T, D+P "Sounds of the city"- finalising the sub-topic

During the first days of the second week other members of the group started to come up with other ideas, making us question our original one. One of these consisted of visually communicating the sounds of the city from the point of view of a homeless person living on the streets of London. After thinking about this throughout the day and talking to various tutors about it, we decided it would not be the best solution to this project. The subject matter didn't really fit the brief that well and in order for us not to become stereotypical about homelessness we would have to had to put a lot of research into the topic, research which the time constraints of this project wouldn't allow us to gather.

We therefore decided to go with the original idea that we discussed in the first week.

Project proposal

The city can be a hectic and stressful place. Therefore, given the topic “Sounds of the City” one might immediately think of busy roads, concrete buildings and huge swarms of people trying to get to their destination. However for our project we wanted to focus on the rare and hidden areas within London where one might go to escape the chaos of city life. Through moving image we aim to contrast the “sounds of the city” that might cause people to feel a curtain level of anxiety with images of nature, encouraging people to find those areas within the city that provoke a sense of calm.

In order to explore the two different environments as a group we decided to meet on location at oxford circus and then walk through to Hyde Park. This allowed us to gather visual research of the hustle and bustle of city life and of the more relaxed and tranquil environment within a park. Some of the results can be seen below.

This was useful as it gave us time to experiment with various methods of filming the information we wanted to gather whilst discussing and developing our ideas for the project further. However it quickly became apparent to me that as individuals within the group, we all had different perceptions of the subject and how we might communicate it. For example some of us wanted to use mostly film and others wanted to incorporate lots of animation into the final piece. After discussing and talking through our different ideas for the final presentation of the piece we eventually understood each other better.

As well as filming in our group I also took some photographs of my own interpretation of the topic.

I really liked how the early afternoon light at the time made the photographs look. The affect it had on the colours and the contrast within the photographs added an increased sense of tranquility to the already calming atmosphere within the park, enhancing the idea of going to such a place to escape the stress of an external city life.

T, D+P Project 2- "Sounds of the city"

For the first week of this project we organised our group and shared a few ideas for possible project proposals. On the Thursday we did a "Visualising sound" workshop where we listened to different sounds, some instrumental and others more generic that we would perhaps hear in our everyday lives. I found this exercise very interesting as different people interpreted the sound differently and you could really start to see everybody's individual style. Some people's visualisation seemed to be more abstract, using just shapes and colour to portray the emotions they felt when listening to the sounds, whereas others produced more literal imagery related to how the sounds are produced.

One of our ideas consisted of basing the location of our project around a park or natural environment within a city. For some people this environment within a contrasting city environment might act as a calming or relaxing place where they can escape the stress of their fast paced city life. We wanted to focus on the fact that when you are in these natural environments even though you are surrounded by the sounds of the city from outside, the imagery in front of you distracts you from the chaos going on outside.

In response to this idea I went to my local park and took several pictures and videos, to collect possible material or inspiration for the final outcome. I started to film different things people might do or see whilst walking though the park/woods such as walking through the leaves, walking their dog or just appreciating the environment around them. Some of my experiments/visual research through film and photography can be seen bellow.

Dog walking.

Walking through leaves.

The surrounding landscape seen through the reflections in muddy puddles.

Some of these experiments weren't as successful as I had hoped however some were, most notably the last video. I thought it might be interesting to film the leaves rustling in the wind and just by chance some kind of emergency service vehicle drove past outside merging the very peaceful imagery of nature with the piercing and stressful effect of hearing a siren. This was one of the combinations I was thinking that we could create whilst editing the video and sound footage we would eventually collect. Therefore I was very pleased that I was able to capture this and illustrate my interpretation of this topic to the rest of my group.

T, D+P Review

At the start of the project I explored various possible sub topics. I went to Highgate cemetery to take some photos, originally thinking about exploring how the people that are buried there have shaped the society we live in today. However during my first tutorial it was brought to my attention that the images showed a cemetery that was becoming overgrown, leading to the destruction of many of the gravestones. I therefore decided to focus on how nature might take over human environments and visa versa or how we might be able to live in a world where humans and nature can coexist. My initial ideas included visually representing this by layering both photographic and illustrative images on Photoshop. After being introduced to print mak- ing, I realised I could do this through screen printing, experimenting with merging an image

of a brick wall with tree branches. I also aimed to recreate one of my images from Highgate cemetery using both the lino and intaglio printing methods but after complications, I ended up putting the separate prints together on Photoshop. For my last workshop I did Animation which I found to be very useful in representing my ideas. I used Photoshop to create an animation of a city gradually building on a leaf. Moving image helped me to visually communicate how the development of an urban environment over time might destroy the surrounding landscape. Although it was quite a simple animation, this method was very new to me and I was proud of the outcome.

As the final animation took a considerable amount of time and effort I would consider this to be my final outcome. However as I discussed with one of the tutors in my tutorial it doesn't completely fulfil the aim of the project and adhere to the given concept. Although it obviously considers with natural and human elements in our society, it doesn't show the impact of this increased human activity on the nature. This is true for the project as a whole as I should have probably focused more clearly on a definite message that I wanted to communicate, rather than experimenting with different imagery that ultimately portrayed different messages throughout the whole project. For the next project I will aim to come up with a more definite direction earlier on in my development, making the message of the final piece set to a specific concept.

T, D+P Animation workshop

In the first week we experimented with stop motion to create an animation. To get used to the technique I did a simple animation of a line gradually becoming wave and growing.

We also experimented with producing a stop motion animation using cut outs from a magazine. We didn't have a set narrative which probably wasn't the right way to do it but we gathered cuttings of man made and natural imagery and words to continue the idea looking at these two emollients in relation to each other.

In the second week we experimented with using photoshop to create an animation. I have used photoshop before but never to create animation. I have seen people do it before but never thought I would be able to because it looked so hard. But using the basic photoshop principles of layers it wasn't too hard to get the hang of.

After doing the experiment of painting the image of a city on leaves I thought it might be nice to use this same concept for my animation. I think this particular animation technique worked well to show the gradual accumulation of skyscrapers and by drawing another bit of the image frame by frame I could show the literal building of the structures.

T, D+P Further idea development

Creating negative space using spray paint and a leaf as a stencil.

Merging the spray paint imagery with London's skyline. I like how the spray paint has created an interesting texture when blended with the image of the city.

Research

(artist unknown)

Merging man made imagery of a city with the natural form of a leaf.

I have arranged multiple leaves to resemble skyscrapers and painted on a city scene using acrylics.

T, D+P Idea development and multi media experimentation

Mark making experimentation using watercolours to create natural forms.

Graphite and watercolour illustration looking at how I might present nature as the more powerful force, taking over human ways of life. A tree growing into the water bottle, implying the damage that humans are inflicting on the natural landscape.

Blending an illustration of a human face with the image of contour lines from a map to further explore the idea of human and nature coexisting. 

Watercolour experiment merging the image of a closed eye with a natural landscape where the veins in the closed eye lid form the outline of the mountains.