catchin up

Hey gang. Just tryin to catch up on my blog, but whenever I start I have too much to say and have to be somewhere else. Here we go. After our success with the "movie quote marathon", I had the opportunity to reward the gruop with a field trip, which also get them out of their comfort zone of the club walls. Gabe, Carlos, Ms. Mays and I piled us and 9 kids in a van and took off for TCU. My friend Ryan is a senior there and is graduating with a major in radio, TV, and film. With his help we were able to get the kids to see a step further than just having fun with a digital camera in an afterschool activity.
We started with a tour of the radio station, 88.7 KTCU "the choice". We got to see the DJ booth, a small recording studio, and he let them each take home a cd the station was disposing of. Next, we moved on to a talk show/news broadcaste set. The kids got to stand behind the cameras and try on the camera headsets, or pretend to be talk show hosts. Next we moved on to see the prop room where the kids noticed the school used some of the same power tools they used in our first chain reaction cycle. Then we checked out the make up room and talked about the importance of costume and make-up. And finally, we checked out the sound booths, where the director sits and sound and music is mixed. That's where Ryan fielded some questions, and when Ms. Mays asked the kids, "If you wanted to be in showbiz, besides acting, what would you want to try to be?" we got a variety of answers we never would have recieved prior to the trip. The experience definatly made them grasp the idea that creative career options are waiting in the future if they put their minds to it.
Gotta go but next time I'll blog about our "improv dialog day" which heralded such works as "Hulk verses Vin Diesle" and "Bionce meets Little Mermaid", and the making and premier of "Leaders of Love".

ALA Wednesday March 23

The plan for today was to bring everyone in that had been working on the music cycle and put them on the floor of the museum with some of their projects to interact with the visitors. As i was preparing for this, i realized that i would not have the support staff nor the space to do this with all the kids on this particular day. The plans were changed then to giving the students some real practical experience in working with the public in a new capacity. THe students were introduced to the wonderful world of working the exhibits at the museum. BEFORE I CONTINUE HERE IS THE REASON BEHIND THAT DECISCION AND IT'S FUTURE IMPLICATION: We have a chance this summer to teach three weeks of museum school classes based on our work in Design IT. Saafir, Megan, and myself will be teaching one week of classes. we are going to be bringing in some of the program students to be our teaching assistants those weeks. They have been informed of this and we have given them three criteria that we are looking for. ONE, We want to see fluency with the technology - which will be crickets, LOGOBLOCKS, and Microworlds. TWO, we want to see dependability on the part of the student (consistent commitment to the program) and the ability to work WITH anyone, not just their friends (i.e. not complaining about partners, etc.) THREE, we want to see who will take some initiative, show some leadership skill, and be able to really engage the public no matter the circumstance. The second and third criteria were experimented during this exercise, because the people were partnered up at random to go to the different galleries. The students were in EXPLORAZONE, KIDSTUFF, JOSHUA'S JOURNEY, DinoDIG, and KIDSPACE. They understood that they were to help out the floor staff in the areas given, and that they were to find ways to engage and interact with the public using all the tools available in the galleries. The floor staff knew that they were to put the students to work wherever they thought the kids would do the most good, and to keep watch from time to time for anything extraordinary taking place (or a big problem.) What i was expecting was a few standouts and a lot of trouble keeping people focused. What i experienced blew me away.
Each one of the students truly rose to the occasion. There are students that i don't think i've ever seen come out of their respective shells, but this day it was all different. Lauren found her comfort in herself by helping kids in Kidspace. Wesley was amazing in his interaction with students in the DinoDig. Tyler did great at moving all around the gallery engaging as many people as possible. Arsenio took over the Bed of Nails and impressed a lot of people. Filip, Bianca, and Ara started a TWISTER tournament on the floor in the KIDSTUFF exhibit. Putting the students in an unfamiliar situation and telling them we wanted to see them show initiative in their public engagement skills was a risk. I"ll admit that. This risk worked! The kids were different after this experience. they all experienced some amazing moments with visitors, and also some tough challenges. Some of the responses ranged from "i didn't know how to interact with this child" to " that visitor was really rude" to "how do we deal with too many people around the exhibit" and "some kids don't know how to share." All of the challenges are felt by people who come to work here for the first time. The students were debriefed and asked to think about how they might interact in a teaching setting with us, as well as in new places putting their own works on display. Next week, we will be changing up the places where they go, as well as discussing professional conduct, what is meant by meaningful and positive visitor interaction, and debrief after they've had a chance to experience a new place and new people. All of these skills are going to come into play this summer with our teaching opportunity, and with our proposed intern ideas and hopefully mentoring opportunities as well.

Jonathon's Art Cycle Favorites



Octavio Ocampo - Don Quixote
and
Jeff Koons - this one is just cool!


