Media Round Robin

In the Media Round Robin assignment, we are to create something in one medium, whether it be digital or non-digital, convert it to digital or non-digital depending on the first choice, then to bring it back into the original medium chosen. I decided to pick the digital to non to digital path. Admittedly, this assignment did seem very odd to me, so I may have deviated slightly from what the main goal of it was to bring forward, but I stuck to it as best as I could.

To begin, I decide to make a temporary alliance between my Creature Design class and the Seeing Sideways class. The main point of this was to help me practice some steps of creative design, while also working on a subject that I enjoy. For a bit of backstory, I created a Leviathan type creature in the Creature Design class that is approximately 2100 feet from head to tail. A creature of this size could host an entire ecosystem of other creatures, some of them being human sized or larger. For this, I began developing a creature that can live inside a leviathan as a parasite. I used a digital medium to write out some of the attributes and descriptions of the animal. Some of these are listed below:

Type of creature: Crustacean
9 foot in diameter carapace, 8 legs, 4 claws (two large, two small).
Antennae have enlarged to provide additional sensory detail of the environment around the crustacean.
Bioluminescent panels developed under the eyes to light the area immediately below and in front of the creature to allow sight in the dark but minimize light saturation in the area around the creature.

The crustacean is omnivorous and prefers to eat decaying material, which can be beneficial as long as the leviathan has decaying flesh to be rid of.


This was a sample of the writing needed for the Creature Design class, but is also part of the basis for the creative process in making this creature. Secondly, I needed to transfer the information provided by this original digital medium and convert it to a non digital medium. For this, I sketched out how the creature might look. I am not a very good drawing artist, so it's really not accurate to how I plan it to look like. Here it is below:

I really should have drawn a person next to it to compare the scale in size, but the carapace (the body shell area) is around 9 feet in diameter excluding the legs and claws, so it's a pretty big size. While the creature drawn is the same as the creature described in both these mediums, they are slightly different, mainly by how they are portrayed. When we read how a design is, we can picture it in our own minds, but it won't be the same image as another person who reads the same description. This is mostly due to different interpretations that people have, such as how people might say the same words differently. With an image, we can see exactly how it looks, but will have different ideas on how the creature might act or behave in an environment. The reasoning is the same as before, but for different reasons.

For the final transition of the Media Round Robin, it's time to go back to the digital medium. For this, I brought the sketch into Photoshop and colored it and tried to give it a type of texture. My skills in Photoshop are on par with my skills in drawing (that doesn't say much about either) but here it is:

I realized that when I was done, that the creature looks kind of like a merging between Kabuto and a lobster. It's kind of frustrating on how I feel as though anything that I draw seems to look like something else that has already been done before. The idea is fairly original (keep in mind that "Simpsons did it") and the design may be interesting, but I'm just not able to draw in order to portray things in ways that I feel satisfied with. I did have fun experimenting with the brush tool in Photoshop to add a texture to the shell of the crustacean, but it just looks (at least to me) like something that's probably been done before, if not already a creature in real life somewhere in the ocean.

Overall, the assignment was helpful and fun in certain ways, but it also brought back to light on how I'm not able to portray images from my mind into pictures on paper. I figure that the best I can do is to create stories on things that I want to bring into the world, and perhaps have someone with actual artistic drawing or photoshop skills help me to make a better image that can actually be seen rather than perceived.

Class take away 9

Yesterday we started off class with going around the room and talking about the foods that we chose to use for the assignment. It was cool hearing all the things that people had never eaten before, some of them I knew, others I did not. There were mixed reactions for each type of food as well, some were good, others were not. Mine was definitely a bad experience, I ate a cactus pear. Cactus are plants that just really don't want to be eaten, so they develop many ways to discourage animals from eating them. Cactus pears taste bad, are blood red on the inside, have a tough outer exterior and chalky interior, and they have very tiny quill patches on the surface. I made sure to describe the experience well to the class, it turns out that Beth has eaten cactus pears before and I think might grow them every now and then. I mentioned on how I managed to still get pricked by some of the quills despite wearing really thick gloves, Beth said that the quills are sharp enough to go straight through plastic gloves.

