Expansion and evolution

I've created a test model using a mason jar, dowels, hot glue and some plastic thread I found while wandering around Micheal's. I think it went together very well and aside from having to remember the width of the jar's mouth there really wasn 't too much work involved (a pic will follow). A few of these could be made fairly quick and aside from the dioramas I could have quite a few made and ready to be displayed. I would have to expand my scope beyond merely nuclear family gender roles though, something i think could be done I would just need to research a wider variety of personas to base each tube on.

New ideas! (?)

Okay, I've got most of the minor a parts just bidding my time checking on cost of large glass containers. I am hesitant to use glass since it breaks when it's dropped. These things are going to be large and the possibility of them shattering into thousands of pieces keeps popping into my mind. I think plastic would be a better choice and easier to work with since I'll need to make the holes in the bottom of them larger to accommodate the mobile structures I am going to make for the pictures and such. Unless of course the glass containers I find have larger holes in them then I won't have to worry about cutting anything and no ship-in-a-bottle construction methods.

On a completely different note I had some other possibilities brought to my attention (sketches of which I will post up later) using smaller versions of my vacuum tube people and going with the dioramas of family life. These would involve something similar to the large ones where I would place pictures of each gender role inside a mason jar-sized container on a sort of skeleton, like seeing inside a jellyfish or an x-ray. Then I would put green LED's inside these to give that healthy radioactive glow! There would be a large backdrop of a nuclear explosion that would also be lit from underneath to have a green glow. The sketch looks neaet and thinking of making three dioramas side by side with a nuclear explosion behind them makes for a compelling image, at least in my mind. I'll have to check again for prices of large containers and if I can't find anything on the cheap smaller tubes and healthy green glow it is!

Parts picked up and Arduino working

*original writing 11/24/10

This weekend I went to Home Depot and grabbed some dowels, epoxy and small planter buckets. These will be turned into the vacuum tubes bases, plug bits and central spine that holds the pictures in the tube itself. I will more than likely spend Thanksgiving weekend primering and cutting these materials to the colors and lenghts I need as well as test fitting them together. I picked up screws to make the connections secure and I might throw in some epoxy too, though I am mainly going to use that to attach the bases to the tubes. Now here are some pics and a short video of the arduino test I did using five LED's. It works pretty good so I'm going to move onto ten LED's per board.

Wiring diagram

*original writing 11/18/10

I made a simple wiring diagram of the LED's going to one vacuum tube. I'm simply going to double this for two and use the same setup for the second set of tubes.

I will also be posting up some of the reaserch I did on the term nuclear family and the main influence/inspiration for this project. I also found a item to use as the glass part of the vacuum tubes (it is also made of glass!). It is called a carboy and is mainly used in beer/wine making. They usually start out at 5 gallon size which is perfect since I pretty much used measurements from plastic 5 gallon containers for my vacuum tubes.

Arduino!

*original writing 11/4/10

I finally sat down and got my arduino boards out to do test out using multiple LED's. After some serious websurfing I found this thread on the arduino forums about multiple LED's. It was pretty useful in explaining why delay is not the command to use for multiple LED's, what millis does or at least how it works and a few ther things (along with some nice code to boot!). I setup 5 LED's on one arduino board and just added more code and just messed with the numbers, pretty simple and I think it will suit my needs very well. I'm just tweaking the numbers now in order to make a blink pattern I like and that will look as if the vacuum tubes are communicating. I plan on having each tube blink at different speeds with the parent tubes at a moderate pace and the children blinking faster. Once I get a baseline for the parents it will be much easier to tweak the speeds and of course I'll be getting outside opinions of it all.
With the Arduino stuff pretty much taken care of I am going to go about gathering the materials I need in order to build a prototype tube, just the inner setup, so I can get an idea of how much wire I will need and the best way to make the smaller plugs that will connect the wiring in the tubes to the arduino boards. I apologize for not having pictures of anything my camera battery needs food badly and I don't have the charger. :P
I was also out of town last week which is why I was unable to take care of things like camera batteries and such. I was checking out some neat stuff down south at a magical place about a movie that is coming out soon....

Moving forward

*original writing 10/28/10

Most of my planning for creating the tubes is done and now I am moving onto creating the code for controlling the LED's through an Arduino. I still have to determine how many LED's I can control through one Arduino since I want to have at least five LED's per vacuum tube. I'm pretty sure if I use resistors then I should be ok, though I will be plugging these into a wall socket in order to power them in the final setup I still want to be safe and not burnout anything that might cost me $$$ to replace (mainly the Arduino's). I am also going to go to TAPS plastics to see about having some plexiglass tubes made along with top and bottom pieces. I can glue them together myself and am fairly certain I can cut holes into the bottoms of each one. I also need to go to a Home Dept/OSH to find some 6" +/- wide planter buckets, And dowels, I need to get me some dowels. And as a last thought the first thing I should do is go get some prices!

