Week 9 – 17 March 2016
Project 2 have come to a conclusion!^^
I’m delighted to see each and every compositions my classmates have put up!
It was truly a showcase of tremendous effort and time each of us displayed.
This post conclude Project 2 – Point of View.
Introduction
I was sharing my initial concept, of a narrative, that I hope to apply in my compositions.
The story will be presented through visual narration which I depict myself as a ‘Finger’ walking through my life as a NTU student.
However, things did not go as smoothly as I want it to be.
My concept of a narration seems to go slightly off track with 2 or more ideas cramp into the composition of 6. [There isn’t really a focal point]
I’m glad that opinion via the group consultation managed to ‘save’ me in time or else I will probably ended up in a wrong direction.
For this project, I worked on the topic on ‘Finger’ hopping to insert some fun and funky elements in it.
The exploration on the concept of ‘Finger’ seems to be rather vast, for example the different application of ‘Finger art’ with relation to the mediums use.
In the previous posts, I shared about various reference artists and mediums I wish to apply in my compositions.
Finger Art (Drawing on finger)
Finger Art (Drawing with Finger)
Finger Art (Surrealism)
Point of View
My initial POVs were selected to fit in the idea of visual narration.
The following are my initial chosen POVs.
1) Finger from the point of view of NTU Student is Winning the Star Wars.
2) Finger from the point of view of Me is a Swiss army knife.
3) Finger from the point of view of Ant is a Missile.
4) Finger from the point of view of A Massage Chair is a Manual Osim.
5) Finger from the point of view of A Computer Keyboard is Endurance.
6) Finger from the point of view of KFC is Licking Good.
The story flows this way:
Finger wins the Annual NTU Star wars race.
He braced himself for the upcoming semester by preparing tools that he requires.
The semester starts and Finger was ‘Bomba’ with lots of assignments from different modules.
He endured the first half of the semester and took a vacation during the recess week.
Later, school reopens and once again he faced a test of endurance.
His effort paid off and he enjoys the long semester break by giving himself a tasty treat.
These are the initial compositions that I’m working on before the group consultation.
As mention, there isn’t a very clear execution as the styles implemented are like ‘Rojak’.
Meaning, I have a bit of this here and a bit of that there.
For the ‘darker’ scene, I wanted to convey the idea of a war scene. Whereas for the ‘Brighter’ scene, I hope to create a more relaxing atmosphere.
However, the use of ‘Threshold’ remove most of the details such as the finger and the HDB buildings. As a result, it add ‘noise’ and obscurer the message.
During the group consultation, the ‘Massage Chair’ outshine the rest of the compositions as it manage to draw attention and arise questions on how it was being composed.
My takes from the consultation is to have my focus on exploring the use of fingers to create a surreal-like products.
Yes! You got it right! Products!
OMG~!? I felt that I have been neglecting ‘Product Design’ for a long time…. and probably have moved on to ‘Animation’ or ‘Interactive Media’ as my major in ADM.
My immediate thoughts of ‘Product Design’ activate my engine inside me.
Product design is in my blood, it’s time to get kicking!
Surrealism (Product Design)
The changed of concepts resulted me to develop a change in some of my planned POVs.
I re-visited my 18 POVs and from there choose on subjects that have relation to ‘Product Design’.
The updated list is a followed.
1) Finger from the point of view of A Massage Chair is a Manual Osim.
2) Finger from the point of view of Me is a Swiss army knife.
3) Finger from the point of view of Ant is a Missile.
4) Finger from the point of view of A TCM Physician is Stethoscope.
5) Finger from the point of view of Baby is Utensil.
6) Finger from the point of view of Growth is Ageing.
I search for reference artists that probably work on ‘Surreal Finger Products’ but to no avail.
*Correct me if I am wrong, probably there are but I skipped on them accidentally.
Using my fingers, and probably a minimal area of my plam, I took various shots for editing.
The following are the various shots of the ‘Fingers’ that were used to construct the product.
