ROTATION FOUR | 3D DESIGN

Realization of the model

The next step was to start working with the design of the structure and its interiors.
The tools I used for the construction are a scale ruler, pen and pencil, scalpel knife, foam board, glue and other personal supply.

Sketch of the space. Author's own.

After a quick sketch of how I wanted the garden area to look like, I started cutting out the floor and the walls from the foamboard.
Even if it was the first time for me to realize an architecture model, everything was looking good and precise.
I decided to visit a model shop to buy some really nice and realistic interiors for the room.
Here is a list of what I bought:
4x big size trees
3x medium size trees
2x sitting people
2x standing/walking people
Grass mat
6x chairs
2x tables/desks

The final piece

Author's own

Author's own

I am really happy about the final look.
During the group crit I have been given some feedback about how the structure seems to be uncompleted because it is completely white. I have intentionally chosen to leave it like this because I wanted the observer to focus on the green area and its meaning.

This 3D design project was really interesting and something new for me. I learned how to work with scale and some techniques about structures. How a certain design of a structure can influence and interact with people is one of the things I liked the most.

I would be really happy to push this project forward with the realization of a new design, maybe more structural and futuristic.

ROTATION FOUR | 3D DESIGN

Research

For this new project (3D design) we had to design an installation we thought the Ravensbourne building is missing. After taking measurements of the space and making drawings in scale I decided to use the room for a garden area ideal for break, rest or study.

First plan of the space with measurements. Author's own.

The part of the research in this project inspired me a lot. One of the architects I researched about is Renzo Piano and I focused especially on his interior gardens/green houses.
To see how a usually external environment have been brought inside a building really pushed me for the realization of my model.

Author's own.

I also looked at some interior design of Ross Lovegrove and Tony Cragg. What I liked the most about their work was the fact that they used found and recycled materials for the realization.
At the beginning I wanted to create some sustainable interiors or sculptures in order to give coherence with the space. I left this idea soon because I wanted to focus on the interaction of people with the area.

Research about Ross Lovegrove and Tony Cragg. Author's own.

What I really liked about these pieces was that they resembled shapes from nature, still having a modern and abstract design.

ROTATION THREE | FASHION DESIGN

Getting to the final piece

After a deep primary and secondary research, a lot of experiments and several plausible outcomes I had to take a direction to follow for my final piece.

I had my piece of inspiration already (see previous blogpost) but I wanted to get something extravagant and original out of it.

As I did not want to create a standard high street wereable dress, I decided to use the shapes of the Type to "wrap up" the mannequin.
To cover the whole surface and enhance the sense of interest and continuity, I worked on each letter separately.

Author's own.

I wanted this piece to arouse interest. That is why I chose to play with the negative spaces and filled them up with cuts of paper with the patterns I made.

In my first final outcome (picture above) I decided to add different materials such as tissue paper to "fill up" the negative spaces.

I realized how this combination did not work well. The shapes of the letters looked modern and flat whereas the tissue paper gave a sense of vintage and dated. I wanted the piece to look fresh so I decided to discard this first composition.

With further research, experiments and the opinion of the tutor, I quickly found a nice look which could perfectly suit my intention. The tissue paper had been replaced with more patterns and the overall started to look better already.  Then I traced an outline with a black sharpie on the shapes of the Type and that was the icing on the cake.

The final garment looks endearing to me. The shapes gives a cartoony and Manga sense.

From this piece I strongly showed how Graphic Design is my background.

Here are some photographs from a photoshoot we arranged with some Digital Media classmates.

As a conclusion I surprisingly enjoyed this session probably because my inspiration came from one of my passions, Graphic Design.

I will take this project further collaborating with some Digital Media students for the creation of a catalogue to present all our works. I can't wait!

ROTATION THREE | FASHION DESIGN

The beginning of the process  

During my High School studies back in Italy, I used to frequent an institute with both Graphic and Fashion Design courses. Although I used to see many mannequins with interesting and kind of unwearable clothes, I have never been into Fashion. 

With this project, I have been asked to realize a garment made of paper being inspired by a piece of Typography or Architecture. Of course I chose Typography as it is part of Graphic Design!
To get to the final outcome I faced a process of development which included drawing, creation of pattern, texture and different shapes.

