Sound piece for Dana – Nicole

Hey everyone!

just wanted to post the video of my sound piece:

Nicole

final thoughts

emonigle

Bri: The objects moving around were effective, though I’m guessing not intended. I enjoyed that the processed foods came out of the ground. The message was strong and obvious.

James: There was a clear narrative, yet didn’t tell a definitive story. The 8-bit beats transitioned (technically) smoothly to the end, but I didn’t like how predictable it was.

Wesley: The photoshoped postcards were clever, but it was hard to tell that you had put work into each individual piece until I looked closely. I would have liked the postcards printed out and stuck to the wall.

Nicole: The animation seemed like it was trying to communicate something to the audience. Was it? I wish I had some more time with each image, yet I can see that the piece was stronger with flashing words and pictures.

Vicky: I enjoyed that there were only two colors in this piece and the slate was wiped clear with a green blob. The sound track or a rainstorm was too similar to the visual. I wanted something unexpected.

Evelyn: The music really tied to the piece and uses the Spongebob theme song without being predictable. I am still unsure what the relationship is between the cartoon and the real sponge.

Ceci: The piece was simple, but tied together. I liked the weirdness. The animation fit the music well and I liked the piece more the longer I watched.

Julie: I liked how this piece plays with size – the boots, children, and gun. I think the filter on top was predictable as it had a distinctive western feel.

Kim: The flashing between light and dark made it hard to watch. I felt like it was just flashing images and there was no clear movement towards a conclusion.

Mauve: The music and animation had good timing and fit well with the piece. I wish there had been more frames so the animation was smoother. I did not like the applause because it made the piece seem show-offy.

Lamont: I enjoyed how the music was unexpected and didn’t seem to fit the piece at all; it allowed me to look at objects that I would have originally missed. The dollar bills were recognizable, which detracted from the piece.

Kyle: The sound piece in the stairwell was interesting, unexpected, and well put together. The piece in the trashcans was expected and I would remove the “feed me words”.

Tucker: I liked the bouncing ball person animation. I liked that the creature died at the end. I would love to know how the animations were created so quickly.

Final Project Comments

by Ceci Menchetti

Elspeth:  The Photoshop editing and animation of this piece was outstanding–very smooth and polished.  The upward motion of the piece was very interesting to watch and the “wings” of the artichoke were perfectly interpreted.  I thought that the rather cartoonish-style writing before and after the animation, however, detracted from this polished feeling.  I would have liked to have seen titles and a thought bubbles be animated/edited in the same manner as the artichoke.

Evelyn: This animation was very clever.  I liked the different filtered images of the sponge, which eventually became the character itself.  I don’t have a problem with SpongeBob being a recognizable character because I believe that you subverted it enough to make the viewer think about it in a new way.

Kim: I think that this video was a great exploration of digital as tool and medium.  The distortion of images into ASCII text and the distorted music make the viewer think about the communication breakdowns that often occur with new media.  I had to watch the video a couple times before I felt that I could truly understand much of it, but I think that this is probably a good thing.

Bri: This was one of the view pieces that had a real message behind it, and it was well conveyed.  The animation of the plants that appear to “grow” products which are clearly synthesized is very effective, especially when repeated and put to the Rage Against the Machine song.  I liked the low-fi element of the drawing–I thought it added to the overall subversive effect of the piece.

Wes: I think that this piece demonstrated a terrific skill with Photoshop and some very clever conceptualizing.  I liked the separation of the pieces, though as someone else mentioned in class, I thought that rearranging the order to have the zoomed-out map in the middle may have been more effective.  You mentioned that you had envisioned the pieces printed out on very large paper–I think that this, too, would have been a more effective way to display the images.  Really enjoyed this one.

Lamont: This image is pretty rich and complex, requiring some time with the piece.  The sound piece being played with it allows for that time, letting the reader draw connections between the parts of the image and the image with the “song.”  I thought that the Lion King song followed by the random noise was a successful way to compliment the image because it first caused me to view the image as a landscape and then when that song was interrupted, I somehow saw the image differently.

