Project Aims:
– To introduce the terms and theories relating to visual language
– To help you understand how visual communication works
– To investigate and study Semiotics. The Science of Signs
– To improve your visual awareness and extend your visual vocabulary
Brief
Like bees in a vast beehive, people struggle to build the cities of their dreams. Some win and produce the most spectacular cities on Earth; others lose and their cities fade and die. The cities we see today are the results of the efforts of people over many generations. As some of the world’s cities grow to contain more than 20 million people, the effort to keep them working will need to grow greater still. As the city eats more of the sky, the countryside on the edge of the city is eaten up as the city people seek more room to expand or just more room and less noise.
Like ants in a colony moving to and fro, our identity is lost, absorbed, given up for the greater good of the collective or moulded into the personality of the city. Who will see the lives we lead, the way we touch and interact with each other? Who will see my unfulfilled dreams, aspirations, secret fears, faith, hope, desires, heritage, loves, hates, routines etc? Do two ants have the same thoughts? Cities are important places with power and influence. Like a huge magnet, a successful city draws people in, as others struggle to escape the ‘concrete jungle’ and demanding lifestyles they are confined within.
Project Instructions And/Or Guide-Lines:
1. Select ten topics from the Visual Signifiers – List of Topics, as a starting point
• The World
• Communication
• Desire
• Strategy
• Thought
• Time
• Sight
• Light
• Unification
• Harmony
• Play
• Life
• Speed
• Multiple Dimensions
• Sensuality
• Organised
• Creativity
• Freedom
• Personality
• Modular
• Infinity
• Importance
• Tranquillity
• Body
• Identity
• Reflection
• Safety
• Entrapment
• Conservation
• Violence
• Concentration
• Defence
• Dialogue
• Memory
• Perception
• Persuasion
• Pleasure
• Power
• Ritual
• International
• Illusion
• Consumption
• Reproduction
• Gender
• Interaction
• Progress
• Self
• Style
• Sublime
• Value
• Rebellion
• Direction
• Hierarchy Simon Emery / Gary Powell
• Attraction
• Help
• Design
• Portray
• Choice
• Open
• Mobility
• Aura
• Zone
• Mutate
• Border
• Improvisation
• Synchronicity
• Intelligence
• Taste
• Perfection
• Skill
• Language
• Process
• Being
• Silence
• Team
• Link
• Erase
• Balance
• Manipulate
• Seduction
• Alignment
• Camouflage
• Opposition
• Invisible
• Customise
• Imagine
• Random
• Delight
• Feeling
• Reveal
• Logic
• Ownership
• Finality
Chosen Words
• Imagine
• Random
• Progress
• Perception
• Identity
• Multiple Dimensions
• Unification
• The World
Chosen Words - Explained:
1. IMAGINE
I Intend for my imagination to play a powerful role the creation/design of my City.
2. PROGRESS
I could research what things have stayed with cities/communities and which have died-out over time. I want to see how certain services and businesses (for example) have coped with differening types or 'urban natural selection', so to speak.
3. PERCEPTION
4. UNIFICATION
2. With this in mind, we would like you to Investigate / Explore / Discover / Uncover / Observe / Interpret / document / record / collect / collate / consider events / connections / associations / experiences / your areas of interest within the Metropolis. Is it the structures? The boundaries within a city; the mapping; transport systems; ethnicity; culture; history; contrasts (e.g. day/ night); divisions (e.g. right/wrong side of the tracks, north south divide). Area Personalities; Zones; Districts; Landscapes / Cityscapes; Open spaces in confined spaces (parks, gardens; allotments; roof terraces); occupations; professions; personalities; flavours and tones; data and statistics; personal stories; security and surveillance; How can you make the mundane and the everyday interesting or visually exciting. The things we take for granted, intriguing?
3. Produce your final response(s) outcomes that follows the signs of your investigations to more focused and significant outcome(s). This can be a piece, a series images or sequence of images etc) If you are to produce a sequential outcome you must consider pacing, composition, the form of the end product i.e. is it a book, animation/film, one main image with smaller supplementary images, or a series of prints etc?
– To introduce the terms and theories relating to visual language
– To help you understand how visual communication works
– To investigate and study Semiotics. The Science of Signs
– To improve your visual awareness and extend your visual vocabulary
Brief
Like bees in a vast beehive, people struggle to build the cities of their dreams. Some win and produce the most spectacular cities on Earth; others lose and their cities fade and die. The cities we see today are the results of the efforts of people over many generations. As some of the world’s cities grow to contain more than 20 million people, the effort to keep them working will need to grow greater still. As the city eats more of the sky, the countryside on the edge of the city is eaten up as the city people seek more room to expand or just more room and less noise.
Like ants in a colony moving to and fro, our identity is lost, absorbed, given up for the greater good of the collective or moulded into the personality of the city. Who will see the lives we lead, the way we touch and interact with each other? Who will see my unfulfilled dreams, aspirations, secret fears, faith, hope, desires, heritage, loves, hates, routines etc? Do two ants have the same thoughts? Cities are important places with power and influence. Like a huge magnet, a successful city draws people in, as others struggle to escape the ‘concrete jungle’ and demanding lifestyles they are confined within.
