6. Remixing

(…)But I think these aren’t just the components of remixing. I think these are the basic elements of all creativity. I think everything is a remix, and I think this is a better way to conceive of creativity.–Kirby Ferguson

I really like when Kirby Ferguson mentioned this during his talks in TED talk. We shouldn’t mind much about originality because everything is a remix.

With the internet, we are able to gain more information, reference ,influence and also inspiration .Because of that and with today’s software , it made remixing easier for us. We can anyhow take open source images and combined together using Adobe Photoshop into something brand new.This technique is called as Photo montage and it can be seen in collage style web design.

Some might think that this is not original, lazy work, less productive and not creative because you are just taking existing images and combine it together. I do not agree with that because a creative mind is require to combine the right objects’ images(as in angels,size,lighting,colors) together in order to form an interesting image.

Internet provides most of the sources so why do you have to purposely go out to find a certain object just for their images and rather being stuck and ended up producing nothing when you couldn’t get it? This is what I called as less productive. And yes,the result is not original but to me, it is in another way because you are producing something new from combining existing one.

Below is my first web design for my project. As you can see, the small elements around the box such as the anchor and ship wheel are all taken from internet in png (transparent background) format. This helped me a lot because it is impossible for me to travel out just to capture these object’s images. That is why clients doesn’t concerned much about originality, they are more concerned on their goal same goes to users.

 

feel free to visit : jourventure.com 

Below is an interesting example for collage style web design.

We don’t have to purposely arrange the objects in reality and take photo of it, we could just find the objects images and arrange it in Photoshop even the realistic looks can be achieved by playing around with color,shadow and lighting in the software.

 Citation

Ferguson.K (2012) Embrace the remix, TED. Jun Available at: https://www.ted.com/talks/kirby_ferguson_embrace_the_remix/transcript?language=en

Coolhomepage.com(2012) Fantastic Collage Style Web Design Examples. Feb 28. Available at: http://coolhomepages.com/Fantastic-Collage-Style-Web-Design-Examples/blog-267.html

5. “Steal” an old idea to built a new idea

As a designer, inspiration are the main element to motivate us to produce an outstanding work. So where do we get our inspiration from? From reference. We can’t just build out a new idea with a empty mind, we need to have something existed to give us an idea on why,what,how it should be. That is why we have to refer things around us or even on search engine since it have less limitation and gives us variety of choices.With the search engine, it makes the world smaller and easy for people around the world to exchange ideas.References might make us less creative but it does guide us on how to start instead of being stuck and struggling to “pop” out an idea. We humans impossible to know everything straight away, we need to observe and learn to gain knowledge and build out ideas.

When lecture gave us assignments’ brief, there will be few links provided as reference for us.Even when we submit our projects, we have to cite some of the links as our in Harvard reference form to make sure where we got our references and also to avoid plagiarism .

Not to mentioned that, the moment we learn from something,study through text book ,we are already consider referencing to existing knowledge .

There’s even a cultural movement called Surrealism which is based on another art movement,Dadaism . Not only that, Surrealism is mostly based on the weird scenario that seen in dream and dream is built up from the combination of what we’ve seen before. Below is an example of surrealism artwork.

The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dali

“Good artist copy, great artist steal” – Picasso

The word “stealing” here doesn’t mean taking other’s properties without permission and illegally and not intend to return it back. In design world, It actually means that you ‘steal’ some elements such as images for photographer ,artistic style for painter and designer and so on, to combine and develop those elements into something better and new.

As for “copy”, it means duplicate other’s work and make it yours , which also means plagiarism in another term.

Picasso got his inspiration from other objects and artists to create few of his works.The painting below is one of Picasso work that he got inspired by African artifacts.

