Programcessing

Posted this on my other blog Programcessing this had made me think about me as a designer.

Karsten Schmidt from Etapes on Vimeo.

Use Graphic design as a tool



Grégoire Alix-Tabeling
the “Territoires en Résidences” project

“I am developing “communication design” during my master in the RCA. After a graduation at the ENSAD in Paris I decided to focus on the investigation coming before any brief for graphic design, and use graphic design as a final tool if necessary. A communication designer should be working in collaboration with all types of creator as designers, scientist and politics in order to extract a brief of a situation or a specific context. The “Territoires en résidences”is the perfect example.

Temporary internet

http://temporary.cc/




Temporary.cc explores the idea of how impermanence can be surprisingly meaningful in this context; with each unique visitor, the site destroys a part of itself and will eventually become a blank white page. The idea is that the site constantly exists in a state where it cannot be archived or experienced in its current form except in the very moment.

Some more good advice...

http://www.ixd101.com/

Especially this bit

Butcher's paper is your friend

Lay it around your desk as you work. Take notes, draw little diagrams. Draw screen mock-ups. Pin them on the wall. They won't get lost like pages in your notebook if they are visible in your workplace. Additionally, your process and progress will be visible to other teams.

Colour Theory

#1 It Affects your Mood

mood_colour

Most of us have a favourite colour or prefer some colours over others. This is because can affect our moods so we surround ourselves in the colours that have a positive impact on our mood.

Red can boost your energy, yellow often makes people feel happier, and blue is proven to bring down blood pressure and slow your heart rate which is why it is often associated with being relaxing. If you combine the happiness of yellow and the relaxing feel of blue you get green, a very pleasing colour for many people.

Mental health units are known to use pastel tones on their walls so that patients feel calm, happy, and relaxed. Walls that are beige with a pink tint combined with mint green floors are a popular combination as it is said to create a soothing, harmonious and calm area. At the other end of the spectrum, literally, schools tend to user bright colours that appeal to children.

When choosing colours for your next design it is important to consider how they will combine and sit with the other elements on the page and what impact that will have on the mood of your audience.
#2 Colours Communicate Invisibly

Wassily Kandinsky was one of the first pioneers of colour theory. A renowned Russian painter and art theorist, he is often considered the founder of abstract art. Kandinsky believed the following colours communicate the following qualities:

* Yellow – warm, exciting, happy
* Blue – deep, peaceful, supernatural
* Green – peace, stillness, nature
* White – harmony, silence, cleanliness
* Black – grief, dark, unknown
* Red – glowing, confidence, alive
* Orange – radiant, healthy, serious

#3 Colour has Cultural Significance

Different colours mean different things in different places. This is extremely important for designers to know because without an awareness of the cultural significance of a particular colour, you risk offending your entire target audience.

Purple for example is a colour of mourning in Thailand. In western culture however, it is associated with royalty, luxury, wealth and sometimes magic. The brand colour for Thai Airways is purple. On first glance this seems like a huge error on their part because as mentioned above, purple is a colour of mourning in Thailand.

It is most likely however, that the Thai Airways website isn’t aimed at locals but at tourists, therefore if westerners view the site and see purple it will associate Thai Airways with values such as luxury and comfort.

Other examples are:

* In western cultures black is a colour of mourning
* In Japan however it is a colour of honour, with white the colour of mourning
* Red in the west represents danger, love, passion
* In India it is a colour of purity, in China it is a colour of good luck and in South Africa it is a colour of mourning
* Yellow represents courage in Japan, mourning in Egypt and hope in the West

#4 Colour can be Inspired by our Surroundings

brown_nature

We live in a colourful world, a world that acts as the perfect inspirational trigger for design. The best thing about looking to the environment for design solutions is that the palette is always changing, from autumnal oranges to cold winter blues. So where better to look than out of your window, take in the colours and then apply them to your designs.

Drawing inspiration from nature for your designs also makes you look at the world differently. Normally we whiz by from place to place but you notice the finer details and undiscovered gems when you actually stop to take it in.
#5 Colour has Political Associations

colours_politics

Individual political parties are associated with one colour or another. Depending on whom your audience is, this might prove to be valuable information when designing.

The association between political parties and colours isn’t a new connection but it is often taken for granted. In the UK for example the following pairings exist:

* Labour – Red
* Conservative – Blue
* Liberal Democrats – Yellow
* The Green Party – Green

If a colour is representative of a political party then the values and behaviours that the party is known for can be suggested through the use of this colour.

* Red is often linked to socialism and communism
* White has links to pacifism and the surrender flag. In contrast to this, black is a colour that is used in conjunction with anarchism.
* Working class Nazism is associated with the colour brown as the SA were known as the ‘brownshirts’.

A design with one of these colours as the dominant shade may well hint at a right wing or a left wing preference or at extreme behaviours.
#6 Religion can be Linked to Colours

orange_monks

As with politics, colours are representative of certain religions. So as not to unintentionally offend anyone through your designs, some examples of these colour/religion associations are:

* Green is considered to be the holy colour of Islam
* Judaism is represented by the colour yellow
* In Hinduism, many gods have blue skin
* White is linked to peace across many religions

Again this may only be necessary information if you are designing a site that has specific links to religion but it also emphasises that a thorough knowledge of your audience is a fundamental part of the design process.
#7 Age Affects People’s Colour Preferences

Colour expert Faber Birren carried out many studies into this area and in his book Color Psychology and ColorTherapy, he states that for both genders, blue and red “maintain a high preference throughout life”. He found that yellow is popular with children but as become move into adulthood it shows less popularity. Birren found that “with maturity comes a greater liking for hues of shorter wave length (blue, green, purple) than for hues of longer wave length (red, orange, and yellow)”

Another factor that influences people’s colour preferences is that throughout their life there will be social and cultural changes and this can directly impact on their favourite colours. Some knowledge of what colours certain age ranges prefer can be valuable for designers. If you were designing a website for a toy store or a children’s TV channel, then knowing they prefer bright colours and yellow in particular would help with your design decisions.

