Brain Dump
Previous Research Track
Nature/computation
Projection mapping – applying the basic principles of cgi modelling to physical models.
Gaming & Immersion in Nature – practice based experiments in Studio, Virtual and natural environments.
Exploring how animation can illustrate aspects of quantum physics
The mystification of nature in drawn animation *
HCI experiments in CG Animation software.
Research Tool App Concept
Indie XR Animation, games and illustration studio – Director, Producer, Animator and illustrator. (Aniseed.studio)
Arts Practice & Research – Personal Work (sarrahornby.com) –
1) is HCI tension one of gender or control?
2) how is nature mystified In Animation (experimental & 3D ) and other transmedia applications (XR).
3) Practice – Based Research : I can speak for myself thank you… I’m not a lab rat.
4) Better Practice – Based research tools: Helix
5) Alternative Animation histories – Immersive internalised/externalised world-building a Animation is not just film on screen it Is a kind of mental modelling.
6) A transmedial exploration of death and spiritualism in experimental animation and other media.
7) The mystification of nature (super – nature) – spiritualism, power, autonomy, beauty and woman.
8) Spirituality/direct connection Something bigger (in opposition to a patriarchal control system) – a kind of panpsychism.
Experimental Animation : computer animation/gender – Birgitta Hosea (9) & Suzanne Buchan (305) Animation:An Interdisciplinary Journal, SAS (counter thesis) “as a practitioner, for me Animation was about being immersed within practice and processes of animation production rather than watching animation on screen or as a moving object, animation was the poor cousin of film and this definition did not hold for me it simply wasn’t how I viewed animation in practice, animation was an immersive process.
Transmedia : Aesthetics Film/videogame/gender – Tanya Krzywinska (153)
Super-natural : spiritualism/nature/gender/materiality Ruth Heholt (36) “a transmedial tracking of the super-natural through experimental animation and other transmedia, speaks to my formative biography, my early kinetic work and aspects of an earlier research enquiry. This was prior to the technological enquiry. I am now interested in exploring magical realism in expanded animation/transmedial work.
Nature/computation
Projection mapping – applying the basic principles of cgi modelling to physical models.
Gaming & Immersion in Nature – practice based experiments in Studio, Virtual and natural environments.
Exploring how animation can illustrate aspects of quantum physics
The mystification of nature in drawn animation *
HCI experiments in CG Animation software.
Research Tool App Concept
Indie XR Animation, games and illustration studio – Director, Producer, Animator and illustrator. (Aniseed.studio)
Arts Practice & Research – Personal Work (sarrahornby.com) –
1) is HCI tension one of gender or control?
2) how is nature mystified In Animation (experimental & 3D ) and other transmedia applications (XR).
3) Practice – Based Research : I can speak for myself thank you… I’m not a lab rat.
4) Better Practice – Based research tools: Helix
5) Alternative Animation histories – Immersive internalised/externalised world-building a Animation is not just film on screen it Is a kind of mental modelling.
6) A transmedial exploration of death and spiritualism in experimental animation and other media.
7) The mystification of nature (super – nature) – spiritualism, power, autonomy, beauty and woman.
8) Spirituality/direct connection Something bigger (in opposition to a patriarchal control system) – a kind of panpsychism.
Experimental Animation : computer animation/gender – Birgitta Hosea (9) & Suzanne Buchan (305) Animation:An Interdisciplinary Journal, SAS (counter thesis) “as a practitioner, for me Animation was about being immersed within practice and processes of animation production rather than watching animation on screen or as a moving object, animation was the poor cousin of film and this definition did not hold for me it simply wasn’t how I viewed animation in practice, animation was an immersive process.
Transmedia : Aesthetics Film/videogame/gender – Tanya Krzywinska (153)
Super-natural : spiritualism/nature/gender/materiality Ruth Heholt (36) “a transmedial tracking of the super-natural through experimental animation and other transmedia, speaks to my formative biography, my early kinetic work and aspects of an earlier research enquiry. This was prior to the technological enquiry. I am now interested in exploring magical realism in expanded animation/transmedial work.