The piece of Typography I chose was a work made by a studio on a typeface.
It is made of interesting shapes and blended colours.
Although using a piece of Type instead Architecture ended up being much more difficult, I did not give up.

Author's own

Here (photo above) is the first part of the process where, after a deep research, I started to play with the shapes of the Type creating some patterns. I then applied my experiments to a figure and a garment. This process helped and showed me how from some simple shapes I could quickly made a design.

Author's own

In the next part of the development process, I applied my patterns to several figures always playing with shapes and exaggerating as the final piece will not be wearable but will reflect the points of inspiration and creativity.
  

SUBVERTING THE BORING PART OF UNIVERSITY | PERSONAL GRAPHIC DESIGN PROJECT

Concept of a new Student's Pass for Ravensbourne

As we all know, education in general and University are not made of exciting and interesting things only. Mountains of paper, scary documents and "boring" stuff are behind the corner.

After the Mozilla Festival at Ravensbourne, thanks to the energy of the event, my mind got inspired.
The main source of my inspiration was this photograph I took (Image no1 below) of the inside of the University building. What I really liked about it, is the shape of the windows and the fact that all together they create a pattern on the wall.
We are working at the moment on a Fashion Design project and we are exploring different patterns and textures. Consequently I decided to transfer and recreate this pattern in a graphic way, using softwares obviously.

Photograph of inspiration (Image no1). Author's own.

The first work that came to my mind, was to create an event postcard using the space of the windows as a text, images and similar field.
After a couple of minutes working and sketching, I was inspired again. (what a perfect day!)
On my desk, next to my laptop I saw the card of my University and I immediately thought about how boring its design was. Of course it is an object made for a purpose only, but why not giving it a nice appearance to our eyes too?

After a good hour of Adobe Illustrator and sketches this is the final result. I have to say I am really happy and proud of it!

Front of the card. Author's own.

Back of the card. Author's own.

I decided to create a good looking (in my opinion) design but still quite flat and simple.
At the front, the colour is defined by the course the student frequents. The overall contains all the basic information such as a photograph, name, id numbers, course and the logo of the University.

In conclusion, I really liked working on a project not related to my Course. It was nice being inspired and realize this piece.
I like to imagine that one day all Ravensbourne students will have this card! :)

LEARNING AND SHARING | MOZILLA FESTIVAL 2015

It has been a rich and funny day at MozFest. Learning new stuff, expanding my curiosity and sharing my ideas were the most exciting things during this day.

Here is a collection of photographs from the Festival:

Author's own

The Banyan Tree (above): congregation point in India for villagers to share stories, learn from others and stay together.

Author's own

I really liked this drawing (above) because it represented to me the process of our brain to elaborate and solve things. It shows how with the use of our mind we can transform and improve things. From concept to work.

Author's own

This image (above) represented the map of the world. There was written at the top of it to fill it up with post it based on where we were from and where we are living at the present time. I really found interesting to see how many people came from different countries and were at the Festival to share different stories and ideas. This system would be a great and interactive way to collect statistics in my opinion! P.S. I was the first one to stick my post it! :)

Author's own

Various colours and a festive ambience, dominated the MozFest.

I am interested in Graphic Design and I would use this photo (above) to create a postcard or poster. I would cut out the windows, fill the space with circular shapes and use this space as a text, graphics or other images field.

I have many other photographs to share and write about, but these are the ones I chose as the best.

A STEREOTYPE IN A SHORT FILM | LENS BASED MEDIA PROJECT

'Do not judge by first appearances'

For the creation of the group project about "Subverting Stereotypes" I worked with Victor and Marta. First thing I want to say: working in group ended up being harder than I thought. We all have different timetables, commitments and knowledge about camera and editing softwares.

Our job was to realize a short film with a series of photographs in sequence to tell the story. We started to work on a brain storm to come up with ideas, ways to snap but first of all the stereotype we wanted to challenge. 

After chatting on Whatsapp for hours and discarding notes and sketches, we finally came up with an idea. The stereotype about judging people by first appearances. 
This is the story for the film:

Author's own

Happy and ready, we immediately started to work on the scene development on our sketchbooks.