Development
1) Finger from the point of view of A Massage Chair is a Manual Osim.
2) Finger from the point of view of Me is a Swiss army knife.
3) Finger from the point of view of Ant is a Missile.
4) Finger from the point of view of A TCM Physician is Stethoscope.
5) Finger from the point of view of Baby is Utensil.
6) Finger from the point of view of Growth is Ageing.
As you have probably noticed, the development of the Stethoscope went through several changes.
I went to ask around my group of classmates from my previous class to gather opinions,
It seems that the initial design of the Stethoscope looked rather like ‘Intestine’ or some kind of weird stuffs.
I tried to darken some areas so that it looks like a rubber tube and adding shadows to give it a 3D feel.
However, it still looks rather weird in some way..
Hence, I simplify the design of the Stethoscope with ‘User-illustration’ to bring out the idea of ‘Pulse-reading’.
Method of Printing
Initially, I wanted to have my printing on acetate plastic so that I could have the concept sketches at the back piece of paper. However, the sketches resulted in a hindrance to my ‘Main product’.
Below are some of the prints I tired with acetate plastic.
I also experiment with adding text/descriptions at the side of the composition,
Method of Presentation
My idea was to create a flat piece of sculpture that resemble the ‘hand’ but excluding the palm.
However, it does not creates a ‘stand-out’ feel but rather a ‘last-minute’ rushed kind of finishing.
I proceeded to re-design my presentation board with something more sturdy and something like a shelving concept.
Followed by more refinements.
I really like how the final presentation board was made.
It started off with a 3D Hand model in the middle as the ‘Topic’ I’m working on,
and the 6 compositions arranged in a circular manner lead the viewers eyes around, explaining how our fingers were being used differently.
PS: Yup, that’s a mold cast of my hand.
Final Composition
Break down explanation
1) Finger from the point of view of A Massage Chair is a Manual Osim.
- For this composition, I made use of the similar idea to work together such as the ‘Massage Therapist’ and a ‘OSIM’ chair. By combining these ideas together I am able to create a manual ‘OSIM’. It demonstrates the idea of finger = effectiveness and give good massage comparable to a OSIM chair.
2) Finger from the point of view of Me is a Swiss army knife.
- Our finger is very well-design efficient tool just like a Swiss Army Knife which is of practical use.
Back in the SAF, the Swiss Army Knife is probably the best tool I ever had. It’s practical usage in any situation is equivalent to how useful our fingers are.
3) Finger from the point of view of Ant is a Missile.
- Sadly, our fingers are like a tool of destruction. For this composition I relate our fingers as a missile, from the POVs of an ant, to demonstrate the capability of inflict damage/mass-destruction.
4) Finger from the point of view of A TCM Physician is Stethoscope.
- With much concentration, our finger could actually become a ‘Stethoscope’. Personally, I do not know does pulse reading works but to the TCM Physician – their fingers are just as wonderful as a stethoscope which is use by the doctors practicing western science.
5) Finger from the point of view of Baby is Utensil.
- When we are young, our first set of utensils could probably be our fingers. To the toddlers, their fingers works the same as a fork and a spoon; the ability to hold and pierce through finger food.
6) Finger from the point of view of Growth is Ageing.
- Our fingers have a story of their own too. As human grow, we aged – so do our body.
The composition was arranged in a way that it resemble the reception bar in our phone. It shows the weaker signal on the far left, and vice versa. The candle light shows the ‘life-span’ that each finger have explaining the journey of growth vs ageing.
Reflections
I really enjoyed working on this project and the theme enable me to get creative with design.
Never did I thought that I could incorporate ‘Product design’ element to create images of different product just by using my fingers.
The use of surrealism in my compositions enable me to explore and understand more, widening my imagination and my approach to the overall design.
In addition, the study of shadow is also a take-away from this project.
Nevertheless, this project was enriching and I get to learn from the works of my classmates.
Check out my previous entries here: