Month: December 2019

For my final week of prototyping, I created design sketches of two other cryptids I hope to include in the museum, the Loveland Frogman and the Chupacabra. This time around I also included some facts about the cryptids that will be included in the museum to garner feedback on what should and shouldn’t be included – basically, how much of the label card should be fact and how much can be jokes. The feedback I received was very positive; everyone liked the designs, especially the Loveland Frogman. One of my feedback questions was about color palettes – here, viewers disagreed. While most people imagined the Loveland Frogman as the classic bright green of tropical frogs, some imagined him in darker shades of brown, much like a common toad. People were also divided on whether his scrubs should be the classic blue color or if they should be an ugly print to enhance the comedy factor. However, from last week’s round of feedback, I know to stick to what people recognize, so I will make the scrubs blue for audiences to better understand his occupation.

It was suggested once again that the cryptids have the normal museum space environment and then at the flip of a switch be transported to their “natural environment.” While I have put aside this suggestion multiple times, I am starting to become concerned. It makes me worried that without the alternative environment my museum will not have enough content or enough of the “wow” factor to attract players. However, I’m not even sure I’ll be able to finish the laundry list of assets just for the museum space, not even mentioning how that list would be doubled or tripled by a second environment for every cryptid. On this one, we’ll just have to wait and see for winter break. If I have enough free time and motivation over break, I may be able to include it, but as of now the second environment remains a pipe dream.

Prototype 1

For my first prototype I thought mostly about what images I want to be shown on the sphere. I was deciding between animated and real graphics, and the best way to convey the story I am trying to tell. The feedback I received was that real graphics of the earth would convey more of a message than animations. I also was trying to figure out how I wanted to go through the story of the process of electronic waste and display it throughout the earth. A classmate suggested highlighting the country that I wanted to discuss next in a darkish grey color and zooming in on it as the shade got darker until the clip I wanted to show was played. The main outcome of this prototype feedback was that I needed to figure out what storyline I want to have in order to create the projection and how its going to make the sphere important to the show. 

Prototype 2

My second prototype was a mini model of what I imagined the room to look like. It was constructed out of cardboard and painted black with a white foam sphere hanging from a thin piece of cardboard that laid at the top of the box. The feedback that I received was to consider constructing a larger scale model of the room and using a small projector to look at how the light will act on the sphere. Also, I talked about what the sphere should be made out of and was debating if it should be something that’s already the shape of a sphere that I can find or building it myself. One idea was getting an inflatable beach ball so that its light and hollow, however the concern was that it would have to be spray painted white and the creases in the balloon could be distracting. Another idea was to create it from styrofoam like what the model ball was made out of, but the surface isn’t smooth and might alter the projections.   Classmates also suggested having some type of projection/screen display on the back wall behind the sphere for the audience to look at after the presentation. 

Prototype 3

My last prototype I built a larger scale model of the room and used a pico projector to display an image of an earth. While talking with my classmates there were several questions that I was asking/brought to my attention: 

1. Will there be a start and finish? 
2. Is the earth going to be projected on both sides? 
3. How will the audience watch the video? 
4. Video display on one half/black on the other side with statistics 
5. Projectors? Screen displayers? A static visual that incorporates the screens?
6. Where will the projectors be in relation to the sphere and screens
7. What will the sphere be made out of 

The conversations during class struck a lot of questions and things to think about while I continue to do research and build on my idea. We discussed having a display in the back of the room that’s built and static and the two screens in the back would be connected to the display but have motion to them. Someone also mentioned the idea of only displaying the earth on half of the screen for the audience to watch when the show begins, and on the back half have other statistics that run while they can look at the display. I personally think that would be a better approach since I was still trying to figure out how I was going to project the earth on both sides of the globe and then realizing that either the audience will have to move or the globe will have to spin so they see the whole show. After this last discussion I felt more confident how I want the show to progress and my main focus now is continuing to do research and plan out/create what I want to be projected. Along with creating a design/logo for the print materials I want to have on the other sides of the room and what I want the title of the show to be called.

My third prototype was intended to be demonstrating my wifi outlets. I had purchased my outlets a few weeks ago but hadn’t had a chance to try them until my third prototype. Although the wifi outlets were simple to set up at home, they were not able to connect to a hotspot on campus or connect to the schools wifi network. I opted to show off my design sketch a second time (especially since I didn’t have a chance to show my sketch to a lot of the class yet) with the videos that I am following to ask for advice on the exterior design of the water screen. Caitlyn suggested the idea of building a well around the outside of the water tank area of my screen which then, through discussion, developed into the idea of having a bucket hanging from the well to collect donations for the Thirst Project. I really liked this idea because it takes my project a step closer to the level of immersion I am striving for. Kris also offered an interesting take with his idea about having the audience come in, offering them some sort of spicy food and then creating the illusion that I don’t have any sort of drink for them to satisfy the burn. This idea sounds out there but I like the direction it’s stationed in. I want to involve my audience as much as possible and a hands on approach would be sure to capture their attention.

Elevator pitch: The main focus of my senior thesis project is to bring awareness to the water crisis, an issue not only holding a large impact in other countries but also right here in Ewing as we just witnessed with our water storage a few months ago. I plan to combine a mixture of woodworking skills and video skills to create an installation that spreads the message of immediate action for the water crisis. I will be using my project space as an area to collect donations for the Thirst Projects in order to build more wells for those who do not have access to a clean water source.

For my third prototype, I brought in my set design for the most complex scene — the opening scene at a sleepover in Freak’s bedroom. Here it is:

FEEDBACK:

• Will blankets laid over puppeteer access points look real enough?
• Can I convert other sets to work for several scenes to save space/time?
• Will dialogue be recorded live (typical for Muppets) or later?

My second prototype was my first main character puppet — THE BEAST! Here she is in all her glory:

She was so fun to make, and while she still needs arms and clothes, I have a more clear vision of The Beast as a character. Her snakes are also a prototype since I had to order more of the appropriate fabric. I feel really positively about the response to The Beast overall.

FEEDBACK:

• Excitement about snakes expressing her emotions from scene-to-scene (similar to Mike Wazowski’s girlfriend in Monsters, Inc.)
• Crowdsourcing a puppet/monster/fur pun for a band tee she wears
• How will her voice sound?

In the past week, I was finally able to get my program to generate a song of more than one note. Using the AC/DC songs Hell’s Bells and Back in Black, it generated this song: https://clyp.it/k32srox2?token=fbd7d03bf3eacbb19e0a2b459dd2cf52

I noticed that in this case (and in the case of a few other songs I generated) the generated song seems to start off a bit random, and then settle into one riff. I think I have an idea of why, so I will look into that.

My next goal is to continue transcribing AC/DC songs, since having a sample size of two songs obviously makes it sound almost the same as the two songs. However, I am thinking about taking a different approach to it. Instead of feeding it whole songs, I’m thinking about feeding it riffs or melodies, and then allowing the program to piece these riffs or melodies together to create a song, since I’ve been using modern day music with more repetition than other styles.

I also gave an early version of my elevator pitch in class, which was along the lines of this:

“My project is a program that is able to create music based off influence from music scores available to it.”

Based off of feedback from my peers in class and from other friends outside of class, I realized that I needed to be more specific on what it does and how it works. Here is my new and improved elevator pitch:

“My project is a machine learning program that takes songs of a certain style as input, learns what makes them unique, and generates a song based off of the input. For example, you can give the program some scores of Beatles songs. It will figure out what features make all of those Beatles songs similar using an algorithmic process, and it will then generate a song that utilizes these features. The result is a what a Beatles song would sound like if they were still together.”