Month: March 2018

Candycane Process

Hi guys!

So this marks the beginning of our Candycane journey! To note it down, Tisya and I will finally be working together for an IM project heheh.

As we all know, when we were young, at the sight of the cane, we know that is a reminder to behave. Otherwise, we will have to face the wrath of the cane. Basically, the pain that was inflicted through the cane was a simple explanation by our parents between what is right or wrong. 

Here are some notes that we made:
– Cane as a reflection of our childhood.
– Has a negative connotation associated to it.
– Should a cane be used for caning?
– The cane as a tool of discipline vs The cane as a tool of play.
– Users are granted the power to control the cane (not by choice)
– Placing canes in different contexts. (Compass / massage / piñata)

Ultimately, the tone of voice that we are approaching in our installation would be a tongue-in-cheek manner, a humorous irony that we are seeking to achieve. To portray cane in various situations, aside from its original intention as a disciplinary object. Not to change the perception of how a cane is, but rather seeing the cane in a different light.

So here’s the new and revised Candycane artist statement!

Candycane

Remember the times when the sight of this wooden rod was enough to get you running? This one-hit wonder, a reflection of our childhood misdeeds, is often used as a disciplinary tool in homes to incite fear and serves as a constant reminder for good conduct.

Candycane attempts to challenge the negative connotations and controversies associated to it, provoking thought about its purpose: “Should a cane be used for caning?”

We came up with various random mundane, humorous scenarios that could be used, other than it being used as a disciplinary object.

Here are some scenes:
1. Massage Parlour
2. Stirring a Cup
3. Pinata
4. Chopsticks (humans are mini sushi)
5. Mathematical Compass
6. Sword fight
7. Blanket Beating

Ultimately, we shortlisted to 3 scenarios which are:
1. Mathematical Compass
2. Massage Parlour
3. Pinata

The first ever cane installation that we are touching on would be the Mathematical Compass! So, how it’s gonna work is that the compass will follow the audience and while doing so, it draws a line floor (paper).

For “The Compass”, we need: 2 wooden canes, one motor and blobs detection. Throughout the weekends, we played with motors and worked with its mechanism. We tried Blobs but we couldn’t get it to work 🙁 We are still working on it though!

First and foremost, lets start the process journey shall we! Whats a cane project without any canes?

I found this bunch of canes (70 cents/each) at a provision shop near my area and sadly I couldn’t find the canes which has a coloured tip. When I asked the owner, she said that they weren’t producing the coloured tip canes anymore 🙁 But Tish and I are not giving it up just yet! We ares still on the hunt for the coloured canes. 

Testing out how it will look like when the motors rotates it (180 degrees)

We used foamboard to create a support to attach the cane and the motor’s wing. By building the structure around the cane tightly, and taping the it to the motor, we are able to secure it! 

Tish getting hit by our cane hahahaha. But anyhow, here’s a compiled version of our video process for a better understanding on our journey!

Initially, we wanted to have two motors attached to the cane itself, so to create a X & Y-Axis. We tried the joint mechanism that LPD taught us but it wasn’t as secured 🙁 However, we will still continue working on the mechanism and try to experiment it with blobs! 

Blobs detection are tough D: If anyone has figured it out, please teach Tish and I plssssss

 

M I L E S T O N E S :

Week 10 : Cane #1 Mechanism, & Blob System
Week 11 : Cane #2 Mechanism, Motion Region
Linking Phidget/Arduino to Max MSP
Week 12 : Prototype II Due
Week 13 : Cane #3 (Pinanta)
Week 14 : Final Presentation

I Am VeJee

Hello! I’m back again with a new assignment!

So, this time round, we get to do this really cool project whereby we use objects to trigger sounds! And finally I found out the magic behind all those projects where our movement will trigger sounds wahahaha. So the secret is simply… a camera. The camera does wondersssss and now I’m being introduced to the world where there’s endless possibilities!!! Hahaha. 

Alrighty then, here’s the final project!

Under pGrabSequence is where I adjusted the motion boxes. At first I was quite overwhelmed with the message that consist of the coordinates because of the numbers hahaha. It’s like numerical overload!! But yeah I sort of figure it so it’s basically for ( 1 10 110 30 90 ) , it means Box 1 ( x, y, x, y), I believe?? Something like that uh

pSoundTest. I didn’t use the playlist as I couldn’t figure out how to sort the audios out for each box. Thus, I resorted to using the Send and Receive method. By receiving the TrigSound, to play the audio!

And there’s this issue I faced, when I remove the item, the audio will continue playing the rest of music and will only stop when it has completed the track. Am I able to cut the music off halfway when I remove the item? 

Overall this project was fun but it took me awhile to figure out how to complete this project, and thank you Chloe’s for lending me a helping hand on this too!!! :))

Here’s the final video for I Am VeJee! 😉

Who Am I?

Hello!

Previously in Mirror, we learnt how face tracking works and now we have to find a way to do a “faceswap filter” on max. One of the issue I faced was that the face tracking bounding box isn’t as accurate as I want it to be, thus the image is not exactly at the right coordinates.

So for this project, I’ve learnt that we can send and receive objects simply by using “s” or “r” and it makes everything so much more organised!

read kim.jpg
But first, we have to put in our image. Simply use read imagename.jpg, don’t forget to press bang! to load the image up.

clear, usedstdim 1, dstdimstart $1 $2, distdimend $3 $4
To refresh our memory, dstdimstart and dstdimend is set the start and end position of where we want the image to be. This matches the x & y coordinates of the detected face.

jit.fastblur @mode 1 @range 2
To soften the image and its edges, we have to use “jit.fastblur @mode 1 @range 2”. If you want the image to be clearer, you have to reduce the value of @mode, to blur it simply increase the value. For range, it soften the edges.

jit.alphablend @mode 1
This merges the masked image and the camera capture. For mode 1, it displays both the mask image and camera capture. If you were to use mode 0, it will just display the masked image.

As you can see here, I tried using different values for jit.fastblur to see its effects.

For jit.fastblur @mode 1 @range 2:  The face is much clearer and defined, edges however need to be softer.

For jit.fastblur @mode 2 @range 3: The face is slightly blurred but we can still see her features, adjusted the range to 3 to make edges softer . This might be a better option.

I felt that my masked image could have been blended even better, as I can still see some of the harsh lines of the image. But when I tried to softened the edges even more, the mask image would lose its features. Anyhow, this was a fun project as I understood the mechanism behind those face swap filters hahaha. Here is the video!