Here's the template I used if you want a better sense of what it looks like.
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
Project 3.5 (Template)
So here's my template, a black and white version of the Los Angeles Lakers alternate logo. I... tried.
Here's the template I used if you want a better sense of what it looks like.
Here's the template I used if you want a better sense of what it looks like.
Wednesday, March 16, 2016
Homework 5
For the first batch of questions, I'll give short answers to each of them.
1) I decide if something is worth "stealing" if I know I can make it different enough to call my own, and good enough to justify that feeling.
2) Seeing as how postmodernism tends to reject the notion of old rules of art from previous generations, the first two chapters seemed to buck the notion that art must be fully original. Kleon is saying the opposite; the since that's impossible, embrace taking from others.
3) "No idea's original" is actually freeing to think about it, especially since I have always worried far too much about being original in that regard. It's good to understand and accept the natural limitations that come with that mindset, and instead to feel compelled to study those I admire.
4) As Kleon stated in the text, hoarders collect a variety of junk because they feel they have to, while artists collect only those things that interest them.
5) Duchamp meant that it is easier to study and model after one person who you admire and find intriguing rather than try to take on that person's form of art as a whole all at once. It will be far too overwhelming to be successful at.
6) Smith and Mapplethorpe were friends who decided to move to New York, and became artists by simply pretending to be artists. "Fake it 'till you make it" certainly worked for them because their efforts to succeed by merely acting as if they already had garnered them successful results.
7) Practice is to observe something, learn from it, and re-apply it in your own voice. Plagiarism is blatantly stealing someone else's work and claiming it to be your own.
8) Much like #7, imitation is directly copying something/someone you saw, while emulating is taking what you have seen and putting your own unique spin on it. ("Remixing" is another way to describe it as Kleon referenced many times throughout the first two chapters.
One of my favorite creative heroes is Conan O'Brien, and the biggest reason I have enjoyed his work so much over the years is because he manages to do very dumb, absurd comedy brilliantly and without a trace of intellectual superiority. One of my favorite examples of this is when doing audio commentary for a documentary about him, and they see a shot of his sidekick Andy Richter wearing a white cowboy hat, O'Brien quips that Richter looks like the guy who failed to protect Lee Harvey Oswald from getting shot by Jack Ruby. It's such a silly joke, but it takes a creative genius to be able to think of that on the spot, and to do so while laughing with someone rather than use it to displaying their mental prowess. O'Brien has talked about many of his comedy idols growing up including Johnny Carson, David Letterman and Groucho Marx. Marx's sensibilities rub off on O'Brien because he often acts very vaudevillian or physical in his routine, and interestingly enough, Kleon specifically referenced O'Brien's relations to Carson and Letterman in the book.
Being a COMM major at GMU lends itself to being lost in the field, as I'm willing to guess that a solid 90% of the student body is doing the same thing (Kidding...I think.) But the key for me has been trying to find my own voice out of that group, and try to take my angle on it (Broadcasting, preferably sports broadcasting) and carve my own niche out of it. I also have to learn to not be afraid to fail as Kleon mentions in the book, because if I don't, then I'll get nowhere in life.
1) I decide if something is worth "stealing" if I know I can make it different enough to call my own, and good enough to justify that feeling.
2) Seeing as how postmodernism tends to reject the notion of old rules of art from previous generations, the first two chapters seemed to buck the notion that art must be fully original. Kleon is saying the opposite; the since that's impossible, embrace taking from others.
3) "No idea's original" is actually freeing to think about it, especially since I have always worried far too much about being original in that regard. It's good to understand and accept the natural limitations that come with that mindset, and instead to feel compelled to study those I admire.
4) As Kleon stated in the text, hoarders collect a variety of junk because they feel they have to, while artists collect only those things that interest them.
5) Duchamp meant that it is easier to study and model after one person who you admire and find intriguing rather than try to take on that person's form of art as a whole all at once. It will be far too overwhelming to be successful at.
6) Smith and Mapplethorpe were friends who decided to move to New York, and became artists by simply pretending to be artists. "Fake it 'till you make it" certainly worked for them because their efforts to succeed by merely acting as if they already had garnered them successful results.
7) Practice is to observe something, learn from it, and re-apply it in your own voice. Plagiarism is blatantly stealing someone else's work and claiming it to be your own.
8) Much like #7, imitation is directly copying something/someone you saw, while emulating is taking what you have seen and putting your own unique spin on it. ("Remixing" is another way to describe it as Kleon referenced many times throughout the first two chapters.