A few of the students made audio files for how their food sounded. I thought it was pretty cool on how they took the title of the assignment quite literally and made music or sounds to describe the food. One of the students had a star fruit and made a song with I think two different types of guitar for it. I remembered the first time I had tried star fruit and I thought the song fit that first feeling quite well.

After having our discussions, we started an exercise in which Beth gave us all a sheet of white printer paper. We then received instructions to do whatever we wanted to do with the paper to summarize their experience with the food in one word, but without using anything other than our bodies. For instance, we could use our hands, mouths, or even feet, but could not use anything such as writing utensils or tools. One person nearby me immediately started shredding it into tiny crumpled paper balls, I thought to myself "Dang, must have been a bad experience. I saw that another person nearby tore the paper into a question mark type of symbol, it confused me probably as much as the mark is supposed to give the impression of, and was probably the way he viewed the experience (unsure). I ripped tiny holes into the paper in shapes that spelled the word "Ouch". The reason for that is because the entire experience of the cactus pear was just painful to me, and sounded like a train wreck or trucks crashing into each other.

After doing this for a little while, we were given another blank sheet of paper and were to use the word we were thinking of while doing whatever to the first page and to draw a character that would use the word with their name, or something like that. I drew a cartoonish pear and named him "Ouch, the cactus pear that doesn't like you" I made him look very angry, be pointing at the person looking at the paper, and yelling stuff like "I'll prick you in places you never knew you had!" The main point of the character is to make him seem like he wants to hurt you if you try to eat him (since he's a pear) but to taunt you with the fact that he's a fruit. I think the character would do good with a Boston accent.

Near the end of class, Beth told us that she was adding a new S to the now 5 S's. The word is "Start". I think this is a great S for the creative process for the following reason: In order for something to be created, it must have a start, and for a person to create something, they have to start creating. It's a stupid reason, but it makes stupid sense to me.

It was a pretty fun class and I'm glad that a new S has been discovered.

The flavor of a Cactus Pear sounds like...

It sounds painful upon first impressions. Just thinking of the word "cactus" I think of words that  relate to; prickly, spikes, pain, hurt, and ouch. However, I do like pears, most pears I've had tasted good, sweet, and nutritious. Something I don't think of much when I eat something is what senses do I experience other than tastes and smells? That's the point of this assignment for this week, to eat something we have never had before and describe all the senses we receive for it other than the primary ones for eating, which would be smell or taste; then create something using it. While grocery shopping with my dad over spring break, I noticed a cactus pear in the produce section, and I knew that's what I would try for the assignment. I had always wondered what desert fruit would taste like, whether it'd be sweet or some other flavor I haven't tried before. I imagine that it would not have much flavor, since most cactus plants do not want to be eaten and will try different strategies to discourage animals from doing so.

This is a picture of it with a size comparison of my hand next to it. It might not be clear, but the small bumps on the surface of the pear appear to be fuzzy. However, with the name cactus pear, I decided not to test to see how fuzzy they actually are. While we were shopping, my dad also mentioned to me how he did indeed feel as though he was pricked by something after handling it, so I decided to cut off as many of these bumps as I could to help the experience.

It honestly looks a bit gruesome, but for the sake of not having tiny little cactus quills poking my cheeks, gums, and in between my teeth, it was worth the time and effort. So now it's time to finally test out how many and what types of feelings I receive while eating a cactus pear. I made sure to turn all noises off possible, close my eyes, and open my mind in anticipation. Just on a side note, before actually taking a bite, I thought of the scene in Ratatouille where one of the rats experiences the flavor of cheese and a berry together in a way of seeing colors and hearing sounds. 3...2...1...

