Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Rule of Thumb
Sunday, December 20th, 2009Art Basel Miami FLA prt#1
Wednesday, December 9th, 2009
Miami: AKA land of the Infinite JACKPOT
Wednesday, December 9th, 2009
Tuesday afternoon i found myself on the E train heading to JFK. The E train sucks. the people on the e-train lack home training. A few high lights include but are not limited to; 40 minutes of repetitive gassing by someone in a serious intestinal battle, to the point the air took on a yellowed mustered gas hue. Ned the Nail clipper decided it was appropriate to clip his nails standing up in the middle of the car. What happened at home that you had to leave so fast to need to finish that portion of your grooming on the train? And how have your nail gotten so far away from you that they have reached the ‘these need to be cut right now regardless of my location’ stage?
Personal grooming on the E train from heavy lox on Vimeo.
E train, AirTrain, JFK NYC to Miami. American airlines also sucks, international and domestic flights all checking into a the same 4 tired over worked agent booths. lines of black hats, italians, hipsters, euro trash, Chipper Brits, angry americans (ill be in that category for this portion of the adventure), it was the noahs arc of travelers ready to be saved by the check in gods.
2005, Cormac McCarthy, No Country for Old Men, page 86:
- You’re already in a jackpot, he said. I’m tryin to get you out of it.
My Miami expectations were shattered, in sense they were the first victims of what seemed like a 6 day gauntlet run at avoiding jam-up after jam-up. I thought i was going to the land of beach bums and 4:30pm dinner specials. What i got was a Dead downtown, with vacancies out the ass, but the urgent need to continue massive amounts of construction on the edges of the city as if they were preparing for a mass migration i was unaware of. A booming vagrant community, only out numbered by the number of police patrol cars out and about. Miami PD would do well investing in oil futures. In NYC the police cars say “courtesy professionalism & respect” , were i to suggest a similarly ironic slogan for the Miami PD, “went green” comes to mind. Blocks and blocks of low rise housing projects, layed out but some drunk in the sun city planners that im sure planned the city on the beach with unequal parts Rum and left handed stick drawing in the sand by right handed individuals looking backwards into a shattered mirror. The Knaty has a GOOD sense of direction but even with I&iphone powered navigation we spent as much time in search of our destinations as we did at the destination. The journey was truely the trip and it took us in to all corners of the city save those the resembled any places ive ever been. In Hotel i saw on the news a burger King near us was robbed for the second time in as many weeks. When reached for comment the manager was quoted as saying,’ this time they had guns, last time it was only knives’. The next story was about a woman, also not far from us, who was gunned down in her idling car, by machine gun fire. In the process of her body being riddled with automatic gun fire her foot came off the brake and polcie arrived to a car drive in circles with a dead woman at the the wheel. So now im in the market to get a winter spot in miami. Did I mention while waiting for a friend to get some falafel I found i had inadvertently jack-potted myself into having front row seats to an 8 way tranny fight rivaling any jerry springer meets UFC in a WWF theatrical release intended for adult audiences only. To say the least i was stunned. To say a bit more i was confused and all of a sudden i regretted not paying attention in gender politics class. What is going on, is this assault or just a brawl involving costumes, my brain hurt trying to sort it out…There was at least one real woman involved, but she was huge and in no real danger of ending up on the losing side of any brutality, to the contrary she was handing out a sever ass whipping to a pretty stocking dude who it seemed threw the fisrt blow, at least ouside. The jackpot spilled out of the club. In fact as i was waiting on my my man to get his food there was what i thought was a hooker a door down form the food spot, basically inbetween the food spot and the club. Shelly thunder well call her, him as it may well be. At any rate shes posted up tossing he ass and hips around trying to catch anything with two legs walking by. Being amused at this slice of Miamica, i was watching. Shelly thunder saw me and tossed me an ass sashay. Your barking up the wrong tree here lady, im just here to take in the show, im audience not an actor, I thought. In my mind i was thinking it would be funny if she was hooking out side a gay club, she really would be barking up the wrong neck of the woods, little did i know i was about to find out it was a gay club of sorts, is at tranny club a gay club? shit i dont know how to classify it. anyway. Shelly thunder waltzed over the slip out of the club, where the bur-ha-ha was about to begin.
lets go to the granny I&iphone Video:
miamiISWild from heavy lox on Vimeo.
