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Topic: Processing = Design? Art? Other? (Read 2907 times) |
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dek
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Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« on: Mar 14th, 2005, 11:38pm » |
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hi all,
im studying interaction design at the university of art and design in zurich, switzerland. today i started attending a course on design-discourse led by gui bonsiepe (anybody know him?). for the course i'll have to write a course-related paper. i've been a fan of processing since i first came across it, so i want to try and fit algorithm-driven design (thats the best description i can find at the moment) into the design-discourse. aside from my individual research i'd like to let the opinion of all those directly involved with processing flow into my work. for that reason i have put together a bunch of questions addressed to everyone who can spare a couple minutes:
1. name/nom de guerre (ignore if you don't want to be named)
2. website (same as 1)
3a what is your job description when NOT using processing? (e.g. Artist, Teacher, Student, ...)
3b what's your background?
4. what in your opinion best describes you WHILE you're using processing? (e.g. Designer, Artist, Programmer, ... , can be the same as in 3)
5a. is there need for an all-new description for this kind of work? suggestions? (e.g. man-machine-design)
5b. what would you call the output after you run the code? design? art? other?
6. who does more work?
- the human
- the computer
- equal
7. when creating a sketch the computer is...
...your dumb little underling
...your helpful buddy
8. what would you call the transformation of logical input (code) to visual output?
9. when you start a new sketch what is is your main goal?
- visualize a specific idea
- serious research
- trial and error
- create some eye-candy
- other... what?
further, if you've already had your thought on this subject i'd be thankful if you could share your two cents to help start a discussion.
hope i sort of made clear what i'm after. i don't know if my english is good enough to translate my german-made thoughts.
i'll be grateful for any input.
thanks,
greg
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Quasimondo
 
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #1 on: Mar 15th, 2005, 9:25pm » |
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Someone has to make a beginning, huh?
1. Mario Klingemann / Quasimondo
2. http://incubator.quasimondo.com
3a. Programmer/Animator/Designer/Freelancer
3b. Intern -> Copyrighter -> Graphic Designer -> Animator -> Flash Developer -> Programmer -> Artist
4. Artisan/Researcher
5a. Generative Art
5b. That depends on the output. In the end it's the audience that decides if it's a piece of art, a toy or some pretentious crap.
6. The human of course. In the same way you could ask: who does more work - the painter or the brush?
7. My tool, my canvas, my sketchbook.
8. Hmmm.. visualization?
9. Most of the time I come with a clear idea what kind of visual or behaviour I want to create. This idea then gets shaped into code. When the basic structure/concept is working but maybe the performance is not sufficient I try to find better algorithms by researching. Over time this creates an arsenal of various tools and libraries which can be reused in further projects.
When the general appearance is pleasing the last step is to find the resonance point of the work by tweaking the various parameters of the piece. This is where randomness comes into play and sometimes happy accidents occur which inspire some new works.
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Mario Klingemann | Quasimondo | Incubator | côdeazur
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arielm
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #2 on: Mar 16th, 2005, 4:04pm » |
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1. ariel malka / arielm
2. www.chronotext.org
3a. designer/programmer/researcher
3b. autodidact geek
4. designer/programmer/researcher
5a. "Computational Design" (Maeda?) is hard to beat...
5b. "whatever" (depends on the viewer, right?  )
6. not really a competition between two comparable entities...
7. if i have to choose: my "helpful buddy"
8. story, game, life (dna = code), interpretation, dream (god's one?), study...
9. all of that together + sometimes: there's no defined goal (just a "process", hence the name of your favorite piece of software  )
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Ariel Malka | www.chronotext.org
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mflux
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #3 on: Mar 16th, 2005, 4:15pm » |
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I haven't had any sleep yet.. so beware...
1. Flux, aka Michael Chang
2. http://users.design.ucla.edu/~mflux
3a Student at D|MA of UCLA
3b 3D animation, 3D modeling, illustration, designer and pompous jackass in general
4. Being able to animate a thousand things at once in completely abstract ways.
5a. I called Casey's work "generative art" once. I think he wanted to smack me.
5b. Art.