First crunch (yeah, a crunch), it just felt like a train wreck had happened right in my face. Every bit of the pear reminded me of cucumbers and I really do not like cucumbers, mainly the flavor. The initial feeling was that the outer area of the fruit was hard and crunchy, while the inside was really soft but almost crumbly, the texture wasn't that great overall. It smelled a lot like a cucumber as well, which didn't help in any way. It just felt as though while I was chewing the pear, I was just really regretting my choice for the food that I chose. After I had finished up the first bite, I thought that I needed a second opinion, this was also not a good decision. This bite had some of the seeds in the center of the fruit in it, they were hard, small, blood red looking pellets that made me think of blackberry seeds, but much larger. I finally made a good decision in all of this, I spit out the second bite, but after giving it a bit of time for me to think while the flavor was reminding me of cucumbers and slowly making me sick. The experience was not bad enough to make me feel like I wanted to up chuck or anything, but it was just plain unpleasant. After this, I saw in the mirror that it turned the inside of my mouth to a dark red color maybe similar to blood, but not completely. Overall, this really gave me images of a train wreck or being hit by a truck. These images did give me an idea on what I could use the actual pear for in my book, I decided to put it in a plastic bag to save it.

If it wasn't gruesome before, now it looks like part of a heart in a bag. I think I will turn the juice of this heart into a kind of paste that I'll use to seal the pages of the book together so that they cannot be opened. In this way, I can turn two things I do not like into one thing that I do enjoy. All I hope for is that the result of the paste does not attract many bugs, because then I will have something I like that possibly attracts things that I do not like (flies and gnats). I did crush up the fruit to make one of the components for the paste, but I think I will not show a picture of that, because it looks like a smashed up bloody heart in a bag. I'll do some research on how to make a glue or paste with this fruit then incorporate it into my Altered book. Somehow, even though I wore gloves while handling it, I managed to get some tiny little cactus quills in my fingers, one on my face, and one on my foot.

As for the 4 S's, that was the last thing I thought about while I was eating the cactus pear. The flavor of a cactus pear sounds like... a real hassle.

Class take away 8

    Today for class we started out with a video, always a nice start. It was a video of a person from American Idol who was making a video log. At first when Beth saw this earlier in the day, she wanted to turn it off since she thought it would just be some kind of drama. But then she started talking about a much more interesting subject. She started talking about how there's one one of each of us, and that we're not one out of a million, we're one out of one.  I thought the video was super good, it was one of the 4 S's moments: Synchronicity. I really enjoyed the video.

    After the video, we started to talk about the assignments that we did for our book covers. There was a student who planned to make a mask from the book, which will look different on both sides, I thought that was a cool concept. One person wanted to do something game related with it because games meant a lot to her. She continued explaining the questions "Who am I and why am I here", going into details on how she didn't have a very good time in high school, then the emotions started to show. Beth made a pretty good point when this happened, she said to us "That's how you know it's real." and indeed I believe it was. I myself like to play video games, they're fun and it's a nice momentary escape into worlds that people have created. But when I saw her getting emotional while talking about her high school experience, it made me pause to think about it.

    When it was my turn to speak, I talked a bit more about my book and that after I had made so many edits to it, I actually didn't want it to get smudged by taking it to school. I really couldn't believe that I actually cared about the book for it not to get damaged, but the changes I had made to it turned it into something that I could actually like and want to keep in good condition (at least until I make more edits to it). After that, I presented the picture that my partner drew while not looking at the paper of me. Starting with the original drawing, then showing how I like to take things apart in the second picture where all the lines were separated, then showing how I put things back together in my own way in the final picture where I put the lines to make up a portrait of myself. Beth really seemed to like the idea and started thinking up ideas of her own while looking at the picture. She gave me a couple ideas to possibly use for the final book, maybe with putting that picture on the back with movable parts to assemble it in different ways. I kept a few of these concepts in mind, I might use some of them for the final.