Sketchup mockups

*10/14/10 original writing

I spent some time to get measurements of the box and used that to determine an appropriate size for the vacuum tubes. I'll have to put a scale in these sketchup drawings so people can get a better handle on the size of these things. They are roughly 16" tall and 12" wide. The sockets at the bottoms are 6" in diameter. I plan on having a three tier system for plugging them into the base. As can be seen in the following picture the bottom of the tube will have a socket with an open bottom to allow the socket setcion with the plugs and mobile to be placed inside the tube.

The Initial research

*I wrote this in early October, the next few posts were all written before today's date.

The new direction required some new research so I've been making a list of common gender roles/stereotypes from the 1950-60 era United States. I plan on finding, creating, acquiring physical objects that I feel best represent these ideas and themes and then going about creating a framework to mount them on that can then be placed inside the vacuum tubes. It is really nice to have measurements to work with and using a 3D program helps out immensly since I can test out an idea without having to spend time actually creating it only to find it out it won't work.

Different perspective

So I've had recent discussion with one of my professors and he suggested I make large vacuum tubes since the vibe from my dioramas gives off a 1960's feel with how they are setup. I really like that idea and of how I can give each one individual character based on common ideas, motifs, representations to form a 60's nukular family. I now need to contact a glass blower to see what kind of cost a two liter sized vacuum tube shape would cost. In the mean time I am going to use Sketchup to make some mock ups and see what I can make.

Here are some links!

http://members.chello.nl/~h.dijkstra19/page3.html

http://www.google.com/images?um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=oB9&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&biw=1355&bih=725&tbs=isch%3A1&sa=1&q=audiophile+analog+amplifier+tube&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=

recycling recycled recyclabes...?

Onwards and forwards. I'm going to be spending the next few months refining my project and ideas. I'm going to try to get some more diorama construction in and take some decent photos with good lighting (probably outside light in the afternoon). Then do some collage assembly. I also want to find some more vacuum tubes so that I can make permanent dioramas to show instead of just posters though if I can't I'm going to have to stick with the poster idea.

Of course reusing stuff is one of the aspects of my project so I might just stick with the poster collage idea, though having physical pieces would be really awesome.

So if anyone has or knows where I can get some of these for cheap (or free) I'd really appreciate the opportunity to get some and used is perfectly fine for my purposes (and is preferred).
Thanks.
Dan out!

Examples.....(?!?!)

Ok, so I finally sat down and made some arrangements of the random stuff I've taken apart and made some nice little dioramas that I think are neat. They are a few scenes that mimic some everyday human events from eating to sleeping to watching t.v. They should be easy to recognize though I do hope there is some figuring out involved as to what is going on. I like the look of the vacuum tubes and I hope to find more so that I might make some more permanent dioramas/scenes. With out further exultation here they are:

Breakthrough?

Okay after some intense brainstorming I believe I've hit the nail on the head as far where this project is going. This is mainly due to two things.

1. After searching for techno-junk and looking through items I have collected  found that I have less of a few key items then I originally thought.

2. Creating a lot of different sculptures and taking pictures of them would enable me to re-use  lot of items and create a wider variety of scenes.

So there you have it, the reasons and the direction this project is going to be going in from here on out. A little late in the game in my opinion though I think it will allow me to create more scenes rapidly. I am also thinking of taking pictures of these scenes in similar environments where they would be found in human society or at least just not with a plain color background. I want them to have an outside-in-the-world feel. Now its going to come down to cost of making posters of of these pictures or at least something a couple feet by a couple feet.

Where did the time go?

The last time I posted was July 7th?! Yikes, well, true to procrastination it's come down to the end of summer for me to get around to actually doing stuff besides drawing my ideas in the most basic of fashions. This week I will definitely post up some sketches and the some pics of concepts I sketched out. I plan on using vacuum tubes mainly since those come across well in the scenes I've been tinkering with. All I need to do is slap a few of them together and hope they actually look how I imagine they will look and that people will be able to recognize them as those scenes/actions. Onwards!

Slight update

So I'm sure I've posted something similar in an earlier post about the possible scenes I plan to create and I think I've got some definite possibilities. Besides the first scene I created I am going to toy around with creating the car-wreck out of two cell phones and possibly some headsets; second is some kind of ceremony using more vacuum tubes and other electronic debris; and lastly using a camera to create a home scene, like a family gathered to watch television. I also think I will take apart some hard drives to make a playground scene, might use some small transistors and such to make little electro kids or something. No pictures yet, I will try to post of some sketches sooner rather than later...

Oh yeah...

If any one has old/ unused/ possibly-soon-to-be-discarded electronics I wouldn't mind taking a look at them :), though I know very few people (none) are following this blog. If there is anyone out there and you have stuff that meets the criteria then please post up a comment and I'll get back to you, or if you have my contact info then just use that. Thanks!

Ok, got some relaxing done...