One of my favorite creative heroes is Conan O'Brien, and the biggest reason I have enjoyed his work so much over the years is because he manages to do very dumb, absurd comedy brilliantly and without a trace of intellectual superiority. One of my favorite examples of this is when doing audio commentary for a documentary about him, and they see a shot of his sidekick Andy Richter wearing a white cowboy hat, O'Brien quips that Richter looks like the guy who failed to protect Lee Harvey Oswald from getting shot by Jack Ruby. It's such a silly joke, but it takes a creative genius to be able to think of that on the spot, and to do so while laughing with someone rather than use it to displaying their mental prowess. O'Brien has talked about many of his comedy idols growing up including Johnny Carson, David Letterman and Groucho Marx. Marx's sensibilities rub off on O'Brien because he often acts very vaudevillian or physical in his routine, and interestingly enough, Kleon specifically referenced O'Brien's relations to Carson and Letterman in the book.
Being a COMM major at GMU lends itself to being lost in the field, as I'm willing to guess that a solid 90% of the student body is doing the same thing (Kidding...I think.) But the key for me has been trying to find my own voice out of that group, and try to take my angle on it (Broadcasting, preferably sports broadcasting) and carve my own niche out of it. I also have to learn to not be afraid to fail as Kleon mentions in the book, because if I don't, then I'll get nowhere in life.
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
Homework 4
For the record, I generally find myself siding with appropriation and fair use. I find the relatively recent trend of over-litigiousness from certain major corporations (Looking at you, Disney), or many record companies to be burdensome, and frankly annoying. When certain YouTubers are being forced to edit audio because a song playing in the background, or even properly licensed to play in a video game, might cause the site's auto-detector to shut it down, it's gone too far. When creators of The Simpsons mentioned that it is much harder to get the go-ahead from Fox on song parodies, which have long been established as an exception to copyright, due to concerns over legal battles from the originators, it's gone too far.
Having said that, Richard Prince absolutely sucks. To the nth degree. What he does is not only plagiarism thinly veiled as art, but he's potentially jeopardizing the future for those who have legitimate connections to the concept of Fair Use. Prince doesn't even try (Relatively speaking). Taking well-crafted photographs from a photographer and putting a silly blue guitar over it is not original art. At best, it's lazy, and at worst, it's stealing, and in neither case should it be considered art. None of the pictures shown in the various articles (The New York Times one specifically) showed any sort of legitimate effort to change Cariou's original photography, nor is there any real artistic merit to it. Neither is taking somebody else's Instagram posts that you left a creepy comment on and hanging it on a damn wall.
To me, Prince is doing nothing but hurting concept of Fair Use by selfishly profiting from others hard work. Going back to Disney, if you wanted to take the copyrighted image of Mickey Mouse, and demonstrate that you feel Disney is evil by creatively incorporating it into a poster or a background, then I am in full support of it. In fact, I encourage it. But pretending to make the same point by taking a copyrighted image of Mickey Mouse, going into Photoshop, drawing a vaudevillian mustache on him and then saying "Give me money" is a slap in the face of anyone who considers themselves an artist (Which, for the record, I absolutely do not). I'm willing to bet that at least half of the people in this class could do what Prince did to those Cariou photos in about ten minutes. Leaving a creepy comment on a woman's Instagram page? Hell, I could do that. And it doesn't help that Prince behaves like an ass. If you're going to be a dismissive dickwad in court when asked a simple question of how you changed someone else's and subsequently banking millions of dollars by doing so, then you should absolutely lose your right to claim Fair Use. So to summarize my position on Richard Prince, in case I hadn't made it clear, he's a tool.
Also, this is why I often don't understand art. Who the hell's paying $90,000 for a blown up picture of someone's Instagram photo with a creeper in his mid-60's leaving a cringy comment? How about saving yourself that money by just leaving the comment yourself and bringing the screenshot to Kinko's for a substantially lower rate?
Having said that, Richard Prince absolutely sucks. To the nth degree. What he does is not only plagiarism thinly veiled as art, but he's potentially jeopardizing the future for those who have legitimate connections to the concept of Fair Use. Prince doesn't even try (Relatively speaking). Taking well-crafted photographs from a photographer and putting a silly blue guitar over it is not original art. At best, it's lazy, and at worst, it's stealing, and in neither case should it be considered art. None of the pictures shown in the various articles (The New York Times one specifically) showed any sort of legitimate effort to change Cariou's original photography, nor is there any real artistic merit to it. Neither is taking somebody else's Instagram posts that you left a creepy comment on and hanging it on a damn wall.