    As we drew closer to the end of class, bBeth brought up a point on how it seems like when we grow up and get jobs, companies do not want us to play at all, calling it "slacking off". She then asked us a question: Without playing, how can we be creative on the job? This is a pretty good point, it's hard to think of new things when we're being serious with all work and no play. This led us to our next topic, how it seems as though we can't be kids after we grow up. It really does seem to be this way with all the responsibilities we have to take on when we go out on our own. I hope that I can still be a kid at heart even after I get out there to catch up with my goals.

    It was a pretty good class, I'll definitely miss it over spring break.

I've got this covered!

    For this assignment, we are to work on the outer cover of our Altered book. While doing this, I will be keeping my "self" in mind, exploring possibilities, and keep in consideration how I want others to view my book by it's outer appearance.

    Two weeks before this assignment, we were to make something creative while "Bible dipping" which was the word "reused". For this assignment, I actually reused the cover of my book to create a better cover for it, which kind of overlaps this assignment. I have added a couple extra changes to further expand on the cover and its outward appearance. For the sake of the assignment, I will try to describe some of the ideas I thought of while changing to cover a bit further.

    The front cover looks relatively the same. A picture of it can be found on a previous blog of mine titled: "Bible" dipping.

    I don't think I'm ready to take on the back cover of the book just yet, that will require a lot more planning for how I want to erase one of the many dark sides of the book. So to add onto the cover for this post, I have made a few edits to the spine of the book. I kept the main feel of the front cover, but ran out of space due to the lack of area to actually draw stuff on. Below is a picture of it.

LIKE A BOUSE!!
    I made sure to keep that a constant theme. The section that was cut out on the front earlier was a part that was a bit harder to approach when it comes to the actual spine of the book. I managed to keep the "Like a Bouse" reference, but ran out of room for the "Leaf Anger" section. If I were to cut out that certain section of the title, it could damage the book further than I may want to (incineration is too good for it). Under other circumstances I would not hesitate to completely remove the part of the title that bugs me the most, but for the sake of the Altered book, I decided against doing anything that could destroy it before the end of the semester. I thought about bringing the book into class today to actually have the physical copy to show my progress, but I thought that the ink or colored pencil marks might get smudged in my backpack. It was at that point that I was stuck with a realization, I actually had a single care for the book. It hit me like a ton of bricks, I had actually changed the book enough that I cared about it enough to not have it get smudged, and had a protective sense for it. At first I didn't know what to think, I really don't like the book so to feel any kind of want to keep it safe was just plain strange to me. At the same time, I had changed it into something that I would not mind keeping in a decent condition, which is a major step.

     Below is a picture of the first page after tearing out some of the pages I did not like, and where I thought the book should start.

    This is something that I can pass out to the rest of the class, and possibly the world. Based on my own experience with this book, this is my best recommendation. To anyone who reads this, DON'T!

Class take away 7

    Our class this week was a bit shorter than normal.

    To begin, we had a bit of a recap on last week's class and discussed a little about the assignment given last week. The main point of this discussion was to go a bit more into the fear aspect of how we are able to act when it comes down to being in a pressured situation or possibly a judgmental one. One of the other students presented what he made for the assignment. I did not see how it tied in with the self portrait picture he was given, but his work did have a self portrait type theme, without any visuals. It was an audio file that sounded like a whole bunch of different sounds put together in a chaotic manner, it didn't sound be be like any song I had heard before, unless I count "On Mount Golgotha", though I don't consider it a song since it's impossible to complete. (That's a different story.) The interesting part to it was that it was all made using one instrument that he plays, I think it was either a Tuba or an Oboe.
 
    After listening to his piece, Beth showed a couple of videos to us of a guy who makes music out of anything; yes indeed, anything. The two videos we watched were of him making music from a tree and from a dry cleaner's place. The best part of it was that the music was actually enjoyable and did seem to capture the essence of the items that it was made from. What I took from it was that creativity can be made using the most unlikely of objects and does not necessarily need to be presented in expected fashion.

    A rather short class, but I still learned a bit from it. I'm looking forward to next class where we can finish the lecture and present this week's assignments.

