Back to it!

Time to get back into the habit of creative thinking.  New venue, different group of students, but fortunately I will have the pleasure of being with the same teacher again. As opposed to last year, it seems I will be the token “old fart” in the class this year. 

It is with some trepidation but also a sense of excitement that I enter into the first term of 2011.  No doubt the expectations of my work will be higher this year – hope I can rise to the challenges.

First assignment – a stop-motion video has now been completed and is here for all to see. Had the usual codec conundrums, but YouTube digested my f4v file without too many protestations. The video probably does not meet any of the criteria set out in the brief – but heck – isn’t that what artistic licence is all about!

The Journey

“Learn to see” was the main objective for the year. I thought looking through the camera lens would be the answer, but participation in this course taught me otherwise.

Looking at what I achieved and the range of activities I have engaged in – merely pursuing a photography only course would have been a limiting experience. Approaching the learning process from so many angles has been liberating as well as mentally challenging.

Having spent the best part of my life in a left-brain environment - suddenly having to attempt to fully engage the right brain in my approach to the arts, at times “messed with my head space”. However, I feel richer for the experience. No doubt, having been with like-minded people in an encouraging and friendly environment made the journey easier.

I feel I have achieved my quest - it is now a matter of building on the foundations laid down during year. I intend to continue this journey next year and hope to travel together with some of the wonderful colleagues and friends I have been with this year.

I would like to pay  tribute to David – his enthusiasm and steadfast belief that we all have artistic abilities was greatly appreciated. The end of year exhibition proves that he is right! Thank you.

Quotes and Quips

Half the modern drugs could well be thrown out the window, except that the birds might eat them.  ~Martin H. Fischer

I have in between paroxysms of coughing, sneezing and feeling generally miserable found time to read a few quotes. It’s been mainly one-liners as that seems to be the sum total of my current attention span.

Over the past few days/nights, I’ve put a few of these quotes on a webpage – and I shall be happy to include your favourite if you post it in the comments section below.

The webpage may not work well in some versions of Internet Explorer but is fine in Safari and FireFox. In IE8, there is an icon resembling a torn sheet of paper on the address bar - clicking it may resolve the display problem! The webpage may take a moment or two to fully load.

I used the @font technique in the webpage – you may very well not like my choice, but free @font libraries are at this stage very limited. Shows great promise though.

Bed-bound

Despite having engaged in all-out pharmaceutical warfare, the nasty little bug currently bothering me, is winning too many of the battles.
Mind and body have turned into mush, making any attempt at useful activity quite futile.

Fortunately Pradnya has rallied amongst the failing troops, and the first copies of the Exhibition Catalogue have been produced, with the rest to be printed and collated on Monday. Go Pradnya!!

Briefly caught the late afternoon light in the garden. Always lifts the spirits:

Image © PeteM2010

Further dispatches when mind and body again join forces.

Colloquialisms

First time I heard the expression “crook in bed with a wog” I had no idea about what it meant, but it sounded exotic! Believe me, from my current experience, it isn’t. To add insult to injury, the attendant fever induced hallucinations over the past few days have been totally uninspiring.
However, I have during a few lucid moments made a webpage from a few of my photos from the Zoo outing. Just click HERE to have a look.

I have used a few CSS3 selectors on that page, so if you have an up-to-date and compliant browser (which does not include IE7 or IE8, but Microsoft is slowly getting the message, IE9 is apparently showing promise) you can see ‘rounded corners’, ‘drop shadows’ and ‘opacity’ in action – no Photoshop. The page XHTML and CSS weighs in at just over 4KB!

Old (type)faces

Visiting the Melbourne Printing Museum was quite an experience. There can't be may places in the world where you can still see hot metal typesetting in live action. Michael and his fellow old boys had a Linotype and a Ludlow machine all steamed up and in fine working order for us to see, hear and smell.

Image © PeteM2010

The culmination of a perfect day’s outing was the production of a hand-printed letterpress poster. Additionally, for me, having had a chance to rummage through cupboards full of old matrices, wooden typefaces and some glorious Italian paper stock, was pure bliss!

Like to see a few more images? Just CLICK here!

Seal Charmer

After a day at the Zoo, it's hard to say what was more fun – watching the animals or watching people’s reactions to them. Without doubt, the Zoo trip put a smile on everybody’s faces. For me, one of the many highlights was seeing Lidia in full flight photographing the seals. Poetry in motion! 

Image © PeteM2010

This chap was used to posing for the camera - didn't make a move until I'd set up the camera and was ready to shoot!

Image © PeteM2010