Apophenia Inc is the digital online sketchbook for:
Gareth Sleightholme (AKA hesir) - an Illustrator, Scenographer and Creative Consultant who has generated Concept Art and Production Design for the Visitor Attraction, Exhibition and Leisure industry, Historical and Heritage Illustration & Design Work for Museum and Archaeology Services for two decades; who is currently lecturing in Games Design & Animation.
mob 07403861838 – or email hesir@hotmail.co.uk
Apophenia – the cognitive experience of discovering, or becoming aware of, meaningful patterns or connections in random or meaningless data where there was no prior or causal connection – Coined by Klaus Conrad in 1958, as the “unmotivated seeing of connections” accompanied by a “specific experience of an abnormal meaningfulness”. The self-convincing perception of patterns or connections where none actually exist. Most psychologists agree that this condition exists in everyone to some degree; it is a bias of the human mind. I, for one, believe it plays a fundamental part in “creativity”.
Inc. – as “Inc.” or “inc.”, abbreviation of “incorporated”.
Use your arrow keys to nosethrow and broadside that bad boy!
Javascript & WebGL based control of Blender generated 3D textures and lighting… The engine renders using <canvas>, <svg> & WebGL.
Game graphics without a game engine… basically controlling beautiful 3D game graphics in a web browser.
Can? opened… invertebrates? everywhere…
A colleague has ran about 2 million polygons on screen using this without drop-off… this is obviously a lot less than something like UDK (which can handle maybe about 15 million).
Okay, so I was invited out to a fancy dress party a while back, the theme being superheroes and comics… I kinda left it late to make a decision but eventually decided on one of my fave comic heroes, Hellboy.
So at some point last week I began fiddling with an old two litre milk-carton and with some brown paper, double-sided sticky-tape, corrugated card and the dispenser for the tape I made this sketch model of a large gun to stand in for Hellboy’s large side arm…
Work then got in the way and I didn’t really do anything else to it until this weekend just gone, when I decided to papier-mache the prop to seal it and make it easier to paint… (see below)
For the papier-mache I used a half and half mixture of PVA and water with newspaper strips.
This of course was going on at the same time I was having my head papier-mache’d… Thanks to Sarah for all the help with this… I bet this time last summer she hadn’t thought that this would be how she might be spending her weekends, laughs.
… even lunch didn’t interfere too much with the process.
Mmmm! Beef stew, tasty! This is such a great look for me…
After that it was just a case of waiting for these to dry…
So Monday comes around and after working with the students all day I spend an hour or so quick prototyping the crazy oversize right arm Hellboy wields… This was going to be tough getting this to look right.
Especially as I wanted the fingers to work.
I’d worked on something similar as a student and thought I could work out a Heath-Robinson style puppet/animatronic set of pull strings that would give me control of the oversize fingers and thumb.
This all came together quickly enough over the next few evenings…The main body of the the costume arm was made with corrugated card, stitched with 2mm aluminium wire (I prefer mechanical fixings where possible) and tricked out with double-sided tape and brown paper in places.
- NOTE: There is nothing quite like a peice of 2mm, scissor-cut wire, or the removable plastic strip from double-sided tape, JAMMED UP THE FINGERNAIL to make you remember you are alive and the owner of a nervous system. –
The pulleys were made with string fixed to the digit tip and running through a set of three hoops or eyes to give a subtle movement…
…with elastic running across the back of the digits to act as a tendon to pull the digit out again when released.
Once I’d got the basic system for the fingers working and following a couple of tests it was just a case of repeating the exercise for each of the clunky digits.
The simple pulleys to draw the fingers closed…
You can see the first two fingers working together here… (above)
Following that I went home and finished the other digits… where, it quickly became apparent that my ad hoc approach to this prototype had been rushed at the concept stage…
I almost gave up trying to get it all to work.
