For my midterm, I was inspired by the book I Need My Monster by Amanda Noll. The story is about a little boy named Ethan who cannot sleep because the monster under his bed decided to go on vacation. With the Monstrous Night Light, children can feel the presence of their monsters even if their monsters are away.
Here is the LINK to the Instruactables page
And here is the video:
I identify myself as a maker, designer, learner, craftsperson.
I would say my favorite tool is the pencil. As an architecture student before came to DT, I have spent tons of time drafting and drafting and drafting. I think it’s still weird that I once could have that patience drafting on the table for 14 hours.
In this week’s new craft assignment, I decided to make the Chinese knotting bracelet.
I have searched several pictures to guide me working on this. There are millions of types of Chinese knotting bracelet that I can learn and I chose a nice looking one. It looks simple at first, however, after I started to work on this, it took me several minutes to figure out the method.
It turns out looking good on my wrist!
It was a fun process doing this. The ending part was not sure since it got some button in the tutorial but I didn’t have that. Therefore, I just made a random knot in the end.
I would like to learn more types of Chinese knotting bracelet and make several of them in the future.
I identify myself as a maker, designer, artist, and learner. I’m always up for learning something new especially when it comes to art. I never pictured myself as an artist until I came to DT and started researching different domains. I am also a designer, because I love to analyze and figure things out with art.
My favorite tool is a pencil, because I have complete control of the outcome.
I decided to try and embroider a flower. I’ve always loved how delicate it looks, and never even thought of trying it until now. It was time consuming, but I did like how it came out. The kind of embroider that I learned is called a raised fishbone stitch.
-Estee
This week i wanted to explore the craft or making paper figures, more than origami, is focusing more on paper engineering and how you can create a form fro different sections and the overall paper shape. As an inspiration I used my little dog.
The best word that describes who I am is artist. Creating my own worlds and hybrid animals is something I have given my life to and coming to Parsons has helped me push that passion further. Studying in both the MFA Fine Arts and Design/ Tech schools has helped my practice develop immensely.
For my project this week I decided to build a model from the laser-cutting machine. Using Adobe Illustrator you can directly load in your design to the computer’s software and then that data is sent over to the laser machine that cuts away material referencing the illustrator file that was uploaded. I am trying to build my own little excavator and place it within my new sculpture. The sculpture is part: family past, hungry animal, wound, and play set.
-AJS 2017
I am a storyteller, designer, artist, and educator. I am always interested in colors, shapes, and pattern. However, I want to make things that not only is pretty, but also meaningful, and can solve people’s problem.
My favorite tool is pencil and paper, because I can draw down everything in anytime. I always want to do a embroidery project. This is my first embroidery work, and I started it in a really simple shape. When I start repeating the action, I feel calm. I also got a manual to learn how to do embroidery. I hope I can make delicate and cool project with this in the future!
I think the hardest part for me is whenever you keep an action(the same way of sewing) for a time, then the consistency become lower, and this might makes the quality looks not good. I am thinking to make it on a machine in the future, if the graphics become more complicated.
When I am doing this homework. I want to make it as a touch sensor. Also, I am thinking of making this project that is related with touch and smell. I put the cotton, thread, and this swatch inside a mint-chocolate bag, so that this swatch now have a candy smell. However, I am still looking for more interesting things to try on. Maybe it is a button that have the natural texture and can trigger a water oxygen sprayer. And also, the user can put essential oil in it. This is what I might do for my midterm.
If I were to describe myself in a few choice words, some of those would be: Maker, craftsperson, designer, artist, student, teacher, gamer, athlete and poet.
As someone who has worked as a sculptor and then a carpenter, I have used many tools… so choosing one is a controversial subject for me. However, for me, one of the most useful tools is the sliding table saw! The reason being is that it is capable of squaring up any odd shaped board.
