| patterns |
[Feb. 23rd, 2005|03:13 am] |
I've been interested in patterns for a long time. Whenever I would try to create one, I wouldn't be happy with it.
But I tried again today and I was very happy with it indeed. Here's the basic process.
I started out drawing a vector shape in illustrator:
Then I repeated it three times to make four, rotated around each other.
I tried various methods of repating it in Illustrator using the bastardized step-and-repeat they have called Transform>Move>Transform Again. What I decided on was a sort of brick pattern:
So I did this and exported the file to photoshop, since I knew I would be making a pixelated web-page style pattern. Here's the hard part - trying to figure out how it repeats.
I know it sounds stupid, since I've already repeated it, I should know. But that was when it wasn't rectangular. When you're talking about bitmapped images, everything has to tessellate around a rectangle. So I opened up the file in photoshop and cropped it various ways and using the bullshit define pattern>new document>fill tool I would test how it worked. Eventually it just clicked and I saw it.
So I cropped it, shrunk it down, and added a few pixels here and there. I changed the color and contrast a bit, but that's the basic process. Here's what it looks like tiled:
And here's the repeating tile:
If you want to use it for anything but don't like the color, just take it into photoshop, image>adjust>desaturate and then image>adjust>hue/saturation. Be sure to click on the colorize checkbox. I wouldn't mess with the lightness, but you can slide the hue around and get pretty much whatever you want.
It's a far cry from Squidfingers, but I'm relatively pleased with the result, considering that it was almost completely random. |
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| uhh |
[Feb. 16th, 2005|11:28 am] |
I have tangled my mind up in an interesting issue.
It has to do with ownership and copyright.
Recently, people (bloggers) began to find out that the Cloud Gate sculpture was being "protected".
I was thinking about this the other day when I went to the art institute, mainly because the cloud gate is on the way. It's covered up now, for "polishing."
Anyway, at the art institute, I was looking at the pamphlet, and read this little snippet:
Photography of the permanent collection, taken in existing light, is permitted on condition that photographs are for personal, non-distributional, noncommercial use. Flashes, tripods, and video cameras are prohibited.
This is basically the same policy that the people in Millennium Park are using with the Cloud Gate. I can understand that a little more, since the Cloud Gate is new and still under copyright.
With the Art Institute, however, these works are old. Definately out of copyright. We then get into the issue of ownership.
I can almost understand blocking photographs of something you privately own.
But... what's the deal with allowing personal photographs, but not allowing tripods? Does using a tripod make you a professional? They sell them for 20 bucks at wal-mart.
The belief (paranoid?) goes: They Art Institute (the city in the case of Cloud Gate) wants to corner the market on postcards and other derivative works. (Ever seen the neckties?) But, by copyright, they can't. So they're enforcing this bullshit rule. I can go ahead and make a derivative work as long as it doesn't interfere with a source of income for the art institute.
I think this whole thing is very confusing when you consider in this way. Do they have the right to prohibit this photography? It resembles the "home taping" argument - cassette tapes are inferior quality reproductions, so it's okay to allow them to proliferate. (In this context, home tapes are analogous to amateur photographs.)
I don't know. Someone help me, it's been bothering me quite a bit. |
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| ass ass |
[Feb. 4th, 2005|02:27 am] |
On sunday, I watched an episode of King of the Hill. In it, Dale began to doubt that the Kennedy assassination was a conspiracy.
This isn't really important. What's important is the idea of JFK.
I started reading stuff. Mostly at Wikipedia, but they've got a lot of good links.
I suggested to Courtney that we rent the movie JFK. It had been a long time since I've seen it, and I wanted to watch it again being an older fellow. Courtney got really excited and we rented not only JFK (205 minutes long) and Malcolm X (201 minutes long.)
So now I've seen two movies in the last two days dealing with assassinated political leaders. Both involve (alleged) conspiracy.
I'd like to conspire to do something. But I don't think that you can conspire to go to the store and buy ice cream. I think you have to conspire to do something someone else seriously doesn't want you to do. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jan. 31st, 2005|04:28 am] |
I had a talk recently.
I said something about how I didn't like The Family Guy as much as I like The Simpsons.
One friend kindof agreed. He thinks that since the Family Guy has 10x more jokes packed in, and, law of averages, some of them suck, some of them are funny. The ones that hit, hit well, and the ones that tank, tank. So the Family Guy is funnier, but the Simpsons is a better show. Of course, this is basically the whole complaint about comedies not getting nominated for oscars. But instead of movies, we're talking about animated sitcoms. On Fox. Based around familes with grossly incomptent fathers.