Julie: This image is makes skillful use of Photoshop.  I like the original image and wondered where it came from.  The layers of color, pattern, and texture within and over the image add interest and force the viewer to consider it in new and different ways.

Vicky: This video is a great example of digital as medium.  The green flashing dots create great visual interest, while the rain sounds coordinate and give them interesting meaning.  There was something soothing, about the piece…probably the rain sounds, but the visual aspect was also very calming to watch.

Maeve: The animation in this piece is really well done and I like the cartoon element in combination with the more realistic looking curtain and the sounds of human applause at the end.  The song “Never Gonna Give You Up” did originally cause me to interpret the piece as a love story between the cars, but once I identified the mohawks and saw that they were crashing with the fire, I realized that the song, especially because it had been converted to 8bit, was unrelated, in a good way.

James: The images in this video are well edited and the beat of the Jeopardy music corresponds well.  The idea behind the piece is an interesting exploration of an aspect of digital media that we haven’t really discussed: when it fails.  I liked the frustration conveyed by the images, but I would have liked to hear different sound I think, just because that song has so much built-in meaning.

Nicole: The combination of images and words in this piece was pretty baffling to me.  I was not sure if I was supposed to be drawing connections or not, but as Maeve mentioned in class, once I gave up trying to do so, I enjoyed the piece more thoroughly.  I think the piece might have been more successful is it was accompanied by sound, perhaps to illuminate at least part of the meaning.

Kyle: I enjoyed the sound piece installed at the vending machines; while I was observing the piece, a worker was restocking the machines and completely ignored it, which I thought was interesting.  But I just thought that was a clever way to, in a way, animate objects over which you do not have digital control.

Tucker: These animations display both terrific technical skill and very creative imagination.  I like the original idea of animating what you think a song might “look like” and find that this is an extremely effective way to do so.  The piece with the dancing ball who eventually falls to the ground, unable to get up, was my favorite because, as Professor mentioned in class, it somehow conveys so much personality with such minimalistic limbs and facial features.

Final critiques – E.Koh

Wes: When I first looked at his pieces, it felt like each of the three pieces is like the games where you have to find what is wrong with the picture, and is a game trying to find what is different between the three when you look at all of them together.  I agree with the critiques in class that the presentation of this piece in a bigger scale would have accomplished the piece even more successfully.

Bri: It is a creative concept but I wish I could have seen more of the top half of the animation.  Especially since it was meant to be a statement against the corn-syrup-based society of today, maybe the sky could have gone darker as the Snickers bar or the Coca-cola bottle was emerging out of the plants.

Elspeth: I think this piece was a good display of what digital art can do, by bringing an inanimate object to life.  However, I wish there could have been something more to the animation, maybe involving the background or accompanying sound.

Nicole: Maybe it might have to do with the quick speed of the animation, but it left me confused in a sense that it made it hard for me to match up the words to the pictures that were being shown.  Since the animation was going in a loop, I would like to see one loop done in the fast speed she already had it, and the same sequence of animation much slower to see if the viewers get a different interpretation of the exactly same animation running at different speed.

Vicky: This piece reminded me of Tyler Collins’ senior thesis in which they both took something very simple and created something much more complex.  I would love to see the animation accompanied with different types of music to see if it changes how I feel about the piece, because with the sound of the water it made it a calming piece.

Maeve: After hearing that this was inspired by Run, Lola Run, I could definitely see it in the piece and I thought it was very clever.  The only thing I will say about this is that some of the animations were a little abrupt at times, such as the third curtain drawing or the smoothness of the animation when the cars driving were inconsistent.

CeCe: I remember our class talking about this egg around campus and I think it was very cool to see it animated.  Somehow it was put together in such a way that even though it is ridiculous that there is an egg-customed being with a shopping cart in various landmarks, it is surprising that it didn’t seem out of place.