After some quick annotations and sketches, we started with the camera.

We wanted to give more importance to some particular photos, so we played with focus, zooming, cropping and camera settings.  

Victor and me, were directing and photographing together whereas Marta and Pedro (not in our group) were acting.

We used the University building for the office, North Greenwich tube station and a Jubilee line train carriage for the shots.

It was productive, really funny and sometimes a little bit embarrassing with many people around staring at us.

After the 'fun' part, the annoying part of editing and post production arrived. I used PremierPro years ago for literally one day. However I surprisingly managed to work with the software quite well.

We even added seven different sounds: the office, the lift voice, the lift bell, the crowd in the building hall, the outside noises, the train station, the train approaching and the station announcement voice.

Here is a screenshot of the postproduction windows on Adobe PremierPro:

Author's own

After a couple of hours editing, we ended up having a pretty successful final outcome. 

I really like how the sequence flows, the sound fits perfectly and the photographs are good quality.

However I am really happy about it and proud about our team work, I can confirm that Photography or Filmmaking is not the kind of career i want to undertake in my studies.

Here is the final outcome:

Subverting a Stereotype | Short Film

                           YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyYgwGzjpLo

ONE BIG DRAWING, DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES

On Saturday the 24th October we went out of College, for a couple of hours, for an "adventure" on the Riverside.
A really big and long piece of paper was waiting for us. We were going to do a group drawing on that paper and each student had to capture the view in front of him/her and try to connect it to the one next to. The main tool used to draw was charcoal. Black, white or coloured.

When everybody started drawing and the whole panorama started to appear, different perspectives, angles and sights took their place.
All the different sections were different. Some drawings were defined by shapes and shadows, other by net lines and colours. This is what made the final piece really interesting and successful.
I think that with this experiment, we challenged us to individually produce drawing which could communicate with the ones made by other people.

Here some photographs of the process and the final piece.

Author's own.

Author's own.

Author's own.

Author's own.

Timelapse of the process here: https://twitter.com/AccessHE_Rave/status/657890207711305728

INTRODUCTION TO PHOTOGRAPHY | LENS BASED MEDIA PROJECT

This lens based media project, which we will work on for the next two weeks, consist on the realisation of two final outcomes through the use of cameras to capture images. Both the final pieces will be about "Subverting Stereotypes" or challenging them and subvert their meaning.
The first outcome is about the creation of a short film made of a sequence of photographs. This is a group project. The individual one is to produce six still photos always about subverting a stereotype.

We started our first class, experimenting and playing with cameras, lights and angles.
I studied and practiced photography few years ago but I have not touched a camera since then. However I was impressed how quickly I could interact with the settings and the lights in order to produce a photo.

Author's own.

This is one of many sets during our first group-workshop.
The aim was to produce a photo and make it unique. With the use of lights, angles and different backgrounds we could change the meaning of the photo. Dark, bright or standing from a background with the use of shadows.

The photo I chose as the best shot from the series, is really different from the ones realized by the other groups. All the photos tend to be dark, mysterious and with the light projected on the face of the subject. Our photo is bright, with two sources of light we created in my opinion really impressive shadows to let the figure not to blend with the background.
I am really happy and proud of this first shoot. (photo below)

Author's own

THE PROCESS | GRAPHIC DESIGN PROJECT

From sketches and ideas, to the final outcome.

The poem I chose is "World History" by Jeff Bresee. It is about people struggling to get something in their lives or not reaching the expected.

It related to myself because I deeply believe that one of the most important things we all should have is self-confidence, along with passion and commitment in order to reach our goals.

The first pages of my sketchbook regarding this project, are all about experimentations with type, contextual research and inspiration by other practitioners.

I wanted my final piece to look clean, fresh and with a flat design. Kind of up to date, I would say.

Through the pages I tested formats, colours, fonts and graphics. All this process helped me a lot to solve the work.

Author's own.

Inspired by the Graphic Designer Niklaus Troxler, I responded to his cultural poster with the creation of a type from the extraction of the contour of each letter. (Photo 1 above)

I blended that technique with the world struggles, because I wanted the observer to literally struggle to read.

Author's own.

From the bottom to the top of the work (Photo 2 above), I wanted to tell a story, a journey. 