- Publish Android/iOS App
- Annecy Cinematic VR Submission
- Research Proposal
- Commercial – sarra.tv & Aniseedstudio Paper craft / illustration / cgi
- Art – sarrahornby.com & human9.com (political)
- research – XR Animation – sarrahornby.com
- Adobe Photoshop 2019 cc
- Blender 2.8 – environment
- Unity – interaction / app UI / vr filmmaking 2019.3.0a2
- Quill plug-in
- Android (In google cardboard headset) https://developers.google.com/vr/develop/android/get-started
- Android google cardboard and daydream (need daydream compatible phone) controller
- Android phone with gyro
- 360 camera (for experimental 360 image capture)
- XR Project Design (holovis)
- Unity accreditation
- Proposal writing
- Designing assets for game design
- Character rigging – blender
- Environment modelling – blender
- VR Narrative writer – hobbit/Chris book/story unframed podcasts https://www.linkedin.com/learning/intro-to-virtual-reality-vr-filmmaking/introduction-to-virtual-reality-vr-filmmaking?u=56738929
- Academic research and writing
- XR (VR/AR/MR) craft based Commercial App including game – Wheels (Android) Unity project.
- XR (VR/AR/MR) Illustrated narrative animated Project with Commercial Retail function – Fizhog (Android) Unity project.
- XR (VR/AR/MR) Practitioner Research Production app – Helix (Android) Unity project.
- XR (VR/AR/MR) Animation Research proposal – Birgitta (UCL) / Tereza (Falmouth) quantum/cinematic vr/XR Animation/feminism/research app/
- Cinematic VR https://www.theverge.com/2018/1/18/16900862/fable-oculus-story-studio-resurrection-vr-wolves-in-the-walls
- Hobbit Adventure game https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/index.php?cat=96&id=2000171
- Jackson fighting fantasy books –
- Quill for unity https://quill.fb.com/userstories/wired
- VR Narrative Animation/ Expanded Animation https://www.amazon.co.uk/Expanded-Animation-University-Applied-Hagenberg/dp/3775745254/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=Expanded+animation&qid=1563701082&s=gateway&sr=8-2
- Quill in Facebook spaces https://medium.com/@navahk/facebook-spaces-quill-designs-101-6d3edab3eec2
- Technology, testosterone, war and Male dominance
- Geolocation and the Physical web – beacons : Military surveillance and personal liberty – working class struggle for the right to roam versus the rights of the wealthy to have exclusive use of moorlands for grouseshooting. The right to roam the world without being tracked and manipulated.
- Feminism – ‘Venus figurines’ – The absence of feet has led to suggestions that the figures might have been made to stand upright by inserting the legs into the ground like a peg.
- Emotional abuse – Gaslighting (conditioning) pull the wool – creating an alternate reality which controls and manipulates.
- Legislation to protect privacy. GDPR – Oxford Research
- Character design – fuse https://helpx.adobe.com/beta/fuse/help/create-custom-content-fuse.html
- material space is important to hauntedness of a place
Decision Thought Process:
- Do I produce a Commercial/Experimental Project ?
- Will this be a film or game?
- Will I focus on the game mechanics or is this a content enquiry?
- What is the current discourse on this theme in animation/video games?
- What is the current discourse on the ‘best practice’ game mechanics Cinematic VR production?
- VR Narrative production (best practice)
- Gothic/Sublime Narratives (Mythopoetic narratives such as the Rider-Waite Tarot)
- Nature & Physical Effects (magical Effects)
- Materiality in Unity (paper Effects)
- Sound (as a narrative device for haptic feedback & to direct attention)
- Gender (Mysticism and Nature)
- When writing for Cinematic VR use existing film language processes such as traditional script writing and storyboarding first to make sure it works but add in things like sound and cut scenes to the narrative test flow and connection between scenes. Use references from cut scenes in the script and storyboards.
