Saturday, April 29, 2017
Friday, April 28, 2017
Digital Art Portfolios using Google Drive
Check out my latest video where I give a quick walkthrough of how I set-up and used Google Drive with my Middle School Art Class for creating collaborative digital art portfolios.
Art Assignment Bot
"Make an etching investigating the exploitation of punctures, due in 31 minutes."
While that isn't realistically impossible due to the nature of etching, the concept behind this assignment is where all the fun lies. Meet the "Art Assignment Bot" designed by Jeff Thompson, an artist, professor and programmer. The purpose of Art Assignment Bot is to use code to produce a randomly generated art assignment using pre-selected words that teachers would typically assign. The fun part about it is the outside of the box thinking that happens when you are rolling the dice for different combinations. Some range from the absurd, to curious to actually pretty fun ideas!
Assignments are tweeted every hour on the hour and some examples include:
"Create a 3D rendering about your relationship to obligations, due on Sun, Apr 25, 2021."
"Construct an etching with teeths, due tomorrow."
"Construct a sound installation denying the exploitation of cats on the internet, due tomorrow."
"Build a photograph about your dream world, due tomorrow."
"Build a photograph about your dream world, due tomorrow."
"Make an exhibition about time, due in 28 seconds."
The tweets can be found under twitter handle @ArtAssignBot or you can follow the link here
Some people follow just to see what strange tweets the bot will generate, others follow through in bringing the projects to life. Jeffrey Thompson's webpage also provides a list of people who have submitted some finished assignments which you can find here
Monday, April 24, 2017
QR Codes
A QR code is like a bar code, but when scanned it will link you to a website online. Using www.QRstuff.com I was able to create my own QR code which links to my new website @ www.BillVaughnArt.com
QR Codes can be a fun way to provide easy access to links for direct information about projects or resources. There are lots of different free QR Readers in the app store too, I use the QR Scanner app. Make your own QR code at QRStuff.com !
Tuesday, April 18, 2017
Amazing split-screen music video
Check out director Alex Courtès new music video for the French duo Cassius. The video isn't entirely school appropriate but the concept is super cool.
Cassius ft. Cat Power Pharell Williams | Go Up from DIVISION on Vimeo.
Cassius ft. Cat Power Pharell Williams | Go Up from DIVISION on Vimeo.
Wednesday, April 12, 2017
Apple Photo Editting Basics
A lot of people I've met have Macbooks but don't know that they're computers photo viewing app already comes pretty well equipped with the tools for quick & easy photo-editting. In this video, I go over some of the basic functions of using Apple Preview App for photo-editting as well as how I use it for making photos of my own illustrations look like they were scanned!
Steve Ciampaglia & Plug-In Studio
At this years NAEA conferences in New York I attended a presentation by Steve Ciampaglia, who is one part of the new media art collective known as Plug-In Studios along with Kerry Richarson. He also is a leader in the group's Street Arcade Project based in Chicago. Steve's presentation dealt with the growing field of contemporary video games that are designed to be art pieces and often address social issues.
I went into the presentation unsure of what to expect, but by the end of the presentation I was very glad I chose this talk amongst so many other interesting sounding options. The work that Plug-In Studios & The Street Arcade Project is a great reminder that the field of art is changing, and there are some amazing things coming along with those changes.
The video below outlines the general vision and goals of the project and also shows one of my favorite projects that he discussed in his talk. What on the surface seems like a zombie game is really a thoughtful commentary on race and privilege. Check it out below.
FIELDWORKS: THE PLUG-IN STUDIO, The Street Arcade from A Blade of Grass on Vimeo.
To learn a little more about Steve Ciampaglia and Plug-In Studio, check out the Plug-In Studio website at http://pluginstudio.net/
I went into the presentation unsure of what to expect, but by the end of the presentation I was very glad I chose this talk amongst so many other interesting sounding options. The work that Plug-In Studios & The Street Arcade Project is a great reminder that the field of art is changing, and there are some amazing things coming along with those changes.
The video below outlines the general vision and goals of the project and also shows one of my favorite projects that he discussed in his talk. What on the surface seems like a zombie game is really a thoughtful commentary on race and privilege. Check it out below.
FIELDWORKS: THE PLUG-IN STUDIO, The Street Arcade from A Blade of Grass on Vimeo.
To learn a little more about Steve Ciampaglia and Plug-In Studio, check out the Plug-In Studio website at http://pluginstudio.net/
Friday, April 7, 2017
Stop Motion & Time Lapse Movies
One of my favorite free apps that I've found during my time as a teacher is iMotion. This app allows you easily create stop motion videos with manual capture and automatic capture functions. There are lots of videos already online that can help you with some of the basic features of the app, however I really think it's worth downloading and playing around with yourself to really get a feel for it!
During my time teaching I've used in creating stop-motion projects and also as a tool for documenting their process. Time-lapse videos and stop-motion are things I found all students knew of, but didn't quite understand the specifics behind how it all worked. iMotion was a fantastic way to talk about things like how animation works, how things can be slowed down or sped up and frame rates.
Like most of my favorite apps, one of the best features about is it's free so it's accessible to anyone with an apple device!
Here are two examples with a warmup project I did kicking off the year with 8th graders. For this, they worked in a group collaboration creating a symmetrical design which they would fill with zentangles and paint the negative space with gradations. To get them used to the digital integration components of the class they were to collaborate using iMotion app and Google Drive in putting together a stop-motion (or time-lapse) movie showing their process
This was a project I did my first year were students storyboarded their own stop motion movies and then took the finished videos and created music that synced up to them in their music class. Unfortunately, the files I had backed up got lost in a computer getting fried before I backed up regularly to google drive (lesson learned). Lucky for me, at least I had this video saved, even if it is without the sound!
If you try out iMotion for yourself and have any questions about it feel free to comment and I'll help you out anyway that I can!
During my time teaching I've used in creating stop-motion projects and also as a tool for documenting their process. Time-lapse videos and stop-motion are things I found all students knew of, but didn't quite understand the specifics behind how it all worked. iMotion was a fantastic way to talk about things like how animation works, how things can be slowed down or sped up and frame rates.
Like most of my favorite apps, one of the best features about is it's free so it's accessible to anyone with an apple device!
Here are two examples with a warmup project I did kicking off the year with 8th graders. For this, they worked in a group collaboration creating a symmetrical design which they would fill with zentangles and paint the negative space with gradations. To get them used to the digital integration components of the class they were to collaborate using iMotion app and Google Drive in putting together a stop-motion (or time-lapse) movie showing their process
This was a project I did my first year were students storyboarded their own stop motion movies and then took the finished videos and created music that synced up to them in their music class. Unfortunately, the files I had backed up got lost in a computer getting fried before I backed up regularly to google drive (lesson learned). Lucky for me, at least I had this video saved, even if it is without the sound!
If you try out iMotion for yourself and have any questions about it feel free to comment and I'll help you out anyway that I can!
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