Graphical, photos on Flickr

1

'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations HYENA & RATS On the new work of Robert Aliaj DRAGOT A CERTAIN DEGREE OF FICTION. 'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations . Media are the most powerful predators on our small planet and media travel at the speed of media.It has its own logic.The other thing with media is that it exists as data or pure information and that it doesn't make any distinction between 'good 'or 'bad' ingredients. Only the reader does put the ethical full stop here. And the reader has to be protected or needs a certain kind of immunity in order to surf beyond risk.Because surfing is risky business and that is probably part of the message the artist wants us to understand. Because this daily 'tsunami' or non-stop flow of information is larger than we ,as adults,can digest and one does not need to be introduced in contemporary human behavior to understand that copy-cat attitudes often lead to exponential dramas such as high school shootings or 'hidden' agendas for group suicides (as was the case in Japan a couple of years ago).The point is often children are badly hit by the wrong contents.They simply are incapable to de-contectextualize and put it in a rational perspective. Fragilised people pay a great deal of attention towards the slightest change in the media and are as such more easily exploited.We all were introduced in the subtle strategies sooner or later.Part of growing up.. The artist has been gradually selecting images from the web .Images (stills and cellular videoshots) depicting "indoor" violence .Images which were meant to be consulted and commented by the same sort of people that throw them on this insiders 'stage'. This information, because of its illigal and illicit content is often taken off the web (read censored) under governmental or corporate pressure.It could indeed lead to embarassing incidents between governments or stimulate massive crowds in the streets if well conducted. In this endless stream of visual data ,the artist has saved and selected on 'You Tube' a small series of brutal videostills where Greek policemen were forcing Roma or Albanian youngsters (2 young men) to hit each other in the face harder and harder, under the amused eyes of the servicemen which are supposed to represent the law and order of a respectable member of the European Union.The cellular shots make one think of the pop song and videopiece "True Faith" once realised by New Order in the 80's where in some sort of choreography people were hitting each other in the face..or less popular the performance "Rythm 0 1974"by Marina Abramovic where she assigned a passive role to herself, with the public being the force which would act on her and gradually use more and more violence against her, enjoying the kick of the forbidden.. The You Tube images Dragot luckily saved(before they were removed) were not intended as a popsong neither as an artistic performance but where filmed by policemen with their private cell-phones and shortly after flung on the internet as the worst taste trophies imaginable .These youngsters were publicly exposed in a merciless orgy of cruelty. Now the information is one thing, treating the information is another thing,treating the information in an intelligent and emotionally balanced artwork is a completely different mission. Dragot started to select the crude 'matter' or 'matière première'(found footage on the net) and to sculpt it socially and artistically in order to slide it in collective memory by a rather fresh and funny (read cynical) strategy.Turning them into cartoons.. Doing so ,he manages to expand the dialogue towards a larger group of society . He refuses to pinpoint the artwork as the next cheap sensational micro scandal in the over-and-done-with academy of shock.(dating form the period BC read "before Crisis"). He devoids the sequence of images (selected stills from the shock video posted) of any recognisable realistic detail and turns the reality into a certain degree of fiction:a cartoon which transposes the action on a different level.Thus the artist decides to vehiculise the information into this fragile target we call children . Children are confronted with violence to an up-to-now unknown degree (useless to draw the lifelong list of video-games,movies,ads,newsflashes not to forget the most subtle of all: reality and needless to say that heaps of books treat this rather spooky subject and discussion panels turn in circles circumventing the real topic:the measurable impact of violence on the mind of the exposed child). Here in the Tirana Museum Dragot has draw huge size stills in a cartoon-like sequence of 6 or 8 images , life size, that is to say the average size of a just-not-teenager . The drawnings (stills sequence) on the wall are emptied of their short historical dimension of a drama which happened in protected police quarters in some capital city (Dragot says" it could be anywhere" .The kids only find the black outlines. On the floor of the museum ,lots of little boxes of 'multi-talent pencil' or wax crayons in a predefined range of colours. The piece is a large sort of "colorbook" and the children have to color in the various segments of the drawings as shown in the pinned up example.. A couple of schoolclasses are invited in the afternoon to color on the walls of this museum, and in the evening ,the piece is shown to the larger public. Has the violence been hidden or substracted out of the raw material (you tube cellular phone videos) and softened in order to protect the children or is the ultimate goal of the art project to accustom the kids to little doses of violence and maybe rediscover the true content?And where is that true content? It seems that the freshly and "disney colored" drawings warn us seriously for the highly manipulated way in which encapsulated violence might reach us since all violence is not visual,but rather subtly merchandised and consumable even for the most innocent sweeny toddlers. Extremely important is the fact that the artist has not forgotten the origin of his found footage and in an adjacent space,the visitor is confronted by the rawness and brutality of the lift off images for the project.The adult side of the piece?The true content? The visitor indeed goes the other way round just as the salmon swims up the river and therefore the result is much harder to take in.Black and white becomes color and color becomes video. This wake-up is directed to the conscience of the adult and leaves him critically behind with it..vision and sound this time.. koen wastijn november 2009

