Unit Three – Learning Objective 2

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Learning Objective Two

Synthesise and critically reflect coherently on your process whilst providing evidence of an active, independent and/or collaborative practice. (AC Process)

Summary

Need a quick summary? Please see the LO2 Summary for a very brief outline of LO2.

Reflective Practice

Throughout my time on the MA Fine Art Digital course, I have maintained a systematic approach to reflecting on my processes and my work in general.  All of this has been captured in my ‘Deep Reflection’ blogpost.  I feel that this blogpost (through the act of evaluation and reflection) captures the essence of what I’ve been trying to achieve and many of the processes involved in it.  Each reflective entry charts my progress and is a useful addition to this section.

Background

Over the last two years I have been experimenting with a wide variety of processes.  Each experiment whether it be physical, digital or AI has helped to shape my thoughts, feelings and indeed the whole of my work going forwards.

The story begins with some drawing experiments with strict self imposed rules that I began right at the beginning of the course.  At the time I had absolutely no idea that these hand drawn images created with a ‘Berol’ fine liner pen would become such an integral part of my final project.  Each week I allowed myself a break from the digital realm to simply ‘doodle’.  I allowed my mind to wander and I just enjoyed making marks and putting pen to paper in a physical way.  I managed to maintain this weekly drawing practice consistently right up until week 40.  I finally gave up at week 43 because the workload for my MA increased substantially.  Actually making the initial pen drawings was a relatively quick activity, however the next stage, took considerably longer.  I would photograph each drawing and then feed it into ‘Adobe Capture’ digital software to smooth and tidy it.  Then I would use a digital program called ‘Photoshop Fix’, and its spot healing brush to remove any blemishes.  This video is a short time-lapse of the process.  The final stage in the process involved the use of Photoshop Express (another digital art program) to invert the original image so that the background was generally black with smooth white lines.  Sometimes my pen drawings were so sketchy that this process of refinement could often take up to 2 hours.  Below is the full gallery of my designs.  This type of design is referred to as a ‘Zentangle’.

The Full Zentangle Gallery

This gallery contains all of my digitised and smoothed hand drawn images created using a ‘Berol’ fine liner pen.  I would work on one drawing per week.  It was never my expectation nor my initial intention to use any of these in my final project.  However, due to the nature of my research and resulting project work, it became clear at a later stage that these drawings would actually be a perfect fit.

The 21 Day Challenge

In Zoom Session 29 which was the penultimate session before the Summer Break.  Jonathan suggested that we try a 21 day challenge.  This concept involved doing something continuously for 21 days, to see what kind of effect it might have on our art practice.  I began the process with an ideas generation exercise to determine exactly what I wanted to do over the course of 21 days.  Eventually I decided that learning as much as I could about augmented reality would be beneficial to my work moving forwards.  Augmented reality allows for the hiding of images, video and audio within the pages of books or on surfaces or even at specific locations.  I had always maintained in my study statement that I liked the idea of a hidden element to my work.  I saw this as the perfect way to achieve this.  The 21 day challenge was a very useful activity and it allowed me to explore different software providers and push their software to the limit.  I still maintain that ‘Adobe Aero’ is one of the best augmented reality solutions, but unfortunately it is still in beta testing and in my opinion suffers badly with multiple bugs.  These same bugs effectively rendered it useless for my requirements.  At the end of my challenge I had enough information to successfully augment ‘MACBA Metamorphosis’ which was one of my self published books.  This was an extensive and sustained investigation that allowed me to use my knowledge to fully augment a full trio of books which included ‘Beautiful Light’,  ‘MACBA Metamorphosis’ and ‘Urban Alchemy’.

Although I performed my 21 day challenge just before the start of ‘Unit 3’, it has played an integral part in my final project work.  Indeed I could not have progressed in the way I wanted to without it.  One of the most exciting discoveries I made from my journey into augmented reality was that augmented reality images, videos and 3d models become ‘sticky’.  Even though a book or augmented surface may move, interestingly the augmented reality videos and images etc. ‘stick to the surface and move in tandem.  An example of this can be seen  in the following video.

