemporary artists to experiment with, and make physical what would otherwise remain as digital forms. Bad Smelling Boy and Body By Body were two influences, both of which are included in the new Netstyles release.

What is the deal with the artists? Do you give them a percentage on the sales profit?

The artists involved receive most of the profit, my production cost is quite high, this whole project is a creative act more than a business.

Sweza 

Berlin-based street artist uses QR Codes in his work, such as his Graffyard project:

I am using QR Codes to preserve graffiti for posterity by photographing the graffiti before it is removed. After the graffiti has been cleaned off by the local authorities or building owners i place a QR Code in the exact location which resolves to an image of the original. In that way a mobile phone with a QR-Code Reader can be used to travel back in time.

Here is a short video, interviewing the artist:

You can find out more about the artist’s work at his website here

ARTchipel interviews monochrome illustrator Rery

ARTchipel Artist

Rery | Rery on ARTchipel.com (Taiwan/France) - Sublime banalité. Limited digital drawing, Fine Art print on Hahnmühle paper, 30x40 cm (2011)

available here >

• Tell us in few words about you.
Born in Taipei, grew up in Montreal, I live and work in Paris for over eight years. I think my multicultural experience is the biggest influence on my personality, my life and my work. I also believe that, having traveled a lot has made me a person who needs to be surprised continually.

• What motivated you to become an artist?
I have always loved drawing since child: on a sketch book, a tissue in the restaurant. But I have hard time to consider myself artist but illustrator who illustrate a person, an emotion or a state of mind…

• What are your work process and techniques?
I use my tablet to make illustrations in Illustrator but have always a little sketches book with me to draw down the unexpected ideas. I like the nearly perfect control and the multiple possibilities of the digital art, as much as the spontaneity and the freedom of the hand drawing.

• Tell us a bit about your work habits.
Often late at night when I’m less stressed by the outside world, with some music and a cigarette.

• What inspires and provokes imagination in you?
I make Hans Hartung’s words mine: “Everything we feel deeply must be expressed.” I’ve always felt the need to express my inner world through the images. My artistic influence is multiple: from the manga I read during my childhood to the contemporary art such as Soulages, Serra, Anish Kapoor, Kiefer, Cy Twombly, Rothko, Jong-sang Lee, Gao Xingjian, Il Lee, Yayoi Kusama, Toshio Shibata, Ryoji Ikeda, etc. Everything can be a source of inspiration to me: the clichés of our society, emotions of daily life, people I love or I meet on the street, my daydreams…

• Does your work reflect your person?
Very probably

• The adjective that best describes you?
Ambivalent

• The word you prefer?
Absurdity

Rery is also the co-founder of ARTchipel.com and co-curate ARTchipel.tumblr. You can visit her rery.tumblr for her illustrations and rerylikes.tumblr for some inspirations.

(interview with artist by ARTchipel Dec-2011)

[more Rery | Rery on ARTchipel.com]

Rery’s Tumblr can be found here

artchipel:

Tumblr Artist

Allan Innman | allaninnman (b.1982, USA) - Under Construction. Oil on muslin mounted to panel, 9.25x7.75 in (2011)

Allan Innman is a painter born and raised in Oxford, Mississippi, a fun college town brimming over with creativity. After years of experimenting with a lot of different styles and mediums, he eventually settled on Realism. Inspired by nostalgia, he has been exploring for several years the idea through childhood toys. “I like to paint toys because it’s a subject matter that everyone can relate to. Everyone at some point in his or her life has played with toys.” Allan told us, “I grow attached to these objects and I feel I must glorify them in the form of art.” (interview with artist by ARTchipel Oct-2011)

Allan shares his work on his website and his inspirations & news on Tumblr.

[Allan Innman on ARTchipel]

User Preferences: A Tech Q&A With Kim Asendorf

Creators Project Interview the digital artist:

The Creators Project: Who are you and what do you do?
Kim Asendorf: My name is Kim Asendorf and I currently live and work in Kassel, Germany. Some call me a net, conceptual, media or digital artist, I would say I am a computer artist with a great passion for conceptual art. But actually I don‘t [care] what kind of artist I am, I just want to figure things out, as I’m driven by curiosity. That‘s why there is always an experimental component in my media art. For me, it‘s a part of the work itself to satisfy my curiosity and experience the reactions of the audience, which makes the internet a good place for my concepts because people enjoy posting their reactions. And the programming implements a random factor, it‘s like drawing an image with closed eyes. Basically, you write down your concept in a digital language, an algorithm, and it’s an awesome way to describe a concept. Do this, check reaction, react, check re-reaction, lean back and enjoy interaction. I also currently work as a new media research assistant at the School of Art and Design Kassel. And recently co-founded the Fach & Asendorf Gallery, an online exhibition space for modern and more modern art. And just at this moment, I am founding an agency for everything.

More here

Above: ctt-04 - taken from Kim’s Flickr stream
Kim Asendorf Tumblr here

Interview with Jimmy Carter from The Guardian (UK)

Very interesting (long read) - I’ve taken a clip from it below and made my own emphasis. Its amazing a POTUS made the effort for peace at all …

 … Jimmy Carter is to Republicans what George W Bush is to Democrats: their very names make their enemies foam at the mouth. And the reassessment is working both ways. For years Carter was considered a failure because he was a single-term president, because he was perceived as weak, and because he refused to take action against America’s newly minted enemy, Iran. But, at this distance, the three great achievements of that single term seem even more of an achievement today: he forced through the Camp David Accords, one of only two peace treaties that Israel has ever signed, isolating Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin at Camp David for 13 days until he gradually wore them down; he also forced through the Panama Canal Treaty, a deeply unpopular move that returned the canal to Panama, but which prevented, many believe, a difficult and nasty war in Latin America; and he brought in an energy policy that saw him reduce America’s dependency on imported oil by half. He was mocked – three decades before global warming became a fashionable concern – for walking around the White House, turning down the thermostats.

What he’s most proud of, though, is that he didn’t fire a single shot. Didn’t kill a single person. Didn’t lead his country into a war – legal or illegal. “We kept our country at peace. We never went to war. We never dropped a bomb. We never fired a bullet. But still we achieved our international goals. We brought peace to other people, including Egypt and Israel. We normalised relations with China, which had been non-existent for 30-something years. We brought peace between US and most of the countries in Latin America because of the Panama Canal Treaty. We formed a working relationship with the Soviet Union.”

It’s the simple fact of not going to war that, given what came next, should be recognised. “In the last 50 years now, more than that,” he says, “that’s almost a unique achievement.” He was bitterly opposed to both Iraq wars. “Iraq was just a terrible mistake. I thought so in Iraq 1, and I was against it in Iraq 2.” And it’s not just George W Bush who has blood on his hands, he says, but Tony Blair too: “I don’t know what went on in private meetings when Tony Blair agreed to it. But had Bush not gotten that tacit support from Blair, I don’t know if the course of history might have been different.”

Full interview here