Likewise, if you designed a website for a charity whereby the audience was to be the older generation then blue, green or purple might be ideal, based on Birren’s findings.


http://carsonified.com/blog/design/color/how-colour-communicates-meaning/

7 Steps for Systematizing The Design & Build Process

http://www.noupe.com/design/systematizing-the-design-build-process.html

Some good advice

Don’t Make The Switch

Most freelancers start freelancing part-time and stick with it while holding a full-time job. The key reason for this is to make sure there is a regular income you can count on. However, many freelancers get so excited about “being their own boss” and “choosing their own hours” that they end up making the switch without adequately planning their finances. The first and foremost thing that you shouldn’t do while starting out as a freelancer is quit your day job prematurely. This is one of the most repeated points and the reason is simple: you need to make sure your freelance business can support you before you quit your job. If you are new to freelancing and just starting out, hold on to your day job for months, and in some cases years. Do not quit your day job unless you are 100% sure you can earn a living solely on your freelance income. If you find it difficult to manage, take a look at this article for a few tips for freelancing with a full-time job.

Don’t Give Into Temptation

When you start freelancing you’ll see that there are a lot of temptations to deal with. You might want to setup your home office with new computers and furniture just to make it look cool. Heck, you might be doing it just to get yourself seen on Gizmodo. Whether it’s the new gadgets, thousand dollar ergonomic chair or another monitor, make sure there is a legitimate need before diving into these expenses. Keep those temptations in check, it’s better to hold on to that money just in case your freelancing income takes a nose dive next month. That’s the thing about freelancing, sometimes you never know. Hold on to temptations and spend only on things that are a must for you to run your freelance business. Do not give in.

Don’t Be Too Friendly or Personal

This is another one of those things that many new freelancers get sucked into. A new freelancer usually gets excited when landing their first client and may feel that he/she needs to be extra friendly. Friendly is good, but over friendly isn’t. Many new freelancers get a little too comfortable with their clients and may share personal problems among other things. The client might stay while the contract lasts, but a lack of professionalism may eventually drive them away. As a freelancer, you should be friendly but a relationship is always better as a client and freelancer. Do not wreck the client-freelancer relationship by being too personal.

Don’t Forget To Create a Plan

Just because you will be working from home, setting your own hours, and without anyone to answer to doesn’t mean you don’t need a plan for your business. Many freelancers start out great during their early years as freelancers and then fail later on because they didn’t create a plan. Make sure you have a detailed plan that will give you an idea of how you will grow your freelancing business down the road, how you plan to land new clients, and so on. This is one of those critical things that your freelancing business will depend on. Do not forget to create a plan for your freelancing business. Just like any other businesses, a plan for freelancing is a must.

Do Not Procrastinate

Procrastination is a freelancer’s biggest enemy and should be avoided at any cost. As a freelancer you have the luxury of choosing when and where to work, and although this is one of the best outcomes of freelancing, it can also be one of the biggest challenges. Make sure you stay clear from procrastination. I have personally seen many freelancers lose out on some of the biggest gigs simply because they procrastinated and the job was either not completed on time or was not up to what was promised. Do not procrastinate, and make sure to get ahead in the game by doing things when they needs to be done.

http://freelancefolder.com/what-not-to-do-when-starting-out-as-a-freelancer/

Bigger than Barry.

I have been doing the designs for Bigger than Barry in Leeds.

Picture 3

6thoctober.indd

20thoctober.indd

27thoctober

3rdnovember

10thnovember

17thnovember

24thnovember

Addicted to the internet



Maybe I need to go to reStart 'an internet addiction recovery program'. I love the internet no denying it, so I took the test and apparently there is 'possible abuse'.
Its also a place for 'Treatment for internet, gaming, texting & video game excessive use'. Maybe its just a place for the mtv, blogging, social networking generation then?

I want to see this film

ART & COPY Trailer from ART & COPY on Vimeo.

Romain Laurent



Some really interesting work from Romain Laurent especially the tilt photography.

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog



I decided to make a fully functioning font yesterday. I wanted to take elements from some of my favorite fronts. Avenir, belwe mono and the dazed and confused font.
I wanted to make s sleek font using circles and lines with a low x height. I don't kow what to call it yet , its not completely finished as I haven't done any numbers, which I would like to do.

Creative Writing with Charlie Dark


Last Saturday I went to a creative writing workshop, I went with the intention to help me get in the mood for writing my dissertation. The workshop leader was Charlie Dark a dj/musician/poet/writer. It was a 4 hour workshop where we had to write about our favorite place, then refine it, then perform it. It was a creative writing workshop but it kind of became a confidence and networking workshop. I do feel a bit less scared about writing because I always associate writing with school work and essays and exams and I'm not good at it, but the workshop freed me up a bit to be a bit more comfortable. But one of the most important things that came from it was to be confident when presenting your work full stop. He said you have to be confident becuase if you come across badly when presenting your work all that time that went into your work would have gone to waste. He also said that if you want anything done do it yourself, makes sense.

Better late than never...

A bit late but here are most of the business cards that I picked up over the graduation show period. The reasons why I picked up the cards were either that I liked the persons work or their business card was attractive or unusual.

The blue ones on the right were the standard Brighton business cards and on the back they had individual circular stamps that represented them.

This is Camberwell's fold out deck of cards book with each card being a different student.
These are mostly from RCA some amazing things going on there.

Life in the UK.

