January 2016 – garythesnail

Lore 3 | Who is in charge of Shea

Prior to the incident whereby the Riah got uprooted, Sheans led very easy and carefree lives. They had nothing to worry about and they were all easily satisfied. They minded their own business as everyone were responsible and their respective tasks were sufficient for the world to be functioning. But now, with doubts lingering all around and having some Sheans being too worried to be doing their part for the sustainability of the world, the group of intellects whom gathered for that sole purpose realise that there is a more apparent hindrance. They have to find a way to bring those Sheans who are badly affected back to normal by means of persuasion or fear if need be, for the better of the world.

The intellects discussed and decided that there is now a need for a leader in their world to keep the order in place in the world and to ensure that the peace is not disrupted. The behaviour of some of the Sheans now, may very well threaten the sustainability of Shea. After all, the Sheans are surviving up till now because everyone were doing their respective tasks. They come to a conclusion that the leader has to be someone respected enough for the rest of the Sheans to be obeying him and wise enough to be making the right decisions for the better of Shea.

They unanimously agreed that Alda, the oldest Shean will take on the role of the Chieftain. After all, he is the one who has seen the most in the world and has spent the second half of his life reading up and gathering knowledge. His role is to delegate responsibilities for each of the Sheans to ensure that the world could continue functioning properly, and also, to mete out necessary punishments to Sheans who fails to carry out their own roles. Due to his age and slightly frailer body, he is assigned with two henchmen to help him with the physical needs of his role.

The Henchmen’s role is to patrol around the world and to make sure that everyone is doing their respective jobs. They are also required to act as the hands and legs of Alda, to gather the Sheans or the intellectual committee when required or to help Alda pass on messages. Klaus is one of the henchmen selected as he is one of those who were called to for the meeting. He has a decent level of intellect and is also fit enough to be able to carry out the necessary jobs of a henchman. The second henchman’s selection is put on hold. They decided that he has to be someone of much higher physical capability in order to instil a sufficient amount of fear for the more rebellious Sheans to obey commands.

Hence, with the start of this system in the hope that it is better for Shea, we shall see how things turn out in the near future..

Typographic Portrait ideation

After presenting on my initial research on hand made typography and having Proj Joy see what I have presented on, she suggested that I should think of collaborating with others for this project. This is because I presented on having hand written types superimposed on photos and if a visual artists were to superimpose his type on a photographer’s photo, that will technically mean that he is collaborating with the photographer.

This set me thinking about collaboration and I came up with my overlaying concept which is that, we are actually, prominently what others think of us as. I mean, if we think that we are trustworthy people, but everyone around us who interacts with us do not see that we are, then we are technically not trustworthy. It is either we are doing what we are doing wrongly or we are just not doing the right thing enough.

Hence, I decided to collaborate with four of the closest people in my life. Those who have spent the most time with me recently. My idea is to get them to think of an attribute that they can best tie me up with and then, we will collaborate and work something out together. As for the last two panels, they will be fully designed by myself and they will encompass and summarize the entire project.

Some of the attributes that they have come up with were: Reliable, Intense, Appreciates that there is beauty in everything, genuine, honest, strong and I see the beauty in the mundane. Some of these initial ideas were really quite interesting attributes of myself which I have never really thought of myself. This actually proved my point about how our attributes are actually what others think of us, as some of these attributes were not even apparent to even myself.

Now to figure how this idea can actually work and maybe make them flow as one piece.

Throughout the week, I managed to meet up with all of the friends whom I am going to “interview” and managed to work a few things out. Here is one short clip of the interview I did with one of my friends! Just a little teaser! Stay tuned for the full clips during submission week

Shea Chapter One | The need to improve

The broadcast of the tragedy throughout Shea meant for awareness inevitably brought about increasing worrying small talks throughout the world. Some of the Sheans who are more afraid of getting carried away to nothingness even resorted to sleeping outside of their houses and on the ground with fewer craters. Life is still pretty much the same except for the decrease in efficiency for some of the Sheans due to over-worrying that resulted in them being less motivated to do their respective tasks. This forced the others to have to work a little harder to make up for those who needed time to recover. But being a small and close knitted community, none of them actually mind.

Kappa is one of those Sheans who were working harder for the better of the world. Although he was quite taken aback and emotionally affected by the tragedy, he is well aware that life has to go on and he quickly moved on. More than ever before, he now has a higher purpose in climbing the Riahs. He starts to climb twice the amount the usually climbs in order to collect sufficient nitrogen for all those below. Although he no longer has the time to challenge himself and is unable to reach the height he used to be able to, he was actually getting stronger unknowingly.