Mechanic/technical investigation (DAD)
Holism and systems thinking
HCI Experiments – cgi interface tension – Applying Craft processes to CGIModelling
Designing an intuitive AR practice-based research tool – Helix App (methodology)
Mythopoeic VR Narrative (Content/themes in experimental animation & transmedia MUM) *
VR Narrative project – The mystification Nature and the supernatural In animation and games. In this project I am going to revisit the suspended research track 5 which is The mystification of nature in drawn animation however I will be thinking in terms of a virtual world, physical materials such as paper and physical effects such as fire, ice, fog etc in the space between Video games and experimental animation.
Interests
Experimental modes of animation – practice and history
Spirituality – Supernatural – agency & control
Gender – Women/witches/evil/demonising & power/control & autonomy.
Natural environment – control, power and intelligence
VR – vulnerability, fear and ethics in immersive experiences/ VR worlds
Narrative – structure / sound
Spirituality
Gothic & sublime – https://the-artifice.com/the-sublimes-effects-in-gothic-fiction/
Tarot – Mythopoeic literature – predicting future events
Mental modelling – small scale models in the mind / prediction
Creepy nursery rhymes – folk tales
Spooky action at a distance – quantum mechanics
Hand of the designer controlling direction – agency & freewill
Supernatural Agency
Natural phenomena – intelligent design
Unseen/invisible – half seen/almost visible/periphery vision/sound/shadows/light
Experimental animated films – svankmayer/quays/norstein/reiniger
Animation – bringing life to material inanimate objects
Puppeteering – puppet master (control)
Spiritualism
Control
Autonomy – wanting to make independent decisions without being manipulated.
Gender
Career Direction
My research is situated In the triangulation between art/ecology/technology.
I am interested in experimental animation – film/kinetic sculpture/projection etc
I have spent 4 years in the animation field exploring exploring the use of technology in contemporary 3D animation practice.
Research question
A transmedial practice-based exploration of the super – natural (spirituality/nature) at the intersection of the experimental traditions of animation practice and cross reality (XR) creative app development.
(This would revisit a fork in the road and expand on an aspect of my practice which explored the mystification of nature in animation).
Literature search (REfWORKS)
Previous research questions
Is the tension experienced using computer animation tools, one of autonomy and control?
Is the tension experienced using computer animation tools, one of gender ?
Is natural phenomena mystified in animated film?
Can animation represent multiple realities and other aspects of quantum physics?
Can animation represent research methodologies ?
Can an intuitive practice-based research app be developed to capture, organise, represent and disseminate practice-based research in Academia and beyond ?
Is the tension experienced when using computer animation software found in the gap between heuristic trial and error, and the programmed algorithm of the machine?
How form, formed in mind and nature?
Can human-computer interaction be naturalised, and if it can, should it be?
Practice
Do I want to make a 360 animated video / interactive video / reward viewers as in gameplay?
If no interaction then I will not need hand controllers only a headset and a mobile phone.
360 animated film https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DR1gT36OtJQ
Research
Unity Cinematic VR
Annecy VR Animation
Annecy XR Selection list https://www.annecy.org/programme:en:vr
Annecy Graduate selection https://www.annecy.org/programme:en:fe
Jan pinkava (piggy) https://youtu.be/AsAwY80CvI0
Baobab studio (crow) https://youtu.be/DR1gT36OtJQ
(Materialising the digital)
(Exploding the micro)
Fizhogg – illustrated world (gamification retail app)
Lumo – Paper mobile app
Pilsner – Paper sculpture
Interconnection – projection mapping
Conductive thread – Soft electronics – Sewn VR headset
Wheels – Paper circus – paper textures https://www.linkedin.com/learning/deke-s-techniques/406-matching-a-real-world-paper-texture?u=56738929
Critters – circus characters
Helix – visual research diary – research the diary/research app market
Feminist literature – what it means to be woman
Paper folding
Biomimetic Design
Sewing
Illustration
White and wood
Book making
Clay modelling
Science/quantum
Micro
Craft
Community building/getting people together for a common cause
Getting fit/walking
Learning about a place / special locations
Augmented/Virtual art and media
Research – library link
Falmouth research repository
GASLIGHT
TOKENISM
Animation
History of Animation
“In particular, the inclusion of a chapter on the ‘Emergence of Electronic Games’ in this volume is significant for pedagogical purposes. While some may take issue with Furniss’s theoretically problematic redefinition of video games as ‘animated games’, the chapter’s value lies in introducing the shared history of digital animation and video games, and the common aesthetic and theoretical questions they raise. This historical overview is complemented by ‘Heroes and Damsels in Distress’ (p. 294), a chapter dedicated to unpacking the gender stereotypes embedded in mainstream games, as well as the sexism of male-dominated online gaming communities and the gaming industry at large. This chapter touches upon topical issues such as the misogynistic discourse surrounding feminist video game criticism and activism, pointing to the recent ‘Gamergate’ online movement, whose members actively targeted and harassed prominent female video game bloggers and developers.”
