Modding Video Games

Months or years after a release people always design and send out mods to popular video games.  I for one think that video games are art by themselves but some do not agree with me.  This game had an incredible landscape originally but these people have released mods that make the graphics even better.  It is not just one person either, each mod is created by a separate programmer.  The community that surrounds this game is quite active and they produce great art all the time.

Normally this game looks pretty good but these add ons have created such an amazingly beautiful 3D environment that it is somewhat hard to believe they are real screenshots from the game!

Such amazing landscapes are created through the games engine and they are breathtaking.  The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim is a game that has an environment that takes hours to walk across for your character.  This means that if you were to transfer it into human scale it would add up to some serious mileage.  And the whole environment gets transformed into one big explore-able fantasy realm.  

This really shows why video games should be considered art.  Why are simply 3D images considered art and then entire worlds that get created get thrown to the side?  I think that these worlds are much more impressive.  They truly show the potential for the future of video games as well computer generated art.  

Digital Blasphemy

Ryan Bliss started a little online site called Digital Blasphemy in 1997.  His goal was to create 3D computer generated images and sell them as backgrounds for desktops.  He put his site up in 1997 and started doing projects that had odd "outer space" characteristics.  His older work was pretty awesome for the time in how realistic it looked given what software he was using.  As time rolled along his software and his art became much more realistic looking and much more complex.

His early work looked like this:

While his newer stuff is much more detailed and real life looking: 

Once he created the site and started putting up his backgrounds, he received quite a following quickly.  The gaming community really took a liking to most of his work and began spreading it through the internet.  I first learned about his work in the early 2000's and really took a liking to it and almost always had one of his images as my desktop background.  His work really speaks to me because it is all stuff that does not really exist and yet it looks like something that could be real.  

He does have a "members section" that allows for people who donate to get special pieces and newly released stuff but almost all of his work can be found for free.  I am not sure if he makes enough money from his backgrounds to live off of or if he has another job but I would be curious to know.

Either way, his work is really cool and I oftens till find myself adding them as my backgrounds.

Microscopes for art

Along my travels on the interwebz I have discovered yet another cool form of scientific art.  It turns out that people are using microscopes to look at very small stuff and then simply taking pictures of them.  It might not sound like a form of art but I assure you that the images they collect are quite stunning.  They are colorful, complex, and wild pictures of stuff so small that they can only be seen by instruments that man has created.

In specific there is a Japanese artist named Susumu Nishinaga who happens to be extremely talented in this line of art.  I really enjoy his work with humans more than anything.  He has taken the task of getting extreme close ups of blood vessels, veins, arteries, and other small pieces of the human body.  But some images I really like are these:

These are all pathways for blood in the body.  But the photos are taken at such a small scale it is somewhat hard to believe.  This man is extremely talented with a microscope and camera combo.

The coolest part is that none of this would be possible without advanced technology.  The cameras being used we only developed recently and the microscopes have been around for a while but getting them to be able to photograph on such a small scale is an extraordinary feat of men.

3D printing! ... famous sculptures?

3D printing has been all the rage in the past few years, especially with dropping prices and the ability to own personally becoming available.  The ability to print almost anything is a very cool idea that is certainly worth the effort to produce.  3D printing is one of those things that really changes the way people imagine creating new things and making items from scratch.  It is as simple as scanning an item and then pressing a button and having an identical looking thing produced in any scale you would like.

Up to this point 3D printing has been used for few things: construction, hardware, and art.  Artists have really started to get the hang of 3D printing and some really cool things have been produced so far.  One thing I found recently though has caught my interest.  It is not "new" art and yet it will change how easy it is to get cool pieces of art that played a role in history into our homes rather than in the museums only.  New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art has started scanning all their sculptures into a database and then selling the files through their gift shop so that people can print out their own masterpieces at home!

This is really cool for a lot of reasons but what I really like about it is that if I wanted a small scale version of some piece in the future I could probably find it online somewhere or through a vendor, pop the file into my 3D printer, and have my own little sculpture to place at my whim.  Super cool idea from the high art community on this one!

http://gajitz.com/3d-print-your-own-famous-sculptures-from-the-met-at-home/

The Apple Tree Youtube Video

My last post talked about a type of video that has become incredibly popular over the past few years around the web.  In searching around for these type of videos I came across one that really blows all the rest oout of the water and I felt compelled to talk about it.  It is called "The Apple Tree" and it is a music video of sorts.  A fan of the Electronica band The glitch Mob spent around 200 hours editing few second long clips from a huge range of movies to remixes of the Glitch Mob's work.  It is an idea that has been done many times before, however this particular user has created this video with some high tech editing software and some serious time consumption.  He has made the video to jump from clip to clip at just the right moment and have some action event appear every time there is a hard sound.  This makes for the effect of having ever small clip flow with the music.  The music chosen is quite fast and heavy most of the time and certainly fits a lot of the explosions and fight scenes chosen by the creator.