To me, Prince is doing nothing but hurting concept of Fair Use by selfishly profiting from others hard work. Going back to Disney, if you wanted to take the copyrighted image of Mickey Mouse, and demonstrate that you feel Disney is evil by creatively incorporating it into a poster or a background, then I am in full support of it. In fact, I encourage it. But pretending to make the same point by taking a copyrighted image of Mickey Mouse, going into Photoshop, drawing a vaudevillian mustache on him and then saying "Give me money" is a slap in the face of anyone who considers themselves an artist (Which, for the record, I absolutely do not). I'm willing to bet that at least half of the people in this class could do what Prince did to those Cariou photos in about ten minutes. Leaving a creepy comment on a woman's Instagram page? Hell, I could do that. And it doesn't help that Prince behaves like an ass. If you're going to be a dismissive dickwad in court when asked a simple question of how you changed someone else's and subsequently banking millions of dollars by doing so, then you should absolutely lose your right to claim Fair Use. So to summarize my position on Richard Prince, in case I hadn't made it clear, he's a tool.
Also, this is why I often don't understand art. Who the hell's paying $90,000 for a blown up picture of someone's Instagram photo with a creeper in his mid-60's leaving a cringy comment? How about saving yourself that money by just leaving the comment yourself and bringing the screenshot to Kinko's for a substantially lower rate?
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
Project 2
Initially, I considered editing out Michael from the picture, but then I realized that his presence actually helped the concept of the photo, as he symbolized family and friendship that I value dearly. I already had the Eminem photo, which symbolized my love of music (And he is my favorite music artist). I then looked for a picture of Shaquille O'Neal to symbolize my love of sports, but alas, there were no good full body shots of him from behind, so I instead went with Barry Bonds, my favorite baseball player of all time. I finished it out with a picture of Conan O'Brien, who symbolizes my love of comedy (I haven't missed a show of his since early-2008, for some perspective). It also helped that the picture takes place during a massive snowstorm, something I genuinely love the same now at 23 that I did when I was 13. I faded the three additions out a bit to show that their presence resides within me on a spiritual/mental basis, whereas Michael is fully filled because he symbolizes who and what I value physically.
Notes:
I struggled to shortcut and add snow to the layers, so I decided to simply add the snow manually through the brush tool. That was more tedious than anything.
I really struggled to add shadows. I sort of got one for Bonds, and I got a teensy bit for Eminem, but the copy tool was not cooperating with me.
O'Brien's source picture cut off most of his feet, so I compromised by placing him near where the snow banks on the road had built up.
In the original picture, I was carrying Brandon's cooler. I figured it would be too distracting (And I don't drink anyway), so I edited it out.
Overall, I'm actually pleasantly surprised with how this turned out, since I have no experience/am awful with Photoshop, but I felt that this worked conceptually the way I envisioned it. And if nothing else, I can be proud of the amount of hours of work I put into this.
Wednesday, February 17, 2016
Homework 3
I found Panera's article to be a relatively fair assessment of the culture at large, despite the "Get off my lawn!" mindset evident throughout. I think there's something to the idea that because we can now quantify what people enjoy and how much they enjoyed it through social media, we feel compelled to document that we were there. I personally try my best not to do that, simply because I too find it off-putting. I'll snap a picture or too here and there, but I don't overdo it, and I don't get the need to take a video at a concert (Horrible quality, no longer connecting to the artist on stage, etc.) But when even though this article is clearly a few years old (As evidenced by him putting "tweeting" in quotation marks), the assessment is just as true in 2016. He's right to point out that with each new technological advent, our attention span becomes less and less. Perhaps older generations took a look at more with an objective point of view, whereas we might instinctively expect to have it handed to us on a silver platter.
To that point, we may become attached to our phones because we have immediate access to anything we want to keep us amused. I agree with the idea that museum art loses interest with the youth because it lacks an entertainment factor, and while my instinct is to say that's not what art should be focused on, I question it more the more I think about it. I personally don't care for art in museums, or often the concept of "art" in general (Except of course for this course and Professor Roykovich), and the biggest general reasoning I can give is that it doesn't entertain me (Keep in mind that I thought MacGruber was a great movie and that Dr. Strangelove was boring, so my opinions on entertainment should be taken with a few grains of salt). And to a small degree, that can impact our "phenomenological" relationship (Which to me means how our relationship to the Earth goes beyond a basic physical one, but one of great psychological import) to the physical world, but keep in mind that the advancement of image quality and access to it can lend anyone a great appreciation for what the world has to offer in the palm of their hands.
And I actually agree with Panera about how our memories are lessened due to the phone becoming a constant life jacket for our memory. It's part of what he calls the "Fascism of the image", where we aren't even aware at just how much we rely on our phones instinctively, which I will support by pointing out how I and many others check our phones the second we get out of class like we were one of Pavlov's stupid pets. So I guess we can become more emancipated observers by using that immense time usually spent checking Facebook or watching YouTube videos of cats chasing a laser pointer and instead use it to familiarize ourselves better with culture, art, and history. It won't happen overnight, but as this technology becomes a great part of our lives, hopefully we learn to adapt along with it for the better.
