From
rAndom (
brilliant bastards behind the pixel-roller)
"The time probes were formed around the principle of an analogue clock. The first iteration of the probes were constructed out of a quartz clock movement, a clip board and piece of card with a task and a clock face. The tasks were a set of questions based around how people perceive their sense of time from a moment, a day or a lifetime...In certain tasks, the participant was asked to attach the second, minute or hour hand to the analogue movement and wait for a time in which they felt compelled to fill in the clock face. Other tasks simply asked them to look back in time or look forward and make plans"I liked this participant's idea of blocking time in terms of objects and tools used. Something interesting there...
MIT Blogs and Projects
I could spend hours and hours following MIT link trails. I am generally a pretty big fanboy (ahem....cheerleader...) of
The Media Lab and its particpants and
projects, as well as The
Aesthetics + Computation Group. These groups are, in my opinion, the "NASA" of product design. They get to create the bleeding edge of interaction in the abstract. They develop products and ideas that are unpolished, but set minds spinning about more concrete uses.
The
Toy Symphony was a Media Lab project constructing instruments and notation software, essentially without learning curves. The results are historic.
"
LittleVision: Storytelling in a Tiny World" was a class from Aesthetics + Computation group, where participants created pocket sized LED displays that loop webcam movies.
I have just only recently discovered their
Comparitive Media Studies group, through it I found these two great projects.
The "Branding Cultures" blogand
Project New Media Literacy "
The New Media Literacies project (NML) is working to integrate new media materials into compelling activities for K-12 students for use in or out of school." Perhaps one of the most important studies for the new century.
This is a great "podcast"(err.. mp3) interview about the
Pixar show at the MoMA in NY...
"...Exhibition co-curator Ronald Magliozzi talks with BusinessWeek contributing editor Andrew Blum about why Pixar belongs on MoMA's walls, and the very special media installation that's causing museum visitors to gasp..."
This interview explains how and why Pixar's work relates to the canon of animation and exactly how conceptual their process is. Whether or not you are a fan of the computer rendered final versions of Pixar work, you have got to see the "flat" conceptual process of the Pixar studio. Their 2d work is incredible! Also at some point in the exhibit a zeotrope is used to make a 19th century style animation of the conceptual work, an neat juxtapostion of animation techiniques.
The orginal artwork from these amazing books is a major component of the show...
The Art of Monsters IncThe Art Of Finding NemoThe Art Of The IncrediblesThe books do not feature a single still from the actual films, nor does the exhibit
Kozyndan my favorite cross continental romantically involved illustration team has crossed over to the not so obvious word of video games. Teaming up with the controversial celeberity game designer
America Mcgee, "Bad Day L.A." is a kind of GTA satire. You play as a homeless man struggling to survive a series of epic disasters. Sounds gruesome? Don't worry, the tounge and cheek style of Kozyndan runs throughout.
The
concept art page explains exactly how strikingly dissimiliar their style is to typical concept work
See a
video trailer and series of screenshots.
Looks pretty exciting, and after reading his blog and interviews with America Mcgee, it seems he is setting himself up to be a legitimate radical in such a stagnant industry.
I had that feeling of... "how could I have just found you now?" when I stumbled onto Swiss software artist Andreas Gysin's site.
His works are some of the most exciting, innovative, beautiful things I have come across.
Sky seems to be his most famous, and it does make for a pretty interesting homepage. Though I can't link to the rest of his works directly, they all vary quie a bit style and subject.
Mostly though I like his
links page it includes some classic favorite sites of mine. And introduced a whole lots of new stuff...
Like the
Evolved Virtual Creatures video from Made by Karl Sims in 1994
Also
Charles Csuri who creating virtual bio models in the 1970s!
I had seen
Sodaplay before, but was a afraid to post it until I had a better understaning of it myself. Basiclly, dots and lines and properties of physics are used in order to create moving creatures or designs. There is also a subculture who use the contstructure to make artificially "grown" amoeba which can crawl equally well. Its all really exciting stuff. I orginally found it through
Theo Jansen's site(also linked on Gysin's page).
One of those days when you most stand up and scream "WE ARE INVENTING THE FUTURE!"
The
actual research group from Carnegie Mellon
I like this more immidiate aspect of the theory...
"Even if claytronics doesn't immediately yield 3-D motion, it might be useful for producing 3-D shapes in the computer-aided design process, Goldstein said. Claytronics antennas could change shape to improve reception of different radio frequencies. A Claytronics cell phone might grow a full-size keyboard, or expand its video display as needed.
"It could be the ultimate Swiss Army knife," Mowry said."
via
Make
This is a project I have been working on with a fellow student. She is studying digital arts. It was inspired by your verbalized facsination with hypertext. It's not finished but, it's going on hold for a while, before we put the finishing touches on.
Click> FINAL
-ASHER
"Two years after the apocalypse that was called the Second World War ended Magnum Photos was founded. The world's most prestigious photographic agency was formed by four photographers - Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, George Rodger, and David "Chim" Seymour - who had been very much scarred by that conflict and were motivated both by a sense of relief that the world had somehow survived and the curiosity to see what was still there. They created Magnum in 1947 to reflect their independent natures as people and photographers, the idiosyncratic mix of reporter and artist that continues to define Magnum, emphasizing not only what is seen but also the way one sees it."
......
"Magnum In Motion editors blend powerful Magnum photography with audio commentary, text and graphics to create an immersive, engaging multimedia experience. Photographer commentary guides the viewer through the photo essay, while text and graphics provide additional information and enrich the viewing experience."Each of these explain the point of view of artistic photographers. They explain both the mudane and intersting details of what the experience of the photographer can be. The stories behind the really make some of these pictures.
Great site. Great use of flash. Hope you have to time to watch at least one of these essays.
A flash game where you must earn points to progress through a reading of Jorge Luis Borges story. The games are based on classics, and you switch games in a rapid ADD style. The creater/reader of the story has a great voice. This is a very interesting idea.
Via
this great list of art games
Jonathan Goldstein's Old Testament
Lately I have been obsessed with Jonathan Goldstein's(of
This American Life) reinterpretations of biblical stories. Eventually a "Bible" penned completely by Goldstein will be released. He contemporizes(a
word?) not the circumstances of the characters, but their emotions. It makes for some pretty interesting results. Note: these are links to full episodes with other stories...
Cain and Abel story is Act 1
Adam and Eve story is Act 3 (well worth the wait, its a great story and episode)
Joseph This is a flash animation of the story, which kind of ruins some of the more serious aspects of the stories. I recomend hiding the movie and just listening.
"Design Innovation Awards (DIA) — is the independent Russian award, which is granted for the best works in the field of innovation design and architecture."
These awards dont seem to have been covered by a lot of the design blogs. I think there are a few really interesting finalists... but I am really in love with
"Oo" perfume packaging. Bubble packaging with scented air. So popping the bubbles applies a mist of perfume on the user. This sounds like so much fun. It gets my mind spinning around all the possibilities that those fun bubbles provide.
