I wrote a forward for this book Computer Generated coming out from Gingko Press early next year. There’s dozens, maybe hundreds of artists featured and it was nice to get to write something for non-academic audiences. It was mostly about the history and future of computer graphics drawing on a bunch of different stories but looking particularly at the way social media has played a role in the explosion of the art form.
Digital Sketch (DS058)
Lots of folks tell me they enjoy my ‘boxes’ which is great! But there’s a conflation in the mind of others (at least in some cases) of the weekly render (which I call a ‘digital sketch’) with the blog – the box. I guess it’s not important. Many more people respond to the weekly render than read the blog but, partly in the spirit of clear delineation and partly to force some reflexive practice, I have decided to add this section talking about the render, which you can skip to or over.
DS058 was a slow one. I’ve more recently become interested in making interesting environments with colours, textures and lighting than focussing on animations or simulations; I use an are.na board as a starting point. This one was another where the stage was set and then something had to happen. The exploding sphere really has no significance. Just decided on a whim that it might be nice. I used the inbuilt Cell Fracture addon to shatter the sphere including a recursive pass for smaller pieces. Then made them all active rigid bodies, made the room and pillars rigid bodies but passive, chucked a force field in the middle, turned gravity off and set the simulation speed to 0.0001 and hey presto.
You may recognise the barriers from DS010. Blender has finally introduced an asset library in 3.0, a feature that’s been sorely missing. This makes it easier to reuse common objects and materials. It is however quite janky to use. You need a master file into which you import asset and then save it – there may be other workarounds.
Short Stuff
- Jemimah Knight asking for input on a project with BBC R&D looking for better AI visuals. This is a big bit of my own work – why these particular imaginaries appear, embodied through the particular images we have. I think this is a more illustrative direction than critical tech.
- Takram have worked with Hitachi to produce Three Transitions, an interactive web project encouraging change. It’s an interesting visualisation of transition design as a process and indicated a way that people might meaningfully engage with it.
- Bleakly funny reflection on bureaucracy and design; Paperweight; a cautionary tale of onerous oversight. About the attempt to implement UK Government Digital Services-style working in the Canadian equivalent.
Love you, see you next year!