This piece is really col simply because it has both an extremely appealing visual element as well as having great audio to back it up.  In my opinion it is the best edited clip/music video I have ever seen.  His hard work has really paid off in the final product as everyone I show it to has been impressed with it.

Here is the link to the video: (watch it in HD) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gP_Q2myNWo

Landscape/ Time Lapse/ Music Videos

Watch this for a minute or so first before reading: http://vimeo.com/51430433

It seems as though over the post year this type of video has been popping up more and more around the internet.  I have seen roughly a million, give or take a few.  I find them to be extremely relaxing sometimes and other times they pump me up like no other.  I have really taking a liking to the "TimeScape" video that have some sweet electronic song thrown in to them and simply have time lapse captures from nature running across the screen often to the beat of the music.  They entrance me in a way that I really enjoy as the visual and audio stimulation combine into some sort of awesome artistic work.

Many different styles of this video have been emerging and all of them seem to have a certain target audience.  Some are for people who like harder, faster music and give off the vibe of pump up videos while others are much more serene and peaceful.  This is a cool dynamic that simply by changing how fast images switch and what music is in the background a completely different feeling can be derived from the same images.  I have seen a few times where the exact same footage is used in two separate videos and the music is only changed and it gave a completely different feel!

I am always impressed with what people can do with a camera and some music.  These videos are incredible simply because of how much editing it takes each artist to create their few minute video.  Overall, my impression is that videos like this are pretty awesome!

Marmalade: High Speed and Tech Advertising

Marmalade is a company that produces visuals for high end ad clients.  But what they end up producing is surely a beautiful form of art.  They use high speed cameras on extremely fast tracking robotic arms to capture amazing shots that seem impossible to not only make happen but to capture.  If you have seen a shot of a wine glass falling off a table with wine spilling everywhere and it beautifully crashing on the floor all in slow motion and perfect pixelation you have probably seen the work of this company.  They are the go to guys for anything like this.  They will take the idea of splashing molten chocolate and milk together and turn it into one of the most beautiful things you have ever seen using their engineering and cinematic skills.

These guys are the masters of filming anything in beautiful slow motion.  Here is a video showing a lot of their work: http://vimeo.com/43455552

I think they are quite influential to not only the advertising market but possibly to the movie and tv market as well.  The technology they have created to make some of these ads is simply amazing!  There is room for them to do side projects and create pieces that involve much more complex animations mixed into the video they capture.  This could result in some extremely interesting short films, music videos, etc.  I think they can really find a niche to fit into and produce some almost unbelievable video.  I love what they do and am really excited to see some future side work productions outside of the realm of advertising.

Hyper Realistic Paintings

Jason de Graaf is one of many hyper realistic painters that exist in the world.  Hyper realism is painting depictions in the hope that the viewer will mistake them for photographs.  This type of hyper realism is known as "photorealism".  In this style, there are many who accomplish this with flying colors.  However, of all the artists I have come across I think that Jason de Graaf takes the cake on photo realism.  His paintings are incredibly fine and precise in most of their aspects.  Every little detail of his still life style is meticulously and painstakingly brushed.  (although no brush strokes are shown on his paintings)

He uses many items that you would find around any normal house which makes his paintings that much easier to digest as photos.  At first glance it is near impossible to tell whether or not his paintings are in fact paintings or photos.  Using common items probably helps our brain interpret it as truth more easily.

I am a really big fan of this style of art.  Having just found it on the internet blindly I am very happy to have stumbled onto a new type of art that I greatly appreciate.  The experience from viewing these pieces is not only extremely impressive from a talent standpoint but it is very pleasing to simply look at for extended periods of time.  There is something about someone trying to replicate reality with paint that is extremely interesting to me.

Rendez Vous by Claude Lelouch

This film is a relatively short film which has a man driving through Paris in the early morning in a Mercedes (which had Ferrari sounds laced over it later).  Claude Lelouch was a big name in the movie business in France during the 60's.  He took this project and turned it into one of the most well known short films of all time.  It is probably just as cool today as it would have been seeing it in the 70's.

The film never shows the car that is being driven as it passes through Paris at first light.  The screeching tires and engine noise are suspected to have been added later using sounds from Lelouch's personal Ferrari.  The car drives around to major sites in Paris like the Arc de Triumph, the Garnier Opera House, and Place de la Concorde.  As it is driving it runs red lights, scares pedestrians, and somewhat wreaks havoc upon the city in the early morning.  It was shot in a single take and no one seems to have been injured.

A link of the video is here: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=a8e_1182066421

I think this piece is really cool.  I really love to watch it every once in a while.  It makes me feel pretty peaceful.  I like the sounds of a high revved engine and the visuals of Paris at sunrise.  It really makes me wish that I could do something similar in time.  