For this week, I have finally tried something that I’ve always wanted to try my hand at. I learned to use the wood turning lathe! I have a pretty comprehensive background in wood working but the lathe is one things I have just never gotten a chance to work with. During my undergrad, the school was extremely protective over who was allowed to use the lathe and the professors would tell horror stories of the worst (although rare) tragedies; so it goes without saying I found having the opportunity to learn, more trouble then its worth.
Anyway, I began by watching a few tutorials online so that I would have at least a vague sense of what I was getting myself into before walking into the wood shop. I knew that the lathe is a tool that makes square or a-symmetrical pieces of wood into round pieces. So the easiest thing to do firstly is to shape my material to be as round as possible before putting it on the lathe. I had a square block of wood and used the table saw to cut 45 degree angles on each corner to make it into an octagon. Once done, I centered and locked into place the block of wood onto the lathe. When I switched on the lathe, the machine made a powerful hum as the motor began to turn the material. Then I began to cut the piece with a rough gauging chisel that needs to engage the material just below the center and at a slight angle.
As I was workng with my first piece, I began to wonder to myself, why have I been afraid of this thing for so long?? Using the lathe reminded me of both working on the potters wheel or glass blowing. The main difference is that wood turning is strictly a subtractive process rather then additive. I think its safe to say that I plan on working with the lathe more in the future!!
Below are two pieces that I ended up with. The one on the right was my first piece where I was trying to get comfortable with using the machine. The one on the left however, I tried to get more intricate with what kinds of shapes I could get. I am absolutely interested in revisiting this tool to experiment with more advanced techniques in the future.
I identify myself as a designer, storyteller, learner, research and craftperson. I like recreating or inventing new experiences through storytelling and in doing so, incorporating design theories and research. Similar to most designers, I love well-coordinated color swatches, rare types and things organized neatly. But I am especially into purposeful design, or design that is backed up by thoughtful research. I have been and always will be a learner because I can never get enough of new techniques. They do not have to be ground-breaking technology. Learning how to crochet this past week, for example, has been delightful.
I have many favorite tools. On the first day of class, I mentioned the letterpress (which is magical). I also love the small but mighty bone folder and x-acto knife for bookmaking. They are tools that are specifically made for artists because they are not as easy to use as scissors and rulers.
What I love about learning how to crochet is that because I’m fairly new, the progress has been pretty fast. I went from making twisted messy knots to a square of single crochet in 2 days. I learned by following Youtube tutorial. It is very helpful when the teacher explained what she is doing instead of telling people to follow her without understanding the structure of the single crochet. I spent a day without much improvement following one tutorial that was shorter but didn’t explain much. The next day, I switched to a longer but more thorough tutorial and the result was very satisfying.
I identify as a designer, learner and maker of things.
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Practice: I would consider myself a researcher who practices, mostly because I enjoy doing research a lot.
Favorite tool: My favorite tool remains to be scissors, mostly because it is very versatile, and something I always forget to carry.
Knitting: For this week I wanted to try making an amigurumi, or knitted plushes. I followed these tutorials (1, 2, 3, 4) to make a knitted square and then followed this tutorial to attempt the bunny. I didn’t have any filling, which might have contributed to why my bunny looks a bit awkward. I used more yarn to make the filling.
I really enjoyed the mindless work involved behind knitting. If I were to become more crafty with my hands (I felt that I was knitting at very awkward angled with my fingers), I would definitely do this as I am thinking or doing other things.
Though it was enjoyable, a frustration I encountered was that while I was looking for other things to knit, many of the tutorials I found online were written in rather complex languages. The explanations for the patterns were very hard to understand, so I was only able to follow whatever was available in video form. Also, knitting required a lot of patience. I can finally understand that being a knitting grandma is not as relaxing as it seems.
A tip I would give to beginners is to be more patient and start slow.
ATTiny:
For the circuit, I had to make it twice as the first time did not work as expected. I believe this was due to the bad soldering. I ended up creating another circuit in the breadboard.