Also, I have never heard the term "retinal masturbation" before reading this article, but I am considering renaming my blog that.
To that point, we may become attached to our phones because we have immediate access to anything we want to keep us amused. I agree with the idea that museum art loses interest with the youth because it lacks an entertainment factor, and while my instinct is to say that's not what art should be focused on, I question it more the more I think about it. I personally don't care for art in museums, or often the concept of "art" in general (Except of course for this course and Professor Roykovich), and the biggest general reasoning I can give is that it doesn't entertain me (Keep in mind that I thought MacGruber was a great movie and that Dr. Strangelove was boring, so my opinions on entertainment should be taken with a few grains of salt). And to a small degree, that can impact our "phenomenological" relationship (Which to me means how our relationship to the Earth goes beyond a basic physical one, but one of great psychological import) to the physical world, but keep in mind that the advancement of image quality and access to it can lend anyone a great appreciation for what the world has to offer in the palm of their hands.
And I actually agree with Panera about how our memories are lessened due to the phone becoming a constant life jacket for our memory. It's part of what he calls the "Fascism of the image", where we aren't even aware at just how much we rely on our phones instinctively, which I will support by pointing out how I and many others check our phones the second we get out of class like we were one of Pavlov's stupid pets. So I guess we can become more emancipated observers by using that immense time usually spent checking Facebook or watching YouTube videos of cats chasing a laser pointer and instead use it to familiarize ourselves better with culture, art, and history. It won't happen overnight, but as this technology becomes a great part of our lives, hopefully we learn to adapt along with it for the better.
Also, I have never heard the term "retinal masturbation" before reading this article, but I am considering renaming my blog that.
Thursday, February 11, 2016
Homework 2
It's pretty amazing to me to be able to think of how GIFs have exploded in recent years, because it wasn't too long ago where they were relegated to being weird flame animations on people's MySpace pages that I found to be annoying as hell (I didn't even know what to call those at time, and the various articles helped me understand that's what GIFs were in their relative infancy). But they are important to my generation, as are most forms of communication that we are responsible for creating. They can be used to emphasize or surmise an entire point into one, simple visual cue. It's very common to see someone tweet "When you see two friends argue on the timeline" and attach this GIF to it.
GIFs work because of how hypnotizing they can be. When utilized properly, they trim any and all fat of a moment and instead merely show exactly what the audience wants to see. They appeal to our inherent laziness by automatically reloading without relying on a cue from the user, so we can pay attention to detail uninterrupted. And they serve any and all purposes. Humor, artistry, sports, and (because it's the internet) porn, amongst countless others.
Now, does that make them "art"? I suppose so, since defining art is famously difficult to pinpoint. Do I think people should be paying thousands of dollars for a GIF to display in a museum? No, because I think GIFs were invented with the purpose of ready availability to any and all who want to see them (And have easily placed watermarks for those who want their work acknowledged). But it does speak to just how much Tumblr in particular helped this form of communication reach insanely hot levels figuratively overnight. And it shows that anything that is condensed down to its quickest, purest form will always have a place in hearts worldwide.
GIFs work because of how hypnotizing they can be. When utilized properly, they trim any and all fat of a moment and instead merely show exactly what the audience wants to see. They appeal to our inherent laziness by automatically reloading without relying on a cue from the user, so we can pay attention to detail uninterrupted. And they serve any and all purposes. Humor, artistry, sports, and (because it's the internet) porn, amongst countless others.
Now, does that make them "art"? I suppose so, since defining art is famously difficult to pinpoint. Do I think people should be paying thousands of dollars for a GIF to display in a museum? No, because I think GIFs were invented with the purpose of ready availability to any and all who want to see them (And have easily placed watermarks for those who want their work acknowledged). But it does speak to just how much Tumblr in particular helped this form of communication reach insanely hot levels figuratively overnight. And it shows that anything that is condensed down to its quickest, purest form will always have a place in hearts worldwide.
Wednesday, February 10, 2016
Project 1
This gif is a very simple loop of Naughty by Nature's "Hip Hop Hooray", during the chorus. I chose partially as an excuse to insert any hip-hop reference I can into my work, but also because it speaks to something beyond that. That chorus is a staple at sports games ("Hip Hop HooRAAAAAAAAY--HOOOOOOOO"), and everyone is happy to do that move a la "YMCA". It's an anthem. It's uplifting. I know that lately when I've been struggling or down in the dumps, I can put this song on and it'll immediately lift up my spirits. To me, this symbolizes the power music can have on an entire community.
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