SuperBland Man
Saturday, October 31st, 2009The Awesome liberation of aspirations.
I dont have to be it, just aspire.
Right now im stuck in the novelty of regarding the legacy of the really good try-er. Those of us destined to be remembered along the lines of, ‘insert name here, gave it his/her all, they really tried’. In celebration of the average joe I drew, Super Bland man, a throw back to the days when all i did was draw super heros with incredible powers that could save the world and look cool while doing.
SuperBland Man, Mild on Crime, more of an ember than a fire.
She wore a polka-dot hat.
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009
the Train sat in the station for a while. Polka-dot hat was engrossed in Black-berryism, and stayed still for a while. Thanks Polka-dot. Mid way through the trip, the train was flooded with 2nd or 3rd graders from PS something or another. The train went from calm and quite and kind of empty to a ruckus sea of chest high heads bobbing up and down, bouncing off the trains inner obstacles, passengers, rails, protruding seats, like rocks at the bottom of a waterfall, all were brought in to contact via haphazard collision courses, plotted by an odd combination of fate and youthful negotiations with gravity, friction and miscalculated forces.
No seats left unoccupied, some even filled beyond their intended capacity. There were no less the 6 bodies crammed in to the four seats next to me. Even polka-dot hat was mobbed having to shift herself slightly to accommodate her new seat mate (seen out of scale left of polka-dot hat; she got obfuscates quickly by an over bearing very nervous teacher). Shortly after sitting the boy right next to me noticed the drawing and began an epic series of, secret gestures aimed at gaining the attention of his cohorts without alerting me to his actions. I had forgotten how awesome it is to watch children thinking they are being clever. High espionage in progress, the whisper, a dull roar. The hand gesture subtly signaling his team, like an over animated conductor in the final throws of the Ode to Joy. Miss Morris, Miss Morris, I want to be an artist when i grow up, said one. I remember when experiences would solidify my future plans, and like all children of his age it was set… for about 3 minutes until socializing with his crew took over again and all else paled in comparative importance.
Illustrator: Scan to vector – Part #2
Saturday, October 24th, 2009Part #1 here.
PART #2:
With ALL THE BASE Shapes created its time to start combining them to form more complex shapes Using mainly the Pathfinder Palette.
starting point:
Ending point:
Step 1:
Isolate the letters and plan the over laps; this can be tricky, as done in the wrong order you can end up combing or trimming unintended shapes. Luckily with ‘undo’ you can go back and or fix later with some more pathfider work or using the scissor tool to dissect some shapes again.
Isolated the main the body of the R and the two extensions that connect to the R body.
The top extension the comes out of the left top arm pit of the R; Since the extension needs to connect to the R and have it s chute pass behind it, I selected both pieces and Trimmed them to remove the overlapping area of the extension. Because the resulting shapes all share a border I couldnt use the Combine function on the pathfinder so I used the scissor tool to snip both the extension end and the arm pit. Deleting the end of the extension and separating the Arm pit points, i then selected the corresponding open points and joined them.
Fill turned of you can see no overlapping outlines.
Similar process to get the Left foot of the R and its kick extension squared away. It also involved some negotiating and trimming its over lap with the Rs main body.
The completed R with only the top left extension un-trimmed. Added the negitave space of the R creating a Compound path so the shape will fill keep the negative space empty.
Close too finished base letters, with top left extension and A sliced un-Trimmed, also the bottom Left leg of the H is yet unconnected to the heart. And the negative spaces in the heat of the T and the A need to be added.
Illustrator: Scan to vector – Part #1
Friday, October 23rd, 2009How i go about translating an scanned sketch into an Illustrator Drawing.
