Weebly does not allow me to embed videos with a free account. So follow the shared Google Drive folder link to the videos to get the real deal.
This project started after my last project of Whip. I originally wanted to draw a series of dancing figures on panels or on found objects in the gestural style. Then a friend of mine recommended animating it and I got to the zoetrope idea. People have done some incredibly cool things with zoetropes and I was excited to make one. This is not a traditional art project, so there was an extreme amount of self-guided figure-it-outedness to the entire project. Lots of dilemmas I faced in the construction of this project have no real answers and there was a large amount of guesstimating in the process. I knew I wanted to do this at a large scale, which no doubt added to the ambition. This was a hugely ambitious project with many more steps then I was anticipating. It started with sketching of the general feel of the figures and the shapes. I experimented with making the figure more geometrically simplified. From there, I scoured the source video in an attempt to find a short cyclical movement. In order to do this, I had to figure out how many frames I wanted and the rotation speed, thereby determining the frames per second on the device. This is what I mean by figure-it-outedness - no one gave me standards or guidelines on how to pull off this project. From there, more decisions: how big will it be? how many frames will it be? How fast will it spin and how long will each frame be? How tall will each frame be? Next, fun with math. I used geometry to figure out the interior angle for each from, the angle of the bevel for each frame, and the inner and outer width of each frame. I went on my reference and selected which frames to use and when I needed to edit it. And from there, I selected wood to use for the project, employed some help with cutting it, sanded it, and painted it. Then it was sketching, which after establishing a baseline so that the figure remained in the same part of the frame. After sketching, I assembled the entire thing with some difficulty. For this, I chose hot glue for ease and simplicity. Then I took it to school and tested it on the potter's wheel. Despite trying it at different speeds and angles, I could not get the illusion to form. Something I had seen online and did in my prototype was slits that interrupt the viewer's vision and I wondered if that would help. So I tested if that was the issue using makeshift cardboard pieces. Still no luck. At that point I faced a decision: to put more time into this project, chasing success, or accept the product and move on. I have some theories on where I went wrong technically - the slits aren't the right size, the scale is too large, the drawings aren't solid and dark enough, the spinning speed and FPS don't match a standard for human perception. After this lengthy process, I began to lose interest in the project. This project is not the prettiest but it is extremely ambitious, both in concept and in product. And I pride myself on that. I wish I had pulled it off, but at this point I can accept that the object itself is the art, not the animation. I could keep trying to create a successful zoetrope, probably by creating another one based on what I had learned. But like I said I want to move on and put this project in my rearview. Maybe within the process there's some content there in intentions, results, failure, success, ambition, and learning. From here, I want to pursue a different direction in my art. I'm thinking surrealism.
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