Jim: I thought this piece did a great job of demonstrating the frustration of digitization that many people may not think about, and worked with the music as well.  I wonder how I feel about the piece if the ending were to be different such as something exploding instead of a blissful person with “Hallelujah” going off at the very end.  I feel that it could give some room of imagination with a different ending instead of having this ending where it packages the whole piece together.

Julie: I’m not sure if I am taking this interpretation too far but what seems like a self-portrait at first embodies imageries relating childhood, violence, and growing up.  I noticed slight streaks of color and wasn’t sure what the intention was, but I would love to see more color with the piece just to see if it changes my interpretation of the piece.

Lamont: When I first looked at it, I thought it may be a social commentary on the world today, but I think the appeal of this piece is that it allows the viewer to freely interpret it however they see it as.  I thought it was interesting that the complete contrast between the happier Lion King music and the dark sense of the vector landscape worked to enhance this work.

Kim: I liked it that the image was in ascii and distorted enough that I could not recognize it.  I wish there could have been a different music with this piece (instead of the digital-like sound) such as classical music to see how the piece might work for the viewers.

Kyle: I really liked the idea of continuing the sound project to disrupt the whole floor of a building.  I wish the sound in the lobby where you come into Ryan would have been different, because I have heard it before so it didn’t interrupt the space.  It could be as simple as just switching the music between from the vending machine.

Tucker: All I can say about his four pieces is that I am amazed by how advanced the tools we have been using this semester can be.  I think it is so interesting that with his second piece, he can change the outcome of which rocket wins the race every time just by a change of codes and would love to see it happen.

Final Comments – Nicole

James:

The narrative of this piece seemed quite clear to me, a little bit disappointing in that way, especially the ending which felt cliche with “Hallelujah” especially. The technical aspect of the images (Photoshop?) looked quite good.

Maeve:

I really struggled to understand why these racing cars were on a stage but it reminded me of a video game, where the curtain acts like a break between the different levels. The music too reminded me of video games. It was weird how the car accident was presented in a very casual way, with no noise relating to it, and then it just ends with people clapping – kind of off-beat.

Lamont:

Lamont made us of his “tornado” distortions quite astutely here. I thought it could even have taken over the landscape even more, with very few objects still distinguishable. It would be like a painting style, like Abstract Expressionism, something characteristic of his work. For me, the relationship of the soundtrack to the image was difficult, because it wasn’t even an absurd juxtaposition, there just wasn’t any link to be made.

Vicky:

Nice correspondence of light and sound in this piece where rain, puddles, thunder find an equivalence in the lighting up of green dots. A bit like the display on a stereo – mesmerizing, soothing.

Wes:

This reminded me of a collage that someone might make after coming back from a trip, adding to it after every holiday. There are many funny moments, with lines like “Stonehenge, now in Central Park” or “The White House, now in scenic Machu Pichu”. It made me think that maybe all these places and cities are the same to tourists – just attractions. And their erroneous placement on the world map is because no one knows where they are anyway, or it doesn’t really matter what their geographical and cultural context is. Come to think of it, it may be more like a kind of advertising poster in a travel agent’s office. They just want to sell a destination.

Bri:

Menacing piece with political undertones. The angry and loud cover of Bob Dylan’s Maggie’s Farm with the animation of growing plants producing Coke, Ketchup and a Snickers bar come together to show that our food products are a travesty. They are anything but natural…our food does not come  from the earth.

Elspeth:

This artichoke reminds me of the phoenix in Harry Potter as it gently rises. It think the strength of this animation is the personality given to the artichoke. It could be a cameo for some kind of cartoon character. I think we start to get to know it when it says “hi” but it needs to do/say a few more things for the fart joke to work at the end I think. We would have gotten into a storyline before being surprised by the fart. And we would have laughed more because we would have felt like we knew the artichoke better.

Kyle:

I think we all agreed on how successful the piece in the staircase was. It really felt like sound architecture – something that was remodeling the space. It was insightful in that it built upon the industrial feel of the staircase (with neon lights, metal railings, cement floors and walls) and added sound to it which was also metallic-sounding. It was menacing because it came from below, a space we couldn’t see. It sounded like a metal shop, maybe there was a fire down there, people preparing for war, someone whistling to his workers…it createed a sense of darkness (slightly evil) and urgency .