Birgitta Hosea
Animation as mindful practice
Animated landscapes (across media)
The reanimating of the Digital undead
Anima/Animus – Chodlodenko (Theoretician) – Animation: The giving of life to and other definitions.
Mental Modelling (Small scale models in the mind) Constructing animated worlds -A psychological/practice-based perspective.
William Kentridge – automatic writing
William Kentridge (On his process and ‘uncertainty’)
Embodied mind affect in animation/videogames – bisonette (2019)
Jan svankmayer –
The ossuary
The Brothers Quay – In Absentia
Teresa Kerowski
Birgitta Hosea (spiritualist)
Norstein
Norman Maclaren
The writer – automaton (bbc4)
ANNECY EXPANDS ITS APPEAL ACROSS THE ANIMATION ARENA
Nature
‘Supernatural’ Special effects in animation (Newtonian Physics)
Elemental Magic, Volume I: The Art of Special Effects Animation: The Classical Art of Special Effects Animation Paperback – 19 Feb 2009
Earthquakes, volcanoes, lightning, rain, bubbling and spewing lava, bubbling mud, magical fairy dust, dandelion seed pods, glistening water drops on a spider web, ocean waves, steam, snowflakes, leaves and flower petals, magic spells, meteors and swirling galaxies, smoke, spirits, frost, clouds, and countless forms of water splashes, waves, and ripples.
(Majesty of nature/command of nature)
Spooky Action at a distance (Quantum Physics)
Depictions of nature in Mythopoeic literature (Tarot)
Supernatural
Ruth heholt – supernature and the environment
(Connects to my interest in the mystification of natural phenomena in animation)
Haunted landscapes
Spiritualism
Rachel Whiteread – Concretising the marks of a life and death in space
Ruth Heholt (writer)
Taking a theme and examining it across media (such as death) is interdisciplinary research without fear of authority and disciplinary dominance.
Affect and embodied meaning in animation
Revenant
Fairytale tourism – projection mapping
Spiritualism
Arthur Findlay College
Spiritualists National Union
Lesley Shepherd – Automatic Writing ✍️
Creepypasta.com
Death in the digital age
Mystification of nature – folklore/myth/oral stories in Brian froud
Supernatural haptic feedback experiments
The science of the supernatural (accessed 24/09/19)
Mythopoeic literature (Tarot)
Raider-Waite Tarot (Including copyright details)
Wheel of fortune
The haunted beach
VR Narrative
A supernatural VR Environment for spatial user Rotation
Touchless haptic feedback for supernatural VR Experiences
Impossible spaces in VR Narrative
Branching narrative in VR
The future of visual novels
Narrative grammar in 360
Instantaneously punctuated picture-music: Re-evaluating videogame expression through Pilgrim in the Microworld
Map du tendre
Map du tendre
VR Research
Bertec
Emma having her balance tests at Leicester Royal Infirmary (24/09/19)
Gender
Women in supernatural VR Experiences
Women and autonomy
Women and agency
Women and the supernatural
Women in Videogames
Seminal texts on Video Games
Cybertext(Aarseth, 1997)
Narrative as Virtual Reality(Ryan, 2001)
Hamlet on the Holodeck(Murray, 1997)
Visual effects in Unity
The Wheel – Masters Final Project
Decision Process
Experimental project that revisits a suspended research track and will have commercial application.