Recently I have come across a couple of people that have taken or are taking the Life in the UK test, to gain British citizenship. In order to become a UK citizen you have to pass the 24 question test on subjects like these::

Migration to Britain

Children, family and young people

Population

The regions of Britain

Religion and tolerance

Customs and traditions

How the United Kingdom is governed

Housing

Services in and for the home

Money and credit

Health

Education

Leisure

Travel and transport

Looking for work

Equal rights and discrimination

At work

Working for yourself

Childcare and children at work

And answer them in the time limit of 45 minutes. Once you pass that you have to attend a ceremony where you sing the national anthem and get accepted at a British citizen.

Well I want to take this and create my own test of brithishness a test of what I perceive as British culture being a mixed race person among thousands of others.

Summer time...

Well a lot has happened since I finished my second year, I was shortlisted for the digital category for the Brahm Sh! Awards, went for an interview which was a useful experience because I'm useless at interview situations. It also helped me reflect on my work and realize that most of it is just a learning process and the feedback that I got was that I should just concentrate on a specific area, but I enjoy doing everything. Anyway I didn't win anything. I have yet to get any responses for internships. And I am scared about being bored over the summer as I rejected a holiday in Malaysia to gain some experience over the summer, but I'm still contacting people and hopefully something will come along.

So far I have been to most of the degree shows to look at the competition. And these are some of the best bits.

St Martins fashion and marketing - Best business cards and promotion.

St Martins mens fashion - Good business cards and interesting clothes.

St Martins Graphic Design, Illustraion, advertising. Was Ok, was expecting more, my favorite piece was an accelerometer controlled doll game.

Chelsea Graphic design - Very impressive the overall exhibition had a lot of thought put into it only problem was they only showed the best work, which is a bit harsh considering the amount of money the course costs.

Brighton Graphic and illustraion - I saw the London show they did, by far my favorite show, the space was good and the work was consistent and had a similar style some very strong graphic work.

Camberwell illustration - exhibition poster.

RCA - MA communication design - the experimental design was amazing there were many arduino projects which strengthens my argument that arduino should be taught at art college.

There were probably more but I cant remember right now, I'll put some photos up later of the business cards that I collected. and some links if I can find them.

Arduino Physical Computing 101.

So I went to the Arduino 1 day workshop last week and really enjoyed it. I had never previously used a micro controller (Arduino) before and found it really interesting due to the possibilities with what you can do with it. I don't think that I have touched a breadboard or played with electronics since my GCSE's. And I have a very basic understanding of java. But it was fine it was a basics workshop aimed at beginners although there were some very experienced people from all kind of backgrounds me also being the youngest there. One of the guys helping out used to work on the movement of eyes of the puppets for the Jim Henson Company which was cool.

Any way for 60 squid I got an Arduino (Duemilanove) a breadboard a bag of wires and a bag of resistors and sensors which consist of switches, light sensitive resistors and a tilt switches.



The Arduino itself is quite aesthetically pleasing, it is well made and quite solid.



The name came from a local bar in Italy, where it is made and this is made quite obvious on flip side of the micro controller.



The practical side of the workshop started off by making an LED blink and controlling the speed of the blink, and throughout the day it got a bit more complicated with more complicated circuits and using different sensors. But overall it was really interesting to see what it could do first hand and that there is a different way of thought bringing things away form the screen and in to the real world.

One of the many basic things that I have managed to do is to light 3 LED's red,green and blue alternatively and controlling the speed.



At the moment I am trying to hack a cheap clock that I bought from poverty aid, I want to make it tick fast slow and backwards and use it for a project.

I'm also reading this:



and listening to this:

ALVA NOTO AND RYUICHI SAKAMOTO - UTP

weyyyyyyy

New website up and running, not quite finished though, but I'm linking it so it will hopefully come up in google.

www.samputera.co.uk

The Maker II

This is basically what I'm going to write my dissertation on. About Existing outside commodity culture and the subculture of The maker and how this could effect the future of design.

'Design doesn't meet the needs of people but meets the needs of manufacturers to sell to people' Papanek.

Dissertation

I was planning on continuing my essay on 'the need to ecologically intelligent design'. But I think I'm kind of bored about that now and don't think that I have enough enthusiasm to be able to write a million words on. So I have been thinking about other topics that I could write about. I thought about doing my dissertation on 'The Maker'. Because is it something that I am becoming very interested in and also I may be able to incorporate some of the ecological design in to it.

Vince Collins

A 1960's psychedelic animator, quite ahead of his time some amazing visuals.





A electronic musician and a vj have used these animations for performances



If I was vj'ing I dont really like the idea of using other peoples visuals for my performance, Id rather have my own stuff, although if you look at vj'ing like dj'ing its is using other peoples work I guess.

C4D+AE

Spike c4d + after effects from Sam Putera on Vimeo.



I took the alpha channels from c4d and put them in after effects and added a blur, glow, and glass effect probably something else but I cant remember.

As Found

As Found

"The Image as it is.
As-Found is our creative response to the trillions of images available on the Internet.
The ‘As’ in As-Found stands for the perfection we perceive in these images. These images, as they have been found, are perfect in our eyes, and we want to showcase them here, giving them a new space in which to be contemplated. Showing them in the context of this site gives them new value.
We often choose images for different qualities than those which were intended to be seen. Therefore the creator is often irrelevant.
If the image has been made by a contemporary artist we don’t want to know about it, because images created with multiple interpretations in mind are useless to us.
We think that a found image can match any image produced within the artistic field, in aesthetic, cultural or emotional qualities.
Our tools have become a significant part of the process as we are able to see further, dig deeper, collect faster and see exponentially more.
Finding is creating."

Plans

This is a quick storyboard for my animation. Doesn't look like much but it looks a hell of a lot better in my head.

Most of it is going to be black and white except for the scribble there which will be this...

(insert video here from vimeo when it is finished being converted, really tempted to get a pro account)


(actually have a picture for the moment)

...but it will be extremely colourful instead of test gray.