A Turning Point

During the Summer break I spent much time reflecting on my Research Paper and exactly what it had revealed.   This was certainly a turning point for me.  I had discovered through my research that people really do not seem to like AI generated art.  There appears to be two very distinct arguments against it.  Firstly, it feels soulless due to the lack of human connection and secondly the moral issues surrounding it.  AI art uses many millions of images in the production of its creations.  Unfortunately these images have to come from somewhere, and more often or not they are scraped from the Internet.  Sadly these images are often taken without the knowledge of their original creators and also without their permission.  As I mentioned in LO1 – I had also fallen foul of this process.  I wan’t actually too anxious about my own images being ground into the machine.  However, I could wholeheartedly sympathise with the many artists who were negatively impacted by this.

After careful consideration, I decided to cease using AI for generating art from text to image or text to video in future projects. However, I believe AI art animations derived from my own images could be an exception, as they would essentially speed up a process I can already do myself. This feels akin to using a calculator instead of mental calculations, thus drastically expediting the process without inadvertently utilising other artists’ work, which I find completely unacceptable.

This decision to scale back on my AI art usage, prompted a reconnection with the physical world, not only in 2D but also in 3D realms.  It was at this point I revisited the work of Alexander Calder.  His work has always fascinated me and I wondered if perhaps a mobile installation might work as a final piece for the end of year show.  Based on previous experiments I knew that I would be able to add a layer of augmented reality to something in motion, so I was inspired to further investigate the possibilities.  However, there were still a number of burning questions that I needed to ask myself including: why a mobile? and what kind of augmented reality should be embedded in it?  My enthusiasm to create a mobile pushed these important questions to one side for a moment.  I felt sure that the answers would eventually present themselves.

Developing a Mobile (Prototype 1)

In Zoom Session 18, we were all introduced to the ideal of a mental derive.  I was intrigued by this concept of allowing the mind to wander.  After becoming aware of this process as a creative tool I took my first mental derive. The next derive was a physical derive whereby I went outside and allowed my mind to wander.  This physical derive resulted in Studio Kind showing some of my work.  I really did feel this was a powerful and helpful tool, so I took a second mental derive.  This time the creation of a mobile was at the forefront of my thoughts.  I used some of my Zentangle drawings (see above) to make the mobile elements more attractive and when I saw how the mobile moved in my third mental derive blogpost, I knew that I wanted to further explore this concept.  Below are two videos of the first prototype mobile in motion.

Video 1 (Prototype 1)

This was one of the first videos I shot of the first prototype.  Although I liked the overall design I felt that the structure looked somewhat ‘flimsy’ and needed to be revised.

Video 2 (Prototype 1)

This was my second attempt at shooting the first prototype.  Again the mobile appeared to be too ‘flimsy’.  However this was only my first attempt and I did believe that the idea had potential.

Further Experimentation

Now that the idea of a mobile was sealed in my mind, I decided to further experiment with the mobile’s elements.  I wanted to make elements that were both more robust, would catch any wind and look interesting.  I experimented with making mobile elements that were inspired by the work of Yaacov Agam.  I wanted to explore the idea of mini agamographs hanging from my mobile structure.  Unfortunately, because these small pieces took so long to produce I was nervous that I would not have enough time to complete a full mobile.  I still think it would be interesting to explore this concept but due to time constraints, now was not the time.

I returned to the drawing board and duly broke my own rules.  I desperately needed some inspiration, so I enlisted the help of AI.  I used the text prompt large mobile in a large room.  The results were very interesting and although these creations may never have actually existed they did inspire me to continue.

One of the first things I needed to do was ensure that I had enough ready materials, so I began to hoard as much cardboard as I could.  I decided that for any prototyping then this material was readily accessible. I had lots of it left over from my combined house renovations and Christmas.  I duly began my first tentative explorations into making a mobile that was more robust than my first prototype.

The Binary Code Development

Whenever, I am working on any project I often move from one area to another.  I find it difficult to sustain one activity for any length of time and so I tend to swap my activity to another part of the project.  This way I can revisit the original activity with fresh eyes.  My mobile making experimentation was no exception.  I moved from the physical and back into the digital where I began to wonder how computers actually see art.  Earlier I had trained my own machine learning model and now I wanted to know more.  How do computers actually perceive art?  My overall conclusions were that it would be nice to use some form of binary code in my mobile’s design.  This code would preferably spell something meaningful and this is when the strap-line ‘Unity in Bits’ was born.