Kim:

This piece seems very well resolved to me in the sense that there is a clear aesthetic, both with the image and music. But I don’t mean that it is too clear and uninteresting. It just feels like a coherent whole. I thought rupture was at the center of the piece, with abrupt switches and broken up images. I couldn’t recognize anything, but the imagery appealed to me and the video with the music put me in a trance.

Evelyn:

This animation is about the sources for Bob Square Pants (is this his name?). We see him emerging from his “ancestor”, an actual sponge, and from code – the thing that supports his digital image. The sponge goes through successive transformations, finally revealing Bob with pride. It feels a bit like a video game or a TV cartoon. I think the theme of transformations could have been developed in a more complex way – perhaps we could have been surprised by some absurd metamorphoses, something less predictable.

Ceci:

The sense of the absurd here is hilarious. Some creature (I thought it was a cow at first) is seen going all over the world with a shopping cart, living a jet-setting lifestyle, like a real “playa” (the soundtrack supports this idea: “feeling so fly…”). Why is this creature so cool? I have no idea, but I am totally convinced that it is living the life.

Tucker

We discussed Tucker’s work quite a bit, and his strengths are obvious – fun animations, interactive, compelling and original characters. I would just like to point out that his sense of space in all these animations is also very sophisticated. He knows how to create and use a whole variety of spaces/backdrops for his characters – a very simple dance floor, outer space, a landscape with cliffs and a mountain…The relationship of the viewer to a storyline is often shaped by the setting that he/she is presented with, and I feel that even in these short animations (they’re not feature films), Tucker presents us with very different and convincing ambiances.

Just found this!

reminded me of the game boy music

-bri

Final Project Critiques

Lamont: I really appreciated the contrast between light and dark in both the visual and audio components of your piece. I think you also did a really great job manipulating the vectors and making them your own.

Wes: I think your concept was really great and did a good job of exemplifying digital as a tool. I think it would’ve been really cool to see the pieces hung up on a large scale side by side.

Elspeth: Your piece really tied this whole class together, transforming the very first project we did in your final project. I think the animation of the movement of the wings was especially successful and realistic.

Evelyn: You did a great job matching sounds to each of your images and transitions, I think that really helped bring your piece to life. Your piece incorporated digital as a tool/medium very well with the ASCII text, the various sounds, and transforming spongebob into a real sponge.

Nicole: I like the concept behind your piece a lot, scrambling a visual representation and a concrete representation of our alphabet and the words in one project. I liked the fact that it was hard to see a lot of the images and words. It kept me intrigued each time I watched it, and caught something new every time.

Kim: The fact that your piece was so confusing and overwhelming worked really well for it. It conveyed a sense of mixed up media with the backwards music and the flashing, grainy ASCII images.

James: The concept of your piece was really interesting and worked really well with what we’ve learned the semester. I liked how it conveyed a sense of digital as a tool/medium gone wrong. The soundtrack also worked really well with the images and the idea behind it- you could recognize the tune, but technology had distorted it.

Maeve: I liked hearing what you had to say in class about your piece, and how it was inspired by Run Lola Run. Like the movie, your piece was fun, upbeat, and colorful, but had darker theme running through it.

Ceci: You did a really good job incorporating the deviled egg into the images. Although it was so out of place in each of the locations, somehow it sort of fit. Your piece had a really great energy behind it because of the humor of the images as well as the soundtrack.

Julie: I think the images you incorporated as well as the color scheme of the piece worked well with the idea of the darker side of childhood innocence that I got from your piece. You did a really good job of seamlessly putting the images and pattern together.

Bri: Your piece did a great job of creating a really angry and rebellious mood. The choice of music was unexpected yet worked perfectly with the piece. It seemed a lot like a time-lapse video to me.

Kyle: I loved how you took over the entire stretch of hallway with three completely different pieces. Each shaped their space in a very unique and creative way, creating a different environment and feeling in each location.