Anyway, I basically agree. Of course, The Simpsons isn't all good. There are quite a few bad episodes. Seasons, even. But the show is hit or miss on a season-by-season basis, not the minute-by-minute basis of the family guy. I would take a good season 3 or 4 episode of the Simpsons over an episode of the Family Guy any day.
The other friend, though. Oh man. He would not let up. Kept saying that the Family Guy was way better than the Simpsons. I can't even remember why - something about how Lisa is an unfunny character, and that the Family Guy is the only show ever to return from cancellation. That's about all I can remember him saying. He was drunk. One time he insisted that working at Wendy's was a better shit job than Kinko's. I told him this later and he apologized, admitted that Kinko's was way better than Wendy's.
I really don't care about this, I mean, in the overall scheme of things, fuck tv anyway, it's worthless. But I also watch a lot of it, so, you know, I do care. Even though I don't. |
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| bored |
[Jan. 6th, 2005|04:44 pm] |
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| machine philosophy |
[Jan. 4th, 2005|02:17 am] |
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/writing/selfmod.htm
Very interesting, and I think that at least one of you out there might be interested.
Looking at the notes, I noticed that the author has another published article in "The Journal of Speculative Philosophy" which sounds interesting.
I know that "speculative fiction" is just the scifi snobs way to say science fiction, so maybe this is an offshoot. Science Fiction Philosophy. Or something.
In any case, interesting. |
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| today |
[Jan. 3rd, 2005|02:29 am] |
Courtney was very sick today, I think a hot pocket did her in. She should be ok, though.
I stayed here to take care of her (not that I was going anywhere, anyway) and played a lot of Metal Gear Solid 3. It's very cool.
Don't let anyone fool you, though, it's not a "return to form" for the series or anything. There's still long stupid cinemas and drama between characters that is completely unnecessary. Ocelot pisses me off in particular.
The gameplay is amazing, though.
In the other MGS games, I was content to half-heartedly sneak around, and as long as I didn't get noticed too much, I felt like I was doing a good job. This one, though, I find myself waiting in the grass for really long periods of time just so I won't get spotted. It's fun, in a boring sort of way.
I have a new website up, again, and this time it actually works in IE for the PC. As if anyone uses that anymore, anyway. I don't know anyone who does, but then again, I didn't know anyone who was going to vote for W, either.
I Saw the Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. It was great, except that in the middle of the movie, the titles changed from Futura to Helvetica, and then back to Futura.
They are NOT interchangeable. I could understand, say, substituting century gothic or avant garde or something (well, not really, but it would be harder to notice) but not helvetica. That's just wrong.
Now that I'm thinking about it there might be some reason for it. Like how in Dancer in the Dark it switches back and forth between video and film, I doubt it, but there might be. I would certainly like to know. Maybe I should do some investigative journalism - or maybe I should just sit on my ass and just pretend that I'll do something cool. That sounds better.
The thought occurred to me today that the one thing about my personality that separates me from other people is that I have doubt. I think it's a good thing. But people, in general, seem to act certain and be attracted to people who are certain.
So if I want to be perceived as a good person, I should act as if I'm always sure of everything. Myself, the world, and my place in it.
I had a conversation the other day with someone (I have no idea who) in which I explained to them what agnosticism is. They said something to the effect of "just make up your damned mind! HAHAHAHA" It struck me as a silly way to think. Are people scared of not having an opinion? Perhaps they think that having doubt is the same thing as being stupid. It would explain a lot about the state of the world.
I'm constantly thinking of one thing, one important idea I could leave the world with and feel good about myself. Things like 1) Advertising is evil, 2) Christian culture is bringing the world down.
Now I would like to teach the world that 3) Being certain is not the path to knowledge.
I see it as a revision of the past two ideas, getting more and more general as I go along.
From time to time terms come into my life in flocks. Family Resemblance has just started to do this. It's a very good term that explains a lot.
Makes me think of those games where you pick from mutations and "evolve" a creature. Like the face making program in the old Sims. You know what I'm talking about. |
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| Ownership society |
[Nov. 7th, 2004|12:40 pm] |
Paying a bunch of money for slips of paper is not ownership.
War is not peace. Lies are not truth.
I don't want any part of it.
1984 was not written as a guidebook. It was an example of what not to do. |
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| the world |
[Nov. 3rd, 2004|11:09 am] |
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everything is wrong |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 28th, 2004|01:43 am] |
These words were spoken in a political debate last night. You must understand a few things about the candidates before this becomes funny.