Why Unity in Bits?

I chose the strap-line ‘Unity in Bits’ because of its deliberate ambiguity and ‘play’ on words.  I cannot take complete credit for this as I worked together with ChatGPT to establish a form of words that would work in binary code and fit the project.  The phrase ‘Unity in Bits’ actually has a dual meaning.  For example: is our ‘unity in bits’? – are we living in a fragmented society?  Or, alternatively ‘unity in bits’ – will we find our unity in the bits and bytes of computer code by fostering ethical algorithms that work to our benefit? Below is the binary code for ‘Unity in Bits’.

01010101 01101110 01101001 01110100 01111001 00100000 01101001 01101110 00100000 01000010 01101001 01110100 01110100 01110011

Continued Mobile Development Using Binary Code

Now that I had made the decision to incorporate binary code into the mobile I began to make a large number of cardboard zeros that would make up the code.  The time-lapse videos in this blogpost show how this was done.  After a full weekend of working, eventually I managed to make the first letter of U of the phrase ‘Unity in Bits’.  The process was painstakingly slow and I could not see any way in which to speed it up.  However, when I saw all of the ones and zeros together it encouraged me to continue.  When I first contemplated a mobile structure, I wanted to ask the college where I work, if I could exhibit it there.  In order to facilitate this, I felt that showing a smaller prototype might help in their decision making process. So I embarked on another round of mini mobile making, but this time it was for a second and much smaller prototype than the planned final piece.

A Steep Learning Curve – Further Experimentation (Prototype 2)

During the development phase of my second prototype, I discovered that small cardboard tubes cut in half were much less time consuming to make.  They also looked visually much better as a ‘one’ in binary.  Therefore, I decided to use small cardboard tubes instead of cutting cardboard to represent the ‘ones’ of the binary code.

Perhaps the hardest lesson I learned on my journey into mobile making, was how to string my mobile – especially how to hang it so that it remained in balance.  In my blogpost ‘hanging around’ I began to research this in some detail.  Finally, I discovered the best stringing methods to use for the second prototype. The ‘hanging around’ blogpost also shows how prototype 2 was assembled along with a ‘first looks’ video at the end.  During the experimental phase of making prototype 2, I learned many facets of mobile making.  Possibly one of the most valuable lessons was that dedicated stringing items helped immeasurably.  I cover my findings in the blogpost ‘stringing along’.  Mobile making is actually far more complex than I had first imagined.  However, my 200th blogpost was something of a celebration.  Not only was it my 200th blogpost it was a first full look at the second prototype which was now finished!

The ‘Balance of Power – Unity in Bits’  Mobile is Born

While struggling to balance my mobile, I became acutely conscious of the stark power disparity between everyday individuals and tech behemoths. It was this realisation that inspired the name ‘Balance of Power’ for my art piece. Just as I sought balance for my mobile, society clamored for a more equitable distribution of power. Just as a mobile operates through balance, society thrives when power is evenly distributed among its constituents. Hence, I christened my mobile ‘The Balance of Power – Unity in Bits’.  More details about this, can be found in my concept blogpost.

Athena – A Useful, Yet Failed Experiment

Athena, a humanoid robot conceptualised for my Research Paper, solely exists in the realm of ideas. As a vital component of my research, I wanted to show a physical version of her alongside my mobile installation. She also made an appearance in a three-minute video where she manifested as a colourful AI animation.

I was intrigued by the concept of Athena and I embarked on a collaboration with my son, Jamie, to craft a 3D-printed model of her. Regrettably, the project proved to be more ambitious than anticipated, leading to its eventual abandonment. Nevertheless, during the printing process, I managed to capture some interesting footage of Athena’s head taking form layer by layer.

While Athena, the physical 3D-printed robot, won’t grace the final showcase, the footage of her creation has found its place in my concluding 5 minute film.  So, although the 3d printing experiment failed, it was still a very useful exercise.

The Augmented Reality Question

Earlier, I mentioned two lingering questions: why a mobile, and what type of augmented reality should be integrated into it? The first question has been previously addressed. However, the decision regarding augmented reality remains.

