SEEING THE LIGHT

Our assignment was to make a luminaire based off of the "light phenomenon" photo we took previously. Who knew it would be such an undertaking?!

My phenomenon was of the sun setting behind mini blinds. You could see just a peek of the sun between the blinds. I wanted to capture this peeking of light in my light fixture.

While looking up ideas I stumbled upon the work of Vicente Garcia Jimenez. His use of layering laquered materials and varying the amount of light shown inspired me.

I first made a little sketch model of what i was kind of thinking of doing with mylar. Then i made a prototype out of cardboard.

When I went to make my final piece I discovered that plastic sheeting wasn't as easy to glue as cardboard was. Because it's clear I had to be very careful with my glue choice. I decided to score the sides and use much bigger pieces just for ease.

After playing around with different ways of gluing/attaching pieces I came to the conclusion that if I could paint glue on evenly and apply lots of pressure it would be nearly invisible. I sanded the sides to make them less transparent and glued everything together. The glue took FOREVER to dry so I spent plenty of time at the middle table waiting.

After everything was dry I made a smaller box to cover the bulb because it was still pretty bright. I drilled a hole in the bottom of the box before attaching that piece (also scored) onto the box. I then put the socket through and glued it to the hole. I made little standing pieces to insert in the bottom so that the box was raised and wasn't sitting right on the cord.

with inner box

without inner box

from top

I experimented  with putting mylar between sheets of plexiglass 

I almost used wire but it was too bulky

I almost used brads but they, too, were just bulky

We then had to do technical drawings of our piece along with an expressive drawing. The technical ones weren't hard to draw at half scale but my one regret is that I didn't look closely at my light effect in a dark room before drawing it. I think it would have been much more successful had I done that.

I had some serious challenges with this project (expensive materials, FRAGILE MATERIALS, materials that required much patience, etc) but I really think it turned out well. 

A PEEK AT THE FUTURE?

This week I went to one of the second year critiques. Their assignment (or what they could interpret from Jonathon's long project statement!) was to take a piece of paper and make rules for how it should be folded...this crease should always go here, the folds should be this size...etc. They took their paper designs and blew them up on the computer and turned them into full scale pieces. Some versions ended up in parks, others in urban spaces.

Jasmine shared with us her concept of weaving paper strips together to make something instead of folding it. She focused on weaving and tension folding. She used aluminum mesh since it was already woven and used fishing wire to sew it into the form that she wanted. She used points from her hand to give the model directional tension, something she learned from an earlier assignment about the human body. She shared with us that 3D modeling was definitely harder than expected!

Justin and his group told us about their concept of biomimicry and how they wanted to capture the look of wind and dune formations. To recreate their paper model they used the laser cutter on acrylic and then baked the model in the oven and had to check on it and shape it periodically. They wanted their piece to be placed in an urban setting and were inspired by the light effects it would produce/that would be produced through it in that type of setting.





What did the students have to say about their projects and challenges? They said that even though some of the assignments will be hard to understand, you have to take your interpretation and "keep moving forward!" They also quoted Tommy saying to "always have a beginner's mind." Later that day one of the second years was walking around looking at our studio. He told a few of us that he stopped in at a few of our previous critiques and that the work we've done was much different/even a little better than theirs last year. I'm not sure how true that really is but it's exciting to think about moving forward and creating things like these. Things aren't going to get any easier but they're definitely going to get more interesting!

DESIGN VISUALIZATION 110

This semester I definitely learned a lot. I learned the expected things like how to successfully draw many types of architectural drawings, how to scale a line down, etc. I also learned the best type of pencils to use in different drafting situations, the best way to sharpen those pencils, the way to hold them...I learned that masking tape and drafting tape are definitely not to be mistaken for the same thing. I learned that staring at the same paper for hours can make your eyes do crazy things.

While my drawings weren't usually up to the high standards set, I know that I worked hard this semester (ask my roommates...they had to make sure I was still alive sometimes I was gone so much!). I've discovered that it's pretty near impossible to get a high A, at least for me, but with more practice it'd be an easier goal to reach.
 Speaking of practice, I've had much practice doing observational drawings this semester as well. We started out drawing leaves...then came twigs...and so on. I wish that I had spent more time on EVERY drawing...I think it's probably evident in my sketchbook which drawings I took time on and which ones I didn't. While I'm by NO means an expert sketcher, I think that my drawing abilities definitely improved. I'm better at shading for sure.

