UN-REALITY

Yesterday we were given our next assignment which i feel is going to bring a lot of our skills that we have learnt over the past year into use.In my group I have Supa, Josh, Jo, TJ and myself. On the first day of brainstorming we explored many ideas however we continuously hit brick walls with our ideas as we did not have a proper grasp on what we were being asked to create. We were focusing on recreating games into real life, and this was our problem, we were not concentrating on generating an experience rather than a game. We are all gamers at heart so we struggled to break though the barriers that were holding us back. We all had a perception of a game as something with a start and an end with activities in between. But after our talk with Maggie we quickly realized that we had been following the complete wrong route. She told us to go out and explore the assigned area for us to work in. We walked around the block and we simply just could not see anything interesting for us to work with. We came back to discuss this with Maggie and we soon came to realize that we could play with the fact that there was nothing interesting. We realized that we needed to use this to our advantage. Perhaps we could change the environment to change peoples perception of it. We looked at the empty boring street that runs beside the library and thought it was rather boring. However after much discussion we figured that we would explore the possibility of how this area changes during the night. Instead of being a boring street we could slowly turn it into a crime scene. Peoples perception of this "safe" street would drastically change, generating, and making aware a completely new reality. And this, was how our idea was born..

Finally

Ok, so after a lot of trouble I finally was able to cut it all out successfully. However Instead of engraving the CD holder I chose to glue a thin layer of plastic of either side of the middle instead, this saved me a lot of time. I also changed the back design as well as the vectors were too complicated to cut. In order to cut the project I had to import it into rhino and then save it back as a AI and read it into the 3d lab printer. This simplified my issues a great deal. Overall, the design looks extremely slick and i am very happy with what I have produced. I only managed to get two done, but that was because someone had taken the remaining scraps I was going to use from the 3D lab. Nonetheless, this still proves that I was able to manufacture multiple units. The only difference between the two is that the two middle pieces of plastic were white on one and see through on the other. Although I thought this created a whole new look to the case which was a positive aspect.

3D model

I manged to catch up with James and talked to him about the situation with the lazer cutting all being either out of order or closed. He  agreed that I make a 3D model of what the design should look like and hand in the actual case when the lazer printer is back up and running.

Here's a rough copy of what it should look like. I couldn't find a copy of solid works so I had to use pro engineer which didn't have any glass texture loaded on to it. The designs I also could not put on the case because they are far too complex. However the model does show how the case will operate.

Here are also my illustrator files that I have been trying to have printed this entire week. If you can imagine the designs rastarized onto the different surfaces. All materials being used will be see through perspex.

Really getting sick of this.

Ok, so I have all the materials needed as I found some more scraps I could use. However, both the rapid prototyping lab and the 3d labs lazer cutter are unusable on the last day before the project is due, really really not happy about this. I've been trying to get my illustrator designs printed non stop for a week now and have been unable to gain proper uninterrupted time on any lazer cutter. I dont know why but there was no one in the prototyping lab, whats worse is that I left all my materials inside and there's no one who can open the door. I also talked to the head technician of the 3d labs and he informed me that the lazer cutter there was malfunctioning and probably would not be usable in the next week or so. I really am not sure what to do here, its too late to change my entire design. I feel as though I have not had proper access to any facilities that I was promised.

I really need to talk to James but he is doing interviews so that is out of the question, I hope he can understand my predicament. I think tonight I will go away and make a 3D model on solid works or pro engineer to show what I have been meaning to make. However, my designs will not be transferable to this program as they will be far too complex.I will however be able to show the overall shape and operation of my device.

If I am given more time to wait for the printers to be back up and running I could very easily print out my case. The illustrator documents have been ready for over a week now.

I am searching around for a commercial printer to use but it will cost far too much to accomplish what I want to achieve.

Lazer Cutting Round 2

I decided to just use paper for the first few attempts just to make sure the printer was working properly before i wasted anymore plastic. FOR ONCE it actually worked, so i chucked in my plastic and for some reason, it decided not to print anything rastarised. The technition (i think) in the lab has been completely rude the entire time I have been in there and has kicked me out on more than one occasion for absolutely no reason and so I haven't been able to get any of my printing done as well. I think it is extremely unfair of BCT to limit us to printing on just the last week of the holiday, especially when there are NO SUPERVISES to help print. And we are not allowed to print without one I am told. I am going to go try get the 3D labs to help me out, but if they cant I think it would be appropriate to give us an extension to get our lazer cutting done with James around instead of the current people in the lazer cutting room who are no help at all.