Upon re-evaluation of the concept of a ‘Balance of Power’ mobile and reflecting on my departure from AI art, I began to draw parallels. Augmented reality typically remains concealed until discovered, mirroring the hidden nature of many artists whose work is both obscured and ‘eaten up’ by AI art algorithms. Behind every pixel of industrialised AI art, lie countless unheard voices and human stories of artistic endeavour, that are never acknowledged in any way.

This led me to ponder: could augmented reality serve to unveil some of these hidden voices currently entombed within the algorithms of the industrialised AI art machine?  I began to shoot my augmented reality ‘trigger images’ and make tentative enquiries.  After all of the work involved it would be difficult to turn back now.

Opening Night

In the same week I completed my second prototype, the Gallery Paradiso invited me to exhibit both of my mobiles (prototype 1 and 2.  Their exhibition was called the ‘Line and the Form’.  My mobile (prototype 2) involved lines of binary code and it was also a form.  The showing went down well and apparently there was quite some sadness at its departure.  However, this showing, cemented in my mind that moving to a larger scale mobile would be a worthwhile endeavour.  Up until now I was unsure whether or not to proceed with the larger version or move to other activities such as large scale images.  Judging by the reaction to my prototype mobiles, I knew that I had to make something even bigger and more impressive.  This larger scale mobile would also carry the sentiments of many artists towards AI art.

The Final Process Begins

Inspired by positive encounters with the Gallery Paradiso, I launched headlong into making my third prototype.  During this period I became aware of SORA.  Although it was a disturbing discovery, I knew without any doubt that I had made the right choice in producing a physical mobile.  This hardened my resolve to finish my third mobile.  I duly embarked on yet another full weekend of work.  The work was ‘tough going’, labour intensive and very time consuming, I really needed a little time out.  I felt that after 2 years of shunning my camera it was time to reconnect with it.  I went into the woods at ‘Becky Falls’ to help my daughter understand the concept of slow shutter photography.  I took some of my own shots and I felt it really was quite cathartic.  It allowed me the time to reflect on what I was actually trying to achieve.  I returned with a renewed sense of purpose as I embarked on one final push to complete my mobile.

First Looks – The Balance of Power – Unity in Bits Mobile

The sound track that accompanies my ‘first looks’ video of the ‘Balance of Power – Unity in Bits’ mobile,  is actually quite raucous, but it does have special meaning to me.  I chose it specifically because of the words.  The lyrics talk about ‘taking my body’. I felt that AI industrialised art had taken my body.  It has taken my body of photographic work and it had taken my camera body (I no longer wanted to take photos).  I felt that my ‘Balance of Power’ mobile was a direct strike back at this!

Visual Explorations

Now that the mobile was complete in the physical sense, it afforded me the opportunity to do some visual explorations.  This third prototype was now very graceful in its motion, its weight meant that the ‘flimsy’ look had been expunged.  Instead, I felt that its movements were quite majestic and kinetic.  It seemed to move with a sense of power and grace.

Below is a short time-lapse video that I created using my DSLR.  Although this is quite an interesting video, I discounted it because, to my surprise the mobile changes direction!  I had naively assumed that the mobile would have been unidirectional, but the following video evidence proved otherwise.

Following on from the time-lapse video above.  I shot a number of stills.  At this stage I wasn’t quite sure how to approach this, so I did some experimentation which can be found in the blog posts: Visual Exploration 1 and Visual Exploration 2.  Here I discuss different shooting styles and how a wide aperture could actually add more mystery to the mobile.  Visual Exploration 2 also covers a video, with clips showing how the augmented reality works in situ.  From there I created some more highly experimental imagery.  Throughout this period, I had been working behind the scenes contacting a number of artists. Some of them kindly responded to the project by supplying quotes regarding their feelings about AI art.  These quotes were to become the hidden voices in the mobile, revealed only by augmented reality.  They stand as a metaphor for all the artists hidden from view, yet whose work lies behind the workings of the AI industrialised art machine.

I had lived and breathed this project now for many weeks.  Indeed I had spent many hundred of hours on it.  However, I was lucky because the annual ‘Low Residency’ was forcing me to take a break.  I attended this event last year and enjoyed it so much that I wanted to attend again this year.  I also felt that it would enable me to come back to my project with new perspectives and a renewed sense of vigour, which it absolutely did!  However, there was ‘no rest for the wicked’ as they say, because the very next week I was delighted to attend a Mattering Life – Scientist in Residency programme organised by Dr. Heather Barnett.  As part of this residency I made two films, one which proved to be a useful addition to my final 5 minute film.

Film 1

The first film was a compilation of time-lapses created during my time on the Mattering Life residency. The first four clips in this film were shot by Shem Johnson (used with permission as part of the overall collaboration) – the remaining three time-lapses were shot by me.  As an experiment I subsequently fed my footage into AI to animate it through the use of a filter.  The resulting pink creations, based solely on my original time-lapses, seemed completely ‘out of this world’.  I decided to put these to one side for the moment as I continued with my work.

Film 2

I created film two as part of our final presentation to the Mattering Life scientists and the whole group.  I felt that my video had some interesting imagery.  This was  created from all of the stills I shot earlier in the week, along with a little animation help from AI.  However, all of the base images were mine, so in this scenario, I was less concerned about the use of AI animation. It was only doing the ‘heavy lifting’ work that I could have done myself using digital tools.

Creating the Balance of Power – Unity in Bits Book

It was important to me that my audience (everyone) fully understood the background to the ‘Balance of Power’ mobile.  The rationale and concepts behind it, seemed clear to me.  However, I still felt the desire to articulate the full aims of the project in an explanatory book.

The book I designed to accompany the ‘Balance of Power’ mobile covered all of the main concepts.  I also added a full layer of augmented reality to this book as well as the mobile.  This blogpost is a useful blogpost as it  covers the concepts and thinking behind both the book and mobile more detail.  This blogpost is a useful blogpost as it shows the process of augmenting the ‘Balance of Power – Unity in Bits’ Book.  Below is the resulting video showing the ‘Balance of Power’ book together with its fully working extra layer of augmented reality.

The Augmented Reality Version of the Balance of Power Book

The ‘Balance of Power – Unity in Bits’ mobile is an interesting piece and can to some degree stand as a work in its own right.  However, its main function is to work alongside the ‘Balance of Power – Unity in Bits’ mobile.  It serves as an explanatory document, clarifying both the concept and rationale behind the art piece.

Having completed the book, the last thing, I wanted to do was explore some photographic concepts for the book.  I was thinking perhaps a poster or a brochure to email out to galleries.  This blogpost covers some of my initial photographic ideas.  These remain at an early stage and are certainly not technically perfect.  However, they serve as food for thought as my overall project continues to evolve.

Resolve or Evolve? – The Making of the 5 minute Film

 The process of making my final 5 minute film from conception right through to execution can be accessed via the following links:

• Film Ideas
• Film Production
• Film Mark II
• Balance of Power Book (used as a concept)
• Augmenting the Balance of Power Book
• Audio Revamp
• The Final Cut
• Three Finished Film Concepts

The question posed at the end of the film is  ‘Resolve or Evolve?’ – it is deliberately provocative.  It challenges the viewer to ask themselves – do we resolve to ‘give up on opposing unethical AI’?  And, also do we resolve to accept that it is ‘game over’ for the human race? Or, do we choose to evolve alongside this technology to ensure that ultimately it serves us and not the other way round?

Conclusion

My journey above has emphasised the ethical implications of AI in art, the importance of physicality in digital art, and the exploration of augmented reality to enrich the viewer’s experience. The above project has also culminated in a film questioning whether to resolve against or evolve with AI technology.

Additional IMAGES AND VIDEOS

To support the work above I have compiled a list of additional image galleries and a list of additional digital art piece videos that give a general overview of my work.  These images and videos have helped to shape all of my work moving forwards.

MA Blog in Pictures

Following is a visual representation of all of the blogposts that make up my full MA blog.  Each image (unless otherwise stated) was created by me and carefully curated to reflect the content of each blogpost.  Each picture is designed to tell a visual story and showcase both my work and my photography.  Many of these blogs lie behind the development of this final major project, serving as a record of all of the processes that went into making it.

Having trouble viewing the images (smartphones do not display)?  Please browse the full blog by using either categories or tags.