I think that this is one of my most successful drawings from my sketchbook. I took more time to get this one right and I think it turned out well. 

I'd be lying if I said this was my favorite class ever, but I can say I'm definitely taking a lot away from it!

MOST MINIMAL

In drafting, we've been working on figure drawing for the past couple of weeks. This drawing is from a day that we all took turns in modeling and sketching each other in groups. We had 10-15 minutes for each drawing and by the end of the exercise we each had 2 drawings on our papers. At the end, we all posted up the better of our two drawings and the class voted on different superlatives such as best line quality, craziest style, etc. My drawing here won "most minimal" and you can see why!

TIMED FIGURE DRAWINGS

We were split up into different groups and each had to go to the center of the circle and pose for us to draw them. For group one we had to draw them as abstract line drawings. We had 5 minutes to sketch.

For the very last drawing, half of the room stood up and we had 3 minutes to draw everyone as contour drawings. It was hard because they all kept moving but this is about half of the group.

So we were told to choose three of our most successful sketches and post them on our blogs. These are the three that I think are the best so far...

This sketch, like all of the others, was done in graphite. I drew it at home looking at a picture from the Internet. It probably took about 20 minutes.

This sketch I also drew from a picture on the Internet. It took about 15 minutes.

This sketch took no time at all but I think it turned out pretty well. I think I just free handed it.

We also were told to look through 2 of our classmates' sketchbooks and pick our favorite sketches...

This one, done by Anuj, really struck me. His shading techniques make the leaf look weathered and it has a thickness to it. It's really well done.

This one was done by my fellow Anna. I like the way she varied her line thickness and shading to show the great texture of the twig. 

LUMINAIRES

Our project now (due at the end of November) is to make a luminaire based on our light phenomenon from the earlier project. This is the picture I'll be basing my luminaire off of. 

I looked around on Google for light fixture ideas and I found some of Vicente Garcia Jimenez's work.

I'm thinking about using the layering of strips technique he uses and making a table lamp. I want to leave gaps so that you can still get a peek of the light (like you can still see the sun through the blinds) but I don't want to leave too much space so its blinding either. We'll see what comes of this...

LIGHT: the natural agent that makes things visible...a source of illumination (Webster)

Using flashlights and torches to create amazing "Lightmarks" Cenci Goepel and Jens Warnecke bring a new definition to light photography. They create these "Lightmarks" in different places in nature, almost contributing to the landscape itself. I know that they experiment with different apertures and camera settings (details are hard to find...on their website they only include a picture of a camera and its settings under the "making of" tab) but what I find to be the most fascinating and intriguing part of their works is the simplistic beauty that they create. The "Lightmarks" don't take away from the beauty of their environments, they only enhance them and add a new element to them. The pairs work can be compared to that of Taylor Pemberton, Lapp Pro, Toby Keller, and even Pablo Picasso. 

website: www.lightmark.de

Pemberton

Pro

Keller

Picasso

WHAT TO DO WITH A 2x4?

The next part of our final project was to familiarize ourselves with the wood shop. We were given a 18 inch long 2x4 piece of wood and were told to cut it at least 5 times in the shop and then reattach the pieces without glue or nails. This caused us to think about joinery and how we'd connect our pieces. After finishing this project, I feel like I could build something way more important. Watch out world, Anna Hambly knows how to use a table saw.

This was my first attempt...a puzzle-like, linear system. The pieces could be rearranged in different ways to make the piece look different.

The different heights and lengths were really interesting to me.

I liked the fact that one could rearrange the entire piece...but it was my first attempt and I really wanted to get the craft right. 

So I made the wood thinner and cleaner-looking. 

The new piece can be tilted in different directions but the pieces aren't able to be rearranged like the first one...mostly due to the different widths that resulted from cutting. I kind of like it better that way, though. Different widths contribute to the different sizes, heights, and arrangements of all the pieces and they really come together to make up one big piece.

Originally I arranged the piece to look this way but I liked the fact that it was able to stand up on its own as well. It's more attention-grabbing that way. I think I plan to put it on a wall somewhere...