I used the Rudy’s Hotdog sign that I grew up seeing to capture a typeface that I wouldn’t regularly use. The sign actually has more than one type on it so I used the Rudy type. After figuring out the typeface I used the letters I had to figure out the letter m which I then used to spell the word yummy incorrectly at first but I fixed it.
This has made me realize that my ranting about the philosophical idea of the human soul isn’t uncommon for designers discussing their work and how it relates to others’ views and ideas. When starting to discuss what good design isn’t George Nelson describes what good design is: “…a manifestation of the capacity of the human spirit to transcend its limitations.” This idea of design being a representation to the extent of a human spirit’s ability to go beyond their restrictions intrigues me as it makes me think about who wants these representations of the ascent beyond the limits set for the designer. Generally, designers don’t need these embodiments of the other designer’s ascent. Is it those who tried to break limits of their spirit and failed or is it those who don’t feel they need to break their own and can get the same effects from another’s efforts? Is it simply those who need the design who get them or do they end up among those who do not know who created it and why?
Designers explain away aesthetics because laymen don’t understand it. Nelson talks about stating something is functional or more functional a certain way was easier than describing something as an aesthetic choice. Today most people have heard the term aesthetics and talk about it like it’s a common word, at least in my experience. Given the amount of knowledge we have at our fingertips today, it’d be kind of hard to explain away aesthetic choices as functional ones. The client or whoever is being described a partial lie about the reason for doing said thing can simply look up what terms you used and find the errors to the logic rather quickly if they understand how to look stuff up.
This project explores the ideas about escapism through layering and masking. To show this there are a mixture of shots of locations in nature and a indoor also a variety of pictures of the mannequin and some books. Mixing books with the mannequin and shots from various locations is meant to give the illusion of alternate worlds being explored, either by reading or writing. Although the mannequin is literally diving into books, people dive into other worlds generally through their minds. Our minds tend to warp things which is why some if not most of the videos are altered. These are meant to be worlds that don’t exist mixing with places that do. The audio quiets down when the mannequin dives as it is meant to show the outside world being blocked out when someone escapes into a book. During the more obvious video distortions the audio warps along with it to encompas the feeling of a warped idea of a world.
Try out color keying in premiere. I also was using masking. I highly recomend not using masking in premiere as it would not mask were I actually put it. I got quite fustrated by it after a view tries. It can be finessed but overall its not a good mask, in comparision to masking in aplications such as photoshop.
As an artist, I am constantly around inanimate objects designed to look like living beings. The mannequin is the inanimate object I focus on which I show as if it was an artist. I show what this mannequin might do if it had its own will and seen canvases and an easel. I started off showing the objects going in and out of the frames then follow it up by showing what the interactions the mannequin has with the supplies. The sound is the ambient noises heard in a studio space. Most of the sound is simple background noise that comes from the ventilation and peoples movement inside the space. Some additional sounds being a paper cutter being used and pages being turned. The main idea for this was to turn an inanimate mannequin into an artist.
Enter into the garden but be careful as vines grow to block you in. In a way to explore my own drawing as well as some stop motion I created this video. Most of the inspiration was simply from modern gardens i’ve seen online but the vines element was my way to show things being blocked off. Given the time we are currently in I thought it was an appropriate topic.
This is a youtuber that I used to watch a lot of. I only stopped because I began to focus on games and other artists. This is interesting to me as it has no voices or direct story descriptions. You don’t know whats going to happen until it happens. None of it appears real but you still get engrossed into the world. I think i’ll use this as a reference to the lighting and possibly use my own hands in this as the artist does here.
Artists tend to surround themselves with humanoid objects that they use in their work. I am one of them so I decided to use this mannequin to represent an artist. This artist is picking which kind of canvas to use than trying to get comfortable at the easel. Although this artist ends up falling back onto their back their canvas(artwork) comforts them. Generally the same work that drives and artist up the wall will be the art they are the most proud of.
For this I am getting used to working with stop motion to create a story. The focus of this story will be on the mannequin but I also want to point towards the people who generally have these mannequins which are artists so I’ve made this mannequin and artist.
Amanda Potts