Michael Martinez-Campos

Weary from several group assignments, I decide to focus more on project management for the next one. I have experienced the good and bad of group work so I’ve decided to be more methodical in my approach. At ITP, we have conflicting schedules and varying levels of interest in each assignment. To try and level the playing field, I created a shared Google document soon after we were given the storyboard assignment. At the top of it, I pasted the assignment description. Below it I told my group members, Michelle Liu and Shahar Zaks that since we probably needed some rest after midterms, we should take a couple of days off before thinking about this assignment.

A couple of days later I sent an email to Michelle and Shahar asking when they would be able to meet. Michelle was able to meet but Shahar wasn’t until a later date. I told him that we would put our meeting notes on the shared document and that he could contribute his reactions from there. As a group, we decided to meet early on a Sunday morning, as Shahar had the M5 bus trip scheduled for that day at 11am. Michelle and I showed up late, Shahar was already gone. Seeing that this project would not go as planned, I decided that we should split the work 3 ways. For 2 reasons, to showcase our individual styles, and to make apparent each person’s contribution to the project.

Michelle and I after some discussion and minor (humorous) bickering, worked on our idea (Shahar as Home Shopping Network host, selling ITP devices). She created about 8 shots and me about the same. We scanned in our work and sent it to Shahar to create an ending to the storyboard. Later on, after he received it, he didn’t get the idea but ended up pulling through and contributed some good shots.

Next week, filming!

David and I discussed what we wanted out of our final piece. He’s a fan of Nine Inch Nails and wanted that industrial vibe. I wanted something more happy as I think that’s harder to create than a gloomy work. Plus, the music of NIN requires alot of studio engineering to add depth to the seemingly simplistic beats (eg kick drums with other sounds/atmospherics layered with it). I told him that either way, once we gather all of the sounds, it will dictate our course. Also, with my past experience using Ableton Live, I told him that we could knock out a few ideas to quickly. I’ve been dabbling with music software for years and Ableton is the most fun, intuitively designed app i’ve used.

The day we were to check out the audio equipment, the ER was experiencing a run on audio equipment. We had to wait a few hours to intercept another student returning their equipment. We couldn’t get a shotgun mic, forcing us to use an omnidirectional mic, probably sealing the fate of our assignment. No focused sounds = material unsuitable for editing.

We walked around the different departments of Tisch, recording ambient sounds, including pipes in the hallways, student discussions, elevator noises, us tapping on metal in the hallways, etc. We next moved on to the Bobst library. We traveled up to the 7th floor where we recorded the sounds of pages turning in a large format book and the sounds of the recorder on top of a library cart(both wooden and metal models) being pushed down the stacks. The rest of the library was perhaps not unsurprisingly quiet.

The most amazing part of our recording session was a walk through Washington Square Park at night. We found a lone guitarist playing the song “So Far Away From You” by Dire Straits(I think). It sounded very good and melancholic. There wasn’t much else to record as it was night time so we started exiting the park down one of it’s dark paths. Up ahead we saw some shady characters standing around in the dark, obviously some of the park’s ubiquitous drug dealing crews. David asked if we should keep going. I’ve spent time around different ghettos and know if you walk with a combination of deference, respect and confidence, you almost never run into a problem. I told him “Yes, and start the recorder”. Sure enough, as we walked toward the group, they walked toward us. Within speaking distance they asked if we wanted ‘green buds or ecstacy’. Dave sputtered no, thanks really quickly, later slapping himself in the head when he realized he interrupted our audio.

We recorded a few more sounds on the street, including traffic and people talking before we headed back to ITP.

At ITP we copied all of the sounds to an external hard drive where we further copied them to both of our computers. We wanted to create an inventory of our sounds so we created a shared Google spreadsheet and divided between us the total amount of files. It only took us about 15 minutes to list the length and descriptions of each sound, including a comments section where we could put our ideas for each sound.

We took a couple day break. I told David that using Ableton, we should be able to make a piece fairly quickly.

When we met at ITP, I discovered that none of the computers in the lab had the full version of Ableton loaded. Only the demo versions, which don’t allow you to save your work. Frantic with this discovery we started working with Audacity. Hating the feel of the GUI, we asked somebody familiar with music software, what else we should use. Somebody suggested Logic. We took a look and figured that it was too steep of a learning curve in too short of a time to use. So it was back to Audacity…

I was very frustrated and trying to work concurrently with my PComp midterm team who looked they were getting resentful that I wasn’t helping them. David and I agreed that he would make the composition and I would further tweak his piece. I know David has good taste and a lot of ambition so I was confident with this idea.

David gave me the sound file and I worked on it at home, changing the spacing of the sounds to give them more room to breathe. I also added delay effects ( I LOVE dub music) and automated fades so the sounds would mesh with each better. I was satisfied with the result, like a dub soundscape.

The demo of our song in class we considered a disaster. It sounded different than what we heard while editing the piece. David looked at me like I ruined his composition. I told him that my changes had sounded very much the same to his composition, just some tweaks. The piece sounded like it was missing elements and the delay effects produced in Audacity were terrible, sounding very robotic.