Bernini - The Ecstacy of St. Theresa
and
David - Death of Marat


Dali - Find the fruit, and the dog


Chaos and Order - M. L. Walker

ALA art cycle Tuesday March 22

Today i went over to the ALA armed with a cd full of art images, ranging from digitally created forms to sculptures to paintings to photographs. Karie and I put the images on 9 different computers, and each machine had a different image showing. the students were given 2.5 minutes at each station to look at and study the work, then write down observations and their own interpretation of the work in question. For the first nine pictures they did this separately, not talking about the art but only studying for themselves. The second group of nine were done together as a group. The purpose behind the interpretation of different art piecesis simple - we haven't ever discussed that before. we have asked the students to create so many things, but they've never experienced the process of really thinking about what a piece might mean to them - what it says, how it makes them feel. This is important because when they begin the final cycle of the year, working on an IT project of their choice, they need to be able to realize that no matter what they create, whether it be a cricket sculpture, a MIDI program and music, original music from digital software, an animated film, or live action film, as well as a possible Microworlds game or program - everyone who experiences their work will see it and feel it differently than they do. If they want to convey a specific image, emotion, or idea, then by learning about how different people interpret the things around them the students will have to serisouly think about what could be done to make THEIR idea of THEIR work stand out to as many people as possible. THis is a great deal of Meta-thinking, but i know they can do it. the students picked up on so many things from the artwork we showed them that even i didn't see. Carlos, Joyce, Karie, and myself were amazed at how much they noticed from the works, and the level of emotion and discussion generated from seeing so many different forms of art. I have posted some of the images that they studied. The next exercise for them will be to bring in art that they find intriguing, and the group will critique and interpret the pieces that their peers enjoy. Then the students will have to explain their ideas and why they brought that particular piece in to the group - hopefully to help cement that what one person may find intensely interesting, another may find terribly boring, and this thought process carries over to the actual creative process to help make much more personal, yet, maybe even more universal work within our IT framwork.
Jonathon

Blog This! Radioshack Store 1 Display

The Radioshack flagship store will open downtown on April 1 and the first thing visitors will see when they walk in the door is six sound sculptures our ALA students built last week. Robin Reardon, a freelance designer/producer who works in New York, invited us to do the display after Van brought her down to see the teens work. Sound sculptures on nice display stands in the front window of Store 1 during the Mainstreet Arts festival…Oh yeah. Each of the sculptures will have a product card with a list of its features and components

The world is a small place – Jonathon and I were listening to Eddie Izzard recordings while we built sound automata and the person producing our automata display at store 1 promoted Eddie Izzard in the U.S.! How cool is that? She is an ex-imagineer who is sharp and fun to work with.

Panther Review

our film and music cycle out at panther was a complete success. by the end we had up to 15 teens participating regularly and many other kids interested and assisting. we took 9 on a field trip to tcu one day, and by spring break we had completed a two minute film we could proudly enter into a national competition. but in order to get the kids interested in dedicating time to a film project, i had to take them through a couple excercises that taught them about the many steps in film making.
after the "simpson's storyboard" excersize, we continued storyboarding, but this time with stories of their own. i brought 5 intel play cameras, and a box of random objects. their job was to pick three objects and write a storyboard for an animated short using their objects before even touching a camera. i've posted two examples of drawn storyboards in the photos below. this definately got them focused on plot before playing.


"one armed grape" storyboard

the next week i had two activities planned. the first to keep encouraging their drawing skills, and the second to help them get aquainted with using and acting in front of the digital camera. first i set up a drawing pad with markers, some cards with random objects, people and places they picked, and jolly ranchers (the jolly ranchers pulled in the crowd). we then played an intense game of win, lose or draw.


storyboard for "3 object" animated short

the game got their attention to where now we had a stage and an audience. so for the next activity, entitled our "movie quote marathon", we set up the digital camera and i pulled out a hat full of movie quotes. earlier that day, i ran around the museum collecting a favorite movie quote from every staff memeber i saw. with these quotes, i had the kids pair up and then pick one quote each. they then had a moment to brainstorm a short dialog using both quotes and shortly rehearse before filming. after two or three takes, some with brilliant acting debuts, the pair would then move behind the camera to film. we even had a directors chair where the person within could yell things like, "actors, places!" or "lights, camera, action!" or everyone's favorite, "quiet on the set!" which turned quickly into, "shutup on the set!". but the shorts always ended with an applause and "that's a rap!".

gotta go, but just to give a little reference to the photos i've posted, i finally photographed some of sketches that accompanied some of the activities we've done. the first two are sketches made of a proposed ALA chain reaction piece, and, as complicated as the the sketch seemed at first, this group eventually created a near exact replica of what was proposed in this drawing. very impessive.


ALA halloween chain reaction


also, i couldn't help but photograph the drawing that accompanied the answer to my ice breaker question to the ALA art cycle group, "what is art?". awesome.


answer to "what is art?"

and finally, i posted an example of one of 25 movie tickets needed to get into the first annual panther film festival, which i will detail its success in my next blog. best to you all.

ticket for 2005 panther film festival


myles

Blog this!

I owe the DesignIT blog a half-dozen entries. I thought I'd list them here so you will know what's coming. (Yes, this is a psychological trick I'm using on myself -- I'll never get the entries written otherwise.)

Mad Scientist Ball
I put in a sixty-five hour week building sound automata with the rest of the DesignIT crew-- don't you want to hear about it?