I attempted to visually represent the passage from the negatives (struggles) to the positives (freedom).

A crowd of people (as each line of the poem begins with One) have to pass through struggles and problems, represented with an image of a polluted city, to reach the top of their freedom.

Author's own.

Wanting my final outcome to be simple and clean, I decided to abandon the idea of the image collage. It would have looked way too illustrative.

After some experiments, I opted for a folding format as I would have been interactive and therefore more interesting. 

A colour test has been then made to look for sensations to communicate. (Photo 3 above)

Author's own.

Not happy enough with my experiments and results so far, I decided to produce more stylized images. I reproduced the photo of the crowd of people with shapes and shades, the polluted city has been replaced by a collage of negative words. As I wanted to put myself in the work, I decided to use a different colour for one figure, like I would tell my journey.

The Final Outcome

Author's own.

The outside of the final piece is completely black. I wanted it seeming to hide something, maybe dark, maybe not. (Photo above)

Author's own.

The inside is clearly divided in three parts. I wanted to play with the spaces created by folding the paper to make the work more interesting.

The part at the bottom contains a line of the poem, written with a typeface inspired by a work of the Designer David Carson. 

I like the contrast between the dimension of the letters and colours. In my opinion it makes the line more interesting to read.

The two parts at the top are in contrast thanks to the colours and the words I used.

To represent something written in a visual and graphic way was hard and one of my main concerns. 

But the final piece is successful and first of all what I wanted to do and to communicate.

TYPOGRAPHY | GRAPHIC DESIGN PROJECT

Graphic Design, one of my biggest passion.

On the 6th of October we started the Graphic Design rotation and the first work we did was about Typography.
Although I studied Graphic Design for six years, I have never worked with Typography that much.
The project brief asked me to realize a piece which visually represents a poem related to my own cultural background. To be playful and to try and discover new things.
Typography is an important part of Design, as it helps to define it, communicate messages and in some cases "let the words speak".
Different uses of this visual art are found in Branding, Advertising and other branches of Graphic Design.

The times I could observe and appreciate Typography works, were thanks to Sebastian or Seb Lester. He is an English artist, type designer and calligrapher who mainly works as freelancer.
I learned about Seb Lester through social medias as he is also known for his videos of hand drawn calligraphy, often of famous brands.
As Huffington Post, UK Daily Mirror and Buzzfeed report, "He can be considered to be known by the wider public for viral videos of him hand-drawing well known logos".
BBC recently defined him as the "Banksy of Calligraphy".

Here are some examples of works by Seb Lester:

To begin our project, we started with some visual representations of some words in our poem.

Author's own.

For the word lonely I chose to darken the background with charcoal first. The typeface is small, tight and positioned at the centre. I then chose to drip some black ink on the paper to accentuate the sense of loneliness in the dark.

TATE BRITAIN, EXHIBITION REVIEW | STUDY SKILLS

Colocation, Time Displacement. The Weight of Data

During a visit to the Tate Britain Museum, an exhibition in particular caught my eye more than the others. The Weight of Data, a contemporary project series at the Tate.

The works in this space refer to recent attempts to quantify the physical mass of the internet with comparing the total weight of information to objects with varying form.

The exhibition displays recent work by four emerging artists settled in Britain. Eloise Hawser, Katrina Pallmer, Yuri Pattison, Lizzie Carey-Thomas and Charlotte Prodger.

In their work, these artists operate between virtual and physical dimensions. They explore our relationship with objects through different forms of mediation, such as scanning machines, website content, and time and space layering. They use temporal lapse to navigate in the past, present and imagined future.

All the pieces in this gallery, from photographs and videos to sculptures, investigate the capacity of the internet space to store data. 

A work which I to investigate further about, was Colocation, Time Displacement by Yuri Pattison.

Pattison is a young Irish artist based in London and creates work with subjective datasets. His practice reflects on the impact of digital media on our understanding of reality. Mastering a huge variety of media, his work often uses different devices to explore the strengths and limits of digital communication. 

The video was screened on a tv in a corner of the space. A speaker for the audio was suspended from the ceiling. I would have given more importance to the work, using a bigger screen and several sources of audio for a more addictive experience. A dedicated, dark and soundproof room would have been ideal in my opinion.

