Month: February 2020

Hidden in Plain Sight

| waugh.149

The Initial Exercises

1. Using fonts to represent several different words helped the initial steps of analyzing context and ‘space’ of something that otherwise seems normal. My group received the word group ‘pronouns’. We used: mine, you, oneself, y’all, and them. Applying those words to places were they ‘fit’ helped us to think about ways fonts and meanings could be applied to space.

 

 

 

2. I chose the letter ‘A’ from my name. The font I picked was a lower case version of a kindergarten-style font. The font, to me, showcases a mindset that I will never be perfect and peak (capital letter) because I try to go through life with the mindset that I am always learning and growing as a person. I filled the ‘a’ with an apple because my small town that I grew up in has a major theme of apples (apple water tower, apple festival, apple orchids, etc.) and think it is important to give tribute to your roots and foundations.

 

Choosing the Space

My three different places are below. A dirty corner in Hopkins, the light table in Hayes, and two windows that were across the way from each other. In the corner in Hopkins I thought I could play on the use of dirt and color of the tile. The light table I figured that I could use the ideas of shadows. With the windows I wanted to create some perspective change while moving on the stairs. Although I ultimately picked the windows, I still incorporated the idea of using dirt from the Hopkins corner.

 

Concept Draft

Initial concept draft before review:

Final Concept Draft:

Ideas for Implementation

Lenticular perspective art

Initially I wanted to try and do an accordion style lenticular perspective change. I soon realized that that wasn’t very possible with the given angle constraints that I wanted to stay in. I began to try and ideate a way where the words “and opens windows” could appear with just the slightest shift. To do this I wrote “and opens windows” with large white letter and then put a grate of a dark brown color in front of it. This contraption rests in between the stairs and the window across from the main window. I then took slivers of that same dark paper and then took a picture of where they would have to be for it to be seen on one step and not the other. This only allows every other shred of the word to be seen, but through the gestalt principles of closure and proximity, you are able to read the words.

The tape with stripes on it helped me to measure exactly where the shreds should be taped on the window so it lined up correctly.

Final

The final reads “Love unlocks doors that have gone unseen”. Yet when you step down a step the other window reveals the words “and opens windows” so the quote finishes “Love unlocks doors and open windows that have gone unseen”. This reveals a window that has gone unseen. In the main window I simply added my own dust (some water and chalk dust) and wrote “Love unlocks doors that have gone unseen” but the space in between ‘doors’ and ‘that’ is where “and opens windows” is seen. Someone has even walked by and underlined the word “that” which I was initially upset with, but I have decided that the fact that they underlined it just proved that it blended in to the space because they didn’t know it was a project.

Although the lens on my IPhone camera doesn’t represent it very well, until I get ahold of a better camera, here is my final:

 

 

 

Dynamic Page

| waugh.149

Morph Exercises

Taking a scuba helmet and transforming it into a snail helped me to think and pay attention to those important middle stages.

Combining three images AND their transitions was a good exercise to get in the right mindset to think and work with that concept of middle ground. Here I incorporated a tree and a bank to give the feel of a stream. I then made the majority of it the river with the ocean in the background.

 

Visualizations

Over the process of ideating, I gained more clarity on what type of transition I wanted to pursue. Some of my more favorite ideas were: childbirth, smoking cigarettes, irresponsibility causing bad grades, and an idea of a change in generations over time. Although I didn’t choose any of those, I kind of took that idea of generation change and ran with it. You can find rough sketches of my initial ideas here!

 

Prototypes

During my prototyping phase, I was still unsure of what exactly I wanted to pursue. I used this time to construct varying mechanics that I hoped would spark some ideas through seeing the different motions and uses of shape and space. During this time I became interested in a cyclical usage (especially because I wanted to deal with a change over time and a circle is common symbolism of clocks and connections). I began to come up with the idea of the transition of the 1920s to the 2020s. I thought I could start with an image that represented the 1920s and then ‘fast forward’ through the decades to reveal the 2020s. During the critique of the ideation draft, the point was brought up that we don’t quite know what 2020 will even be. This inspired me to go down a path of ‘we decide the future’. You can view my prototypes right here

Final Dynamic Page

 

My final model plays on the fact that even though society has changed and warped dramatically over the decades, we have continued to experiment with pop culture, art, and expression. How I achieved this was by modeling the project after vinyl records because the popularity of records skyrocketed in the 1920s.

You can view the breakdown of the mechanics and reasoning here

 

Decades!

In my wheel I modeled each section by its corresponding decade!

1920 was modeled after the record and the black and gold Art Deco color scheme

1930 was modeled after the black and white Oxford shoe

1940 was modeled after the American flag for WWII

1950 was modeled after the popular red dress with white polka dots trend

1960 was modeled after the moon landing

1970 was modeled after the classic teal and white VW van

1980 was modeled after popular patterns that included fun geometric shapes and bright colors

1990 was modeled after the classic disposable cup with the blue and purple design

2000 was modeled after the popular color scheme at the time with popular use of stars and asymmetric pattern

2010 was modeled after the popular use of rainbow zebra print

2020 was not modeled after anything, but does have some abstracted pathway-looking design because I wanted to symbolize that we don’t know what the decade will be so we decide what path to go down.