Tucker: Your pieces, especially the characters they featured, were extremely creative and original. Although each of your characters were so crazy and unknown, I still had the feeling that they fit well in the different environments you created for them.

-Vicky Goodman

Final Critiques

Vicky:
-I like how it relates to the John Cage piece about the nature of sound and noise.
-While I don’t understand what it actually was, I still liked it, but I guess the point of the piece was not to have a meaning, which I’ve learned this year is also as successful as having one.
Ceci:
- Love the soundtrack first off. The song really made your piece. It could almost be a low-budget music video for G6.
- I like how there is no meaning to it, just a deviled egg crusing around the world; very well done.
Wes:
-After figuring out what the final two pieces of your set were, I Understood your project a lot better. I like the overall idea, and as I said in class “The Photoshops were good.”
-I think that you should have made the images bigger to show the photoshopped images a little better as they were small. I think you should blow them up and print it out, I like the concept a lot.
Bri:
- The coke bottle in your piece was very well done on Illustrator. It looks very good.
- After talking about the soundtrack in class it makes more sense why you choose it, but I feel that all 3 objects moving at the same time in a nice neat row doesn’t work well with your piece. I think they should move maybe at different speeds, and not all at the same time rather then being so in unicine.
Evelyn:
-Great use of the topics from class to tie everything together. I liked how the ASC-II text acted almost like a screen when Spongebob was morphing.
-I like how at the end he is a “real sponge” but still a cartoon, that was a good touch.
- I think you could fix the middle a bit, where it just goes black for a second to make the piece flow a little more fluently, and theres no “jump.”
Kim:
- I have no clue what the images are flashing on the screen but I liked it.
-The soundtrack was really perfect for the piece and the ASC-II generated images really make you focus on what could be in there if it was zoomed out and focused in.
Maeve:
- I initially wrote, do the cars have mohawks? But we talked about that in class.
- I like the fire/crash scene, because it fits in well with the rest of the work.
- After hearing that the curtain acts like a changing screen, I like them a bit more, but at first I did not really care for them, and thought it broke the work up, but thats what they were supposed to do, as i found out.
Nicole:
-The speed for the images was great. As the one disappeared I wondered what it was, but I was forced to look at the next one that popped up.
- I would like to see the entire code-word alphabet in a similar piece. If there was time for another project, I think it would be a good one to do.
Elspeth:
- Sassy Brocalli’s cousin, the Flying (and Farting) Artichoke
- I like how the animation of the fake wings fits in with the image of the real artichoke; very well done. Also, the script at the beginning of the piece was cool, and was very seamless.
Julie:
-My favorite part was the child in the cowboy boot.
-I wish I knew the theme for your picture, I think I would get a better understanding of it if I did.
Kyle:
- The Coca-Cola guy putting the sodas into the machine as your piece said “feed me” was great.
- I really liked the one at the end of the stairwell, the construction noises and etc. where great and really changed the space from an academic stairway to something else. Very well done.
LaMont:
- I liked how the tornado divided the day and night, but at the same time connected the entire piece together.
-Like the landscape designs, it really makes you think about what you are looking at and whats going on. There was a lot of things in your vector, and I liked how it came out.
Tucker:
- Phenomenal Animations. I don’t know what else to really say, they all were great.
- I liked the little things you put in there, like how the lights flicker in the dancing face one, and how you can see the giant watermelon rotate into the background before it comes back to the foreground. As if it wasn’t said enough already, good job.

-James C.

And That’s All Folks

Critiques of Final Projects:

Kim:

-I found this piece interesting because it conveyed a sense of broken technology doing exactly what it is supposed to.  It reminded me of the really old original Nintendo when the cartridge was dusty and the images would come out like ASCII text.  I think I desired a just a little more familiarity with the images though.

-The music also matched because it seemed broken as well because I could not understand it, but it felt familiar.  This reminds me of the idea of DJ scratching.

Nicole:

-I found it interesting how the piece was presented so small because we often watch videos that are that small, but because it was an art critique it seemed out of place.

