Kinetic Sculpture Maya Tests

To help me narrow down my sculpture thumbnails to ones to finalise for the garden I have been taking them into maya and roughly modelling and animating them. By doing this I can see what needs to be added/developed on ones I like and which parts are not working. For example, on the sculpture on the left parts keep entering each other when moving which is glitchy and not realistic so I know this couldn't work.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (10)

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (9)

I really like these three sculpture thumbnails because they work as other parts of the garden as well. For example, number 3 is like garden archways and pergolas, number 2 could be a feature wall, and number 1 acts like a windchime.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (8)

I tried something a bit different with these thumbnails, number 1 is inspired by the hanging ball bearing sculptures and number 2 suggests the movement of light patterns around a circular sculpture.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (7)

Out of these thumbnails I really like 3 again because it would work as several tubes which react to the wind.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (6)

Even more thumbnails for possible sculptures. Number 3 stands out to me because it is really different from any other thumbnails I've done so far and reminds me of my plants a bit.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (5)

These thumbnails and how they work were especially inspired by the whirly and groan tube toys and the football rattle.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (4)

Some more thumbnails for possible sculptures. Instead of being kinetic, number 5 reacts to the weather especially the wind through noise.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (3)

Here are some more thumbnail designs for possible sculptures. It is quite difficult to explain how each one would work but I think once I have narrowed down the designs I can make some rough block shapes in maya and show how each one could potentially move.

Filming Location Confirmed!

 

 I thought I would update everyone on the situation of filming for my project as it is a very important part of it. For the last week in between drawing I have been in contact with an events organiser at Somerset House discussing the possibility of allowing me an hour of filming for my project in the Edmond J. Safra courtyard at Somerset House.

I now have permission, a date and time so I will be off to film on Wednesday 12th March! There are quite a few things to get ready in preparation for filming so look forward to seeing some makeshift props for tracking on my blog within the next two weeks.

For those who are not aware with the Edmond J. Safra courtyard here are some images of it.

 

 

 

Kinetic Light Sculptures Tests

Yesterday Alan told me that a kinetic sculpture could be kinetic through lighting moving rather than the actual sculpture moving. I thought I would try this out in Photoshop with a previous thumbnail and colour picking colours from Futurist paintings. I've made two gif animations in Photoshop showing ways I could represent movement and kinetics through lights.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (2)

After drawing some thumbnails on paper I still felt that something was missing, as if these sculptures were still not Futurist enough. I decided to look back at Futurist paintings and picking up key shapes and movement in them I have been drawing some sculptures in photoshop. Here are the ones I have so far using just one painting as a template.

I feel like these drawings are far more dynamic and unique than the previous ones.

Kinetic Sculpture Thumbnails (1)

These are my first thumbnails trying to get down some ideas for kinetic sculptures which could be Futurist. I tried using ellipses, spirals and triangles as the main shapes for the sculptures so that they fitted into a Futurist's world, I then begun working out how these sculptures could be kinetic such as carrying marbles around.

Suitable Futurist Materials for Sculptures

Similarly to what I did with my plants, I have allocated certain Futurist approved materials to the ways I design my sculptures. These are cardboard, glass, hemp, aluminium, ceramics, neon tubes, celluloid plastic, rubber as well as tin and wood because they make good noises when hit, also while not on my original material map have also been used by Futurists.
I then thought about how some of these materials make better sounds when interacted with in a certain way compared to others. A lot of these materials come in ranges of shapes/designs. One thing that is key is texture and all of the materials have different textures.
I have noticed however, that a lot of them can have a corrugation/ribbing which creates different noises on each on when interacted with. Adding a bit of ribbing could help add more interest to my sculptures and the sounds that emit from them.

Noise Making Child Toys

Whilst looking at sound machines and kinetic sculptures I suddenly thought about child toys. It was the 'Groan tube' which I could picture in my head remembering the noise and way to use it but couldn't remember what is was called so I typed in noisy child toys and got a range of other really useful noisy toys.

The 'groan tube' has a ball in it which rolls down a spiral trial each time you turn it making this strange noise. Another noise happens if you shake it. This reminded me of some of the unusual noises from pieces of Futurist music so I thought it was perfect to look at how it works.

I've made some influence maps of noise making toys which I think I can use to inspire my designs and mechanics of my sculptures so that they would work if actually real.