VR Animation – aligns with career objective.
This is fundamentally a content enquiry as I have previously followed a technical track and now I have an opportunity to further investigate two suspended research tracks which are:
1. Can animation represent aspects of quantum mechanics (or as Einstein put it ‘spooky action at a distance’)
2.Does drawn animation mystify Nature?
Super – natural (Ruth Heholt) – peer reviewed
Gothic Horror (Tanya) – peer reviewed
(Birgitta Hosea) – peer reviewed
GDC Vault – Grey Literature
Annecy VR Category
Is this a practice-based trans media investigation of the ‘super-natural’ in Cross Reality (XR – AR/MR/VR) production ?
The Wheel
This project takes ‘Wheels’ as it’s starting point but it is significantly advanced in terms of narrative and mechanics. This will be rigorously underpinned with relevant research.
I would like to revisit a suspended branch of my research that explored the mystification of nature in drawn animation. I would like to explore the theme of the ‘super-natural’ in videogames and the experimental animation focusing on the gothic/beautiful and sublime in relation to nature. I will focus my research on VFX and mythopoetic narrative i
This means that I will develop a virtual world, constructed in paper in which the participant can explore a mythopoetic narrative based on Rider-Waite Tarot card deck and encounter (and control, or not) various ‘mystical’ visual effects based on natural phenomena.
The project experiments with studies of the natural environment acquired in practice-based experimental animation research as applied to a Unity Cinematic VR Project.
The narrative is yet to be finalised and I will need to structured with a clear objective as I am still thinking about how to structure this. I am considering applying natural form as the basis for this structure.
To complete this project I will need to conduct a through sweep of academic and grey literature at the intersection between the experimental traditions of animation and video games, focusing on the the mystification of nature (VFX, the visual depiction of Natural Phenomena and mythopoetic narrative) 2015 – 2019 (worldwide).
I have identified the following two relevant papers as a starting point for this project.
The Great C’ : Lessons From Creating a 37 Minute Cinematic Narrative
S, Bosco, S, Miller , L, Van Osch : Secret Location
GDC Vault Virtual Reality Developers Conference: 18-19 March 2019.
Accessed 26.09.19
Available on Steam and Oculus
First 5 minutes https://youtu.be/lwL9FpnSlrk
Key Points
Applying this to my project raises the following questions…
KRZYWINSKA, TANYA. 2017. ‘Gothic American Gaming’. Cambridge University Press.
In this article, Professor Krzywinka begins by defining the unique quality of video games as requiring a players interaction. She focuses on Monstrosity, Otherness and Dislocation In Gothic American games so as to analyse relations between Story, character and game mechanics.
She begins by using examples from American Gothic Video games to find relations between monstrosity and the monstrous, the objectification of monstrosity in the Other and monstrous locations in which he player feels dislocated.
The author discusses how the monster can be used to support game play as the player becomes stronger they can fighter stronger monsters and this feeds back as advancement through the game. Although this does not often alter the storyline games such as fable and mass effect series can intense the trajectory of the game. Limiting the players affect on the stolen preserves authorial control of the storyline and reduces production costs.
ProfessorKrzywinkawrites that games take up real world mythological systems and translate them to a ludic agenda, applying a universal realisation of monstrosity.
She progresses from swarms of monsters, to individualised monster and even the player as monster.
The concept of monstrosity relates to the other as threatening and terrifying, adding that certain people and groups can be ‘othered’ made strange and different as a means to ostracise and marginalise them.
Finally, author discusses the functionality of gameplay space and how it may impede a players progress through space, acting as antagonist. This is referred to as player versus environment.
Questions:
Access granted for Alcwyn