I did manage to get one section of my CD case done however, but it was just a practice attempt. I am very glad i did get this part done as I found out that the measurement was off by about 1/5 of a mm and so the CD didn't fit in properly. The depth was also very hard to regulate, as I needed it to be an exact depth of a CD. After a bit of trial and error I found that if the lazer was on 100% power and 10% speed I could get it to a suitable depth. Other than that, i did waste more plastic so I am going to have to somehow find more for Monday to lazer cut. This is going to get expensive I think.

I may ask James if it would be alright for me to just make 2 or 3 copies instead of 5 as the perspex that I would like to use can get very pricey indeed.

Lazer Cutting, Disaster

I decided today that it would  be important to actually test out what I have made in illustrator on the lazer printer. I really didnt want to leave it to the last minute. And BOY am i glad that I did this. The lazer printer was a complete disaster. First of all, it took almost 30 minutes to get the printer to actually cut, when it did, it cut off page. I re adjusted the printer to the right location as defined by the user. Great, everything should be ready now. Wrong, it started to print the persons design that last used the printer. Started to print again, and after cutting out the basic shape, the printer refused to even read the vectorised image and engrave it. I tried to print again, and for some reason it printed in the completely wrong location and cut my original print in half. I asked the supervisor in the room to help and he pretty much gave me to the cold shoulder and told me to leave him alone as he didn't have time to help. So I am at a stand still at the moment,I have no tutors to ask what is wrong because everyone is away and I have no idea if my idea is even able to be printed. Lets hope tomorrow will be a better day.

On a good note, i did manage to print out my CD's  today,

I have created the illustrator images over the past couple days and everything seems to be going ok. I still am not happy with the design, as it seems rather simple. But on the other hand, i feel that we were asked to create 5 copies for a reason. And that reason is that the paper wants us to create something reproducible and not something that is extraordinarily complex and hard to make. I feel, as a designer, that I could have done a lot more on the aesthetic side of things. Ie in Photoshop, but I really wanted to stray away from 2D images and do something different. I was talking to a friend who does architecture and he informed me that my images were far too complex even after I had simplified them down. To fix this I simply reduced the line weight of the images so that the lazer would only have to do the outlines. This really helped a lot as time is definitively a huge factor in this project. The fact that we have only been able to lazer print in this last week is a pain...

Hating Illustrator Right Now

I have never really used illustrator before, so it is virtually all new to me. The vector system is very confusing,but at the same time I can see its advantages. Since I want to be doing some complex engraving I have been live tracing some images  to experiment with. I have found that most images are generating extremely complex vectors which will take an eternity to engrave, because of this, i know later on I will have to simplify down the images. THe plan is to have  a top layer, a middle layer and a bottom layer. The middle layer I plan to engrave the shape of a CD on both sides. This way 2 CDs can fit on either side. The top and bottom layer will hold the CD in place.

Illustrator

I finally got an idea that I would like to continue with. I am not 100 percent happy with it, but I have decided that if I do not start making the design I wont be able to get it complete before the deadline. The design revolves around the idea of transistions. Instead of using a coffin as representing the death of the CD I have chosen an entirely different approach. I want to use the human as the symbolism of nature. The case will be made  of perspex so the entire package will be see through apart from the CDs on the inside which will act as the iris of the eye. The case will contain 2 CD's, and so the design will be double sided. On one side you have a natural eye, representing unchanged nature, while on the flipside the iris is designed with electricity and engraved with wires. This symbolizes how humanity and technology are constantly growing together it is as if the technology is part of the human body (or eye in this case).

CD case

Ok, i have finally, kinda, got an idea what I want to go with, I have done a fair bit of development, but since 3D printing costs such a ridiculous amount (especially when we have to make 5 copies) I chose to flag it. Instead I went up to the 3D labs and got myself some perspex plastic which I will use for my project instead. I have been playing around with designs of electric PCB boards in my design, inspired by the new microchips that are now encased in see through plastic. I wish to somehow incorporate layers into the design so that you can peel each layer back 1 by 1 to reveal the CD case inside. I feel it is important to show some kind of progression in the design, ie, the closer you are to the CD the less wires U will see, to show how the CD is trapped within the case. Furthermore, I have also been playing around with the shape of the case and I wanted to use the idea of a coffin. In a way, the coffin represents the death of the CD and how everything is becoming more and more digital these days. This relates to the audio because in the audio it shows how a progression into a more electronic state.

I also wanted to incorporate a blue LED in the case, but it seems that option will not be very likely as having batteries inside the case with random wires would make the design look rather tacky in my opinion.

It is going to be an arduous week ahead ....

Design Exercises 1 & 2 Final Business Cards

Here are my final business cards for our first exercise when we were learning how to use adobe illustrator. There are 4 images, each business card has a front and a back: