Run in to Uni assessment

Hi all

At the moment I'm working on editing out my work and picking and choosing the best bits of my work to put into my presentation for my assessment on 3rd May :S Also I am starting to make decisions on what to put in my degree show.

For my assessment I'm hoping to presenting a powerpoint with a run down of where I've started to where I have come. Also I'll be compiling my photos, vids and sketchs to back this up.


The countdown has truly begun.

More work.

Click on the images to make them larger.

Current work direction

These are work in progress candidates for the degree show. At the moment they are early versions, I'll be using a better editing program next time round. I think they need music so I have added some music to one to see if it successful or not.

Concept for degree show/ Update

Unfortunately the leaflet idea isn't going as well as I had expected, it seems ineffectual without something interesting backing it up. So I am putting that on the back burner for the moment, I may just make a flyer instead to inform people of my work but we'll see about that.

On to the real exciting stuff for me at the moment :)  Ok the other night I was discussing my work with my parents, whilst talking I began to formulate an interesting concept relating directly to the incidental light that I have been observing around the city. I have been struggling to find some that I can do without busting the budget as it where. So on to the Idea!!

The Idea I have in mind is this: A single(but fairly large)room totally dark and empty inside. Before the viewers enter the room, I ask them to put on head torches (like this one http://photos.autoexpress.co.uk/images/front_picture_library_UK/dir_426/car_photo_213212_7.jpg)These head torches will be configured with different lights, some coloured, some restricted etc. Once the group of say 8 viewers are equipped with thier head torches they proceed into the room and the door is closed behind them. The light cast by the viewers looking around in the room should create strange shapes, colours and shadows. This is all happening because of the movement of the viewers head. As a way of showing or documenting this occurence. I would like to hook up a camera or cameras inside the room which are linked to a live feed so people outside the room can view what is going on inside the room. Or, have the cameras record whats going on and as the viewers are let out they can watch what they have just created.

I feel that this could work quite well and it has a grounding with the idea of incidental light and people not noticing the occurences. My only worry is the source of the head lamps, I might consider asking a manufacture to sponsor or donate a few to the cause or just purchase a few myself we shall see.

But for now I want to just try this idea out.

Thanks

Mark

Project update 19-2-2010 The Leaflet of light is coming!

Hi everyone.

Over the last few weeks I have had various encounters with different tutors, people, students and friends. To which I have spoken about my work to them and there has definetly been a concensus throughout the talk. Basically my idea of recreating those incidental light anomalies in a studio space wasn't going down very well. The concern was the incidental light lost its "magic" the didn't have that special quality that the originals. The artificial ones seemed forced and lacked that fragile natural feel.

More discussion lead to me moving back a step and actually using my photographs as the main material. However I needed something that could be construded as an artwork, as the photos are just of light. They needed something more to justify themselves. Recently my parents took my little sister on the go penguins trail and it dawned upon me that I was indeed trekking around town finding these light anomalies almost like the go penguins trail. Quickly I have began to produce the idea of having a guide/leaflet for these Light anomalies much like the go penguins. I have now began to forward this Idea, at the moments the leaflet is in its early stages but I feel this definetly has something within it. More so than my past work on this project.

Soa Summary of my progress:


1) Designing the Leaflet (First very rough mock nearly finished)


2) Taking the Photographs of the Light Anomalies and taking down their locations.


3) Thinking about how to distribute and present at assessment

Quick update 1-2-2010

Hey all, just a quick update. Here is a few pics and vids to show what I've been up to recently.

Incidental Light photos

 

 

 

 

Some new photographs of the incidental light I have become interested in. In some of the images the light almost looks like it has been painted on by hand. the shapes, colours and sizes are quite intriguing aswell, as some of these are over 20ft tall and yet people still walk by and not batter an eyelid towards them. I definetly feel that there is some creative link here between nature and the man-made. Could I create somethink of a simiar beauty using artificial light and artificial methods? Well my plan is to draw up some concepts and try a few mini mock-ups to get a feel for what material does what and such.

First post of 2010

Hello everyone and a happy new year to y'all.

Well the christmas break was quite an eventful one to say the least. Keeping related to the sky did anyone see the partial lunar eclipse and the blue moon on new years eve?

Now during my break whilst contemplating my work, I found myself disliking this project. For some reason I just can't get my head into at all, I think the subject matter is just to "Astronomical" for me at this time. So to take my mind from it I went over to the liverpool with my camera to take so photographs as it was a beautiful sunny day. Little did I know that I would find some subject matter that would tickle my fancy.

As I was walking around looking up at the sky (like I usually do) when I noticed a massive coil of light on the side of a building. I quickly took some photographs of the occurence and moved on down the street. Soon enough I was spotting all of these different light shapes on buildings which I had never seen or noticed before. I became very excited; ideas began to run to me from all directions.

I spent the whole day searching for these light anomalies. I came home and upload my photos to my computer and scanned through them. I found that the light streaks and shapes looked almost painted on to the buildings. I really like the melding of the conformist architecture and the somewhat fluidity of the light in the photographs.

I have made an executive decision to drop the project of the light and stars and focus solely on the light content of the project.

Now I will be renaming the project and posting up the photographs that changed my mind. This might seem like a big leap from what I was doing with the stars, but it is not. I was playing with light then however it was aimless playing, now I have a centre something to dig my teeth into.

Project and Intent

Now that I have found my focus, I intend to further my research into "incidental light" and painting with light in photography. I will go about this by taking photos of numerous "incidental light" occurences around the city of liverpool. Furthermore, I will look into artists such as Michael Bosanko and Joost van Santen.

I would like to try and create incidental light formations within buildings to see how it transforms the space, and how people interact with it.

I'll keep you all posted once I have enough photographs and spoke to my tutors about it.

Mark

New images

Well had a quick thought today. I had been hearing that people were looking at some of my earlier photographs and found them exciting in themselves. So i decided to create a few more higher quality ones. So here they are, for a better viewing visit the Urbanskyproject photobucket page.

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First Time Testing plus more disco lights

E-mail/MSN

Hey all just a quick one, I have setup an Email/msn so you can contact me, for whatever reason... maybe some feedback or just a general chat about the project.

UrbanSkyProject@hotmail.co.uk

Current Work

Photos to accompany

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Quick update

Hey all, well this week my work has been quite nicely I have created a few more mock works and have come up with some more ideas.

I will post up some photos of the mocks later once i have uploaded them and such.

As for my new ideas; I was reading through and astronomy magazine the other day and I read about the sizes and distance of stars. The phenomenal text and figures involved were quite baffling, this interested alot. For example the star Polaris (North Star) is approx. 430 Light years away that in miles is approx. 2527808910468951.5 Miles. Now these figures can be understood on paper in writing form but as soon as you try to imagine travelling that kind of distance it becomes baffling. As a rough calculation the average human walks 108,131 miles during their life, if we were to walk to Polaris is would take us approx. 200,000,000,000 life times to get there.

So, I am think of including some text with my work or using the figures and text as work themselves. I will have to see how this goes as it could be just a dead end, but I wont know until I try it out.

Another idea I have been thinking of came about whilst watching a tv program. I saw a man drawing on the pavement with chalk, and I instantly thought that I could do the same with my work. Reason being its not going to cause as much of a problem than if I spray paint something on a wall or pavement. The nice thing about it would its life span. Chances are a chalk drawing would only last for a few days depending on the weather and other factors. Now this creates a sense humour which harks the serious existance of stars which have existed for nigh on billions and billions of years. So there is that kind of a "Hey look I can replicate the stars but it aint going to last five minutes" kind of humour which I like.

However,I think the work might gain a sense of preciousness too, especially for the people who view it. They may see it just as it has been finished, they might see it every day on their way to work and then one day it will be gone. So there might be some kind of an attachment to the piece, at this point I dont know if that would happen. I won't know until I actually try some if it out, but this idea has got me the most excited so far.

So keep watching this space :)

Mocks and more

Here is a few photographs of some pieces ive been working on.

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And here is a quick vid too.

Back tracking progress.

Hello everyone, for this entry I will be back tracking a few days and posting my earlier tests, observations and such.

First off here is a selection of images and a short video showing some of my early experimentation with mirrors and CDs. This was my first try at using them to deflect light and such. I apologise for the poor quality of the videos too. I am trying to find a compromise between vid size and quality so bare with me on that front.

Sunlight reflections by luck!

Project idea update

I have been turning some ideas over in my head about how to "bring" the stars to a city environment. I began to think about using solar lamps which I could place in scrub land around the city. Which I still might consider because the mental image I have of that is very promising, plus it would coincide with the stars only coming out at night. However I want to try and create the work for day time use so more people could view it.


By a bit of luck I had a spark of thought  when I went out on the 12th October. It was a lovely sunny day. I was out looking for places to consider place my work in the future, when I noticed something interesting. I noticed these shadowy light markings on the floor, I instantly started snapping away. One particular instance really took my fancy it was a multitude of light reflections on a large blank wall. Straight away I had the basis for somework could I use mirrors or a reflective surface to reflect onto the sides of buildings. Creating the constellations with light from our sun which is in turn a star itself. I found this thought to be quite simple yet quite loaded; also there is a slight sense of humour there. Recreating these wonderful and vast constellations that have existed for billions of years and yet I can create them with simple mirrors.

Anyhow here are a few of those snaps, I shall up more when i get the chance.

Transition Films Cont. -Rural to Urban

Ok these two films are my trip from where I live to Liverpool town centre. In these to videos I was focusing on the relationship between our "world" meaning what we have constructed plus ourselves and the vast shelf of the sky. These films are again sped up to shorten the time, however it has created this strange effect were the sky remains motionless. Or so it would seem, can you spot the transitions? I found it very interesting to see but not see the change happening before my eyes. This relate to the idea of the stars being in the sky all the time and yet you dont see them very often in the city.





Videos dated : 5/10/09 and 8/10/09

Transition Films - Sky in the Evening

Well to get me started i thought I'd start to record some videos of the sky to get a fell for how it transitions between day, evening and night. I found them quite interest to watch there is so much subtly to be admired. I have sped these videos up to 6xspeed to shorten them, however they still have a sense of subtlty.





First video date: 7/10/09
Second video date: 12/10/09

Initial Idea of Intent

Spending time in the City of Liverpool I made an observation that at night you can barely see the stars at night. It intrigued me quite abit; because I only live a few miles away in a more rural area. Yet I can observe the stars with relative ease. This got me thinking about how we as people relate to the stars and the night sky. Does seeing the night sky and the stars make any direct impact on us? Do they make the people who live in rural areas perceive or act differently compared with city folk? Have the stars lost there importance in modern society? These kind of questions will hopefully be answered along the way during my work.

At this point I dont know where the outcome lies, however I do feel I have to create something physical which the public can view and interact with. As a key part of my work I want it to be out in the public domain within an urban environment as I feel this is where the work will be validated. However I will have to see my work takes me.

I will have to back track to my earlier work, so watch this space (pun not intended :p )

P.S. If you want to keep track of this blog and hopefully you do. Please become a Follower/Reader, I'd like to hear your thoughts and opinions.

Thanks alot

Mark