My lessons learned from this assignment: use the best equipment for the task at hand. bad source material won’t lead to a great end piece. when depending on computers to have a particular app loaded, doublecheck far in advance. At least i’m inspired to start making some music again!

I have followed sample based music for over 20 years with the appreciation of new artists breathing new life into the old. The best example being funk songs that hip hop has sampled. Many fans have sought out the previous work to judge it’s ability to stand up on it’s own. In many cases, these older artists have gained new fans that wouldn’t have discovered them without experiencing the re-use of their material first. Along with this, there has always been a troubling amount of unattributed sample material. The artists don’t have to deny that they use sample-based material, they simply omit that knowledge, given that most people won’t question their production process.

I have known about Shepard Fairey ever since his ‘Andre the Giant’ has a posse days. In recent years, his popularity has skyrocketed. I generally enjoyed his work (however formulaic), until I discovered a blog that showed many of the images he used in his work that were unattributed to the original artist. He has legions of rabid fans who would never think that these images are anything but original. The fact that Fairey doesn’t make clear the fact that uses art created by others to me reflects a lack of integrity. He has made a lot of money with his art and at the same time, prevented his fans from discovering the work of the artists he took material from. There is no doubt that he has a great aesthetic sense, but like they say about good sampled hip hop songs, how hard is it to extend an already good work into another good work that hasn’t been changed too significantly content wise? It’s my contention that Fairey feels that if he attributed the artist’s that he gets his material from, it would remove some of the luster of the ‘Fairey brand’.

Letheim reading:
Crytomnesia: hidden, unacknowledged memory. Carola show, stealing jokes. An interesting parallel is inventions that occur within a few months of each other, as if there is concurrent neural connections or dynamics.

‘when you live outside the law, you have to eliminate dishonesty’

I never knew so much of Bob Dylan’s work was derivative. And some of THAT work was derivative. Makes me think of the evolution of human culture, reincarnation(a multitude of lifecycles until enlightenment is attained), and

Ties in to my thoughts on hip hop samples and how I have found more value from knowing of the other artist’s who’s work has been built on.

Helps study and acquisition of new musical knowledge, leads to other artists and sometimes an understanding of how those artists worked with each other in previous eras, giving us an insight into how our culture evolves.

Media property rights . In the case covered in this article, after hearing both of their stories and motivations, I find it hard to side with the original artist(at least in terms of not wanting to credit the original artist). The story behind the picture is very powerful and interesting. The painting version of it does abstract away some of it’s raw emotion. Extending this out to other works is more difficult but if there’s any reason to mimic a previous piece of media, surely that media can be credited.

Commercial rights vs personal expression, art for commerce or culture.

Christine and I met to discuss ideas. We have very different ideas so it took a while before we hit on the idea of doing a stop motion version of the game Dance Dance Revolution….as played by a marshmellow man.

We checked out a light kit and camera w/tripod from the ER and set up our shoot at Christine’s nearby apartment. We couldn’t figure out some of the camera’s functions worked so we took it back to the ER to get some questions answered.

When we got back to the apartment, we went to constructing the marshmellow dancer. It looked good when done but there was one major problem…we couldn’t get the dancer to stand or be posed that much. We tried a couple of solutions but none worked. Our patience was wearing thin and we had to decide what to do as an alternative idea. After rising tension, we decided on an animation using gummy bears, one of the few intriguing materials around for film use.

We created the animation as we went, without choreographing it in advance. It was tedious but we finally finished. It wasn’t until we added music that the video seemed decent. There comes a point in the music that we used that syncs up perfectly with a sequence in the animation that was the result of a positioning mistake. I love serendipity!

Lessons learned: try doing a quick mockup of the project before committing to borrowing the equipment needed on the day of the project. if your primary idea doesn’t work and you’re ready to start working, it can be very frustrating.

gummy phoenix from Michael Martinez-Campos on Vimeo.

I was disappointed with the output of this project. I had added a soundtrack that worked perfectly on preview (and I’m sure I saved the file). When I checked the video after uploading to Vimeo, I discovered that the soundtrack didn’t come along with it. I will double check that i’ve saved the file correctly. If I did, i’ll check the help file for adding audio and if it’s supposed to get built in to the project or if I had it set as an external file.

Physical Computing ’stupid pet trick’: EYES ABLAZE! from Michael Martinez-Campos on Vimeo.

“And I had at one point this rather depressing image of some alien creature seeing the death of this planet and coming down in their spaceships and sniffing around and finding all our skeletons sitting around our TV sets and trying to work out why it was that our end came before its time, and they come to the conclusion that we amused ourselves to death.”

