Filed under: CCA1103, Creative Project | Tags: animation, art, camera, cca1103, concept, creative, enjoy, harman, idea, illustrate, investigation, john, portrait, problem, project, Representation, stop, surface, tripod, visual, whiteboard
I have spent a fair amount of time on the creative portrait concept so figured it was time to investigate the first idea I had. Harman, J (2011) pointed out the importance to “entertain all ideas” not based on its merit but on where it may lead. If you recall I was interested in creating a visual representation of the creative process. I was inspired from a video I found on the net where an animation was created from graffiti (or street art depending on who you are). Here is a link to the original post if you are still a little hazy: Creative Project #001.
First thing was to find a surface that I could use legally. More importantly a surface I could draw or paint images on top of each other in rapid succession. After some consideration a whiteboard came to mind. The main problem I found using this surface however was how reflective it was. Will have to look into ways to minimize this if this is the way I decide to go. I setup a tripod with a camera and began a trial run. I had a very basic idea of what I wanted to do but it was still very much on the fly. Will definitely have to storyboard in the future. This short animation is called ‘how ideas are made’. The plan is to illustrate the whole creative process. Enjoy and let me know what you think!
References
Harman, J (2011). Personal Creative Process: John Harman.
http://sandbox.ea.ecu.edu.au/staffuse/mtmcmaho/CCA1103/CCA1103L3/index.html
Filed under: CCA1103, Creative Project | Tags: alter, art, arts, better, created, creative, dad, design, display, download, ego, gimp, graphic, happy, help, illegal, image, jim, next, photo, photography, photoshop, portrait, present, program, project, question, sinister, software, success, visual
Jims creative self
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: awesome, awesomeness, blog, center, competition, contestants, context, famous, funny, hot, humor, humour, infamous, interwebs, model, perth, photo, photography, picture, popular, Post, selected, sexy, shopping, statement, time, traffic, universe, win
I have been getting a lot of feed back from my Famous on the Interweb post. It also seems to be getting the most traffic on the blog with about 14 hits a day. So I thought I’d share the back story on that now somewhat infamous picture.
Last year there was a competition to become the face of a new shopping center here in Perth. It was voted on by the public then a winner was selected from the most popular. Along with the photo you had to submit a 25 or less word statement which basically equated to why you thought you were the centre of the universe. My statement was “see photo for proof of my awesomeness“.
Here is a screenshot from the competition website with myself and some of the contestants.
I am a model
In case you were wondering I didn’t win…
Filed under: Uncategorized
Changed the theme today so I could have two columns. Now if I could only figure out how to change the hyperlink colour from red…
Header had to be re-done so it’s missing text at the moment.
Probably should have just left the blog as it was!
Filed under: CCA1103, Creative Project | Tags: auto, break, camera, cohesion, conditions, consistency, course, crash, creative, ecu, editor, labs, photo, photography, portrait, powerpoint, project, software
Introducing my dad's creative self
I did a test shot last weekend with my dad. What I learnt was I really need some photo editing software on my home computer. Using PowerPoint as your editor only gets you so far! It is the reason for the stupid white line running down the middle of the picture. I think I’ll be taking up residency in the ECU computer labs over the break.
I did decide however I wanted to take the photos under the same conditions to keep a consistency and cohesion for the project. Looks like I’ll be chasing up Franco for a crash course in photography! My camera will be for the very first time venturing from the full auto setting.
Filed under: CCA1103, Creative Project | Tags: chaos, coffee, conversation, creative, daft, Debate, franco, Ideas, messy, neat, portraits, process, project, question, questionnaire, Structured, suggestions, tidy, walk
Running with the portrait idea for my creative project I thought a brief five question questionnaire about creativity would add a level of intimacy to the project.
After throwing ideas around with Franco for a bit we were able to get a ‘flow’ going. Bouncing ideas off each other, building on some, acknowledging others and finally refining it to the questionnaire. The whole process lasted about five minutes. The time it took to walk from class to the cafe for Franco‘s regular coffee fix.
I love how the creative process is rarely linear. I thrive in the chaos of refining ideas from a swirling mess of information. I actually had an interesting conversation about this last night. The messy vs neat debate. I represented messy and Peter represented neat. He liked everything structured so it could be put away, out of sight and easy to find. I on the other hand liked everything out, around me and within sight. I like to feel connected to everything at all times. This applies to the physical world as well as my inner thoughts. Might have the neat or messy question on the questionnaire.
The first draft of the questionnaire.
First name?
What do you consider creative?
Rate your level of creativity out of 10
Are you messy or tidy?
More questions to come. Please feel free to leave your responses or suggestions for questions.
Filed under: CCA1103, Lecture, The six posts for Mark, Tutorial | Tags: art, arts, cca1103, chinese, coates, crazy, creative, erin, fear, formal, franco, fremantle, haunted, house, Ideas, photo, presentation, process, theories, video, visual, week6
What a crazy day its been today!
For the first time in a month I arrived early to a lecture with time to spare. Even arriving before my good friend Franco, though I am not sure if he was genuinely surprised or resented me for making him look late. Then again it could have had something to do with my continuous gloating and declaration that he shouldn’t have even bothered to come in this morning. After about ten minutes of relentless badgering Franco was rescued as Erin Coates began her lecture.