ALA Art Institute
Myles and Jonathon have already written, but I'll add my perspective and some COOL photos

Making the Northside Dodgeball Film
Or, how to get a bunch of teenagers excited about working with IT in forty-eight hours

Northside Field Trip
Santiago brought over fifteen teenagers on Friday to visit the Museum, watch Aliens of the Deep, and help close DinoDig

Radioshack Store 1 Display
Robin Reardon is awesome, Store 1 is awesome, the automata the teens built are awesome, the cramp I have in my shoulder after working on the laptop for ten hours straight is awesome.

goin into spring

hey gang. just want to briefly add some details to the ALA art cyle experience.
had a blast. activities not mentioned by jon, (who, by the way, did a fantastic job) included an icebreaker on tuesday morning where all picked a sheet of paper with an artform on it (ie sculpture, film, culinary) and shared with the class an example of such. we also asked the eternal question, which they all aswered on sheets of paper to themselves..."what is art?" i still have the answers which i am excited to share with them after break, but for you all, a few examples...

"art is i guess to draw or to like make something.
well i guess art is anything. fro example this table is art!"

"art is people making things that inspire them"

"art is anything that you notice."

"art is what beauty is in the eye of the beholder...
(drawing of a cow)...
to me=art
to someone else=ugly"

"art is creativity, something that you can make, draw, paint, or say."

"art is a drawing or painting or sketch.
a sculpture or carving or 3D figure of some sort.
art is anything and everything.
a person is art."

on wednesday, we also went outside to analize photographs from my college portfolio and let a few of the kids talk about art they brought in themselves. melenie even brought in drawings her great uncle made. i'm hoping through this we helped them identify themselves as artists, and for them to see that there is art programs to consider in college and beyond.
finally, the one constructive critisizm for the cycle was lack of time. i feel more connections could be utilized including visiting tcu's art biulding or my friend's painting studio, and cycle activities we brainstormed could be pursued further, including an idea we gathered from chip where the kids attempt to photographs one mood per evening with 5 shots per mood from disposable cameras. great concept, but more time was needed. on a positive note, i had a great time with the kids and truely hope we inspired some future artists.

Design IT Art Institute - March 7 - 11, 2005

The set up for this particular week of work with the ALA Design IT students was as follows: We had nine kids the started the week, with a tenth that came the last day to get involved. The ideas of exploring visual art, design, and drawing were integrated with the opportunity to create new sound sculptures for a display at Radio Shack's STORE ONE in downtown Fort Worth. We were able to acquire the expertise of some of our designers and artists here at the museum to come and talk with the students about their work, show them some of the designs and artwork in progress for new exhibits, and gain insight into the building and designing of their own scupltures. We were able to explore interesting art activities such as free form painting and drawing, as well as photography during this week. The painting and drawing included exercises where the students were asked to paint from their emotions felt during certain forms of music playing in the background. They were also given activities to sketch certain emotive ideas from their own thinking, and share them all with the group. All these activities served to get the students thinking about how drawing, sketching, and design might affect their work with the cricket scupltures, and the painting exercises helped to stimulate their thinking about color and the affect it might have on the viewer of the specific piece. The students also took a trip to the Modern Art Museum to gain some inspiration and see new examples of the same ideas - color, design, painting, drawing, sketches, and scuplture. The students id an amazing job of designing and building new sculptures to be put on display, all visually stimulating and exciting, coupled with their original artwork and designs for the actual scuplture. The sturdiness of the sculptures was called into question by tow of the museum's artists, so saafir and jonathon will attempt to help make these works as strong as possible over the next week, but keeping the original intent and design as intact as possible.

busy, busy, busy

hey gang. i'm blogging after the mass hysteria of the mad scientist ball, which ended up driving many scientists mad. however, i keep hearing about its overall success which is encouraging.
alot has happened out at panther since the outbreak of breakdancing/fighting films dominated the plotlines of our short films. knowing that we needed to begin to focus on the different aspects of how a movie is made, i came up with activities that would focus the gruop on particular steps of movie making instead of handing them a camera and saying "go!". first step, storybaording. this i knew would be difficult to hook the kids into, considering it requires sitting in one spot for a length of time. so, out came "the simpsons". first, to communicate the concept that film is not simply one long cammera shot, but a series of them portraying different anglesand perspectives, we watched the first 30 seconds of an episode and counted how many camera angle changes occurred in that time. to make it fun, first we counted by ourselves, announced our estimate to the group, then counted outloud together to see who was closest. marquas won with 31 camera angle changes. next, i handed out three storyboard sheets and pencils. this time we continued to watch the episode, but after three to four scene changes we paused the show and attempted to storyboard what we just watched. i still have some great storyboard examples from the kids of where homer buys a lottery ticket from apu at the quickie mart. overall, we had a blast, and i feel drawing from shows the kids relate to really draws interest. ran outta time to let you know about my last three visits cause i gotta be in dino dig. but the following blog will be about our win, lose or draw day, movie quotes marathan, our field trip to tcu's radio, tv, film department, and finally our this past monday, our improv movie dialog day. wish you all the best.
myles