When i first started using illustrator I went about painstakingly trying to trace pretty complex images, not concerned with Illustrators most powerful feature, which is to create complexity by building from simplicity. Just like books aimed at teaching you how to draw illustrator is great when used to block and refine. Towards this end illustrator has an awesome set of drawing tools to help build generic shapes that can be combined with another tool (the PathFinder Tool; more about this one later)
Resources:
if you’re not familiar with the pen tool check out these links: http://school.tatoland.com/illustrator/aipentool.html & http://vector.tutsplus.com/tools-tips/illustrators-pen-tool-the-comprehensive-guide/
STEP #1:
Scanned Drawing, opened in Illustrator. I set the transparency to 20% to help differentiate the vector shaped from the scanned sketch. I always set my scan on its own layer and LOCK the layer so it wont accidentally get moved. I have accidentally moved a scan before and continued drawing with old layers turned off and didn’t realize the new lines were shifted until sometime later, it was a bit of a pain to get them re-registered. All subsequent illustrator work will take place on new layers sitting above the scan layer. Its a pain but if you are going to work on a file for a while of set it down and come back to it, naming layers is super helpful to help keep track of what is where.
STEP #2:
Start to block out the basic shapes. I used the pen tool for this. I am not a fan of the pencil to when it comes to drawing these kinds of precise lines and curves . The pen tool also allows for better control of the number and positioning of anchor points. When drawing with teh pen tol i always turn the fill off and set the stroke to an arbitrary color the will not be confused with the scan I’m tracing.
If youre the kind of person who draws over-lapping letters with out thinking about what goes on behind the over-lap, now is the time to consider it. Closing your eyes only blocks your view of the world it doesnt make it go away; the same goes for the parts of letters that are behind the over-lap. This method of working in illustrator will allow me to combine all these simple looking shapes into much more sophisticated and complex shapes, that would be the wrong use of energy to simply draw out with the pen tool. Once all the shapes are blocked in you can then playing around with the bits, and where and how they sit in relation to each other; something that becomes Sisyphean if done on paper.
I have purposely left out the negative spaces of the letter, they will be added later when the shaped are combined. Also the Arrows will be created separately and then copied and added to each branch.
All the basic shapes are drawn. I set the fill back to the default white and black so i can see the solid shapes and begin any initial adjustments to where the basic shapes will sit.
Next post:
pathFinder Palette and using it to manipulate the simple shapes and turn them into shapes that more resemble the finished letters of the sketch.
C.A.M
Monday, October 19th, 2009
The Right Stuff
Sunday, October 18th, 2009
The urge for order…
Tuesday, October 6th, 2009I maintain and amateur interest in everything.
The urge for order satisfies itself, it seems, regardless of the quality of the evidence.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/health/06mind.html?_r=1
How Nonsense Sharpens the Intellect
I read a bit of an article in the Nytimes today that tenuously linked the idea on nonsense helping to stimulate the brain in pattern recognition. That is a bit of an over simplification but its what i took away. Its interesting that what i did with the article is almost exactly what it suggested one does when encountering a confounding situation; try to make sense of it by fitting it to known scenarios to find what seems to be the most reasonable answer or solution.
Reading this article reminded me that ive been trying to write a post linking style-writing in particular but general visual arts as well to the music rhythm and pattern. The goal was to begin to build a set of guidelines by which to critique various forms of style writing.
So far i have about 8 pages of ramble, each paragraph leaving me further away from my points then when i started.
basic ideas:
- style-writing is similar to a music.
- as with patterns the ones the keep our interest are the ones the have enough info to allow you detect the presence of pattern but leaves enough room to make you search for it and in good cases it takes a few tries to figure it out; thus allowing room to intellectually participate in the experience.
- the process is furthered by the layering of patterns or motifs which interplay with each other setting of dissident pattern reactions throwing you off the trail you initially started.
- SO good style writing follows the idea of layered patterns that create a visual rhythm.
- the rhythm is followed and broken so that at each break you must re-think what you thought you new as the pattern.
- reassessment leads to deep engagement by the viewer.
is that confusing enough? I feel like there’s something in there i just haven’t gotten to it yet. Its not groundbreaking in any event, but does seem so common-sensicle that its over looked by most and stumbled upon by many. It also assumes a certain artistic motivation, which for many simply isnt really the concern.
Still, the new research supports what many experimental artists, habitual travelers and other novel seekers have always insisted: at least some of the time, disorientation begets creative thinking.
NYTimes article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/health/06mind.html?_r=1