Blog » Homage

Hope returns with a new day.

Matt — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 09:40:23 +0000

After a sleepless night, wondering if yet another edit will work, I have come to terms with things. How much is it my usual panic and disappointment that the final object doesn’t match the magic of the idea. The idea still stands, and its not about people working out what the content on the small screen is. In fact I don’t wont people analysing each frame turning the whole piece into to a highly elaborate but very tiny TV screen.

So its not a disaster just a slight annoyance, but it has snapped me back to focusing on the big picture.

And the pain sets in

Matt — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 15:29:19 +0000

I finally received my screen from china, it was supposed to be the same as one I had had before, which was cheap and fantastic, this was was even cheaper, but who knew there was money in cheap Chinese knockoffs of cheap Chinese products.

The upshot of all this is less screen size(to obscure the bright green play icon) but worse still the clarity is way down many of my composite images are muddy and unusable, hours of editing all together just so lost. Ahhhhhhr, I cant replicate the effect on my computer so I have to put it together convert it upload it to the device and then see if its ok or not. Painful and time consuming, and I have lost many of the images that I liked, the subtleness of their composition vanished in a sea of mud.

Reality isn’t a slide show.

Matt — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 13:37:42 +0000

I started to put the images together with some cross dissolves between them. Straight cuts didn’t have the right feel “Dreaming of reality should still have some sort of soft dreamlike sense to it” But it still felt like a slide show of very dull holiday snaps. Some of the images also seemed to important. The work isn’t about the content of the images they were just meant to add to the idea of the whole piece not be about a specific thing.

I decided to overlay multiple images over the top of others. Suddenly the images stopped being snaps of things and became something else, my random placement gave some great imagery and confused things nicely. This felt a little dreamlike while still being of traffic and building and all the mundane reality one often never even notices while contemplating a deeper reality.

Happy with his direction I started ordering these images with a real purpose.

A Throne of Clouds

Matt — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 13:32:43 +0000

Clouds projected on a sphere. I had some time-lapse footage of sky from a previous project but it didn’t project so well I didnt want a sky rushing up and over the dome I wanted the dome to feel like it encapsulated the sky.

I also tried some perlin noise generated clouds and the just looked like noise. I wanted real puffy clouds. In my mockup I used some actual clouds and I was happy with that look.

The only solution was to build my own cloud generator, then I could controll speed and movement around the dome.

I used actual bits of real clouds and randomly cluster them into larger clouds that grow and deform as the move around a circle. This is then projected on to the dome giving me the effect I was after.

Reality doesn’t have checker board transitions

Matt — Sat, 16 Oct 2010 12:36:30 +0000

The key ring screen I was hoping to use had awful random transition, between images, think powerpoint in the hands of a ten year old. I used to have an mp4 watch that had a beautiful OLED screen, I have found it … Continue reading →

Visions of reality.

Matt — Mon, 11 Oct 2010 09:33:37 +0000

I have been collecting photos for the visions of reality. Many options crossed my mind, I started question reality its self.

I started thinking about when I felt real or actually thought about things. Driving, walking and showering were the most common. Usually when occupied but only just. This was when I felt real so images of this would be my reality. I set about the next few weeks collecting random pics when out. Plus a few pics from the bathroom, A shot of a razor a little nod to Magritte’s painting “Personal Values” the image where It all started.

Dreaming ?

Matt — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 14:08:22 +0000

I think “Dreaming?” is going to be my title.

here is a mock-up

Images of ordinary things in the frame.
(butterfly just there at the moment as a nod to Zhuangzi.)

I toyed with random images form google image searches, It works on some levels, and the terms I planned using came up with some interesting images especially the word “of” lots of images from computer games eg god of war etc quite relevant I thought, but there were too many that I didn’t like, and the control freak in me would want to toss the crap ones. If it was a live feed then there would be some relevance, but as the hardware I will have available wont give me that then its just not the same. I did think of writing an algorithm to choose images based on the words and a colour palette (but I think that’s another project).

Zhuangzi ~ 400BC

Matt — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 13:57:06 +0000

Once upon a time, I, Chuang Chou, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness as a butterfly, unaware that I was Chou. Soon I awaked, and there I was, veritably myself again. Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man. Between a man and a butterfly there is necessarily a distinction. The transition is called the transformation of material things.

Just remembered this quote sort of so thought I should look it up to see who actually said it. It had been a favourite of mine for some time. I like how some themes keep recurring, butterfly and umbrellas, wings transitions/metamorphosis have always had held a special place in my thoughts.

Not entirely sure why I put this in but it seems important.

Plan B and a bit of a rant.

Matt — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 13:11:03 +0000

Almost thought of dropping the idea but I like it too much. Never has there been a more relevant time to question reality. Many people spend increasing amounts in virtual spaces, fighting imagined enemies of keeping in touch with the hundreds of friends they don’t have being spammed by robot , tweeting, tagging, poking investing thousands of hours to set various bits scatted on computers dotted around the world.

This is not a pipe.

Ranting now. But don’t want to let this idea go and I can’t really afford to buy a reasonable camera to pull apart.
Sooo… I am going with a screen from a lcd keyring (Maybe a olde mp4 watch screen if it get here from china in time) will display images of reality in it.

I wont get the camera feed, but the idea is dreaming of reality, can show a series of images or a film on the display instead.

I have a few possibilities on what to show, but am still deliberating on what will work best.

Camera woes

Matt — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 13:05:25 +0000

My cheap camera, is a complete pile of crap, it was only just usable in good light, but in poor light you could make out no detail at all, as I plan to project clouds onto the inside of my skydome I’m planning on a low light environment. Worse still is the fact that the screen is practically unviewable at any angle other than completely square on. would require fine work to remove the screen from the rest of the camera, but its not worth the effort.