ddump posters

I'm actually impressed by how people can be differently inspired by dumped files.
This is the work from a graphic designer(Emanuele Bonetti) who wanted to try the recycle design process himself.
He used some bad pictures in the creation of some posters, nicely reinventing the aesthetics of the pictures themselves.

chmod +x - ddump speedgeeking

An image of the ddump download flow.
(Martin Howse)



















A poetic interpretation of a super pixelate image.
(Avik Maitra)



























A messed-up pp presentation.
(Dave Griffiths)



A pd viedo-collage of some random images from the dump.
(Agoston Nagy - ?)



Here some of the results from the speedgeeking workshop, during the chmod +x festival in Groeningen! I've just asked some partecipants to use the files from the ddump repository to create something new, in spite of the short amount of time(30 minutes) I had really inspiring results!

Michael Landy : Art Bin 29|1 - 14|3|2010 South London Gallery

Again news from the project which inspire the fisrt approach on my collected files (art is rubbish poster), it seems it's going pretty big! Mr Landy is collecting real art trash in the gallery, raising "issues around disposal, destruction, value and ownership" - sounds intersting to my hypothesis! I'll pay attention to the results.

6 to 7 - Python/ImageMagick gif tiles

Animated gifs using image tiles.

6 to 7 - Python/ImageMagick tiles

Again playing with the idea of tearing apart images and try to have something new out of them, I created some tiles compositions from dumped images. I'm actually impressed by the fact that the final result is totally depending on the chance of finding the right image to fit the process. The end visual result has clearly came out from different sources, characteristic that in my opinion in enriching the traditional design process and its output.

6 to 7 - Python/ImageMagick tiles

Experimenting with Python and ImageMagick, lookin for a script to create regular patterns. Work in progress.

6 to 7 - LaTex/Python maps

From today Lafkon workshop I had an image randomly cut into pieces, trough python, and pasted into a LaTex grid. The aim is again to try to mess up the coordinates of all these maps I keep on finding in the dump.

6 to 7 - dump in LaTex, during LAFKON workshop

Here is an experiment done while learning LaTex as a tool for graphic design, I've used an image from the dump (see first image) and tried to make something else out of it. [Thanks to Christoph from Lafkon, and to Ema that helped with the script].

6 to 7 - google maps

Google maps snapshots can be turned in made up areas using the Python Image Module. The first image is the original one from the dump that I've used to create the others. In the second one a part of the original picture is rotated, replacing the original area the new one is confusing the viewer in the region identification, while from the third image on, I show other experiments with loops.
It seems that architects are using Google maps to study the areas they are working on, this could open up the possibility to find other sets of maps like the one I just found and mix them up!

6 to 7 - opposite backlight

What if we try to actually create something with those backlight shapes? I can already see how my graphic output is changing using a precise kind of input, looks fresher and spontaneous.

6 to 7 - black pics

Among all wrong pictures in the dump, black ones made me curious! Black is not always the same kind of black, will this make you moving your laptop screen(or your head) to better understand the shapes of the squares?

6 to 7 - backlight

I find interesting the amount of bad pictures you can find in a trash,
in particular the ones you can get with the manual mode of those digital new cameras. You can get completely black or completely white pictures, put a finger between the subject and the camera, or forget to put on focus. Today I've found many backlight pictures and I've tried to build something with them. For the moment is just a weird skyline but it can become anything in the future.

February - 6 to 7 - constellation

For the next months I'll be posting about my experiments with the dumped files I had so far. This is today's test, I've opened an illustrator file with open-source softwares and I found quite interesting the result I had with Gimp. Quite funny to have a constellation turned into a black square!

Modern art is rubbish

Here thevery first attempt to use dumped files. In the black square are displayed the number of files used, and a little preview of all of them. In this case I was just inspired by the title of an article I've read called "Modern art is rubbish", that was quite connected with the value of rubbish.

Here the link
http://www.creativereview.co.uk/cr-blog/2010/january/modern-art-is-rubbish.

Digital dump

What would happen then if we had a digital dump?

The idea would be having a computer application that could connect everyone's trash with a common garbage repository on the internet.
It could be made by building a "recycle bin" that would basically stay close to the one commonly used, and where people could choose to put their trash in order to share it with the community.
An other option, but the twos are not exclusive, could be creating a warning that every time you dump something will ask if you want to share it or not.

The repository would be an internet resource miming what also happens for real in the design recycle process, that is basically reuse something that the society labelled as useless and try to give life to it again.

Recycle design in general, is maybe not the most productive solution for the environment problem, but it's in my opinion a huge statement regarding society and its attitude of selecting the right things to buy, choose, leave and be.
Who said that thing was useless? Who will be able to criticize the end result of those processes? And why things are actually thrown away?

This are some of the questions that are, among others, coming out approaching the topic:
Is everyone dumping the same kind of material? What does this material look like? What is it about?
Can we find connections between what we dump and our lives? Our way of thinking? Our opinion on society?

I have the feeling more are going to come!

Small presentation

-Slides group critique-download-
Group critique presentation.
(main ideas at page 13, for design ethics, and 17, for digital recycle)

It can go even further!

This doesn't just fix aesthetic problems(guess you noticed the bald head), but more alarming is the difference between the picture from the Italian and from the English magazine in matter of message communicated. Already the title can explain how things are going in italian journalism: "La grande offensiva" Vs. "Feeling the heat".

Photoshop warnings?

Photoshop can have a social responsibility too. It seems nobody can renounce to the perfection you can gain using this amazing tool, specially fashion scene and advertising.
This is actually building a world made of as unreal characters, whose fame is leading to unreachable beauty ideals for generations of teenagers that are more and more relying on cosmetic surgery.

So far the retouching issue interested just in the gossip magazines, but the social consequence of this banal manipulations recently extended into the political debate.
Specially in France and UK is growing the idea of warnings that should clarify how much the image has been retouched.

[Above: Kim Kardashian, Keira Knightley]

BP - Emerald Paintbrush award

The prize was offered at the company for its great attempt to greenwash its brand over the course of 2008(nice brush homage too), in particular Bp, invested millions of dollars in an advertising campaign announcing its commitment to alternative energy sources(with very strong claims too).

The realityis of course different, since we are speaking about an oil company. Greenpeace found the way to get internal company documents, which could clarify the real intents of the company, that was of course still investing more than the 90% of its investments just in oil and gas.

more at http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/blog/climate/bps-wins-coveted-emerald-paintbrush-award-worst-greenwash-2008-20081218

This is definitely beyond the line that divides ethics and money, or it isn't? Is design meant to be that cynical?

Design ethics

[>information design >design power: show the power of design advertising wrong stuff, show the power of infographics through several graphics interpreting the same data giving different results(maybe recursive on design ethics), several small projects spread in the internet (see the eye-coffemachine story).
>design ethics >design for all: machine that can check how much ethic in the work(make it good or simply say how much)
>photoshop: kind of WikiLeaks but with originals of photoshopped pictures]