-I liked how the slide moved not in a constant rate because I felt that related to communication as a cadence or style of talking.  I desired to understand if all the words matched a picture, but I would not want to be told.  So I actually desired it to be longer for me to continue to try and decode it.

Maeve:

-I felt the animation was confusing because I was unable to identify objects like the Mohawk.  The happy music confused me when the cars crashed in the end.  I also took the animation as a storyline instead of 3 separate events, which caused confusion for me.

-I enjoyed the curtains because they made me think about the actual properties of animation its self.  We will never know what is in between frames and the curtain blocked off the animation for a while and then something different was happening.

Julie:

-The little use of color was very important to how the viewer experienced the piece.  The dichotomy of good/bad and innocent/guilty are very well presented in the piece.

-I think the image was very skillfully photo-shopped, but I desired either a series of photos that followed the same issues.

Wes:

-These post cards were great to see because it highlights the effects of colonization and globalization.  Post-cards are often seen in a happy perfect light, but there is an interesting interruption to this idea with physically large intrusions of America/American culture.  These were well photo-shopped images as well.  So well that it took me a minute to realize what was happening in these pictures.

-I desired to see each post card better and I much preferred the images without effects because it makes it more realistic.

Kyle:

-The sound in the stairwell was very successful and made me feel that the area was busy and continually moving.  The sound filled the chosen area very well and if I did not know that it did not lead to the bottom of a steam ship or factory, I would have thought that is exactly was there.

-I liked the fact that you were giving life and motion to the inanimate building so I desired your first jungle piece to not be a part of the set.

Lamont:

-This illustrator image was extremely interesting with the dualism with the natural green areas looking as if they are being ripped and taken over by this tornado.  The music oddly worked with this piece because it took what many people in the US would be “natural” music with the African drums and it is changed in the middle to a more modern and intense electronica music.

-I do not think you would have had time to do this because the image is very involved, but I think that this could have been made into an amazing animation, especially with the music.

Vicky:

-I found that the dots were interesting because they were flowing with the sound of waves, but I wished that when there were surround sound effects from one ear to the other, you had moved the dots with it.

-I think that visually you chose two very affective colors because the music was so natural that the lime green created the dichotomy with technology.  It reminded me of the old computers or even the coding from the movie the Matrix.

James:

-This animation spoke to the timing of the semester when one is stressed and how we can blame technology for not acting the way want it to.  I think it was very successful to use the 8 bit music of the jeopardy timer song because it conveys the feeling of the end of the semester is winding down.

-I was not expecting the ending because it was so cliché and I know I have been working all semester to try to understand the impacts of work that has clichés in it.  I feel like it almost would be more successful if that happens, but is not the end?

Elspeth:

-The flying artichoke was a skillfully done animation, but it left me hanging.  I was not a fan of the fart at the end because I felt it did not really match the smoothness of the animation.

-I desired for the artichoke to pop in and out, or to have sassy broccoli whistle a him, or maybe get his heart cut out because he is an artichoke.  Basically I thought it was a well designed character, who has more potential.

Evelyn:

-I enjoyed this piece because I thought it would have been interesting to discuss if it were handed in as the midterm project that, which was explain digital as a medium and as a tool.  It was creative to watch a real sponge turn into sponge bob.

-I desired to have the end of the sponge-bob theme song finish because I felt the music ended abruptly and took away from the piece.

CiCi:

-This one was interesting because it was a “devil” egg that was travelling to many places.  I felt the music gave an interesting addition of attitude to this devil egg that was nice and allowed him to be able to accomplish the impossible like being on the moon and then in a grocery store.

-I desired the egg moved more often like he did on the dance floor.  I would have found it great if you could have made him moon-walk on the moon.  I wonder if that is easier there?  Well all in all this animation was entertaining, but I am left wondering if there was a deeper meaning.

Tucker:

-I am going to stick to two points even though Tucker out did us all with his awesome animations.  The animation with the watermelons was very visually pleasing and was able to warp one’s sense of time in a way.  I think if he were to add to this I think he could add another fruit into the mix.