6. The human
7. The computer is my poor committed minion. Most of the time.
8. Transcription.
9. Eye candy + Serious research.
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bsr
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #4 on: Mar 16th, 2005, 4:22pm » |
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1. jonathan fisher / blue sky research
2. www.hippocamp.net
3a design/freelancer
3b event promoter - general slacker trying to grow up
4. code hacker (not being a particulary good or efficient at programming)
5a. generative art/computational design both fit the bill quite well (as in music, genres and subgenres tend to irritate the people making the art)
5b. art
6. human - the computer is a tool and pretty things don't happen by themselves
7. when creating a sketch the computer is... my evil adversary
8. sometimes a miracle in the face of defeat
9. - trial and error - most times when i create something nice to look at it comes about thanks to a 'happy accident'.
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http://hippocamp.net
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sspboyd
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #5 on: Mar 16th, 2005, 10:03pm » |
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1. name: Stephen Boyd
2. website: boydstudio.ca (in a week or so)
3a job description: artist
3b background: environmental science, instructional design
4. artist, researcher, learner, frustrated programmer!
5a. I don't think there is a need for a new description. Computational Artist is a possibility.
5b. what would you call the output after you run the code? design? art? other?
I call it the expression of an idea. Other people use whatever works for them.
6. who does more work?
This is kind of an odd question. I do all the work I think. The computer is the tool. You could also make the argument that it is equal effort. I do the creative work, the computer does the computational work.
7. when creating a sketch the computer is...
is probably thinking to itself 'man, I wish this guy would learn to use hex values when sampling and mixing colours!'
My computer is just a tool.
8. what would you call the transformation of logical input (code) to visual output?
Visualization.
9. when you start a new sketch what is is your main goal?
- realize a specific idea via trial and error
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gmail.com w/ sspboyd username
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TomC
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #6 on: Mar 17th, 2005, 12:49pm » |
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1. Tom Carden
2. http://www.tom-carden.co.uk/p5
3a.
Officially: IT Product Developer / Research Engineer / Guest Lecturer
Unofficially: Programmer / Software Developer / Thinker
3b.
Undergraduate: Artificial Intelligence / Mathematics / Philosophy
Graduate Studies: Architecture / Virtual Environments
4.
Programmer / Designer / Analyst? / Inventor?
5a.
Not really. We already have plenty of words: art, performance, toys, tools, science, design, interaction, artifical life, systems, animation, investigations, experiments, illustrations, visualisation.
5b.
Depends on the context, see above.
6.
Define work. Depends if you think design is just a search problem, within constraints, or whether there is true invention going on. Whose task is harder, and less well understood?
7.
Ideally invisible.
8.
Computer graphics.
9.
All of the above. Proof of concept, mainly.
I've talked about this with fellow students and coders recently. To borrow toxi's term, I think Processing is an approach. It's an approach I think is embodied by:
- the sketchbook metaphor
- the lowest possible barrier to pushing pixels on the screen
- the pedagogical environment that is processing.org
- the workshop mentality
It's the ideal teaching tool, but it's the start of the journey not the end. Learning Processing should prepare people to use whatever programming tools are at their disposal.
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| « Last Edit: Mar 17th, 2005, 12:58pm by TomC » |
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Koenie
 
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #7 on: Mar 17th, 2005, 9:18pm » |
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1. Koen Mostert
2. http://koeniedesign.com (I like to call it RE:axis)
3a. High school student
3b. I can't really say I have a notable background but oh well, I started doing drawings when I was in kindergarten probably, and I continued to make drawings, eventually on the computer in my early teenage years. Then I started to make websites and learned how to program.
4. I wouldn't say I change being something when I start to use Processing. I just work out ideas I guess.
5a. There is no need.
5b. 'Something I made'
6. I'd say the computer, but it depends on your definition of 'work' really.
7. It's my tool, my medium of expression.
8. I don't think you would have to give this 'transformation' a name. It is the same as the process between finishing a painting and looking at it, it has no name, nor does it need one.
9. Most of the times I want to visualize a specific idea, but often I just want to make eye-candy.
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http://koeniedesign.com
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st33d
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #8 on: Mar 21st, 2005, 1:05am » |
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1. Aaron Steed (but no one ever takes the user name st33d)
2. http://www.st33d.net (gonna buy one that rolls off the tongue easier when the loan comes through - year's almost up)
3a.Student
3b.I used to clean desks in the offices of Daimler Chrysler (formerly Mercedes Benz).