But this morning after some sleep, I got into the studio early and solved the issues from the night before (I hope)… and pushed on…
Taking the finished hand and forearm section down to the workshop and spraying them up in the college paint-booths.
I added the broken horns to the skull cap at lunch and sprayed the lot… The papier-mache might need a couple of coats to hide the newsprint… the brown paper on the other hand worked a treat, something to remember for next time I guess.
Papier-mache with brown paper, NOT newsprint.
Then after the afternoon session with my animators today I sprayed up the gun…
…and I guess thats where I’m at…
I guess this wouldn’t be a bad place to be if the fancy dress party was next week… but it’s tomorrow night…
Over at the excellent Brainpickings blog you can find a quiet acknowledgement) rather than a review in its truest sense – the book was originally published in 1979) of – The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World.
…and although I might disagree with the nomenclature surrounding the appropriation and redefinition of the words “work” and “labor”, it is an interesting stand point that considers Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s ideas of “Flow”.
“Work is what we do by the hour. It begins and, if possible, we do it for money. Welding car bodies on an assembly line is work; washing dishes, computing taxes, walking the rounds in a psychiatric ward, picking asparagus–these are work. Labor, on the other hand, sets its own pace. We may get paid for it, but it’s harder to quantify… Writing a poem, raising a child, developing a new calculus, resolving a neurosis, invention in all forms — these are labors.
Work is an intended activity that is accomplished through the will. A labor can be intended but only to the extent of doing the groundwork, or of not doing things that would clearly prevent the labor. Beyond that, labor has its own schedule.
…
There is no technology, no time-saving device that can alter the rhythms of creative labor. When the worth of labor is expressed in terms of exchange value, therefore, creativity is automatically devalued [by non-creatives] every time there is an advance in the [potentially creative superceding] technology of work.”
- Presentation given to Arts Faculty Staff at the Faculty Day hosted by HSAD for members of HSAD, Horncastle and Harrogate staff…
- Tuesday, 17th January 2012.
- Presented by Gareth Sleightholme & Paul Starkey – covering Games Design & Web Design‘s involvement with Heritage Projects and the opportunities for Research and Transferable Skills development, Animation Year 2 and their Documentary Projects and finally the Rabbit Heart Game project.
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Rabbit Heart is a game concept based around the character of a young girl, called Ululu, lost in a strange world of flying galleons, tentacled monsters & abandoned cities, whose only ally is a semi-sentient Exo-Suit that reminds her of the toy rabbit she had lost.
Gareth and Paul hope to publish the “making of” and development document as an educational book (above).
The Rabbit Heart Game is a collaborative educational project led by Gareth Sleightholme & Paul Starkey (HSAD – NEW MEDIA dept) being used to show students how to pull a games project together, with the intention of eventually publishing the recorded design process as a book including Concept Art, 3D development as well as Mini-projects & Tutorial Ideas for use in teaching games design.
Rabbit Heart the Game will be appearing at this yearsPlatform Expos 2012 two day conference and expo event.
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One of the hardest but most fundamental principals we try to get over to students on the new media courses here at HSAD is “the difference between Education and Training”.
In particular the adaptability and ability to react creatively to new and unexpected situations that “education” brings.
This is exemplified by the work the Games Design Students (and more recently web design students) have been working on in conjunction with Adele Howitt and the local Museum Services.
Over the last three years Year 2 students on the Games Design BA have produced heritage based imagery (digital video fly-throughs) based on research undertaken at the Museums and elsewhere and created using games engine software (UDK), stretching both the remit of the software and their own appreciation of potential revenue streams for their developing skills and futures in practice.