I have decided to make it half with Cinema 4d and half with After Effects because I will be able to get much better results and better control over the animation.

1.0

The submission for the OneDotZero gives a few guidelines on what is needed for the submission.

List:

On a playable DVD
. - A preview of my short film / animation.

On a cd
. - A preview movie file, no larger than 100mb saved with extensions .mov /.avi / .mp4
. - Aselection of a minimum of 4 hi-res print quality stills (300dpi, at least 10cm)
. - Brief synopsis (approx 50 words about techniques, software, inspiration)
. - Biography (approx 50 words eg where I studied.

DEADLINE 29TH MAY

I plan to have this all done by the 27th.

This made me think about how to actually format my final moving image, I have never really made a dvd of specific moving image so I had no idea of what resolution to make my animation what frame rate what aspect ratio nothing really, all I was learning was how to make the animation, not how to physically produce it.

So I did some research so that I don't have to leave it to the last minute. I used videohelp to find what I needed to know.

PAL (25 frames/second)

Video:
Up to 9.8 Mbps* (9800 kbps*) MPEG2 video
Up to 1.856 Mbps (1856 kbps) MPEG1 video
720 x 576 pixels MPEG2 (Called Full-D1)
704 x 576 pixels MPEG2
352 x 576 pixels MPEG2 (Called Half-D1, same as the CVD Standard)
352 x 288 pixels MPEG2
352 x 288 pixels MPEG1 (Same as the VCD Standard)
25 fps*
16:9 Anamorphic (only supported by 720x576)

Audio:
48000 Hz
32 - 1536 kbps
Up to 8 audio tracks containing Dolby Digital, DTS, PCM(uncompressed audio), MPEG-1 Layer2. One audio track must have MPEG-1, DD or PCM Audio.

Extras:
Motion menus, still pictures, up to 32 selectable subtitles, seamless branching for multiple storylines, 9 camera angles. And also additional DVD-ROM / data files that only can be read by computer DVD drives.

Total:
Total bitrate including video, audio and subs can be max 10.08 Mbps (10080 kbps)


* Mbps = million bits per second
* kbps = thousand bits per second
* fps = frames per second

AE

Really good tutorial site VideoCoPilot made me realise how powerful After effects was and that I have now decided to use it in conjunction with cinema4d.

Resourceful links

Motiongrapher
Mograph
cgart

Bounce

For this animation I went with a different method, instead of making the animation react to the sound I made the animation first and then the sound. I made the sound using the Max/Msp patch I made previously to create an organic random feel to the bouncing balls.

Bouncing Balls (with audio) from Sam Putera on Vimeo.

Visuals with sound

After seeing the advanced beauty showing and talk, I wanted to make audio reactive visuals for my submission to 'onedotzero'. This can be done with Cinema4d using something call the mograph sound effector. Hear are some of my tests from using it with a simple 4x4 beat.

Sound test 1 from Sam Putera on Vimeo.



I like this one its quite simple and I like the movement.

Sound test 2 from Sam Putera on Vimeo.



This one didn't work how I planned, it took about an hour just to render 3 seconds, which is ridiculous and while my computer is rendering I cant use it to do anything else because its using up all the cpu. And it becomes annoying when something you have been waiting for a long time doesn't work out how it was supposed to. This has made me realise about the complication and detail that goes into an animation, do i sacrifice detail for a more productive and efficient work flow?

Sound test 3 from Sam Putera on Vimeo.



Here I tried to move all of the cubes but only the bottom one worked.

Meatball

Here is the video that I didn't upload before but I compressed it so it fits.

Meatball from Sam Putera on Vimeo.



It was done using C4D, I used the 'worst fight ever glitch version' that I did as a texture fro displacement mapping and as a texture for colour, it Took 3:30hrs to render.
I submitted it for the Lunar night, which I got some feedback from Jack who runs it

"Thought your visuals were awesome man..especially ur more recent one..i really havent a clue how you've done it so im not really sure wat to constructively say about how to technically improve it. I would definately have liked to have seen more in a club environment because they both worked perfectly with any kind of music.

With the more recent one, how did you manage to incorporate faces in there? really cool! maybe if you brought other moving image into it such as motion graphics or organic film, create a whole scenery in which can be part of it could give another dimension to the work...like i say though i really dont know how manageable that would be because it looks really technical what you've done already."

Here is also a little test that I did before this one.

Melt from Sam Putera on Vimeo.



Looking back at this I think I prefer it.

Max/msp/jitter

I sat down last week and started to go through the help files in Max/Msp/Jitter(MMJ)(the only way that you actually teach yourself there are no books or websites that teach you the basics) which are really good, at first they are quite simple but they quickly become quite daunting. MMJ are 3 different programms within a program, it is a graphical interface where you patch up building blocks based on logic and it does what you patch it to do, its amazing.

Max - is the basic framework
Msp - For audio
Jitter - visuals

I read that is is probably best to learn in that successive order so thats how I started. It has taken me a week to get through the Max tutorials, and it is a very practical learning process so far from what I have learned I have made a random number generator that controls the MIDI in logic.



It has made making music a lot more interesting, and I am still going through the tutorials so eventually I can make sound and visuals with unlimited control.

~//x\\~

So far I have been documenting the research that I have been doing, practical as well. But I haven't really documented my learning process, and how I have made these things. In order to make these animations and graphics I need to understand the software that I'm using and in order to do that I taught myself using video tutorials, giving me a basic ground to work from.

Here is a list of the tutorials that I went through.