Project Instructions And/Or Guide-Lines:
1. Select ten topics from the Visual Signifiers – List of Topics, as a starting point
• The World
• Communication
• Desire
• Strategy
• Thought
• Time
• Sight
• Light
• Unification
• Harmony
• Play
• Life
• Speed
• Multiple Dimensions
• Sensuality
• Organised
• Creativity
• Freedom
• Personality
• Modular
• Infinity
• Importance
• Tranquillity
• Body
• Identity
• Reflection
• Safety
• Entrapment
• Conservation
• Violence
• Concentration
• Defence
• Dialogue
• Memory
• Perception
• Persuasion
• Pleasure
• Power
• Ritual
• International
• Illusion
• Consumption
• Reproduction
• Gender
• Interaction
• Progress
• Self
• Style
• Sublime
• Value
• Rebellion
• Direction
• Hierarchy Simon Emery / Gary Powell
• Attraction
• Help
• Design
• Portray
• Choice
• Open
• Mobility
• Aura
• Zone
• Mutate
• Border
• Improvisation
• Synchronicity
• Intelligence
• Taste
• Perfection
• Skill
• Language
• Process
• Being
• Silence
• Team
• Link
• Erase
• Balance
• Manipulate
• Seduction
• Alignment
• Camouflage
• Opposition
• Invisible
• Customise
• Imagine
• Random
• Delight
• Feeling
• Reveal
• Logic
• Ownership
• Finality
Chosen Words
• Imagine
• Random
• Progress
• Perception
• Identity
• Multiple Dimensions
• Unification
• The World
Chosen Words - Explained:
1. IMAGINE
I Intend for my imagination to play a powerful role the creation/design of my City.
2. PROGRESS
I could research what things have stayed with cities/communities and which have died-out over time. I want to see how certain services and businesses (for example) have coped with differening types or 'urban natural selection', so to speak.
3. PERCEPTION
4. UNIFICATION
2. With this in mind, we would like you to Investigate / Explore / Discover / Uncover / Observe / Interpret / document / record / collect / collate / consider events / connections / associations / experiences / your areas of interest within the Metropolis. Is it the structures? The boundaries within a city; the mapping; transport systems; ethnicity; culture; history; contrasts (e.g. day/ night); divisions (e.g. right/wrong side of the tracks, north south divide). Area Personalities; Zones; Districts; Landscapes / Cityscapes; Open spaces in confined spaces (parks, gardens; allotments; roof terraces); occupations; professions; personalities; flavours and tones; data and statistics; personal stories; security and surveillance; How can you make the mundane and the everyday interesting or visually exciting. The things we take for granted, intriguing?
3. Produce your final response(s) outcomes that follows the signs of your investigations to more focused and significant outcome(s). This can be a piece, a series images or sequence of images etc) If you are to produce a sequential outcome you must consider pacing, composition, the form of the end product i.e. is it a book, animation/film, one main image with smaller supplementary images, or a series of prints etc?
Opening scene to Blade Runner, very popular film, and partly because of this, this world has lived on in many different forms and adaptations. This, honestly, was the first thing that came to mind when i read the title, the prospect of creating a virtual environment anywhere near as visually impressive, inspiring, creative, intricate as this, I find very exciting.
Bridge Planning Animation
Aesthetically, to me, this is the most significant part of the video. I like the way the digital water glistens and shimmers in the fake sunlight, the digital water makes for a truly beautiful texture. If I were to include free flowing water in my city I would probably use Real Flow. I'm also intrigued by the stark contrast between more natural, organic, free-forming structures of the mountains (all be it digitally made ones of course) and the ultra-neat, machine-made looking structures.
Practically, a supply of water is obviously an essential in any city or place of human habitation. Designing my city on a practical level would require a functional water system and the amount of water avaliable would have to correlate with certain dependent variables such as population density, what the main power source was (EG to create the steam used in nuclear power plants ect ect) and so on. |
I also found the light tunnel, visually, very interesting. I like the immersive nature of the tunnel, it really makes you feel like your actually there, as opposed to the other shots I highlighted, which make you feel more as if you are an onlooker in the sky.
I would like to explore my inspiration by the tunnel further in my project.
I would like to explore my inspiration by the tunnel further in my project.
FURTHER AESTHETIC RESEARCH
FINAL PIECE
Self Evaluation
I am very pleased with the aesthetic strength of the final piece, however, I felt slightly unsatisfied at the end of the project. I wanted to develop the overpopulated earth into a motion graphic but didn’t have time. Another thing I would have done if I had more time would be to research more into cities rather than just creating a hyper-stylised image of one. I wanted to create a fictional city with its own culture, systems, people, laws, etcetera.
I feel my project delivered with regards to the ‘semiotics’ section of the brief. It used a clear method of visual communication to illustrate the theme of overpopulation. I also felt that all aspects of the final piece were relevant and conveyed some part of that message; The slick C.G look lets a futuristic tone while the colouring… or lack of it, suggests the impending hash austerity such a situation would necessitate.
I feel my project delivered with regards to the ‘semiotics’ section of the brief. It used a clear method of visual communication to illustrate the theme of overpopulation. I also felt that all aspects of the final piece were relevant and conveyed some part of that message; The slick C.G look lets a futuristic tone while the colouring… or lack of it, suggests the impending hash austerity such a situation would necessitate.