They are running for a senate seat from illinois. Obama you may recognize from the DNC a few months ago. Keyes you may recognize from the mental asylum.
In addition, Keyes is like 40 percentage points behind Obama. No one thinks that he will win. But when he started talking about logic, I perked up. And I laughed.
And, sadly, his logic isn't that horribly flawed. Yes, it's true that if I don't know who my father is, there is a possibility that I could have sex with my sister.
I'd like to study some numbers about hospitals giving children to the wrong parents. If Mr. Keyes is truly as worried about incest as he claims to be, then he should spend as much time bitching about hospitals as he does bitching about gay people adopting children. I'd like to see him introduce a bill to that effect if he gets elected.
Anyway, what follows is funny, I think, read it if you have some time to kill.
( Read more... ) |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 4th, 2004|10:44 am] |
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Also I hate Pavement. |
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| Vanderslice and his tagalong |
[Oct. 4th, 2004|03:29 am] |
Saw Vanderslice again tonight. Rocked. Actually bought a couple of albums for two reasons, in decending order of importance:
1) Felt guilty about enjoying him so much and not paying him for it
2) Nicotine is broken for some reason and can't get to downloading that last album I missed.
Anyway, my point to writing was not to talk about Vanderslice, I'm sick of hearing myself talk about how great he is. I'm writing about the Mountain Goats, who is headlining this tour that Vanderslice is on.
They're awful. I'm sure I could manage to glean something worthwhile from their immense catalog, but -
why?
No reason fucking whatsoever. The guitar playing was somewhat like folk, which I can admire, but it was not folk. It sounded to me like a guy who plays acoustic guitar not because he likes it, but because it was all he had in his basement and is too afraid to buy new equipment. Like the people who play punk music not because they like it, but because it is easy.
It was just average. Not bad, not good. Often, I find myself hating average things more than bad things. Don't know why that is.
Anyway, his singing was bad, but liking a lot of singers who can't sing, I can't really fault him for that.
Thirdly: the lyrics. Before the show, I was listening to the people around me, as I usually do, picking up snippets of idiocy. I heard someone talk about the mountain goats, saying that the singing was an acquired taste, but that the lyrics were really what was important.
So, based on this and what I've read around the internet, I was listening to his words. I was very unimpressed.
There was just nothing interesting at all about the Mountain Goats. Sorry, I take that back - that people weren't leaving the Empty Bottle in droves after Vanderslice finished. I can usually understand why people like something that I don't like (doesn't mean I don't hate them for it, but I can understand.)
I do not understand the Mountain Goats at all. I don't really care to, either. |
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| a statement |
[Oct. 1st, 2004|01:34 pm] |
I wrote this, trying to figure out what sort of art I want to make. I think it's a good list (very disorganized, though.)
What I want my art to be:
interesting
different
substantive
pretension-less
simple
not therapy for myself (my parents were so fucked up! etc. etc.)
not general (aren't doggies so cute? people are meant to be together etc.)
not boring
not cliche
not belonging to a genre (i.e. a gaming comic or a scifi novel)
specific to the medium - a song should be musically engaging and a comic should be visually engaging. Some comics, for example, are not visually engaging but they are written well, for example. Not to demean the writer, but, damnit, if you're going to write, write a book. Not that comics shouldn't be well-written, but that it should not be the only engaging element. Nor should music be engaging for purely sentimental reasons. I developed this aesthetic when I began asking people why they liked certain music. I discovered that many reasons offered had nothing to do with music - so and so was physically attractive, it reminded them of their childhood, they liked the lyrics, etc.
it should challenge the medium, but only to a certain degree - i.e., pure noise is interesting as music, but only for so long.
free of errors (typographical, grammatical, factual) (unless intended)
engaging
powerful
it should make some people angry and some people happy
it should not attempt to mimic old styles, for the most part
not preachy
not specifically about philosophical issues (read philosophy if you want that)
not have one clear message
express ideas different from my own (i.e. authentically speaking through characters that are significantly different from me.) |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 1st, 2004|04:00 am] |
I feel like such a waste.
I spend all my time waiting for my two days off (If I'm lucky.) During those two days, I want to do good things. I want to draw and be creative, read, write, play video games, do all sorts of good things.
I just had those two days. Not much happened. I watched two good movies, though, Jacob's Ladder and Bartleby.
Enough of the two bright points in two otherwise lackluster days: I want to talk about the crap.