CINEMA 4D

Introduction

Introduction 0:54 1.5 MB
CINEMA 4D packages 0:42 0.9 MB
What's new in CINEMA 4D R10? 1:08 2.4 MB
How to use the exercise files 1:26 2.1 MB

1. Getting Started

Understanding the interface 3:16 5.5 MB
Working with the viewports 4:49 9.5 MB
Context-sensitive help 1:43 3.2 MB
Working with layers 3:52 5.4 MB
Using the Content Browser 9:10 16.6 MB
Managing a multi-document workflow 1:51 3.2 MB
Enhanced OpenGL 2:15 3.6 MB
Essential preferences 2:57 4.9 MB

2. Modeling Essentials: Structure

Modeling with Parametric primitives 11:38 19.8 MB
Modeling with Landscape, Figure, and Relief primitives 6:18 12.0 MB
Polygonal modeling project 1: Building a spoon 8:13 13.1 MB
Modeling with polygons, points, edges, and HyperNURBS 2:30 4.1 MB
Working with Default, Automatic, and Tweak modes 6:17 10.5 MB
Polygonal modeling project 2: Building a maze 5:27 9.6 MB
Understanding the object axis 2:06 3.5 MB
The Bridge tool 2:25 4.1 MB
The Brush tool 1:46 2.9 MB
The Close Polygon Hole tool 0:44 0.9 MB
How to create polygons 2:05 3.3 MB
The Iron tool 1:07 2.1 MB
The Magnet tool 1:44 2.7 MB
The Set Point Value tool 2:40 3.8 MB
The Slide tool 1:25 2.3 MB
The Bevel tool 3:59 6.9 MB
The Extrude tool 2:33 4.5 MB
The Extrude Inner tool 1:19 2.4 MB

3. Modeling Essentials: Functions

Arrange 3:05 5.6 MB
Center 1:27 2.6 MB
Connect 1:07 1.9 MB
Current State to Object 1:45 2.9 MB
Duplicate 6:15 10.7 MB
Transfer 1:17 1.7 MB
Randomize 1:53 3.2 MB

4. Modeling with NURBS

Modeling with Curves 3:13 5.6 MB
Modeling with Loft NURBS 5:29 8.3 MB
Modeling with Lathe NURBS 4:05 5.9 MB
Modeling with Sweep NURBS 3:13 5.3 MB
Modeling with Extrude NURBS 4:32 8.3 MB
Modeling 3-D text 4:29 8.1 MB
Modeling with Adobe Illustrator files 4:37 8.3 MB

5. Complex Modeling Tools

Deforming with Bend 3:41 6.3 MB
Deforming with Twist 2:17 4.0 MB
Deforming with Melt 2:11 4.2 MB
Deforming with Explode 5:15 9.3 MB
Modeling with Boolean 6:48 11.8 MB
Modeling with Symmetry 4:31 7.6 MB
Modeling with Array 2:19 3.9 MB

6. Creating Materials and Textures

Creating and applying materials 12:18 21.0 MB
Creating shadows with Ambient Occlusion 6:26 11.2 MB
Applying multiple materials to polygon selections 7:26 13.5 MB
Using the Texture and Texture Axis tools 4:38 7.8 MB
Using material projection methods 2:14 3.9 MB
Camera mapping 12:56 22.4 MB
Displacement mapping 5:53 10.7 MB
Using layered Photoshop files 4:40 8.4 MB

7. Painting Textures with BodyPaint 3D

Introduction to BodyPaint 5:11 6.9 MB
Understanding UV polygons 3:16 4.4 MB
Painting on multiple channels 3:49 5.1 MB
Layers and filters 3:31 4.8 MB

8. Creating and Styling Hair

Adding hair to a character 6:32 10.8 MB
Working with hair material 6:13 11.5 MB
Hair project 1: Creating a brush with hair 4:54 8.2 MB
Hair project 2: Creating a furry creature 6:00 11.1 MB
Hair project 3: Creating rope 11:19 20.1 MB

9. Lighting, Cameras, and Scene Objects

Light types 20:53 39.1 MB
Animating cameras 12:56 22.3 MB
Switching cameras with Stage Object 3:03 5.0 MB
Inverse Volumetric light 4:13 7.4 MB
Creating caustic effects 4:28 7.0 MB

10. Creating Skies

Creating amazing skies 6:04 11.2 MB
11. Rendering Essentials
Rendering essentials 8:56 14.8 MB
Rendering settings 19:41 31.7 MB
Multi-pass rendering 6:21 11.0 MB
Rendering cartoons with Sketch and Toon 9:49 17.1 MB

12. Animation Essentials

Animating with keyframes 5:37 10.2 MB
Automatic keyframes 3:13 5.5 MB
Animating along the spline 4:10 7.6 MB
Animating deformers 3:05 5.2 MB
Creating particle animations 10:16 16.7 MB
Particle forces 17:05 28.9 MB
Animating expressions with Set Driver and Xpresso 7:55 13.8 MB
Controlling animations in the Timeline 7:50 13.6 MB
Controlling animations with the F-Curve Manager 6:51 13.3 MB
Creating lip animation with Morphing 6:37 11.9 MB

13. MoGraph

Cloner objects 13:07 21.7 MB
Matrix objects and Target Effector 7:38 12.6 MB
Text objects 3:27 5.7 MB
Tracer objects 5:46 9.8 MB
Sound Effector 6:30 10.8 MB
Displacement Deformer 4:00 6.8 MB
Spline Deformer 5:03 8.5 MB

14. MOCCA 3

Working with Joints 7:04 13.2 MB
Character rigging 17:03 29.6 MB
Editing weight maps 10:50 18.5 MB
The Visual Selector 3:19 6.3 MB
Adding muscles 4:36 8.1 MB
Animating with Cappuccino 4:32 8.0 MB

15. Creating Cloth

Creating and animating cloth 10:59 17.9 MB
Belting and tearing cloth 7:00 12.1 MB
Cloth-to-cloth animation 6:29 10.6 MB
Creating character outfits with Dress-O-Matic 20:08 35.5 MB
Cloth project 1: Cloth text with hair 8:02 13.5 MB

16. Dynamics

Creating rigid body dynamics simulations 7:54 14.1 MB
Simulating dynamic velocity 10:14 20.6 MB
Simulating dynamic motors 9:10 15.9 MB
Simulating dynamic joints 3:57 7.0 MB

Conclusion

Goodbye 0:18 0.4 MB

That is about 10:30 hours of video. I didin't do this I one go it took me a few weeks and I would do it bit by bit doing a few tests along the way I skipped some parts that I didn't need to know like some of the character animation because I didn't want to animate characters.