Sound Machines

I found these really cool versions of sound machines on Vimeo and thought I would share them. I think the first two are more of an influence for my project than the others because I could actually design a sculpture which did something along these lines.

Pendulum sound machine from kyouei design on Vimeo.


The Kaleidochord from Johannes Bergmark on Vimeo.


Garden of Russolo at V&A by Yuri Suzuki from Dezeen on Vimeo.



Soundmachines from The Product on Vimeo.

Futurist Sounds

I found this really interesting video on YouTube about Futurist sounds/music. It talked about Futurism seeing noise as rich and artistic so established ways of producing music were disapproved of. There are categories of sounds that the Futurists would believe were suitable music noises.

• Booms, thunderclaps, explosions, crashes, slashes, roars.
• Whistles, hisses, snorts.
• Whispers, murmurs, mutterings, bustling noises, gurgles.
• Screams, screeches, rustlings, buzzes, cracklings, friction sounds.
• Percussion on... Metals, terracotta.
• Shouts, shrieks, howls, laughs, wheezes, sobs.

The Futurists showed their love for these sort of mechanical noises through their music experiments.

I am going to look for man made objects/materials which simulate these noises so that I can figure out what my 'noise sculptures' can be made of.

Various Kinetic Sculptures

These kinetic sculptures are just various ones which I really liked and gave me ideas while looking at them.

Phil Price- Kinetic Sculptor

I came across this sculptor Phil Price who makes beautiful kinetic sculptures. They are brightly coloured, high gloss and modern looking. Very futurist! I will definitely be looking at his work to inspire my own kinetic sculptures.

   

  

 

Ball Bearings & Marbles in Sculpture

'Fluid' effects do not neccessarily mean actual fluids but instead could mean symbolising fluids. So sculptures using sound and movement to simulate for example water are fluid effects. I have already put this video on my blog during my minor project but it is going to prove handy in my design of fluid effects.

I have looked up some further sculptures using ball bearings and marbles and have found some really cool and inspiring clips!

Dynamics: Plant Instancing Tests

One of the questions I needed  to answer was how to limit the amount of objects in my renders. I've been testing this out with some dynamics by instancing 3 versions of the same plant.

The first render took 5mins 56secs but this is still a lot better than it would have been if I had individually duplicated each plant.

I lowered down the rate of particles as a lot of the plants were beginning to cross over each other making a horrible green brown colour. This render took 2mins 28secs which is a lot better than the first one.

I really wanted to get rid of the crossing over of some of the plants but it seemed no matter what I did it still occurred to some of them. It is a little better but I have had to lower the rate of particles again.

Maya Deformer Experiments: Plants 02-19

Here are the rest of the deformer experiments on all of my other plants.

Maya Deformer Experiments: Plant 01

I have been experimenting with deformers such as the bend and lattice deformers to see how I can make my plants less vertically and horizontally grown but instead more dynamic and chaotic.
This is very fun pulling at parts of my plants and having no idea what will be the result. I've started off doing this on one plant to test what could be achieved. I really like the outcomes, some of them are more extreme than others but each has its own quirky quality!

Fluid Effects Research

In my minor project feedback Phil mentioned opportunities for fluid effects to keep my garden dynamic and not just sculptural. Automatically my brain thinks water but the futurist I'm channelling threw this out of my head with a mighty noo! Water is not artificial and synthetic! So I cannot dare touch this. However, there are of course other fluid substances that I can use. I'm going to research into these synthetic fluids to see what's out there but for now I leave you with the lava lamp.

The 'lava' in a lava lamp is actually wax which rises and falls when its density changes due to the heat from the lamp's light bulb. Wax is either a natural material or a synthetic one depending on how it is made so saying that my wax is synthetic I could have screen like walls or things like path lights which are similar to how a lava lamp works.

Plant 06 Further Adjustments

With Phil's suggestion of a more ochre yellow I'm had another go at making this plant pop, definitely much better than the plain yellow!

Plant 06 Fixes

Something  I needed to revisit from my minor project was plant 06 because the colour I picked topped off with an ambient occlusion layer bleached it out in the final render. I've been working on fixing this.

Originally it looked like this.

 

I think I have fixed it now, the yellow seems a lot more vibrant. Below are some progress shots and what the plant looks like now.

 

What it looks like now.