Aaron Cochran – PP1 2019
Posted: September 13, 2019 Filed under: Uncategorized Leave a comment »Initial Goals
For Pressure Project 1, my initial first priority was to meet the objectives in a timely, efficient manner. The objectives for our assignment were:
- Make someone laugh
- Keep the audience surprised for 10 seconds.
- Keep the audience surprised for 30 seconds.
- Make the program listen for and respond to numbers 1-5.
Planning
Starting with the first objective–make someone laugh–I saw this project as an opportunity to work on something from my list of side projects: learn how to efficiently create animations in a style similar to the sequences in the British film comedy series, Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
My first half hour I spent planning and dreaming. I initially wanted to have three sets of assets: images, animations, and sounds. These three sets would be shuffled and randomly paired together each cycle, creating a cacophony of random, ridiculous sequences.
The time constraint made me contentious that I might not be able to flesh out all the layers of what I wanted to do. So I broke my goals down into three levels:
- A single animation with user interaction.
- One sequence with multiple animations triggered by listening for the numerical values from the network.
- A full mixture of multiple animations that worked with multiple sets of images and could be randomized to different positions around the screen to generate animations that I had little to no control over.
My planning steps were:
- Research (watch Monty Python 🙂 and take notes)
- Gather imagery (make PNG files)
- Design animations
- Randomize animations
- Trigger with numbers 1-5
- User-designed animations using sliders.
Research
My next half hour was dedicated to research. I watched a few Monty Python animations and my eye was caught by still images where body parts were cut out of pictures and collaged to give the impression of a mouth moving, an arm waving, clothes being removed, etc.
Gather Imagery
I then decided to make a prototype of my first animation using Photoshop. I showed one of my friends the sequence I was planning on emulating and they reminded me to be conscious of my audience if I want a laugh. So after looking through some Ohio State imagery, I settled on the bust of William Oxley Thompson as my subject for my first animation.
Design Animations
I entered Photoshop and had to play around with a few different methods to make Oxley’s bust’s mouth open. I initially tried to repeat the top line of pixels defining his lip, but it turned out that those pixels were not all true black. Eventually I settled on 3 images: a black background (the inside of the mouth), the main image (a PNG with an empty hole over the mouth), and a cutout PNG of Oxley’s mouth and chin.
I then built a prototype in Photoshop where I could move the mouth up and down and showed it to a peer that was in ACCAD. They laughed instantly. SUCCESS! Objective 1, CHECK!
Roadblocks
I had my Photoshop prototype completed and my assets were ready to move to Isadora. I am using the computers in ACCAD for my work for this course this semester. Unfortunately our license was down and I lost a half hour of time. Additionally, I couldn’t just stop my stopwatch on the project because I had allotted my time to butt up directly against the beginning of classtime. Fortunately, we were able to get the licenses up and running again with a little over a half hour to spare. I quickly aligned my images, turned on the transparency blend setting for my PNGs, and tried to hook up Oxley’s mouth to respond to an audio sequence of Buckeye Battle Cry on a circus-y sounding MIDI file. Unfortunately (last unfortunate occurrence) no one in the class knew how to make the system react to music played internally. (This turned out be be an issue with other classmates as well.)
Conclusion
My final sequence reacted to mouse input to move Oxley’s mouth. While not ideal, it brought instant laughs to everyone in the class and I think the operator messed with the mouth for at least five seconds.
I enjoyed the experience of having a time constraint as it allowed me to prioritize my life outside of class while still providing successful work in-class. I look forward to fleshing out this fun generator in the future once I find the tools to operate the mouth and can implement my other prototypes such as “Hand entering from right to tickle Oxley’s chin” and “Drum major hat dropping from above with musical accompaniment.”