http://www.n3k4.com/cat.swf

Best game ever, where else could you fire children at cats?

1. Feedback On Coursework It was noted that feedback wasn’t being given on coursework that had been handed in. Although it was then suggested that this feedback could be given in the lecturer’s surgery hours as it would take a lot of time to go through individual coursework in lecture time. Therefore it would be best to contact the lecturer to arrange a time within surgery hours to go over coursework if needed.
2. Contacting Certain Lecturers Some people had said that they found it hard to get in contact with certain lecturers out of hour, especially by email. It was then pointed out that these were part time lecturers and were not contracted to work within certain hours. Therefore get as much out of them as you can within lecture time.
3. Attendance There was some concern about the attendance at the start of the year, but it has started to pull itself back up again so this wasn’t a major issue.
4. New IDAT Website Chris has been working on the new site for IDAT which you can see here. It was also pointed out that the forums would be a better way of communication not just for the first years, but all years as a whole instead of using the mailing lists. Chris will be meeting Craig Mason (forums admin) about it soon.
   Also, he will be updating the people list so get your URLs in!

That’s it unless you want to know boring masters stuff

Who?

Initially it’s hard to start this. Is it who are GRL, what is GRL, what is the GRL? I think the start of this post is best put by Wikipedia’s entry for GRL;

Graffiti Research Labs, created by Eyebeam Atelier and OpenLab, is dedicated to outfitting graffiti writers and artists with open source technologies for urban communication. G.R.L. agents are currently working in the lab and in the field to develop and test a range of experimental technologies for the state-of-the-art graffiti writer.

GRL is a collaborative non-profit group based in New York which has been created from the foundation of Eyebeam by graffiti writers Q-Branch and Fi5e. The aim of the group, is to research and develop open-source technologies for fellow graffiti artists.
After brainstorming ideas into looking for ways to get around anti-graffiti paint, the Graffiti Research Lab was born.

Why?

I have had a huge interest in all forms of street art for a couple of years now and I feel that that the type of projects and ideas is ‘the street art of the future’. That is quite a statement to make, however, a lot of the aspects of current street art that hold the artist back are bypassed in these type of projects such as legal issues and style.

One of the projects of Graffiti Research Lab is the LED throwies project which is shown in the video below.

This impresses me greatly for many reasons. Not also does the final product look amazing, it’s on show for the entire community (effectively being its own exhibition), it can be created collaboratively, it’s legal and it’s inexpensive. Therefore it seems like a perfect project to recreate.

How?

There are various instructions online that show how to make an LED throwie. It seems very easy, being only a number of steps and it shouldn’t take too long to make a large number of them. I have already bought some of the ‘ingrediants’, so when everything arrives I will start testing out some test throwies and when the time is ready, prepare for the final piece.

When it comes, I shall be using a number of people to help throw the throwies at the metal surface. Also, the event will be filmed and photos will be taken. The edited video will be the final documentation of the project, as the video is for the original LED throwie idea.

Where?

Obviously the location needs some sort of large metal surface for the throwies to stick to. Unless you are properly looking for a good location like this, you have no idea how many places are built out of concrete. I have had a number of ideas for locations to perform the project;

1. The Sundial+
   
   This would be an ideal location because it is in the heart of the city, being the optimum place as an exhibition because it allows the maximum amount of people to enjoy the event and project.
   It has the water fountain underneath it so it may stop people taking the throwies off to keep for themselves if they enjoy them so much.

   -

   As this is a very public place, the council may not allow it to happen although Plymouth Council have been pretty good in allowing art projects like this but it’s not 100% certain.
   If the throwies bounce off the sundial and land in the water, they die.

2. Side of the Smeaton Building+

   The Smeaton Building is part of the University so they may be more willing than Plymouth Council to allow the event to go forward.
   There is a huge metal panel on the side which is quite open and public. Also it is very high which makes sure people cannot steal the throwies.

   -

   It is not a prime location and not the most interesting of buildings (the throwies may change that).

When?

Preferably before the deadline.

After trying to research information about Lasse, I couldn’t find much information at all because he is a fairly new media artist. I thought this wouldn’t be a good avenue to follow and even though because the sole point would be to get into the mind and processes of the artist and it would be hard to capture his imagination with very little known details about him.
I may carry on outside of the project with a similar idea that I had which involved using footage of everyday occurences and editing the footage in a way that the audio produces a song.

One thing that has interested me is the work of the Graffiti Research Lab, both their work with light and with a collaborative audience. I think out of all of their work, LED throwies would be the most appropriate work to copy because it doesn’t involve expensive equipment and can be replicated easily. Also, an audience can be used in the same way they are used in the video to create the ‘finished artwork’ which will add an extra aspect to the project that I will have to deal with.