-Roger Waters, Pink Floyd

I read alot and by far, this story was the most chilling text i’ve read in quite some time.  It’s been said that people have a love of fatty, salty food because it stimulates certain gustatory sensors in us that were much less stimulated in the hunter/gatherer era of human history. It’s literally addictive to us.  So are media that feeds our ego and our sense of social connectedness (which in the past was a social safety net for the times that an individual was in danger).  The fact that this story was written in *1909* illustrates Forster’s innate understanding of human nature.  When there is a shortcut to fulfilling our desires, we’ll take it, even if we’re not FUNDAMENTALLY fulfilling them.

The story made many mentions of the woman’s multitude of friends that she never actually interacted with in person.  A direct parallel to social networking sites, such as the current behemoth, Facebook, can be drawn. Users in many cases try to pad their accounts with as many ‘friends’ as possible.  This leads to increased online communication, online updates and a sense that one is popular.  It is arguable that these same ‘friends’ would not support said person in times of need.

The son in the story tried to illustrate to the mother, the perils of the lifestyle they were leading.  Without considering his opinion/analysis, she instead started to shun him. It’s easier to brand someone as being anti-”progress” rather than consider the merits of their argument. I’ve tried to discuss similar things with friends and acquaintances and the immediate reaction is that i’m bitter or ‘I just don’t get it’.  They believe that participating along with the zeitgeist is the natural order of things.  Anything to the contrary is a threat to ‘progress’.

In the story, the woman is constantly attending to her role as a music historian and the constant pursuit of new ideas.  This seems to come at the expense of being a person who cares for other people.  I can see this attitude at ITP.  People trying so hard to be unique, or the one with the ‘best ideas’ that they find it unnecessary to work on getting along well with others.  In a program that is focused on communication (and preferably mass communication),  this is a problem.  How can one communicate with others when they are wrapped up in their own persona?

The easiest and most obvious conclusion I had when reading this story is that we gamble with our humanity when externalizing ourselves to technology. Once we depend on technology to define ourselves, we lose a bit of what makes us human and further more, our ability to communicate with other people.

Michelle Temple and I visited the section of the Tree Museum located by Yankee Stadium in the Joyce Kilmer and Franz Sigel Parks along the Grand Concourse in Brooklyn.

While the idea of the project was great, the implementation left much to be desired. Whether that was a function of the creator’s budget or the creator’s vision of the implementation, we felt that the aim of the project missed it’s goal.

The goal of the project in our minds was exploring the history of the neighborhood. We talked to a few people who lived around the area and none had much of an idea of what it was about. The first person we talked to walks around Franz Sigel Park a few times a week. She has lived in the area for over 20 years. She said she had seen the placards around the trees but wasn’t sure how to interface with them. We saw a sign for the project at the Joyce Kilmer Park that had an illustrated map of the trees. I felt it would have made more of an impact to have a simplified infographic simply showing a talking tree, the placard next to it with phone number and extension, and a viewer dialing the number on their cellphone. Instead the sign had the map of trees and a list of credits. To the average citizen who isn’t interested in art, this presented an (admittedly low, but real) barrier.

We also had a problem with the assumed fact that viewers would have a cellphone. This automatically filters out people of a lower socioeconomic status who might not have a cellphone (or at least carry one at all times). We saw a group of kids lighting firecrackers. While they might not be entranced with the history of their neighborhood, if they at least had the chance to interact with the project, it would give them a difference perspective on their surroundings.

If I was to design the project, I would have had the placards be pressure sensitive. By standing on a placard for a few seconds, a recording would be activated. This assumes the use (and budget) for outdoor speakers (a requirement on a rainy day like the day we visited). The low fidelity recordings we heard on the cellphone detracted from the emotional effect of the experience. Preferably, the recordings would be played at a volume low enough for people to enjoy the park for it’s more relaxing aspects.

Michelle and I agreed that the goal of the project was an admirable one. We tend to get lost in the minutiae of our own lives and don’t realize the history of our surroundings. Understanding your surroundings and the influential people who have helped shape it brings extra layers of meaning to your location and possibly the effectiveness of your own actions in the world.

And that Michelle, she’s a sweet one. We talked alot about art, who it’s made by, who it’s made for, and what’s the whole point of it. It’s filled with so much potential but alot of it targeted towards a very limited audience (mostly other artists that understand the jargon and lexicon). Art has the ability to contain symbols that inspires and translate complex ideas for the average viewer. We should strive to produce art that has meaning for the average viewer and help them act in a way more in accordance with their vision of a better world. In my opinion of course…

Reading through the Ong material, I was reminded of an article I read about the Mandarin dialect of the Chinese language being suited best for engineering and the arts.  I believe it was related to the structure of the language and the imagery contained within it.  The medium of communication defines the parameters of it’s output. Oral language was only able to transmit a certain amount of information from generation to generation.  Written language was able to externalize knowledge, allowing storehouses of information to be passed to future generations.

Human cognition is not based in textual information but rather image-based. It strikes me that we could be moving towards communicating in images, lowering the need for education to process the storehouses of textual knowledge.  This would democratize knowledge and perhaps bridge the gap between cultures that speak in different languages.  Going back to my first thought about mandarin being the best language for engineering and the arts, perhaps we’ll all find a common communication medium in the future.