I tried to draw. I tried to write. I can't do anything anymore. This isn't just a one-time thing, it's been happening to me for a while. I feel like the last good thing I did (not for school) was my comic, while I was in Japan.
I don't know what it is. I do spend a lot of time thinking about things to do. I've had at least twelve new ideas for comics, but I can't get around to doing anything.
I tend to blame it on work. But I have some free time. Every day, I wake up at around 10am and do nothing for about three hours. I could be doing things. Sometimes I do. I've gotten about 2 letters into three different typefaces over the past couple of months.
I just seem to be artistically lethargic. I tell myself that I think too much about how lethargic I am and that makes me more so.
It's really nothing but excuses.
What I don't want is to be a worthless person. I think that I have something artistically unique to offer the world, and I want to do it. I absolutely don't want to be someone who does nothing with his life.
I'm often scared by knowing that many people I admire achieved great success at a much younger age. =w= is the classic example. Others - rock musicians, graphic designers, painters, none are coming to mind but you get the idea.
I got nothin'. At all. I did this one painting that a bunch of my friends seem to enjoy. I also did a comic that one or two people liked.
I'm always thinking about how much better I felt about my artistic output when I was in high school. I know that high school sucked and I couldn't wait to get out of there - but what was so different? Do I actually need to be around a bunch of people I hate to be artistically active? Do I need to be forced into doing something every day?
I remember drawing because I liked doing it. I remember writing because I was bored and thought it would be fun.
Maybe I have more distractions now. Maybe working for a living just isn't compatible with art.
Maybe I just need to let it go and realize that I peaked with the cambodian war machine. It's not so bad.
But I want more.
You know how, in those stories about the world ending, there is always a ragtag group of survivors who fight for their survival and later become important founders of a new civilization? I often think about how I want to be one of those people. But then I think about everyone else in the world dying and I feel guilty.
Sometimes I think it would be funny to make a comic or write a story about this state of mind. A desperate, pathetic character trying to make himself more important that he really is. But then I think about Adaptation and how that has already been done, very well, I might add.
Strangely enough, I've been thinking about buying music lately. For some reason, my file sharing program of choice has decided to completely cease to run on my computer no matter what I do. Seriously, I've been trying for about 2 weeks now to get it to run.
It's not that big a deal, though, there's nothing I can even think to download anyway.
Late. Wow. |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 1st, 2004|03:32 am] |
Something I wrote earlier but forgot to post:
An old man is going to work. He enters the station, slides his card, and then walks to the train platform and waits.
The train is coming, says the loudspeaker, please be patient.
Other people gradually make their way to the platform. The old man opens up his conservative bag and pulls out a bagel. He was going to eat it later, but he wasn't planning on waiting this long. While eating the bagel, the old man opens up a newspaper. It's one of those newspapers with orange paper instead of off-white.
There are kids on the platform, perhaps they're going to school. They talk amongst themselves, pretending to have more energy than they really do.
The old man finishes his bagel and throws away the napkin it was wrapped in.
After a few more minutes, the train finally comes. Everyone is relieved. They get on separate cars, hoping to never see the people they waited with again. |
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| A job |
[Sep. 14th, 2004|06:03 pm] |
Sort of. What it has entailed so far is working for approximately 11 hours making drafts for a layouts in photoshop. Doing layout in photoshop is a bad idea.
Not only that but the client was on IM and was giving instant feedback. Awhile ago I read that a "secret" of the graphic design profession is to put an obvious flaw in your comp so the client, who desperately wants to have input, can "correct" you on that small flaw, and thusly feel like they have some input. Something like making the type not quite line up, or having some of the colors off.
During this one day, I learned the wisdom of this.
The other thing that bothered me was that I was working on COMPS. This means that they are basically drafts of the final product, and only represent the general idea. However, I was working on these and getting feedback like "move this paragraph down, bold this," etc. Also I was doing one page at a time.
It would've been much better and less stressful if they had saved the nitpicky comments until the end, before we worked on the final product.
Anyway. It was interesting, but mostly annoying. It scares me - if one day of graphic design was too much for me, imagine a lifetime. |
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| Jobs |
[Aug. 24th, 2004|01:58 am] |
I guarantee you that I'm better than some fuck who just has a job because of the tech "boom."
I'm better than a lot of people. Certainly not all, but a lot.
I mean, damn, I just figured out how to use Fontlab to make multiple master fonts. I bet at least half of don't even care what this means, but I know how to do it.
I learned to type two spaces after a period. But now I'm trying to make myself not do it and it's really hard. |
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