Klaus, a Shean on the other hand, is a worrywart and one of those who choose to sleep outside of his house. He is a book lover and he loves gaining knowledge. The Shean who was recently thrown off was actually a friend of his and that made him realise the severity of the situation they were in. That gave him more purpose to gaining knowledge in hope to find a solution. Needless to say, the spot he choose to make his new resting spot a high ground right beside the library and was gaining knowledge at a much higher speed. Some times he even ends up losing sleep when he gets too engrossed in his readings.

It has been three days after the tragedy happened and Klaus was napping in the day as he was too exhausted from all his readings. He fell asleep right beside the mountain of books he has been reading for the past few hours. Without any warning, the weather got a lot more humid and the sound of gushing water was getting increasingly loud. All the Sheans knew what this mean. The daily flooding situation has arrived. But now?! At this hour?! All the Sheans started to panic and either went to take shelter in their respective Riahs or held on tightly to them. Klaus, who was fast asleep, was oblivion to it and was too tired to be awaken by the loud warnings from everyone else. Kappa who just came down from his 35th trip for the day, collecting nitrogen, happened to pass by and saw Klaus lying motionless on the ground.

Will Klaus wake up in time? (Roll two dice at http://www.random.org/dice and add the value of your agility to the final value. If it exceeds a value of 10, he wakes up and describe his choice of actions. If not, he will remain asleep. With barely enough energy to hold on to the Riahs himself to keep him safe and with the flood coming in in seconds, what will Kappa’s next course of action be?

Lore 2 | Housing in Shea

The Sheans are highly adaptable as a species. They make use of whatever were available.

Riahs are not just structures for the Sheans to scale up to collect nitrogen, they also serve as housings for the Sheans. With its sheer height and thickness, there is plenty of room for each of them. Sheans make us of the size and abundance of the strands by making it hollow and make room for them to reside it. The insides are relatively simple, complementing the kind of lifestyle they lead. Housings were mostly for rest and shelter and they were all clustered together as the population of Shea is only a few thousand.

However, with the uprooting of one of the strands, some of the Sheans were starting to fear for their housing. Their worry is if they would actually be carried away with the strand when it uproots and they happen to be in it. These eventually set off some discussions about whether Shea is actually a sustainable world to be living in. After all, if all the strands were to start falling off, what would be left for them to live and hide in?

Hence, some of the more intelligent Sheans gathered and began to think about how they can make their world more sustainable…

Lore 1 | Shea: The world that never stays

LORE

Background

Shea is a world with endless black towering strands, called Riah, that shoot up from the ground. Or so it seems. The strands block out most of the light, making Shea a generally dark place to be residing in.

The ground on Shea is relatively soft, sinking in with every step taken, and is constantly pulsating. Also, it is filled with craters and all of this makes it tough for the inhabitants, Sheans, to transverse. To make things worse, giant puddles of salty water will erupt from the craters at random moments. Mostly when the pulsation increases or when the weather gets warmer. These puddles of salty water are also the source of food for the Sheans.

The Sheans’ capabilites

Once or twice a day, multiple blasts of bubbly fluid and pure water pours down from above and threatens to wash the Sheans off if they do not hold on tight to the Riahs. These required them to have a certain amount of strength for their survival to make sure that they do not get flushed away along with the bursts of fluids. Sheans who are strong enough take this opportunity to gather the only source of fresh water while holding on for their lives.

Sheans found no need to be intelligent as they lead very simple lives and they are easily satisfied with what they have. Although a minority of them with thirst for knowledge do read up in the library during their past time. Sheans who are agile are highly valued as the land below was so dense that air could barely reach the base and they are able to maneuver their way up the towering strands to obtain nitrogen from the air in order for them to breathe.

Problem

The Sheans were all happy and carefree till one day, one of their agile counterparts got thrown off the world to what seemed like an endless abyss. He was up on a Riah gathering nitrogen when it just detached and flew off and he got carried away with it.

Now the Sheans had something to worry about. It was the first time ever they had witnessed a Riah detaching and them losing one of their own. Amongst the mourning, they realised that they could no longer just rely on one aspect of their abilities. They had to have a certain amount of strength in order for them to not get flushed away from the daily flood. A certain level of agility for them to maneuver on the tough terrain and maybe, just maybe, a higher mental capability for them to predict what could come their way in future and ways to prevent such catastrophes from happening again.