Because I have become more interested in motion I felt it necessary to get to grips with After Effects so I have been making my way through these tutorials.

1. Introduction

Welcome 0:55 7.1 MB
What does this title cover? 1:14 0.8 MB
Using After Effects with other applications 2:20 1.8 MB
The importance of reference material 1:32 1.2 MB
Using the example files 1:12 1.2 MB
A note about the art 0:28 0.8 MB

2. Creating a Simple Project

Overview of the After Effects workflow 3:46 8.8 MB
Setting up a project 3:15 5.2 MB
Creating graphic elements from shape presets 3:16 5.5 MB
Creating animated text 4:22 6.0 MB
Animating a star 2:48 6.0 MB
Adding effects 6:24 6.6 MB

3. Project and Importing Essentials

Understanding the interface 5:01 8.5 MB
Saving the interface layout 2:45 3.0 MB
Understanding how After Effects projects work 3:36 3.3 MB
Importing files 2:58 4.0 MB
Browsing and importing with Bridge 4:49 7.7 MB
Importing images with transparency 3:06 4.6 MB
Using image sequences instead of video 3:38 5.5 MB
Organizing and searching in the Project panel 3:06 2.6 MB

4. Using Compositions and Layers

What is a composition? 3:30 3.1 MB
Adding imported items to compositions 2:47 4.2 MB
Understanding how layers work 3:16 5.8 MB
Managing multiple layers 5:42 8.9 MB
Blending layers together 2:54 5.2 MB
Aligning and distributing multiple objects 2:49 4.2 MB
Using layer and comp markers 3:59 5.4 MB
Creating layers from scratch in After Effects 3:57 5.8 MB

5. Creating Animation

Animating properties 6:54 5.2 MB
Animating the wizard's face with Position 8:18 8.1 MB
Previewing animations and portions thereof 3:32 6.1 MB
Adjusting the anchor point of the knight's arm 3:24 2.7 MB
Rotating the knight's arm 4:11 8.1 MB
Adjusting animations by moving keyframes 2:01 4.6 MB
Duplicating motions by copying keyframes 2:23 4.0 MB
Using the Puppet tool to animate the dragon 6:01 6.0 MB
Animating magical attacks with Scale 3:53 5.4 MB
Creating pauses in animation 4:49 9.7 MB
My favorite animation-related shortcuts 2:08 2.6 MB

6. Understanding and Editing Video

Understanding timecode 1:29 4.6 MB
Learning important video concepts 4:41 5.5 MB
Trimming or editing layers 3:56 11.0 MB
Trimming video before adding it to a comp 2:40 4.6 MB
Replacing edited footage 2:01 2.9 MB
Applying video transitions between clips 3:01 6.9 MB
Splitting layers of B-roll footage 2:17 5.4 MB
Slowing down and speeding up video 5:46 12.3 MB

7. The Power of Effects

A showcase of effects 0:58 2.1 MB
Applying effects 3:38 5.7 MB
Using Glow 4:33 8.2 MB
Creating infinite patterns and textures 6:35 14.9 MB
Creating the dragon's fire 5:03 9.1 MB
About the included Cycore effects collection 1:50 2.4 MB
Using blur effects 6:23 7.6 MB
Creating a galaxy scene from scratch 7:47 12.6 MB
Distorting objects with effects 4:07 4.7 MB
Creating waving wizard hair 1:36 1.9 MB
Blowing stuff up with effects 6:15 18.0 MB
Creating motion graphics elements from scratch 4:32 8.9 MB
Creating and using lens flares 2:39 4.2 MB
Creating the wizard's lightning bolts 4:17 8.1 MB
Viewing random variations with Brainstorm 4:43 7.1 MB
Getting help with effects 1:34 3.7 MB

8. Color-Correcting Footage

Brightening dark footage 3:48 6.9 MB
Changing colors in footage 3:54 5.7 MB
Colorizing black-and-white objects 5:31 11.6 MB

9. Creating and Animating Text

Creating text 3:41 5.2 MB
Formatting text 3:38 5.7 MB
Applying text animation presets 4:38 7.9 MB
Animating text manually 3:56 6.0 MB
Animating text in 3D 2:36 5.2 MB
Applying layer styles to text 3:35 6.4 MB

10. Creating Animated Digital Paint

Using the paint tools 11:23 19.7 MB
Animating paint strokes 3:48 6.5 MB
Animating growing vines 10:42 18.9 MB

11. Creating Animated Digital Drawings

Creating shapes with shape layers 3:00 4.5 MB
Modifying shape layers 4:26 7.4 MB
Combining shapes 2:10 2.0 MB
Creating multiple shapes instantly 8:12 15.8 MB
Browsing shape variations with Brainstorm 3:49 6.0 MB

12. Motion Paths

Understanding spatial interpolation 1:35 1.5 MB
Creating and adjusting motion paths 3:12 3.3 MB
Orienting moving objects along a path 1:59 5.1 MB
Drawing motion and timing with Motion Sketch 1:44 3.4 MB
Pasting motion paths from Illustrator 2:17 3.5 MB

13. Intermediate Animation

About temporal interpolation 1:41 1.3 MB
Easing keyframes 6:10 5.3 MB
Randomizing keyframes with the Wiggler 2:47 4.1 MB
Smoothing motion with the Smoother 2:37 2.9 MB
Linking objects with parenting 5:28 8.8 MB
Linking objects with expressions 3:54 3.7 MB
Fine-tuning animation in the Graph Editor 3:19 3.1 MB

14. Concealing with Masks and Keying

Masking out portions of objects with masks 5:54 9.7 MB
Masking objects with other objects 3:53 9.5 MB
Masking colors with keying 4:38 7.2 MB

15. Compositing 101

Understanding the basics of compositing 1:10 2.6 MB
Removing the green screen background 4:30 7.6 MB
Importing and combining the elements 3:58 6.8 MB
Fine-tuning the composite 5:47 9.5 MB

16. Stabilizing and Tracking Motion

Stabilizing shaky footage 5:47 12.1 MB
Tracking the motion in footage 4:30 9.2 MB
Connecting a fireball to the tracked object 3:04 7.2 MB

17. Working in 3D

Turning 2D layers into 3D layers 3:33 3.9 MB
Positioning layers in 3D space 4:28 4.4 MB
Creating lights and cameras 5:28 14.8 MB
Creating shadows 4:18 5.8 MB

18. Using Audio

The significance of audio 1:18 1.4 MB
Using audio in After Effects 2:38 2.5 MB
Creating audio markers 1:44 1.4 MB
Previewing and mixing audio 2:49 2.4 MB
Enhancing audio tracks with effects 5:17 4.3 MB

19. Linking Audio Volume to Animation Properties
Setting up the project 1:47 2.7 MB
Creating keyframes from audio amplitude 2:03 4.5 MB
Linking to keyframes with expressions 2:16 5.2 MB
Modifying the expressions 4:54 13.1 MB

20. Precomposing and Nesting Compositions

When do you precompose layers? 2:42 2.5 MB
Creating compositions from existing layers 3:46 5.0 MB
Navigating through compositions quickly 2:32 2.8 MB

21. Integrating with Other Adobe Applications

Using After Effects and Photoshop 6:53 8.4 MB
Using After Effects and Illustrator 2:35 2.9 MB
Using After Effects and Flash 3:02 5.8 MB
Using After Effects and Premiere Pro 4:08 7.4 MB

22. Exporting to Video and Media

Sending video for review with Clip Notes 6:43 9.7 MB
Rendering high-quality video 7:22 10.4 MB
Rendering compressed video 3:48 5.0 MB
Outputting with an alpha channel 3:50 6.9 MB
Rendering video for DVD and other media 3:04 4.1 MB
Creating video for mobile phones and devices 3:30 4.5 MB
Rendering multiple videos at once 2:01 3.0 MB
Rendering with the Adobe Media Encoder 1:56 2.0 MB

23. Bringing It All Together

Overview of the final project 1:06 3.5 MB
Adjusting color 7:24 14.5 MB
Adding motion graphics 6:42 16.5 MB
Adding a lower third 7:26 16.3 MB
Adjusting text animation presets 4:30 12.5 MB

24. Conclusion

Goodbye 0:10 0.3 MB

I have just started making my way through these, its really good for compression compared with CINEMA 4D.

Arduino



'Arduino is an open-source electronics prototyping platform based on flexible, easy-to-use hardware and software. It's intended for artists, designers, hobbyists, and anyone interested in creating interactive objects or environments.'

I'm really looking forward to doing the one day workshop, I have been wanting to learn it for a while. It is programmed using the same language as processing. There are so many thing that you can do with it.

They are even starting to teach children this, imagine what their generation are going to be capable of when they are my age?

Arduino the Cat, Breadboard the Mouse and Cutter the Elephant from hmt on Vimeo.



When I was 6 I thought it was amazing when you could print off a picture of a lion with your computer, internet wasn't even around then and now kids have grown up with programs like photoshop and the global information form the internet and learning basic programming at such a young age means they will be miles ahead by the time they are 21.

Leeds Web Festival



Going to get nerdy, its the Leeds Web Fest from 5th May - 3rd June. There is some good stuff going on.

14th May BASE Show and Tell Thursday 14th May, Leeds Met Gallery, 6pm

Iman Moradi the creator of the Glitch Browser will be talking about glitch aesthetics. Which I want to see.

29th May physical computing 101

I got my ticket for this, its a 1 day beginner workshop with Arduino

Ticket cost £60 so I hope that I get the hardware as well, if not I will buy it.

The Maker



"I'm not entirely sure what this terrific Dan Clowes cover for the May 11, 2009 issue of The New Yorker is supposed to be about, but I would like to think it's making the point that makers are going to leapfrog traditional industries that can't seem to get out of a rut that has helped cause the recession." (makezine)

I found this really interesting I have recently become obsessed with makezine There are so may people making amazing things making their imagination a reality and its very inspiring.

Maker Profile - Music Machines on Make: television from make magazine on Vimeo.



I think it gives way to a new way of thinking in a sense that almost anything is possible if you can think of it.

Ongoings

I have started reading Foundation Processing: Creative Coding and Computational Art
by Ira Greenberg, its the other processing book that is available.




Im not quite sure about it yet, its quite down to earth in the way that its quite casual but I kind of prefer Processing: A Programming Handbook for Visual Designers and Artists because its more like a text book that has exercises that you can practice as you go along, whereas Ira Greenberg's book is more about the history but I feel that its more about being creative with the processing program. I haven't finished either of the books yet so I cant give an in depth review but its my first impressions from someone with a basic understanding of processing.

There is another book available 'Visualizing Data: Exploring and Explaining Data with the Processing Environment ' but I haven't read good reviews about it.

void setup {

moiré (piano and organ) from defetto on Vimeo.



Very hypnotic and calming, it was made with a program called vvvv, its very similar to jitter but its just for windows, yuk!

