Thursday, January 29, 2009

Digital traces





Here are digital time-lapse captures taken from within the EV building of Concordia University. 

What we inevitably see is how a slowed down digital capture exposes the digital process. What is qualitative and continuous in analog equipment becomes sequential, precise and divisible in the digital. Movement can be captured, but only in a precise, yet abstract way. We don't get the faint, blurry trace that we have come to expect from time-lapse photography. What we get is a the precise information of that existed in that pixel position at that particular time. 

Moving Bodies are transformed into information - numbers to be precise -  and only those things that appear immobile allow themselves to be understood. 

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Full Metal Jacket Diptych




Here are my most recent attempts at a conceptual use of my, slightly modified, temporal palindromatic pixel sampler! I know that doesn't make much sense, but I am in no mood to explain what the program is actually doing at this point.


The Organic and the Algorithmic

So, after that slight setback last week, I am back at it with a modified version of my video processing software. I realized, that in reality, the work I was (or still am,) doing is not that interesting. The problem with machine processes is that once the "fun" work of writing a program is done, the output becomes predictable and uninteresting. It may be interesting to look at, but it lacks any opportunity for continued thought.

I am not saying that there is nothing to think about. I am just saying that once there has been one piece of work output, each additional one, is redundant. The program is too predictable and that is the obvious shortcoming to all programed works. The addition of random elements, arguments or parameters, is usually not the solution, as again that just gives the appearance of difference. 

Though, my knowledge of programing is extremely limited at this point, I am starting to see the limitations of purely programed work and why it has usually failed to hold my interest in the past. I need to find a way to imbue them with more "organic" algorithms, if that is even possible or meaningful. 


Monday, January 19, 2009

Shut it down!

Ok, so it is rare that I have to completely pull the plug on something that I have worked so hard on, but today I am doing it. 

By pure coincidence, I came across the work of American artist Jason Salavon, and realize that he has tackled the same issues as me, but seven years earlier. And when I use the word "same" I do not mean "similar", I mean the same exact thing. Same look, same point, same format, same everything. 

I have never heard of this guy before and I have lost weeks of work, as their is no way I can keep going with this without outright plagiarizing. 

Here is the link to his 2001 works that have staled me thus. http://salavon.com/MTVsTop10.shtml