Now onto serious business! So I've managed to nab some more electronic bits and am now looking for, lack of a better term, iconic human scenes. I am basically looking for scenes that are easily recognizable by people. Scenes of sadness, happiness, pain, joy... things like that. So far I think using the cell phones to create an electronic car accident is a good idea and now I just need to find some other scenes that are as easily recognizable (I hope) and find appropriate/suitable electronic bits to make the scenes out of. I am thinking that bluetooth headsets might be useable for something I just can't determine what yet. I am leaning towards some kind of victory scene similar to the raising of a flag or cheering someone on, maybe have them all holding another headset up in the air so to speak. I can help feeling hat I should try to capitalize on the main use of the headsets: that of making communication easier while keeping us separate at the same time. I just can't think of anything at the moment.

I am also wondering what I could do with a broken camera or two. Though I think I am going to try to stay with things that can be perceived as human somehow or replace other things (like cell phones and cars). I have to just sit down and sketch things and print out pics of "human" scenes. I'll have to see what I can get up to this week.

So many irons... so little fire.

*edit*
Okay I thought the headsets might look interesting gathered in a crowd, either simulating a gravesite or a crowd at a sporting event, though I think the sporting event might be tough, unless I can find a tiny LCD screen to place in front of them and have a blurry picture of a sporting event on it. The gravesite seems much easier and goes along with the other ideas I have, which seems to include violence or its aftermath.

A little sculpture...

Okay so I scrounged up some pictures of a piece I worked on a  few years ago and as it is the direction I want to go in with my current project I am going to show some pics of it in all its glory. Though I admit that it is missing the central vacuum tube, mainly due to forgetfulness.

I'm sure I must have mentioned it early that the elements of this piece are arranged as if arriving to the scene of an accident. I dislike having to explain it since viewing it in person always seems to get the idea cross instantly, not having the benefit of actually being able to present it in such a away over the internet does that sort of thing. Hit the read more button for neat pictures!

More research, different routes

I've been looking through the Wikipedia page on found art and the artists listed there, I know, not the academically preferred site though I trust it enough that I feel comfortable using it. Listed below are some of the artists I found to be interesting in either the way they worked (beliefs/ideals, method) or in what they used in making their pieces. I've got about 16 more to go although Micheal Craig Martin might make the list after I do some more reading about him, I like his style and how he goes about creating, I just want to look at more of his works first.

Another aspect of my project

Here is a partial example of another aspect/part of my project. I want to find objects people have either had since childhood (a favorite toy for example) or just something they really wanted at some point in the past and compare its current condition with how it looked brand new.

I have here a statuette of Aeon Flux, an animated television character, that has been through quite a bit, an earthquake and changes of residence. I have found it retailing for $89.99 currently and I am still doing some research for the price when it first came out.

First subjects

So I've been doing some reading about different artists and methods and what-not. I think a direction I'm going to go with the sculpture aspect of my project is to create variations of the objects I use. Take my first two subjects: cellular phones. These first few shots are just the phones and some details of the screws. The Samsung might give me some trouble since it has the little star/Allen key type screws. I think I have the right kind of screwdriver for it. Anyways, I want to take these a part, see whats inside them and turn them into something else, I'm thinking flowers for some reason. The function of communication came to mind when I saw these phones. Flowers are colorful and can communicate feelings through color and type when you ive them to someone, kind of like giving someone a call.

My basic idea/proposal

My main idea revolves around people and objects that they hold dear, either through the objects functionality or the perceived value the object has in the person's mind, a cherished childhood toy for example.
I have three aspects to the project: the creation of sculptures using discarded electronic devices, images of items when they were new and how they look now after years of ownership/neglect and combining two objects to create a new hybrid object.
I found some old cell phones and plan on taking them apart and seeing what I can do with them. I'll post some pics later this weekend, some before and during shots of the electro-surgery.

The beginning...

Hello, here is my first post concerning my art 180/198d project for the bfa show I need to have in order to graduate. I will be keeping track of my progress and planning for the ideas I have for my project through this blog. Right now I've been doing planning and research. Here is some info I posted on my main blog concerning the project I have in mind:

So the idea I have for my bfa show/project revolves around found art and trash art. I've put some stuff down on paper and the basics involve combining the two into three types of pieces (which I will clarify later).  I am hoping to get people to submit objects they own to me for part of my show and I hope to find things in garage sales and similar situations for the other aspects of what I plan. I'm doing research into various artists and trying to find someone who has done something similar that I can use a  starting off point.
Two artists so far are Jeff Koons and Man Ray. I've seen a few of their works and believe that I can use some of the stuff they have done as a basis for my project and how to expand on it. I'm going to hopefully get to school early tomorrow to meet with my adviser and get her thoughts on this.
Here's a link to the found art wiki page. It also has links to he artists I've named above as well as many other artists who have done found art.
Found art

So there is the basic plan, over the weekend I will post more about what I am going to try to accomplish for each of the three types of pieces and some pics of some of the objects I have found already.