4. Artist.
5a.The best work escapes definition.
5b.A program.
6. The work should lead in that respect, but I hope someday the computer will carry on whilst I push up daisies.
7. Obstinate.
8. Abstraction.
9. Sketch book ramble, implement ramble, see what happens.
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| « Last Edit: Mar 21st, 2005, 1:05am by st33d » |
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I could murder a pint.
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jtarbell
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #9 on: Mar 21st, 2005, 10:06pm » |
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Good questions Greg...
1. Jared Tarbell
2. www.complexification.net
3a Computational Artisan
3b B.S. in Computer Science
4. Designer / Programmer
5a. A wide number of descriptions are accurate. The nature of the work is rapid change, however, descriptions need revising often. The idea of the algorithm, the numerical expression of ideas, visualization of compuation are all centuries old ideas. The computer is the tool that has finally exploded these 'ideas' into 'life'. The relationship of man and machine is interesting and will evolve.
5b. The execution of code is what creates output, so unless code is specifically being outputted (rare), the output is better described as a 'generation' or an 'instance'. It is art if it is trying to describe new relationships. It is design if it is trying to display information. It can also be both, or neither.
6. In terms of the number of steps taken, the computer is absolutely doing most of the work.
7. The computer can only operate under specific instruction. Because most of us would be lost without the extreme usefulness of the computer, I would say the computer is more of a helpful buddy than an underling, although this perspective is probablly deteremined by each individual user.
8. Generation. Translation. Instantiation.
9. when you start a new sketch what is is your main goal?
- visualize a specific idea 50%
- serious research 10%
- trial and error 10%
- create some eye-candy 20%
- other... what? 10% pragmatic exploration
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gll
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #10 on: Mar 23rd, 2005, 4:51pm » |
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1. Guillaume LaBelle
2. http://ingallian.design.uqam.ca/goo
3a Architecte|Designer|Researcher
3b M.Sc.Architecture
4. Architect Hacker. It's not from me, it's from M.Delanda.
5a. LeCodePopulaire - PopCode as PopArt - I don't know how it should be named, but I feel that there's changes since the 80's.
5b. The output could be called an error in a sense that we validate a structure and we continue to raffine the sketch. There's no end to the process.
6. Human - The More simple(élégant) it is, the best it is.
7. the computer is... a tool and a support as paper and pen.
8. Compilation|Visualisation|Vérification|Valider|Confronter|Try
9. The Creative Process. Working with P5 is for me a way to discover what I'm looking for. The main Goal of a project is to discover what the problem is. To establish a dialog with the problem. It's a way to confront an understanding of the structure and discover that they are innacurate. A good way to do the best amount of error at the very begining.
Travailler avec Proce55ing est pour moi une façon de travailler à découvrir ce que je cherche. Le but principal est de chercher à découvrir le problème lui-même. Entrer en dialogue avec le problème. Confronter une hypothèse de structure et découvrir qu'elle n'est pas bonne. Faire le plus d'erreurs rapidement.
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guillaume LaBelle
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dek
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Re: Processing = Design? Art? Other?
« Reply #11 on: Mar 27th, 2005, 1:08am » |
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hi all,
i'd like to thank everybody who took his/her time to answer my questions.
i managed to complete my papers and give in a satisfying essay. at least my professor thinks so. not me. i managed to answer many questions throughout my own research and thanks to your feedback, but unfortunately i found much more areas worth analyzing. i must confess that the whole subject turned out to be way more complex than i had first imagined. i was able to put together a couple of questions alright, but only after i had done more research, i managed to uncover more interesting, "deeper" questions.
although i have finished the project for school i understand it as a door-opener into this worth-analyzing area, and i definitely want to continue finding answers to the remaining and upcoming questions.
when exactly i'll find the time to do this is another question. i'm starting my pre-diploma the week after next and it will occupy me the best of the upcoming three months, but i hope i'll manage to fit some research work in-between my schedule. i have some kind of weblog in mind where i post my findings and make them available to anybody interested. if there's anybody out there who's allready involved in a similar project or who'd be interested to contribute her/his own thoughts please give me a note.
i'll let everyone know as soon as i get something off the ground.
thanks again,
greg
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