self assessment 3

Kristin Seymour

Self-Assessment #3

            This project combined my first two projects in a whole new manner. I used the trails created by car lights from the first project, and the moss design from the second project. The central theme of the work followed the same overall theme I have been working with for over a year now, seeing the unseen. With this project I wanted to create an animated short movie that would be used for a portfolio. I am applying for an internship with Under Armour in the winter so I wanted to produce a compelling piece to send them. I have been creating art for the purpose of fashion and constructing clothing all semester. With this project I took the designs to a whole new level. I not only implemented the designs into clothing advertisements, but I also made a physical scarf with my design.

            My inspiration comes from my love for athletic clothing, specifically Under Armour. I love the company’s products, uprising and commitment to the community. They are also always coming up with new designs and new lines of clothing. This is why I would like to work for them. They just introduced a semi-artistic line called “Lux”. It is meant for yoga, but the designs are more artistic then those of their previous products. I think that my organic designs would add an aesthetically pleasing style to a new “artistically athletic” line of sports wear.

My inspiration specifically for the designs themselves comes from my organic surroundings. I have recently become interested in the shapes within nature. I began shooting macro images of objects within nature. First, I started with the belly of a turtle and then to moss on a brick path. For this project I focused on the moss. The shapes created by the moss were magnificent, shapes that I could never think up and create within my head. I feel that I have thus far been very successful with these designs and want to continue on this path.

As I have stated in previous self-assessments, my process is multi faceted and used multiple different methods and programs. I first take the macro photograph; edit it to black and white with high contrast and definition. Then I use Adobe Illustrator to separate out the shapes with live trace. I then recolor them and then move the design to Photoshop for adjusting and final editing for size and shape. For this project I took it a step further and downloaded clothing images from Under Armour, cut out the sectioned I wanted my design to be located, and placed the design within these sections. I also created a design from the car light trails and placed the design on a sports bra. I decided that I did not just want digital versions of clothing that I wanted to create a physical clothing item out of my designs. Since I cannot sew and/or create shirts etc., I created a scarf. I changed the moss design to have a white background with black outlining the shapes. I printed and attempted to sew the scarf. Although it did not turn out perfect, I am proud of what I was able to make.

I learned a lot about After Effects during this project. Most of all I learned that you cannot give up on a new art program just because you do not understand it at first. I, like most of my classmates hated After Effects at first. I was not as similar as Photoshop and Illustrator. It used different controls and short cuts. The location of menus was different and I had to get used to the key frames. It took weeks to get the hang of it enough to navigate around. In the end I figured it out enough to create the animation that I did. I then finished it in I movie, due to the simplicity of adding effects and sound. I coordinated sound effects with the light streaks to make it sound like electronic lasers progressing into car drive by sounds. This was intentional due to the source of the design. I then showed the source of the lights by taking the original photo from back and white to color through the saturation of the light beam across the image. This was accompanied by a sound effect that I think was one of the most successful ones in the animation. I then showed the original moss image and overlaid the design congruent with the shapes within the moss. I am very proud of how it was so easy to see the direct source of the shapes within the photo. The movie then finished with the appearance of two articles of clothing from Under Armour wit my two designs on them. I chose to play a musical piece with the movie because I felt that it suited the tone of the movie and the lack of words did not distract the viewers. The Hip Hop violin style was intense but playful at the same time. I would listen to this sound while running or warming up for a game, which I think suites the athletic wear at the end.

I am happy with the two finished products. Although I do think my first two projects were ore successful, I am proud of myself. I think I am less satisfied with this project because as an artist I like physical objects and works I can display more so then a movie. Yet, I do know that this movie as well as the scarf will help me as an artist while applying for internships.

Stepping back from my own work as a third party viewer I think I would see the animation as successful. I may say that it is too short and that I would want to see more clothing mock ups. I would notice the synchronization of the sound effects with the images as well as the music. I would also think that the scarf was interesting. It is not a normal looking scarf. It is a far more interesting design not like I had seen before. Usually scarfs are solid colors or very recognizable objects like feathers. This one has shaped that may appear familiar and I may try and connect with a previous memory, but unable to do so.