Year 2 Games Designers produced a Fly-through of Hull circa 1900 looking at the Docks that came right into the city as far as Queens Gardens (see fly-through in situe in the Ferens Art Gallery – above & Below)
…and this speculative “time travel” interpretation of the journey of the Grimston Sword (Hull & East Riding museum, Celtic Exhibit) using a games design engine software to see it move through time from its creation in a Celtic Forge, via a Victorian antiquities collector’s study (a nod to the likes of J.R. Mortimer) and on to the “stacks” of the museum before its eventual exhibition (an innovative technology exhibit which again proved popular with visitors, much like last years recreation of the Hull Docks as they appeared in 1900) – the full video can be found here:
The final work based around The Grimston Sword on show in last years “What Lies Beneath” Exhibition at The Feren’s Art Gallery, Hull.
The development of assets for the Game Engine, from sketches to 3D modelling.
…and of course all the historical research that goes with that.
Years 2 Games Design – Roman period visual research wall.
This years exhibition will see students looking at the journey of a Roman Oil Burner (above) from the potters yard where it was made (possibly) in Syria, across Europe, and finally to its current place in the East Yorkshire collections.
Add to that the excellent work done by the 3rd Year Web Students for their Client Brief for the Civil War in Hull Project.
Year 3 Web Design students early visuals for the Civil War Hull website.
…the website, the mobile app’ and print materials along with the work of the Games Design students on a new touch screen installation would all connect to create a “multi-platform” marketing opportunity.
Year 3 Students for Web Design and one of the Games Design students look through the research materials in the archives at the History Centre.
…looking at actual period materials with help in interpretation supplied by a historian from the archive team.
Year 3 Web Design students invited a local re-enactment group into the New Media Studios to discuss the Civil War period in particular the struggle as centred on Hull.
Explaining the dress and equipment of the typical period infantryman.
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Elsewhere in New Media?
Well…
This year the New Media Students have had a much more subject focused experience than some of the previous years.
Year 1 Games Design this year has changed a little… part of their Craft & Media technologies has seen them looking at:
- Drawing with Basic Primitives for 3D (many of our new media students come from a none arts background, and need up-skilling in visual communication).
- Creating Game Maps as part of the Games Design Process.
- Using Sketch Up to “block out” Level Designs …amongst other subjects.
Each of the twelve, four hour sessions working as “an intro to…” but producing some great results. Especially the group Games Concepts element based on the back of the Game Maps session.
Like wise, Sallie Bell‘s revised Interactive Comm’s project saw students learning how to develop content for the blogs and “web presences” they had set up.
…including the great Monopoly Project, that asked students to revise the classic Monopoly Board basing the gameplay instead on a digital/computer game of their choice.
The results of which you can see here and find on the mezzanine outside the New Media Dept.
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Animation Year two students have been working on Documentary or Non-Fiction projects this semester and Alex and Nat have done particularly well, surprising them both with the stretching of themselves as creatives through the unfamiliar documentary format.
Bee designs for Alex’s short documentary “Dialects in the Language of Bees”
Hull’s first ‘Scratch Theatre‘ night allows audiences to see new work for the stage by the region’s ever-expanding writing and performing talent, a project run by Dramatist, Writer, Award winning Blogger and all round Literati type, Dave Windass.
This is the second Poster Design I’ve been asked to create for them…
The theme of the image was based on discussions with Dave on what he described as “on a shoestring” performances, that come together at the last minute – which is probably why they are such vibrant, lively shows to see… the nature of the project and Dave’s attitude put me in mind of my early days as a designer working with Keith Sparks, and the numerous times we designed on napkins on the train with Biros, and of course the proverbial “Back-Of-A-Fag-Packet” designs of yore… So that’s what I did… I simply took a cigarette pack*and made a toy-like model theatre from it based on the type seen below.
The model or Maquette, was made using tears and folds only, and without removing/destroying any part of the packet… You can still actually refold the box back together from what you see above.
My first poster design was linked into this theme too, being based around my “noodling” in SketchUp (3D software) to come up with a way to create a pop up theatre design. As you can see here…
Though the final one used was changed to a more peachy colour, rather than the pine green above… You can see the raw SketchUp screen grabs below…
The next poster, for Scratch Theatre 8 will hopefully be an elegant elaboration on the image below… i.e. a real cutout and keep theatre you can fold yourself… keeping with the theme of participation etc.