Who am I and why am I here?

    For this assignment, we are to answer the questions "Who am I and why am I here?" To briefly summarize this post, who am I is the question that I should be asking rather than answering, but I do know why I'm here, to learn the skills and gain the experience needed to reach my ultimate goals. In this assignment, we were given partners in class and were told to draw their face. It may sound easy at the first, but there was an additional twist; we had to draw this person without looking down at the paper, only looking at the person across from us. We would then use the drawing and incorporate it into the assignment somehow. Down below is the picture of myself that my partner drew: 

    Yes, that is me. No, I do not look like that. Maybe, there are some resemblances between me and the picture. It was a fun exercise to do in class, and it was funny seeing everyone's reactions to their own drawings and the drawings of themselves. When we were told to use the picture in our next assignment, I immediately thought: I'll probably make a mask out of this. As the week went by, I thought to myself; *I wonder if other people are going to have the same idea and relate it to perception or fears or something like that.* I decided to scrap that original thought and tried to make some sense out of the picture. One detail about me is that I like to break things down, figuratively speaking, and find out how they work. In other words, I like to see things work but also figure out how they work as well. I applied this same concept while thinking of creative things to do with it. In the picture below, I drew the same lines that I saw on the picture onto another piece of paper, being very careful to make all the lines look about the same and trying to stay in proportion. I also made sure to have every part of the picture separated to further dissect it.   

    Now that all of the pieces of the picture were separated, I could see each part that made the picture as a whole individually. I feel like this can kind of describe a bit on who I am. I do like to be prepared for anything as much as I can, so going through the steps of taking the picture apart was a good plan for thinking creatively. I remember seeing or hearing something that said "Each stroke of a pencil/pen/brush can tell a different story." While I think that can be a very true statement, I'm not sure if the person who made that quote would say the same about a medium in which the person could not see what they were doing, but maybe they would. I'm not quite on that artistic level to know how emotion looks when it's drawn on a template and I don't have much experience with drawing either. 

    Getting back to the assignment, after I had everything dissected, I was ready to start thinking of ideas. Another detail about me is that when I see something that is taken apart, I like to see if I can put it back together. This is the idea that I decided on for the assignment. I would take the pieces of the picture that I separated and recombine them to remake a picture of where they would be placed if they were in the relatively correct positions. To do this, I brought the picture into photoshop and moved all the pieces to fit together. 

While making the picture, I could not help but have a lot of fun with it, it made me laugh a lot. Not to say that I was laughing in a bad way, but if an assignment can make me laugh, it's a good assignment. I'm not sure if this picture would say anything about me, but I can say that the effort that I put into reshaping this picture definitely does say a lot. When it comes to other people's work and making edits to it, I don't ever want to lose the same feel that the original work had, the Altered book being an exception. I like to take things apart but also to put broken things back together; I sometimes have a variation in this practice in which I still break something down to see how it works, but I put it together in a different way that I would enjoy better, which is kind of how this assignment worked out. I'm still not quite sure who I am, but assignments like this help me to further explore those uncharted boundaries, and I really enjoy that. I know one thing for certain, I'm headed towards very rough times. It's a part of me to want to be prepared, which is the main reason why I am here, to be prepared for the road ahead. If I can learn enough and be prepared enough to find a way to make my hard work become an enjoyable experience, I'd be able to die happy. I have not stated this much in the blogs and can't state it enough; I can't proceed without the good Lord in Heaven watching over me. I'd be hopelessly lost without God in my life, and I appreciate His presence more than I am capable of expressing in words, actions, or whatever other expressions are possible, but I'm going to try my best and keep praying that I'll make it through the test of time to His expectations.

This was one of the few assignments that I have ever really appreciated. There was only one assignment that I appreciated in high school and a few more after starting college, it's things like this that I want to have a relatively same experience with once I get into the working field. It's definitely something that I had to work on, but it's one of those things where it's enjoyable to a point where I don't consider it a burden.