3D sidewalk art by Edgar Mueller

Edgar Mueller is a German artist who started life as a painter.  At the age of 25 he started street painting around Europe.  He went to high school in a town called Geldern in which the "International Competition of Street Painters" was hosted.  He gives credit to this town for inspiring him to become a street painter.    He competed for the first time when he was 16 and went on to win 3 years later.  Mr. Mueller has been labeled a "Maestro Madonnari" or "Master Street Painter" by winning so many competitions worldwide.

His work consists of literally taking paint of different colors and type and makes what appear to be three dimensional areas on the flat surface of the street.  This type of street art takes perspective and makes it almost absolutely necessary.  If you are standing within the 3 foot range where the image looks correct it is breathtaking, however stand a few feet off to the side and the amazing concept is somewhat lost.  This is due to the fact that creating a three dimensional sight on a two dimensional plane is very difficult to create from one vantage point, let alone many.  

Notice that the perspective is what makes the piece in all of these images.  He has done many pieces in many countries all with different themes.  However he has a style all his own in comparison to other street artists.  For instance, he uses a lot of cave type ideas with a heavy influence of water.  Other artists use anything from Greek mythology influences to coke bottles.  All in all, Mueller has an awesome style for street art and he really deserves the title of "Street art master".

Big Red

Like Walter the bus, Big Red started out as an airfield fire/rescue engine.  He is actually the same brand just a different model than Walter.  In fact, the reason Kirk bought this second one is because they have the same chassis and wheelbase.  In case you did not know the VW bug and the VW bus both have the same wheelbase making these two fire trucks the perfect brother and sister for conversion into large scale VW's.  Kirk decided he wanted to make a Baja this time though.

Here Big Red is all done ready for Burning Man 2012!

Kirk had taken a few years to build Walter from start to finish but Big Red only took about 9 months!  Kirk knew what he wanted the second time around and he knew what it would be used for.  This made the fabrication process much quicker and much more painless.  Of course there were struggles (like when Big Red's diesel engine decided to literally explode) and hardships along the way, but Big Red really went from the drawing board to fully created incredibly fast!

Here he is at Burning Man 2012!

The lightstrips blazing

So while Walter and Big Red are two separate great art creations they are similar in many ways.  Walter is more of a party mobile/ dj station while Big Red is more of a playa cruising vehicle/ art car.  I am always really inspired by Kirks creations not just because of the scale of them but how much he really puts into each one.  Each person who works on these machines or plays with them gets a really big kick out of them.  They are monstrous creations of mad design and damn fine engineering! 

Walter The Bus

Walter is a vehicle that was created by my father's friend Kirk Strawn.  He has always been very excited about Volkswagen cars and wanted to make an art car to resemble on of his favorites: the bus.  This project started almost 10 years ago when Kirk decided during a trip to Burning Man that he wanted an art car for the festival.  He had a few initial ideas but decided that the most plausible would be to make an extremely over sized VW bus.  So Kirk went out and purchased a "crash truck" that is essentially a fire truck for airports.  He then started ripping the whole thing apart and got down to just the chassis.  Once down to the main components he started fabricating, with the help of the "Walter Tribe", parts to make it a 2:1 size replica of a VW bus.

Walter has a big frame and the following measurements:

Wheelbase - 186.5 inches
Width - 100 inches
Length - 368.5 inches (30.7 feet)
Height - 13 feet 2 inches
Weight - 19,500 pounds



Here is a Photo of Walter pre-fabrication


So once the construction began to change Walter into a VW bus things really kicked into gear.  Lots of aluminum sheeting was used to create the overall exterior look of the bus which several areas were reinforced to create seating areas and dance areas.  Once Walter "looked" like a huge VW bus the really fun stuff started.  Kirk decided to put in a eight, two thousand watt amps to power his ten, twelve inch subs and his thirty, eight inch mids which all have spots around the bus.  The sound system was an incredible edition to Walter which really made him all the more a "party" vehicle.  Furthermore, Kirk added over ten thousand LEDs that are controlled by a switchboard capable of changing to most colors as well as "dancing" to the music which is being played.  This sound and light show really comes in handy when you are hanging out on the top deck where the dancing area exists.

Overall, Walter is just a big party bus that makes appearances for local VW rallies, charity events, and the occasional party at the Walter Dome.  Walter was built for Burning Man but has transformed into creating a beautiful community of people who now brew beer, play music, make art, and do all sorts of fun things in the Walter Dome.  The Walter Tribe has grown from a few people to over a hundred in the past few years.  They do great things for their community and create some really cool art in many different forms.

Here is a photo of Walter in front of my parents house for my Dad's 55th birthday


This is the dance floor up top


The short lived "horns idea" only lasted one year at Burning Man


Mid fabrication


Burning Man 2012

So, in a nutshell, Walter is a big VW bus that is used to party on.  Walter is pretty artistic in every respect.  He has had mechanics, painters, welders, audio professionals, light show specialists, bands, normal people, and even kids work on him to create this wonderful piece of art.  He holds a special place in my heart given I watched him be built over the years and transform into the crazy party vehicle he is today.