Colocation, Time Displacement is an 18 minute long video in which a roving camera navigates the interior of Pionen, a former civil defence center in Stockholm, Sweden. Built in the 1970s to protect essential government functions from nuclear strike, it is now a datacentre. The Pirate Bay & Wikileaks have both used Pionen for their colocation services, as cited in the artist’s website.

Revelations of different kinds reach the viewers via a speed reading technology, which displays a conversation of a purported time traveller from the year 2036. The legend says that he was sent back to the year 1975 to recuperate an old computer machine (IBM 5100), needed to “debug” computer programs in the future year from which he came, but stopping in the year 2000 for “personal reasons”.

The effort to blend reality, eras, and provenance is hit in the different elements of the video. The viewer is left with an image that is inextricably complicated by time.

The aspect of this video which I was drawn to was the conversation set. Although it was difficult to keep up with the fast flowing words, the content had a funny tone. It was humorous and I found interesting to read about the time traveller’s stories.

The contrast between the visuals, the dialogue and the sound created the perfect balance for myself as a creative practitioner and observer. Visitors of the Tate Britain also seemed to be attracted to this video, because of its content and its way of communicating.

My overall opinion about Colocation, Time Displacement, is that it is successful because it is informative, interesting and fun. This blend of contradictions given by the mix of different medias, could be an inspiration for other creatives.

Bibliography:

Carey-Thomas, Lizzie (May 2015) curator of the exhibition “The weight of Data”  at Tate Britain.

Pattison, Yuri (2015) Colocation, Time Displacement, Dystopia, DIS Magazine website.

 (http://dismagazine.com/dystopia/61140/colocation-time-displacement/)

Pattison, Yuri (born 1986, Dublin) Colocation, Time Displacement, Artist’s website

 (http://www.yuripattison.com/)

Space of the exhibition "The Weight of Data".
Author's own.

Caption of the video "Colocation, Time Displacement".
http://dismagazine.com/dystopia/61140/colocation-time-displacement/

NICOLA L'S RED COAT | STUDY SKILLS

Nicola L, a woman in the Pop

Nicola L is a French artist, born in 1937 in Morocco but she lived in New York for a long time.

She is one of the women artists in the movement of Pop Art. 

How women has always been omitted from the canon of this movement, is the major inspiration for Nicola’s works. Her practice is mainly based on functional objects like sculptures, but with a purpose, they can be lamps, chest of drawers or coats. All these works resembles feminine shapes. When Nicola L went to New York for the first time, in 1967, she was overwhelmed by the magnificence of this city. It was incredibly active, revolutionary, innovative and different. The artist was highly influenced by the Pop Art in this city.

Nicola can set an example of artist who used this language to reflect upon the role of women in society at that time.

The Red Coat for 11 people, is one of the main works of Nicola L. It was created in occasion of a Music Festival in 1970. This coat enclosed the idea of “same skin for everybody”. Everybody is and has to be the same. Because of its immediate success, Nicola decided to travel with the coat. It brought a highly social meaning, because once the eleven people were inside, they were the same. The artist has the role of director. The most recent exhibition of the coat was in London in 2015. A video about it is kept in the Tate website. 

My understanding about this video, let me reflect about the impact caused to the public. It is funny but curious at the same time. It is an example of experimentation with the manner in which the body interacts with the artwork. The trumpet player who accompanies the group increases the sense of curiosity, because we don’t really know if it refers to jazz music in New York in the 60’s or if it is a sort of busking around the streets.

If we think about the concept of “same skin for everybody”, we think of a world-referred message which can therefore be related to other things. From both the past and the present times. It can be related to race equalities and no discrimination as well. 

A personal reflection to conclude my review, can be that art and music are probably the unique languages we all understand and are able to interpret. Nicola L set the example of an artists who reworked this concept with her skills, provoking me happiness, curiosity and restlessness.

Bibliography:

Frigeri, Flavia (september 2015) curator of the video. Tate Modern website.

  (http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/video/nicola-ls-red-coat-tateshots)

Nicola L’s Red Coat, Tate Shots (17 september 2015) Tate Modern website.