I had been looking forward to this lecture since seeing the unit schedule for the first time. Mostly because it was specific to my area of expertise; the Visual Arts. Erin Coates’s lecture Visual Arts and Creativity was a great insight into her work but more importantly her creative process. I’ll also point out that I really liked her art and will be heading down to the Fremantle Arts Centre to check out the Chinese Video Art exhibition she is involved in.
As the theories and ideas of the creative process start to sink in it was great to be able to not only see them in Erin’s practice but to start to understand why they work. My notes during the lecture started to shift from documenting the presentation itself to focus on the elements she draws upon from the theories we have been learning. Here are some of the examples Coates, E (2011) gave;
- …every experience shapes you…
- …be resourceful…
- …try something new. try new mediums…
- …draw all the time…
- …record what you are thinking…
- …be a collector of information…
- …avid researcher…
- …passionate, rigorous…
I felt these statements really fit in strongly with the idea that the creative mind is always collecting and cataloging information for later reference. For me this cuts to the very core of creativity and something that should be nurtured. This revelation just isn’t specific to this lecture but more the cumulation of the last three.
With the lecture over I would generally continue bugging Franco but today was different…we had our presentation!
Formal presentations have always terrified me. I can get up and talk about my artwork or man a booth at an oil conference no worries but the moment it becomes a structured, formal presentation the wheels fall off. Following those set points one after the other doesn’t feel natural, especially when thinking about the next point. It always messes up your train of though as you try in vain to get the current point across. I really struggle if I have to keep it linear. Maybe my understanding that a formal presentation has to be smooth and linear is unrealistic. Or I worry about the overall message of the presentation and not let the points do the talking. The fear that it won’t run smoothly or the pressure not to let your group members down. What I do know is when I sat down again it was like walking out of my last TEE exam. The relief was so great I have been in the best mood all night. Which is crazy considering I have been stressed all week over reading three pages in front of sixteen people for about five minutes. The worst part being I would have probably done a runner if I wasn’t in a group! The mind is an amazing thing!
Thank god it’s friday and I won’t be doing that again for a very long time…I hope!
References
Coates, E. (2011). Visual Arts and Creativity
Download .pdf
haunted-house. (n.d) In Google Images [Digital image]. Retrieved April 8, 2011, from; http://segmentnext.com/wp-content/uploads/haunted-house.jpg
Filed under: CCA1103, Lecture | Tags: assume, beliefs, cca1103, challenge, childhood, christian, different, drifting, fantastical, fixating, glen, heathy, idea, imagination, information, interesting, lecture, monkey, mthyoposis, overbearing, package, question, religion, science, speculative, spoors, superpowers, Thoughts, understanding, view, week5, world
This week’s lecture by Dr Glen Spoors on Mythopoesis was…well…different. Like his last lecture the rate of information being thrown at you was quite overbearing but at the same time extremely interesting. I found myself constantly drifting away from the presented material and fixating on Spoors’s rather odd childhood understanding of the world. He was basically left to discover and figure out the world himself with very little outside guidance. With an extremely active imagination even by a child’s standards is it really any wonder that he came up with a very fantastical world view?
Spoors, G (2011) stated on several occasions that his family wasn’t religious and was I assume, brought up without the teachings of any religion. I find this of particular interest as while I do not believe in any religion I was brought up on christian beliefs. Would Spoors’s world understanding been different if he had been brought up with a religious background? I have always been of the belief that religions are more trouble than they are worth but for the first time I began to wonder and challenge that idea. Religions basically help people understand their purpose, place, how the world functions and even how it came about. Which is exactly what Spoors seemed to be missing and compensating for. Without these stories to explain the world he simply came up with his own. Not all of which turned out to be healthy. At the time however they made sense and helped him deal with the complexities of life. So would Spoor’s childhood been any different if religion was involved? Let’s face it Religion is a lot more interesting to a child with Gods and superpowers than science and monkeys! It is also in a nice little package. I one stop shop so to speak.
This is all very speculative and just my opinion but it did keep me thinking well after the lecture had finished.
Would be really interesting to hear others thoughts on the subject.
References
Spoors, G (2011). Glen Spoors – Mythopoesis
Click to access week_5_mythopoesis.pdf
Religion-The-Creation-of-Man. (n.d) In Google Images [Digital image]. Retrieved April 6, 2011, from; http://religion.lilithezine.com/images/Religion-The-Creation-of-Man.jpg
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: 41, avoid, awesome, awesomeness, celebrity, classmates, day, delusional, douche, famous, fans, female, funny, graph, humour, inflated, interwebs, ladies, list, mark, mcmahon, milestone, picture, poses, sexy, single, stats, views, waiting, week6
I’m now famous on the interwebs! Check it…
Screencapture of blog stats
Hit a milestone yesterday. 41 views in a single day! Pretty good since it’s week6 and we are still waiting on a list of our classmates’ blog addresses!
41 hits on the interwebs baby!
Avoid the rush ladies get some now before I become a delusional celebrity with an inflated sense of self-worth. Hit me up on 1800-IAMADOUCHE…you know you want to!
The Rotten Lemon of Enlightenment 
