end of semester

Well, this semester is almost over and I just thought i would take some time to talk about this class. I was very impressed with the work that the majority of the class managed to present, and interested at many peoples take on the notion of security.
I think that my work was alot simpler than many others, not that this is better or worse, just different. Also, from seeing all the presentations, mine seemed quite distanced conceptually from most others works.
I am very happy with my project, both the end product and the process (I know alot more about flash and geography now).

Soft Landing - A Geopolitical Contexturalisation

Soft Landing

The flash implementation of my project is coming along nicely. I have a zoom system and buttons which turn on and off the different layers (names, flags, greyscale representation). I have rollovers working, i just need to implement them. On that note I will implement hierarchically. That is, I will have rollovers on the black 'do not travel' countries initially and then extend the system.
On another note, I am still trying to decide on a name, but am leaning towards 'soft landing - a geopolitical contextualisation', but it might just be a bit of a mouthfull. I like this name because it conveys the idea of travel, and gets the point across.
Now its just to decide on a name, finish the rollovers and make the pre loader.

As yet untitled

The world map is full of instantly recognisable shapes that viewers have preconceived ideas about. The same can be said for the flag of each country. These icons hold history and stories that their simple shapes and bold colours belie.
The Australian Governmental department of foreign affairs gives a hierarchical warning set about each county, interprested here as a solid grey scale, and also a textural facade.
These flag and map representations of each country are linked, and this project represents this binding literally, but the flags are no longer pristine. War, poverty, terrorism, facism etc are etched into the texture of the flag, into the fact of the country. These factor effect the rating the Australian govermnet gives each country as an ideal travel destination.
All of these point, graphically represented, blend to form this project.

http://www.playdamage.org/
I dont know if this site has been mentioned before, but it is definately web art, lo-fi, but really cool. Some of the pages are very annoying and ugly, but others are beautiful in their own pixellated way.

Getting there

I am almost finished the actual image for this major project, now i just have to implement the flash side of things. As what i am aiming for is simple (several flash pros have told me it will be easy), i think that the most important thing is to implement a pre loader with an appropriate animation.
I think that it will be simple, maybe a black and white map in which the countries fill in as the flash file progressively loads.

Sonata for the Unaware is a really cool audio visual web art piece that i found. It creates a sound scape from three camera feeds (not in real time), I guess it could even be considered sonification. I also really like the simplicity of the display in what is a complex system.

Above is the beginning of my major web art project.

ALIGHIERO BOETTI
Mappa, 1979
Embroidered fabric
146 x 192 cm

I have been struggling with how to represent the idea of security, whether it is good or bad, on my maps. I wanted to use stereotypical images of a country, but a complex collage would be way too big and bandwidth heavy for its flash implementation. Then I remembered that I had come across this artists work using the flags as the earth in the map. Previously I thought it was a bit boring and obvious, I realise now that I can appropriate this idea, use the flags but have them destroyed, decaying dependent on their level on the security heirarchy.