 (http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/video/nicola-ls-red-coat-tateshots)

The EY Exhibition: The World Goes Pop (17 september 2015) Tate Modern website.

 (http://www.tate.org.uk/about/press-office/press-releases/ey-exhibition-world-goes-pop)

THE PASSPORT AND 4WEEKS 1PAGE

Our identity, our journey, our Passport.

My Passport contains the course of my life since the last couple of years.
Its pages tells stories about me. About where I am from, where I am living now, what are my passions about, what I love and what I am afraid of or most commonly called, my fears.
From the first to the last page the observers can find things which tell something about me. From the objects I am fond of to quotes I believe in.
Through the use of various materials, patterns, photographs, drawings and colours I have been able to express myself. To express my mood during the creative process.

Here is a collection of my favourite pages of the project.

An overall look at the Passport. 

I am now living in England and this (picture above) is a graphic representation of London from above with the shape of the river Thames used as a path where I can walk. Where I can spend my journey.

Author's own.

Everybody needs it, but somebody does not have it yet. No, it is not a riddle.

I am talking about Freedom. Not freedom to vote, but freedom to be, to live and to express ourselves for what we really are.

The vortex of love. The vortex of life. The vortex of the storm.
Author's own.

I had my inspiration about this page (picture above) when I found on the floor in my College a copper wire. The aim of many artists is to reuse "dead" objects. To keep them alive. That is what I did.
I modeled this wire in a spiral shape to reach the concept of Vortex.

I am quite an introverted person, but with this project I have been able to show myself and burst within the use of some pages.
 

"Remember to work hard,

be nice to people

and try not to get lost or killed"
MrBenBrown (YouTuber and Filmmaker)

4Weeks 1Page

This is my big format project to sum up the first four weeks of studies at Ravensbourne.It includes drawings and digital images made with Photoshop about my personal objects.I chose to use files with vivid and saturated colours which includes photographs, drawings, scans and patterns. The choice of the typeface gives a sense of fun with the blend of different fonts and shapes.

Author's own.

DRAWING SESSION | THE PASSPORT

Visual drawing

On the 12th September we have been introduced to visual drawing techniques.
For the realization of the first project "passport" we are representing our six personal chosen objects in different ways through the use of visual representation, photographs and photocopies. The aim is to show different perspectives through our works.

One of the objects I chose is a miniature of a Smurf, given to me from my best friend as a little reminder of her and good luck present.

Author's own.

Representation of the object as it is, with lights and shadows. Author's own.

Representation of the object with the use of its negative spaces. Author's own.

Creation of a pattern with the negative space drawing. Author's own.

Colour

During the 16th of september session we talked about colour.

Colour is a way of communication which can change how things like photographs, videos or drawings appear to our eyes. It is used to identify groups, identity or brands and to organise and navigate. 

Its use can define political, religious and cultural connotations, represent gender and as believed by the artist Kandinsky, have emotional and physical effects on us. Colour can also improve or memory, influence buying decisions, tell meaning and stories. 

There are various examples in art, design and film-making about the use of colour. Here are some.

Jackson Pollock painting.

Mondrian, composition with Red, Yellow and Blue.

Notebooks, "Hey" Spanish graphic design studio.

Hue
Is the main property of a colour, infact hue is the colour itself.
Shade

A shade is a mixture of any colour with black, which reduces brightness.

Tint

A tint is a lighter  or darker variation of a colour.

Tone
The tone is the lightness or darkness of something. Different tones are created by the way light falls on a 3D object. This process creates highlights and shadows.
Saturation
Saturation defines the actual amount of hue in a colour. From a pure one (100%) to gray (0%). A pure colour is then fully saturated.

After the introduction and research of the main terminologies of colour, we started to apply each of them in our drawings of objects.
I firstly created in my sketchbook some palettes (picture No. 1) for another of my objects, a NYC taxi cab travel souvenir. Each of which tells something about the object, its history or what it refers to.

No. 1 Author's own.

After the first process, we used the colours in these palettes on other drawings to give them different perspectives and character. Here is my example.

Author's own.

These sessions about drawings and the use of colour gave me the opportunity to learn and understand a process made of different steps which can be used to get to a final outcome.