This assignment is intended to test your ability to apply the approaches, concepts, methods, and techniques covered this term (active-server pages, relational databases,) along with those covered last term (such as loops, conditional execution, constants, variables, arrays, classes, procedures, functions, and modular design).
You are required to design and implement a prototype virtual photograph gallery web-site.
You are advised to stick to the specification provided – to prevent wasting time on aspects that don’t get you more marks. For the purposes of this assignment, I will act as your user (discuss your submission with me during tutorials – I will give you advice). In the past, students who use me to test their web-site do well in this assignment.
Description
You are required to develop a web-based photograph gallery system, that allows customers to view and rate (1 to 5 stars) the photographs on-line. It is important that only members can access the site.

It is essential the you adhere to the specification, as your system will need to integrate with components developed by other people (ensure you use the correct database, table, and field names).

The following information should be stored in the database (provided):

D1. Member – details of people who are members:
MemberID – A unique number identifying each member.
Surname – a member’s family name.
Forenames – a member’s given name(s).
Email – a member’s email address (used to login).
Password – the password used by a member to login

D2. Photo – details of Photographs that are to be rated:
PhotoID – A unique number identifying a photo.
Title – The title of the photograph.
Date – The date that the photograph was taken.
Location – The location were the photograph was taken.
Description – A description of the photograph.
Filename – The filename of a picture of the photograph.
MemberID – The ID of the member who took the photograph (members are not allowed to rate their own photographs).

D3. Rating – details of each photographs rating:
RatingID – A unique number identifying a rating.
MemberID – the ID of the member who has rated this photograph.
PhotoID – the ID of the photo being rated.
Rating – this member’s rating of this photograph (between 1 and 5 – 1 is poor, 5 is excellent).

The system should provide the following facilities:

F1. Login page – This should ask the user to enter an email address and password, which when submitted should be validated against the members in the database. If the details match then the browser should be redirected to the menu page, otherwise a suitable message should be displayed indicating that the login failed, with the option of trying again.

F2. Menu page – This menu should offer options (links) to the pages providing functionality F3, F5, and F6.

F3. Photo List page – This should display a list (table) of Photo Date, Title, Location, and the Average Rating (needs to be calculated from the database).
Each row (Photo) should be a link to the Photo’s details (F4).
The user should be able to restrict the items displayed to those matching a given search criteria (entered via a text box), e.g. if the user enters the characters ‘be’ the list of photos should show only photos containing these characters in either the title or location fields.

F4. Photo Details page – This should display the details of the selected Photo. It should contain a star display of the rating for the currently logged in user, if this photo belongs to another member (members cannot rate their own photos). When clicked this should alter the corresponding record in the rating table, or create a new rating record if none exists.

F5. My Photos page – This should display:
- A list of Photos belonging to the current member,
Each photo should have a link to the photo details page (F4).

F6. Logout – This should log the user out and prevent any subsequent access to the pages (unless the user logs on again).

You should submit two copies on CD, each disk containing a copy of the following:

· ASP program files (no other programming language or version is acceptable). This must:
- work from localhost/studentnumber, where ‘studentnumber’ represents your student number. e.g. localhost/12341234
- use the database called D:\Gallery.mdb (provided by me), and
- have an account with my email, and the password photos
(so that I can test your application)

Each disk should have your student number clearly written on it. You should ensure your disks work properly (on a different machine) and are checked for viruses before submission.

The following mark scheme will be used:

Functionality 30
F1 5
F2 3
F3 7
F4 9
F5 4
F6 2

Design 20
User Interface 7
Code 13

Anything that fails to run is liable to receive a fail grade.

This post is to help organise the social on Wednesday the 21st. We’re gonna go bowling at the place next to the VUE cinema at 7pm and then a couple of us are going to see Hot Fuzz at the cinema which is on at 8.30pm which you can come along to if you want.

Anyway this post is just to see who can make it and who can’t, please post a comment if you can’t/can, just to show that you’ve read this.
Cheers.

Have just been real busy, and when I’ve not been busy I’ve been drinking alcohol. I’ll get some proper updates soon but recently I have;

• Completed a number of IDAT projects.
• Worked on Cloud-One.com and created a number of websites through the company.
• Started up SpeekGeek.org with Ed Rackham which is going really well.
• Moved everything over to a new server thanks to Beeserve.com and Gary for the hosting.
• Drank copious amounts of tea.
• Drank copious amounts of Southern Comfort.
• Listened to copious amounts of drum and bass.
• Put a deposit on a house for next September.
• Not slept.
• Made images such as the this one.

More posts soon, need to stay on top of this blog.

Essentially, the idea of the Artefact project is to copy the work of another artist, getting involved in the work process and how their mind thinks. At first I wasn’t too keen on ‘copying’ work after all the plaguarism stuff we’ve been drilled with and would much rather take an idea an adapt it, but I can understand the point of it. Read more »

I have finished the audio project which required me to mix a number of tracks together and included recorded samples.

This was probably the most enjoyable piece I’ve done so far. It was quite new to me and I feel I got on well with the task, enough to try and mix more tracks.

You can listen to the mix here.