Cryptic Nights.

I went to the universal everything & advanced beauty talk last night, it was a showing of the dvd 'advanced beauty' which is an 'ongoing exploration of 18 digital artworks born and influenced by sound, an ever-growing collaboration between programmers, artists, musicians, animators and architects.' And after the showing there was a q&a session with freeform (Simon Pyke) a musician and sound designer and Konx om Pax (Tom Scholefield) who was one of the 18 digital artworks.



Konx om Pax

Advanced Beauty from Konx-om-Pax on Vimeo.



Flight 404

Advanced Beauty Preview, Rework from flight404 on Vimeo.



And zhestkov

My favorite one watch it here

I spent most of the time trying to work out how each of the artists had made their work, a few of them had used processing, which means they wrote the code and let the audio create the visuals like flight 404, it is an organic process. Whereas Konx om pax hand drew his video and is completely and meticulously controlled.
I found he talk quite insightful especially on the topic of mixing audio and sound together. One of the questions is which is easier to put the visual to audio or or audio to visual, the answer was they are just as hard as each other.

New brief.

Im going to scrap brief no.1 because if I organise an event now I will be wasting time on organising it and not making visuals which is what is more important so I have decided to make an audio visual piece of work to submit to onedotzero.

"onedotzero_adventures in motion is acclaimed by artists, audiences and creative industry alike for being the world leader in audio-visual arts and entertainments at the forefront of a new experiential festival experience which combines music, film, play, live performance, interactivity, digital arts and culture."

So from now on I am going to concentrate on making this visual in time for submission and deadline.

Interactive planetary.

An interactive music video/ website for Black Moth Super Rainbow, its a really good idea. Watch it here


New video

Its too big to put on vimeo so here are a few screen grabs, took me 3 and half hours to render... just submitted it for the Lunar night so if you want to see it come down on monday.



Universal Everything.

http://universaleverything.com

Based in a log cabin studio in Sheffield, Matt Pyke is a painter, photographer, artist, curator, designer, animator, director, producer and lecturer

He formed Universal Everything in 2004 as an ever-growing collective of designers, programmers, musicians and artists.

The Guardian newspaper listed the studio as one of the Top 50 designers in the UK.

Matt has lectured to audiences worldwide including D&AD President's Lecture Series, Cambridge University and Apple stores across the USA.


Designing Seeds / Exhibition / SIAD Gallery, Sheffield from Universal Everything on Vimeo.


The Making of Forever / Victoria & Albert Museum from Universal Everything on Vimeo.

"Motivated by the pursuit of the new, creative research and development are central, leading to self-initiated pieces and unique projects for brands, galleries, collectors and consumers."

They do some amazing work and I would love to get some work experience with them but the problem is they don't really have a fixed studio.

Next week I am going to Glasgow to see the Advanced Beauty, and I am really looking forward to it.

"Advanced Beauty is an ongoing exploration of 18 digital artworks born and influenced by sound, an ever-growing collaboration between programmers, artists, musicians, animators and architects.

The collection is a series of audio-reactive 'video sound sculptures'. Inspired by synaesthesia, the rare sensory experience of seeing sound or tasting colours, these videos are physical manifestations of sound, sculpted by volume, pitch or structure of the soundtrack.

Curated by design studio Universal Everything and musician Freeform, Advanced Beauty is an international collaboration, taking in a family of artists from London, Russia, New York, Japan, Buenos Aires, Glasgow to San Francisco."

worst fight ever! glitched up

First test using the datamoshing technique. Although its called using compression artefacts according to David O'Reilly.

"First of all, datamoshing is an extremely lame title for the effect, it’s another attempt at branding a basic technique as something new and edgy, there really is nothing hardcore about removing keyframes from a video file. The title is and always has been using compression artefacts."



glitch test from Sam Putera on Vimeo.

Damn bloody good amazin'



Its soo good someone is going to rip it off soon...

here is a making of

Cinema...

Charles Huettner

What the what!?


Dalt Wisney from Charles Huettner on Vimeo.

"If you love Pixar, you will hate this." David O'Reilly

David has just become my new favorite artist, hes doing M.I.A's visuals at the moment and he worked on Son of rambo doing the illustrations and animations. Look at his vimeo


M.I.A Bang (original test) from David OReilly on Vimeo.

Datamoshing

Its a process where about you mash the moving frames of a video to create a really weird colourful mess, which has a really nice aesthetic to it.

This is the video where Mr kanyeezy was inspired.



kanye



Mr Hudson



And this is how you do it



I'm going to have a go at it right after I finish writing what feels like a million words.

Brief no.2

I was given a brief to do some designs for t-shirts the brief is quite open all i have to do is use the logo. And they might go in n-dubz new music video doubt it though.

Rationale:
(Why are you doing it? How does it fit with your own sense of development? What is your particular interest in this area?)

HoodTwinz is an up and coming clothing label, that is in need of designs for t-shirts.

Context:
(Where does the project fit in the real world?)

The t-shirts will be made with my designs and sold.

Brief:
(What exactly are you/is somebody else expecting you to do?)

Create t-shirt designs, must use current HoodTwinz logo somewhere on the T-shirt.


Partners/Key Stakeholders:
(Who else has an involvement or interest in what you are doing?)

The person I am designing them for and the people whom will be purchasing the clothes.

Outcomes:
(What exactly will you have, or will have happened, at the end of your project?)

I will have produced designs that can be printed on t-shirts.


Measures of success/evaluation strategy:
(How will you know how successful you have been? You can’t evaluate effectively unless you know what your aims were.)

If my designs are good enough to be used for the final product I will have succeeded with the brief. I can further know the success with the number of sales made.

Research:
(What do you need to find out to help you deliver the project?)

• Audience
• Current t-shirt designs for streetwear
• What can be printed on to a t-shirt