Updates and Proposal for Animatronics

Updates on my progress with everything:
 
So I've been feeling a bit hindered lately due to the fact that my computer has crashed since Saturday of about 2 weeks ago. I've been manageing what I can with the Lab resources that are available to me but my progress on my exit show animation has pretty come to a stand still. Luckily it has given me an opportunity to focus a bit more on my animatronics.

I'm not sure when my laptop will be returned to me from the toshiba company but with due dates from my BFA Seminar class and other personal due dates quickly coming apron me I have decided to designate a personal sketchbook to at least have several drawings of my ideas for no other reason but to have a visual representation of my thought process and to show my teachers that i've actually been working.

 Proposal for Animatronics:
This is a power point proposal I presented for my Advanced digital multimedia course and I got some feed back on my ideas. Thomas asked the Advanced digital students to create a "mood board" as a visual representation of our proposal.  

By this point i've gone ahead and purchased most of my materials for the Animatronic  figures, including the Arduinos, the servo motors, the ultrasonic range sensors, and the casting materials I need.

I was told to look up a few different artists/ other references in order to keep my project art related and not slip into the realm of cheesy haunted house or Chucky Cheese effects.

People to research: 
- Carlos Castaneda

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Castaneda 

- Joseph Campbell

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Campbell

-Matthew Barney

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Barney

-Bruce Charlesworth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Charlesworth

Some suggestions/ questions:

1) Am I going to include sound?

       - I haven't given too much thought to this aspect yet i've been so focused on the actual physical creation and design of the characters i have not real focused on their envirnoment extensively.
      - Some suggestion I received from my class were shaman chantings and modified wolf howling not necessarily together but I might play around with it just to see how it comes out. I'm even planning on going ahead and collecting sounds and saving them for later when i'm ready to play in that area.

2) Need more visuals to get a better idea of what kind of space i'm envisioning:
      - along with the sketchbook idea that I mentioned earlier it was suggested to me that I go into the
TAG gallery and photoshop a representation of how I might set up my show this will be somewhat difficult to do at the moments without the use of my Wacom tablet but it is definitely something I am planning on doing for the future.

3) Will I include a Fan or a Fog Machine?
-I will answer these questions later.

Obitus

    
   

  My first concept picture of my character Obitus. His name is  Latin for natural death, he represents the soul he is represented as organic and ghostly.

Created in Photoshop 2012.

First Entry: So here is what i'm doing

Exhibition Summary/ description briefly outlining the formal and conceptual idea behind the work to be created/ shown:

     My plan is to explore the concept of death and people’s interaction with it, exploring how people see death and illustrate my own speculations about the afterlife. I delve into this subject through the use of three anthropomorphized wolf characters each representing a specific kind of death and the mythology behind their creation and purpose. Each character design is based on how society sees different kinds of death as well as a representation of the mind, body and soul.

    The first character is Obitus a Latin for natural death that also represents the soul he is represented as organic and ghostly.

    The second character is Letum a Latin word for violent death that represents the body he is represented as a spirit also but also includes the circulatory system of a canine.

    The Last character is Mortis a general Latin term for death, he represents the mind having no traditional eyes but instead has a third eye on his forehead as a symbol for mystical knowledge, he is also physically represented with a skull face.

    I chose for these characters to be portrayed as canines for their symbolism, due to their Latin names the symbolism of the three headed dog Cerberus, the guardian of the underworld, comes to mind. Upon more research I found other mythologies with canines as underworld guardians Anubis, The dogs of Hekate, The Hounds of Annwn, Bau, Cerbura and others. I chose to make them wolves specifically because throughout history the people’s view of wolves have been similar to how people view death as something to be feared, when in reality they are just as much a part of the cycle of life as anything else. It is natural, instinctual and even though a person may be consumed by death just as an animal may be consumed by a predator. It is in reality an organic transition ultimately returning it to the environment for reuse or rebirth. Show Exhibition: I plan for my show to be held in the-------------, this exhibition will depict this spiritual transition from death into new life. My plan for my show is to create a projected looping short film of a day in the existence of all three spirits. The film will show the spirits in live action collecting the souls of dyeing beings and the souls being transferred and reborn, everything else in the film besides the spirits are animated, by doing this it inverts reality from the spirit’s point of view where we are the illusion.

   For the rest of my show I also plan to create three mannequin sculptures of each character within their own environment created by lighting effects, the mannequins will have an animatronic effect to them where they interact with the viewer. I also plan to create a series of illustrations representing their mythologies, and a series of animated gifs.