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon

 Citation

Jessica.H(2011) THE ILLUSION OF ORIGINALITY: PLAGIARISM VS. SYNCHRONICITY & HOW TO COPE WITH BOTH .August 5 Available at: http://ohmyhandmade.com/2011/head/businessy-goodness/the-illusion-of-originality-plagiarism-vs-synchronicity-how-to-cope-with-both/

Jessica.H(2011) COPYCATS & COPYRIGHT: KEEPING OUR HANDMADE COMMUNITY SAFE .March 13 Available at: http://ohmyhandmade.com/2011/head/entrepreneurship/copycats-copyright-keeping-our-handmade-community-safe/

Wikepedia(2015)Pablo Picasso. Available at : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pablo_Picasso

4. Digitally

Now technology is advancing at such a rate that traditional ways of teaching and learning are not pushing students and teachers to their full potential.- Ben McNeely

I agree to that the traditional way had been slowly replaced by technologies due to it’s convenient but it does not replace any skills nor talents. Both does have it’s own advantage and both needed skills in order to proceed.

Nowadays,there are software like Adobe Photoshop and PaintTool SAI can achieved traditional art style in digital painting.

“Why use traditional painting when you can paint digitally without costing much expenses and time?”

Based on my experience, working in software like I’ve mentioned above is not easy and it is still time consuming even thought it provided undo options and other tools. One must still understand how a tools work and require the general knowledge in painting skills and computer skills. About expenses, do not forget that tablet , computer and software does cost a lot too.

Digital painting is less original than traditional way of painting because we are using brushes that had been provided and the software can help you mix and blend colors with the tools. Other than that, there’s even a method of taking images and paint layer by layer on it to make it into a realistic looks. The result is based on existing image but into your own style that blend in with the rest of your artwork. But even in traditional ways of painting, we are still referencing to the objects to paint it out. So in the end, both traditional and digitally way are still less original.

Citation

McNeely.B(n.d.) USING TECHNOLOGY AS A LEARNING TOOL, NOT JUST THE COOL NEW THING, EDUCAUSE. Available at: http://www.educause.edu/research-and-publications/books/educating-net-generation/using-technology-learning-tool-not-just-cool-new-thing

3. Originality challenged by Internet and technologies

Nowadays, we are surrounded by technologies which means information just hanging around us.

Whenever I face problems or want to know something or even when lecture had given me a topic for my project, I would just on my technology devices such as computer, tablet or smart phone to use the search engine to find the answers and references With such convenient, we tend to search first and think second which make us less creative since we get the ideas from others first. But it doesn’t mean that it’s bad, we are able to save our time and avoid being stuck since time are very important for designer because we have to produce a lot of works in a short time.

We human are easily influenced by the things we saw, heard and felt, we might have some ideas that we thought are new but actually is based on something we got influenced unconsciously or consciously but had forgotten. Originality got more challenged by Internet not only because of the search engine but also when it comes to social media too. Social media such as Facebook, Twitter , Tumblr and many more had became very popular among us and most of us are always on it as long there is internet connection.The amount of information posted in these social media by others are wide and it also means that we easily got influenced by a lot of different kind of information.

So, can technologies actually help us excess our limitation in information to improve our skills but sacrificing originality in the same time?

2. Originality is rare

After I did some research and consultation with lecture, I decided to go for Question 4. This questions have a wide range and I decide to just focus on a section that related to my work in design field .

What are your thoughts on the idea of originality is being challenged by
the internet? Do you agree or disagree that talents and skills are now being
replaced by technology? Discuss the issue using your own projects and
practice.

So, what is originality? Originality is an original work that is not received/copy/based on other’s works. Is originality and skills in designs field at a risk on vanishing now due to internet and technologies?

What I’ve observed that originality is hard to be seen now, it does exists but rare. Today, it is hard to create “The first in the world”

Unlike the past, human’s knowledge in all kind of fields such as science,technology,design and so on are still very shallow and you can easily discover anything new without digging deeper. Today,there are billions of human around the world and our knowledge had far surpassed the past and so, there are very few ideas, each are similar and it is hard to be the only one who have the brand new idea.

Such as Austin Kleon, he mentioned during TED talks that his idea on making boxes around some words and connect them to form a poem had been told by others that his works are completely unoriginal. He had been told that his idea is quite similar to Tom Philips which is years before him and when he did more research into it, he found out that this method was a 250 years old history.

Citation

Youtube(2012)Steal Like An Artist: Austin Kleon at TEDxKC. August 24 Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oww7oB9rjgw

TED Radio Hour(2014)Steven Johnson: Where does good ideas come from?. June 27 Available at: http://www.npr.org/programs/ted-radio-hour/321797073/what-is-original