-The spaceships were an interesting idea because the animation was all up to tucker and there was no real reasoning based on natural law for the winner.  I think this would make a great website if you wrote the code to make the winner random.

-cgochenour

final thoughts

Wesley: I really had to challenge myself to gage an understanding of this project. I think this project could have been more successful if they three images were printed out (big) and placed directly next to each other. I had to look very closely to see the intricacy of the Photoshop (which was mechanically very well done).
Evelyn: The use of zeros and ones as a curtain brings in the elements of digitalness. The music compliments the scene well in terms of what is happening to Sponge Bob.
Elspeth: Graphically speaking the leaves turning into wings is clean and smooth. This piece reminds me of the sassy broccoli. I think the sunglasses add flavor and spice to the artichoke as it takes on humanlike qualities.
Nicole: I had to watch this piece many times to try to grasp a concept and make sense of the pictures and words. I enjoyed the varying time spent on different frames however I had a lot of trouble grasping a meaning between the various pictures and words. The words were initially distracting from the pictures and I had to force myself not to look at the words and try to look solely at the pictures after watching it several times.
James: I enjoyed the Jeopardy song in 8bit music form. The series of frames conveys a sense of how stressful computers can be despite their purpose of aiding our endeavors. The music and the change of slides was lined up very precisely.
Meave: The attention to detail was great – the way the car seemed like it was moving through the use of the background building and lines on the road. I at first had no idea what the stuff on the car was but then after watching the scene a few more times I realized it was possibly a Mohawk. But while trying to figure out the Mohawk I realized that colors of the cars/Mohawk change which I did not realize the first few times.
Bri: The heavy metal music is a very interesting choice. I would desire seeing the Coke can, Snickers bar and Ketup bottle do something after sprouting. The political commentary is interest, with the music, corn and what is produced from the corn add an element of complexity.
Julie: The use of size distorting make me want to look at the picture for a long time. I am not sure what the purpose of the colored design in the upper half of the picture but it is effective because of the black and white tint of the picture. While at my computer later and seeing this piece from a distance created a different feel.
Ceci: This piece is so random it makes me laugh. The egg with horns and a shopping cart with wheels visiting famous places in combination with the G6 song continued to make me smile and become more amused I watched.
Lamont: My eyes were overwhelmed by everything going on in the photo. The Lion King-like music seemed random when I first put on the headphones. The “darker” music, with the cool beats, seems to fit the piece better for me because it reminds me of videos games with dragon slaying.
Kyle: the sound piece in the stairwell entrance I found the most successful of the three pieces. It reminded me of getting in line for a roller coaster at t theme park which fits the space well due to the industrial style architecture of the stairs. The sounds actually kind of made me scared to descend the stairs to where the sound was coming from. The vending machines, I didn’t think was as successful as the stairwell piece because the sound corresponds too well. It was successful in the fact that it made me want to buy something though.
Vicky: This piece seems so simple at first but knowing how much time it takes to get the green blobs to get bigger and smaller and glow and get sucked into the middle is more difficult than it may seem. Originally I did not listen to the corresponding sound (because someone else was experiencing the work). I was not expecting to hear water because the green blobs reminded me of space. I really liked the sound moving from right to left in the headphone speakers because it really conveyed a sense of the water moving from one side to the other.
Tucker: Very creative having the pieces be interactive. The first one (Watermelon & Earth) I found it strange that it took so long for the smaller watermelon’s face to come around. The shuttle race game was very creative and it would have been cool if Tucker could have randomized the winner. The third one, where you can move the varying pieces around is also cool. While the different elements look so simple, there are subtle aspects that add a lot to the piece, such as the glow and sunglasses with specs on the sun and the facial expression on the mountains. Finally, the bouncing stick ball I find the enjoyable. Moving the mouse over top of it and then clicking the mouse to make it fall are cool features. The stick ball seems so smug dancing/running around until you click and he falls straight down – so great!

-ksiembieda