I think that even though this project I did not produce as compelling and successful of work as in the past, I did work very hard at it. I managed to create an animation from two programs I was unfamiliar with, as well as creating a physical object like I had never done before. Also, I completed this assignment on time and was ready to go 9:00 this morning. I am always prepared and finished before the due date. I take pride in my work and make sure it is completed and presentable on the due date. I think I deserve a high B for the finished products and an A+ on effort and time. 

the scarf I created

final project

I am using this as a portfolio style work.

It shows the source of my organic designs from their photo origin to their digital design after.

I wish to use this while applying for an Under Armour internship. I am in love with the company and brand and think my artwork would be a nice addition to their clothing lines. A more artistic side to the clothing.

Artist research #3

Artist research on Takashi Murakami

            Takashi Murakami is a Japanese artist dealing with sculpture, digital media, performance and even factory-produced textiles. He is a well-trained artist receiving degrees in Art from The Tokyo National University of Fine Arts. He is world renowned and especially famous in Japan.” Takashi Murakami's work has been exhibited in prestigious museums all over the world, including the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; and a recent solo retrospective exhibition at the Bard College Museum of Art”  In class specifically we have seen two of the ads he worked on as well as a few sculptures. “In 2000, Murakami curated an exhibition of Japanese art titled Superflat, which acknowledged a movement toward mass-produced entertainment and its effects on contemporary aesthetics.” It seems like in all his work I have viewed there is a mass production, industrialized side to it. He is most famously known for his collaboration with Marc Jacobs to create hand bags for Louis Vuitton.

http://www.takashimurakami.com/biography.php 

            He is known for his main character Mr. Dob. This character appears in many of his works digitally and in physical form. This character as well as others appear in the line he created for Loius Vuitton and in the advertisements for the new hand bags. The New York times reported in 2003 that the handbags were flying off shelves and that the supply was not keeping up with the demand. “Waiting lists in stores from San Francisco to Berlin still number in the thousands, and People magazine recently lamented (or celebrated?) the fact that the only humans who actually seem to be able to get their hands on his totes which sell for more than $5,000 apiece are ‘A-listers’”. Murakami was not exactly happy with all the hype that had happened as a result of his collaboration. He saw himself as an artist not as a fashion designer or hand bag maker. He was quoted by the New York Times saying:  "I need to rebuild the wall between the commercial art and the fine art I do," he says. "I need to focus on the fine-art side of me for a while." He knew that his new found fans knew him as a hand bag designer, not as the artist he wanted them to know him as.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,452870,00.html

I find this very interesting because even though he was a famous artist prior to the collaboration, the Louis Vuitton gig made him famous world wide. He even thought that his artwork was selling for too much now that it was not worth that much. He enjoys being an artist not a fashion designer and seems to me like he is not in it for the money. I myself have been struggling with the whole idea of doing art for me and doing art to put food on the table so to speak.

Murakami’s sculptures and artwork is very striking when first viewed. It seemsto appear childish at first but when looked at more closely you begin to see the puns and darkness of his work. Big bubble characters with large eyes and bright appealing colors eat other helpless characters in the scene. Or a sculpture of an anime looking man holding on to his genitalia and a stream of white spiraling around the person. Although his work appears to be geared toward children because of the colors and bubbly figures, it is not something I would show my eight year old sister. The New York Times said “Murakami purposely engineers a neo-Pop Art universality to his work, making his art both effortlessly accessible and intellectually provocative an ingenious feat. His sometimes sincere, usually ironic, often disturbing plays on the empty smiles and bright colors of cartoon cute are designed to appeal to the preteen in Tokyo”. I wonder if the preteens in Tokyo have seen his sculptures of anime people such as “Hiropen”?

http://www.takashimurakami.com/art.php

I like his work but also am still trying to figure out a lot of it. I also like working with very bright vivid colors. I know that bright colors are often associated with children and pre-teens, but I still use them. I am not directly trying to target that age group with my art and I feel that Murakami is not either. I am also getting in to the fashion side of art more recently and Murakami is best known for his collaboration with Louis Vuitton. I wish to target a different type of fashion. Rather then a $5,000 handbag that only “A-listers” can get their hands on, I would like to design graphics that will go on athletic clothing. Under armour my main inspiration.