Characters

Feel free to create your own characters to play in this seemingly small and simple world to just keep yourself alive and easily contented or create it in such a way whereby you help the world keep themselves safe or reach further heights.

Do include your name, general appearance, age, distribute your points for strength, agility and intelligence, totalling up to 8 points and any other information you want to add for your character.
Thank you

Typography Research

My initial idea when I read “handmade typography” was literally hand made typography and so I went on to search for types that were made of 3D objects to seek for inspirations. There were countless examples of such types and I found these 3 to be the most eye catching and inspiring. They were created with one thing in mind, which was to have the material and medium used for the typography have a link to the typography itself.

The first one is by Dominic Le Hair as shown below.

This typography quoting “There was nothing to fear, nothing to doubt” made use of blocks of letter making out the quotes submerged in very shallow water. As though to suggest that there is literally nothing to fear or doubt because the water is so shallow and it is impossible for anyone to drown in it. Deeming it nearly harmless. Hence, by making use of the water as the medium around the type, it emphasises and allowed viewers to actually see the point the phrase was trying to make.

The second one is also by Dominic Le hair.

For this typography, Dominic made use of hollow block letters to allow light to shine through. To enhance the effect, he used fog in the foreground. He then strategically positioned lights to shine through the second half of the quote “will get called to the light” to illustrate what the quote was saying.

Lastly, for my research on “hand made typography”, I found what Tien-Min Liao did really intriguing. She literally used her hands for these types, creating every 26 letters of the alphabets.

As seen in the GIF above, the letters are all interchangeable from small to capital letters by changing just the gestures of her hands. I found this really creative as all she used were ink on her hands and for each transition, the ink on her hands were constant throughout.

While researching further, it hit me that hand made typography can be interpreted in other ways. One which was to be the cliche way whereby a type is superimposed on a pretty photo. I interpret it as hand made as, if the type is hand written, and the picture is taken by someone, it is technically hand made as both layers of the typography are created originally by the artists.

One of it which I found really aesthetically pleasing is by Kirill Richert, a Russian graphic designer.

I like how his type flows and having interesting elements such as the hat and the sneakers embedded into it. Also, he superimposed it on a picture of New York with a rainbow over it which gives his viewers an idea of how the city actually looks like.

I personally have tried doing something similar not too long ago. By writing my own inspired type and superimposing it on a photo I took so I thought I might work on it and use it for one or two of the final submission.

However, I did come to realise that the picture I have used had no relation or whatsoever to the quote I have chosen as my viewers will not be able to relate to it. I could, as the picture was taken when I was on a trip with a group of friends and the quote was meant for them. From the lecture given by Prof Joy, I learnt that I should take into account the receiver’s possible confusion of the usage of my photo. This is because, no one but myself can relate to the context I have used except for my friends who were with me. Hence, one of the many take aways I have from the class was that I have to consider what my receiver will interpret my message or type as while creating my typography.

References

http://designinstruct.com/visual-inspiration/typography-inspiration/hand-made-typography-projects-that-will-inspire-you/

Tien-Min Liao’s handmade type

http://typostrate.tumblr.com/post/86682576760/enjoy-your- life

“HELLO MY NAME IS___________”

For this exercise, I decided to base it off me as a photographer as I feel that it is what most of my friends and people I know remember me most vividly for. Also, I really like photographing as I feel that it is the only way memories can be captured in it rawest form and there is no better way to remember a certain moment than to snap it down in a camera.

Typography

For this part of the exercise, I decided to to play around with the letters in my name “G A R Y”. After a few tries to compose it, I realised that it is possible for me to compose it in such a way where by I can create a camera’s outline out of the letters and hence, coming up with a name tag which consists of both my name and also, the device that I can relate myself best with.

Abstract

For the abstract section of this activity. I really had no clue as to what I could do. I just started drawing shapes and doodling. While I was drawing squares of different shapes, Nathalie peered over and commented that they actually looked like pixels. Her comment made me realise that i could draw the squares to be like the thousands of pixels that make up a digital picture. And hence, coming up with my abstract name tag. I purposely added a “dead pixel” as I feel that us as humans are never perfect and the dead pixel can represent that part of me.

Conceptual

Last but not least, for the conceptual name tag, I decided to play around with different material. What I chose to use is a reflective paper that I have bought for last semester’s final 2D project. Reflective paper as it will reflect anything that my name tag is facing. Very much like my camera which captures everything that I face it to. Hence, representing the object that i feel relates to me best and representing me.