Who you gonna call?

Get it?  The painter's name is Egon.  Did I just date myself?  At any rate; I ended up keeping this one fairly simple.  I wanted to add a little more depth than I was seeing in the original image, and also play around with what the viewer's perception of the space might be.  I followed the overall form of the figure pretty faithfully, while flattening it into 3 basic planes (skin on hands and head, undershirt and jacket), each of which was given its own color.  I noticed an interesting thing happening here: it struck me that the depths implied by what I had done did not entirely follow those given in the original image.  I suppose this was the effect I was going for, though, so mission accomplished.

Photoshop Workshop

Well, this is it.  The right (cat's left) side of the moustache seemed to not come out as dark as I was hoping.  I probably messed something up when I was creating the layer masks.  Otherwise, not so bad.

GIF

Well, this is it.  I've noticed a problem, though.  The frame rate that I set in Photoshop isn't being preserved when I save the file and try to view it in a browser.  I'll look into this, but here's something for the moment.

This was my first time using Photoshop in this way, so this particular animation became more of a gag than a fully developed statement.  I've always found clowns to be funny, so I thought it might be fun to create something that catered to the kind of zany, over-the-top stunts you might find in your standard circus.  It always seems important for me to add my own humor into the situation, so I ended up coming up with a twist on the classic "snakes in a can" gag.  To add a little bit of history, I decided to use standard depictions of clown archetypes (for more information, this Wikipedia article gives a decent summary) and set the scene in a historic-looking circus setting.  That is the basic narrative.  In terms of aesthetics, I thought it best to keep things simple.  The figures have relatively limited motions, and there is a clear stylistic disconnect between figure and background.  This gives the whole thing a kind of chunky low-tech cartoon or B-movie aesthetic that has always been attractive to me, as well as adding the kind of cultural and iconographic blending that I like to do. I suppose I also learned some useful Photoshop techniques.  Win-win.

Also, a Trick

I thought I might share an obvious time-saver: duplicating layers.  I spent about 3 hours trying the drawn-out linear approach before I realized that it would be a hell of a lot easier to compartmentalize my operation.  Rather than populating then altering each frame individually, I made a mental storyboard of the entire sequence and divided it into sections based on what action was taking place.  For each action, I created a base layer that included all of the non-moving elements, then duplicated that for as many frames as I needed (copying and pasting the moving elements from a separate file into their desired positions).  This way, I was able to keep better track of what I was doing and everything stayed pretty consistent while I was doing it.

This image was used as a background plate for the first 9 frames (the entry of the Auguste clown and the production of the peanut brittle can)

This image is then used as the background plate for the next several frames (the only alterations being the cobra and its movements)

Not fancy, but it helped me out quite a bit.

Propose This

It seems to be a common sentiment that technology did not exist before the 20th century. I have always been severely skeptical of this particular claim. While certain advancements constitute a necessary and welcome element in any progressing society, I have rarely felt the need to situate my practice on the cutting edge in any field. It has, however, become painfully apparent of late that a working artist lacking (at the least) a passing acquaintance with emerging practices is considered something of an oxymoron. Circumlocutions aside, the point seems clear: I need to learn what all the fuss is about. Keeping my skeptic wits about me, I have always preferred long trial periods when approaching new skill-sets.

While digital media may one day become a more substantial part of my research, at this point my interest in and intentions for this course are to gain a rudimentary understanding of techniques to support and manage the professional end of my practice. As my experience with digital techniques and tools leaves a great deal to be desired, I would like to develop at least a basic familiarity with the programs and skills mentioned in the course description (the Adobe suite, photo editing, basic animation and web design). It is my hope that after a semester of practice I will be equipped with the basic understanding necessary to both improve the documentation of my work and begin to develop a more substantial presence within various creative communities. Aside from these more pressing goals, a possible long-term application of the course material may present itself in the context of hypothetical future exhibitions. Over the course of the last year I have been developing a group of fictional societies based around major commercial holidays, each derived from a factual historical culture that has been transported into the present (and future) through various means ranging from disturbingly plausible to downright absurd (see below).

Norse News is Good News: Dimensional Assistance for the Homesick Viking
2011

ValhallAir: Flight 1225
2011

The First Easter (concept drawing)
2012

This semester, I plan to create an installation dealing with a war between these groups for control of a post-apocalyptic America. While primarily a sculptural installation, I intend to augment the physical structures with interactive lighting and audio. Through not directly tied to the content of this course, this upcoming show may serve as a sort of platform to investigate the compatibility of digital media with my current body of work. If successful, future projects may include digital elements (such as projections or animation) applied to the more tangible material:

Untitled (Coyote Tells Me His Secrets)
2012