Murakami seems to be a very interesting person and artist and I do want to explore further into his different types of work and see what he will come up with next.  

revised rant

So revised idea: scarf printed with white moss print.

continue with the after effects
- light streaks coming in
-light streak saturating photo
-moss image
-shapes showing in to design
-designs on clothing

good portfolio style

final project rant

So I am thinking as of now to create a new ID design from a macro photo much like I did from the last project. Then compare that design to the light design I created and the moss one that I put on a white background. I want to print two scarves and hang them like a tapestry on the walls for presentation. Also, I had the idea of projecting the original photos on the scarfs for the crit. I don't know if I will have time to do all of this though so it is a work in progress.

projects

Research: Daniel Vosovic

     Daniel Vosovic although not what all may consider as an artist, is rather a fashion designer who has taken his work to the next level by incorporating textures inspired by photographs. Vosovic is a Michigan native and graduated from FIT. Most people may recognize him from Project Runway, the second season. He was a favorite then and a full career bloomed out of the reality show. He now engages in art direction as well as working in New York design houses and creating his own fashion collections. He has also written a book titles “Fashion Inside Out”. He launched his first own collection in February of 2012. This collection is where I based my research. source1

I first found information on Daniel Vosovic while looking at the First 2 Print website. This is a website that prints in mass quantities designs onto fabric. The description on First2Print.com describes simply that his collection “exemplifies the possibilities of using artistic photographic imagery created as a textile prints”. The print the site was speaking about was for the Fall/Winter collection of 2010. This was his first full women’s’ collection. He was inspired for this collection while walking through a NYC park on night. He observed the effects of time and nature on the elements of the statues and sculptures. He was exploring the idea of creative destruction. “Vosovic created completely original prints and embroideries derived from studying the aging process of oxidized copper, broken marble, and other materials in various stages of transformation.” The dresses appear to be direct prints of the photographs. He accentuated the fashion clothing by his presentation of them all. He placed the models on plain white pedestals while playing nature films in the background. Source 3

In his Spring 2011 collection he also started experimenting with digital printing again, to create what looked like an abstract print was actually a close-up photo of wolf fur, deer fur, burnt ash, and wood. He focused a lot on natural textures and made them “fashionable”. Source 4

I even surprised myself how I found an “artist” that was doing something so similar to what I did for this last project. He was inspired by the textures he saw in nature and created fabric out of these macro images. I did come up with my idea on my own prior to even knowing that fashion designers were doing this also. I took photos of highly textural objects within nature and rather then printing them in photograph form onto fabric, I made them digitally traced images. The end result of his work and what I would like to do with my work is the same, fashion. His is high class NYC fashion and the output I would like is Athletic clothing, but it is still textiles.

I am only going to analyze the fabric itself because I know nothing about high-class fashion styles. The fabrics he created were very interesting. Although, while looking at them I can tell that they are a photo or relate closely to a photo, I could not recognize and pinpoint exactly what the photo was of. Using the texture of oxidized and weathered statues is very out of the box and conceptual. Also, the use of wolf fur in his 2011 collection is even more interesting because it correlated with humans. We wear closes for warmth and wolves have fur as their “clothing”.

 

part two of project 2 self assessment

Self- Assessment

Project 2

Part 2

            The overall purpose of this portion of project two was all about experimental output. Since I have taken this class before, I knew a decant amount about some of the techniques. I knew a lot about super sauce and I knew that I wanted to steer clear of that technique for this project. I wanted to try something new and push my limits. While in Italy this past summer I became obsessed with textures. The natural textures in this world are amazing and so rich. I then after returning from Italy came up with this wild idea that combined my love for athletic clothing and my art. I had the idea to take up close macro images of natural textures and patterns found in our world and to convert them into digital representations. To then recolor these images to create designs similar to those found in athletic clothing, especially spandex material.

            Recently in the last year or so my overall theme of my work and focus, whether intentional or not, has focused around “Seeing that the eye cannot see”. Mainly I have been using my camera and its mechanical abilities to create art that shows viewers those things out eyes cant. My inspiration for this series that I have yet to name comes from many different areas of my life. I am seeing the world differently ever since my concussion and since I spent a month in Italy. I am more in tune with the world and with the shapes I see in life. I have ideas flying at me left anf right and it seems almost everything I see is inspiring and adjusting my art in some way or another. I have been thinking about these types of art for a few months now. I knew what I wanted to create and I knew a general idea of how to make it but I had yet to conduct the steps I needed to complete this project.

