Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Design, Influence, Math.


“Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.” – George Bernard Shaw
If you look around you and began to dissect the objects in your area, I bet you couldn’t name a handful of things some sort of designer or artist hasn’t touched. I dare you to try to imagine what that object would look like if there was no artistic thought or personal touch put into it. What would that object be like if the creator didn’t care about your reaction, your feeling, your need or want of the object? What if we neglected originality or imagination, how about emotion or innovation? Everything would be the same, boring, and cold. Design influences every aspect of the world. Design is also influenced by that same world. It is our ideas, our expression, our voice, our release and sometimes our only escape.
I found myself enjoying and being more creative in my projects for my math class over my design classes this past month. Here are my last two creations:


The project was to make a Lute of Pythagoras and then a “creative” version of a Lute of Pythagoras. Most people just filled one with different colors and pictures. I thought about how I could use the Lute in real world. Even though it was only required to be on an 8.5” by 11” piece of paper, I wanted to challenge myself by doing it 3D. Since the holidays are coming up, I had Christmas on the brain and said to myself “hey why don’t I make a tree ornament?” So I did. I laid it out like a package that didn’t open in Illustrator. Then just for the fun of it I colored it by hand. 


My second project was to create a fractal. Instead of just making a pattern with a fractal, I decided I was going use a fractal to make something real, so to speak. I watched a tutorial on how to make fractals in Photoshop and began experimenting. They started to look like octopus tentacles to me and I thought “Heck yeah, I’m making an octopus.” So you know what? I did. Challenging myself yet again I not only created one fractal but also made the tentacles by using a fractal inside a fractal within a fractal. Yeah you try following that. The tentacles were done in Photoshop and then placed in Illustrator where the head and bubbles where created. I think she is a cute little thing if I do say so myself. I think I am going to go back and try to blend her head and legs together better but I am not going to critique myself on work done with no expected results. I am just going to enjoy the fun I had making happy mistakes. 
 -DND