*I suppose thinking about it I should have been ethical and responsible and put some sort of health warning on these. I’m not a smoker myself, and of course the inside of buildings are all smoke free these days but still…
I’m currently working with my Level 3 Btec (Year 2) students on a “Drawing for 3D and Product Design” brief (see the rough draft below)…
…a draft version of the brief in which I’ve highlighted the Mini-Project and also the checklist at the end, a useful item for the students as the contemporary FE level brief seems now laden with information not necessarily pertinent to the student, but included to prove that opportunities learning has been offered (no doubt a side effect of our wondrous litigation culture) by the institution; all of which in fact appears to further obfuscate the object of the brief.
Anyway… Part of the larger brief deals with a short, mini-project to give the students a portfolio piece (yes, it’s interview for Uni’ time already) that will show off their spacial awareness – Several Uni’s, looking for Games Design students specify that they want to see examples of traditional 3D work for just this reason...
With my students I’m looking for them to choose an object that they are familiar with, something no bigger than about 500mm x 500mm x 500mm, that they can recreate in simple corrugated/brown box card, without… and this is the thing that gets them… without using glue, or sticky tape.
For example here’s a quick model (below) I knocked together showing how laminating on a curve can make strong (by this I mean rigid) shapes. No glue, no tape… nuts and bolts instead.
A former student of mine tackled this brief with success while going through the same prep’ for portfolio/interview last year, you can see her outcome below… including her quick paper maquette test.
Corrugated Card & Thread Boot Construction – by Shayleen Hulbert – Shay’s blog & portfolio.
I can pretty much guarantee that the “Boot” model (above) would not have looked half as good if it had been constructed using glue and tape. And it certainly would not have looked this good after all this time and being handled and dragged about with portfolios etc. The tape would have been peeling bit of card coming away from each other, glue dribbles down seams would have looked unseemly, and chemical fixings on paper or card always deteriorate.
I feel this is a great way to get he students to think and plan ahead a little with their designs, rather than just plod through a process, and eventually have a great looking and durable product to show at the end of it. The kind of thing that can be seen not just as part of a process, but as an end product too.
A retail window display in Manchester – Designer/Maker Unknown*
Hopefully I’ll be able to post the results from my current students in the near future… I’m looking forward to seeing them myself.
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Of course this all relates to the post I made about 3D maquettes as part of the design process…
I found a couple more photos of maquettes and simple card models for working design projects, which I’ve scanned and uploaded below.
The images on the left are of a model, that I abandoned part way through the build as the problem I was looking for a solution to became apparent, which it wouldn’t have unless I started the model.
The images on the right are of a scrappy model using left over blue card, just exploring shapes and treatments for sculptural forms to be used on a roof, the canopy at the bottom is made from cocktail sticks, tracing paper and invisible (Scotch) tape.
Oh, and for those of you interested in more detailed model making, you may well be interested in this site suggested by one of my students: http://www.shapeways.com/ who Customize and create 3D printed products (apparently, they are “the future of stuff”…?!)
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*If someone does know, I’d be glad to credit them and put a link to there website or blog – All Photos taken by G. Sleightholme.
Visiting my sister’s house at the weekend I met with my great niece (12yrs old), “Hi Edan who had recently (for xmas) been given whole bunch of art equipment, which is great.
She has started to keep a personal sketchbook in which she has already filled a number of pages with drawings and sketches of the dogs etc.
But she also showed me her paper-craft…
…all made from folded paper triangles, and giving a really interesting finished texture.
The triangles can be arranged in different configurations and patterns using colours to create different finishes.
I showed this to one of my Btec students who was looking at using some paper models in the latest project… very impressed.
@PaulStarkey Cool...check you doing graphic design. Well, its a start... And a kick in the butt for me. I'll pull some together myself too. 20 hours ago