            My process started with my root focus in photography. I first photographed the bottom of one of my pet turtles. I am amazed by the patterns created in their shells and skin. I have three pets and have come in contact with over ten Diamondback Terrapins and amazingly every single one has been different. No two that I have seen in life or in pictures look alike. Each one has their own designs and patterns. I find this fascinating and knew that these natural patterns would make really interesting graphics. So I photographed the bottom of one of my turtles. I then converted the image to black and white and increased the definition as well as the contrast. This made the silver/tan shell appear whiter and the dark grey/black markings even deeper black. I then loaded this image into Adobe Illustrator. I live traced the image and set it to the default setting which creates a black background and the once black marking are not white and closed paths. It is then that I select each path individually and recolor it to my liking. I chose to work with only three colors and black because I felt if I used more colors that it would create a graphic that was too busy and no longer aesthetically pleasing. For this image I chose female oriented colors. It did not take too long for me to figure out the process and how to work in illustrator. What took me longer was trying to figure out how to make the remaining white paths, turn black. Once I figured this out, I was done. I printed out test prints and placed them on my wall, I also made the graphic my backdrop on my computer and phone. This is a technique I use often when I print tests of works. I am then forced to see the works and stare at them analyzing them multiple times through out the day. This is how I discover if I am done or not. After a few days of staring and analyzing the test prints, I was happy and ready to make it to the next step.

 I decided from the start that I wanted to print on the stretchy fabric. Although not like the spandex that I imagine my graphic to be printed on practically, this fabric is very interesting. Once printed, I taught myself through experimenting and trial and error how to construct a canvas wrap out of the printed fabric. It was surprising very successful and looked professional enough for me to be pleased and content. I hung it on my wall and honestly stared at it for a few hours while doing homework and I was still pleased and loving it so I knew I made the right choices.

A few days later I was walking around and saw this moss like plants growing on the brick wall on the way to Anne Arundel. I though it may make an exciting graphic so I took an up close photograph and followed the same process as before. With this image I finally learned more specifically how to convert the illustrator document into Photoshop and make a plain black background. Once in Photoshop, I could move the colored shapes around in order to create a new overall lay out. I took a very portrait orientation image and made it circular and squared off. I printed this the same way on the stretchy fabric but the printed decided to go crazy and mess up over half the print. So I had to improvise and only use part of the overall image. I created a much more panorama landscape looking canvas wrap.

From this project I learned even more about Illustrator and Photoshop then before and I learned how o create a canvas wrap. I also learned what textures can and cannot be created into art this way. My work habits were different then in the past. Since, I have a Macbook Pro now with the Adobe creative suite. I have the products I need that I once had to walk to the Mac Lab for. I like being able to work from home and whenever I want. It is less stressful and I am able to jot down or fix a little thing whenever I want. Much like in the remix project I feel like I spent less time then I have in the past on this project but I say I spent about 15 hours in total on this project.

             I am extremely happy with my two graphic prints and will absolutely reprint these images as well as create more. I think this project has lead me in a direction that will not only help with my SMP but also in looking for internships and jobs in the future.

            When people see my images I want them to wonder what they are and what they are pictures of. People who have already seen them hanging on my wall in my house have already been asking what they are. Most guess that the large work is of a turtle’s belly. No one has guessed the moss one though. I have to tell them. I think in the pure nature of the fabric and the graphic design of it people will image it on clothing. Yes, it is presented as a canvas wrap but with as much clothing and advertisements we are exposed to today, I think people will make the connection. Formally the colors in contrast with the black background create a compelling image that supports that it is not a photo but rather a graphic. Aesthetically the color combinations just fit and compliment one another well. A downfall to these pieces is the transparency. I want to create more and print on thicker fabric more closely related to those that clothing is made out of.

            As I have already said before, I am actually very pleased with my work and my effort level matched with my creativity and end product. It all played out well and I think I have created some of the best art works I have ever made and I am thoroughly inspired to create more in the future. I again think I deserve an A plus.