HYENES & RATS by robert dragot

'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations HYENA & RATS On the new work of Robert Aliaj DRAGOT A CERTAIN DEGREE OF FICTION. 'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations . Media are the most powerful predators on our small planet and media travel at the speed of media.It has its own logic.The other thing with media is that it exists as data or pure information and that it doesn't make any distinction between 'good 'or 'bad' ingredients. Only the reader does put the ethical full stop here. And the reader has to be protected or needs a certain kind of immunity in order to surf beyond risk.Because surfing is risky business and that is probably part of the message the artist wants us to understand. Because this daily 'tsunami' or non-stop flow of information is larger than we ,as adults,can digest and one does not need to be introduced in contemporary human behavior to understand that copy-cat attitudes often lead to exponential dramas such as high school shootings or 'hidden' agendas for group suicides (as was the case in Japan a couple of years ago).The point is often children are badly hit by the wrong contents.They simply are incapable to de-contectextualize and put it in a rational perspective. Fragilised people pay a great deal of attention towards the slightest change in the media and are as such more easily exploited.We all were introduced in the subtle strategies sooner or later.Part of growing up.. The artist has been gradually selecting images from the web .Images (stills and cellular videoshots) depicting "indoor" violence .Images which were meant to be consulted and commented by the same sort of people that throw them on this insiders 'stage'. This information, because of its illigal and illicit content is often taken off the web (read censored) under governmental or corporate pressure.It could indeed lead to embarassing incidents between governments or stimulate massive crowds in the streets if well conducted. In this endless stream of visual data ,the artist has saved and selected on 'You Tube' a small series of brutal videostills where Greek policemen were forcing Roma or Albanian youngsters (2 young men) to hit each other in the face harder and harder, under the amused eyes of the servicemen which are supposed to represent the law and order of a respectable member of the European Union.The cellular shots make one think of the pop song and videopiece "True Faith" once realised by New Order in the 80's where in some sort of choreography people were hitting each other in the face..or less popular the performance "Rythm 0 1974"by Marina Abramovic where she assigned a passive role to herself, with the public being the force which would act on her and gradually use more and more violence against her, enjoying the kick of the forbidden.. The You Tube images Dragot luckily saved(before they were removed) were not intended as a popsong neither as an artistic performance but where filmed by policemen with their private cell-phones and shortly after flung on the internet as the worst taste trophies imaginable .These youngsters were publicly exposed in a merciless orgy of cruelty. Now the information is one thing, treating the information is another thing,treating the information in an intelligent and emotionally balanced artwork is a completely different mission. Dragot started to select the crude 'matter' or 'matière première'(found footage on the net) and to sculpt it socially and artistically in order to slide it in collective memory by a rather fresh and funny (read cynical) strategy.Turning them into cartoons.. Doing so ,he manages to expand the dialogue towards a larger group of society . He refuses to pinpoint the artwork as the next cheap sensational micro scandal in the over-and-done-with academy of shock.(dating form the period BC read "before Crisis"). He devoids the sequence of images (selected stills from the shock video posted) of any recognisable realistic detail and turns the reality into a certain degree of fiction:a cartoon which transposes the action on a different level.Thus the artist decides to vehiculise the information into this fragile target we call children . Children are confronted with violence to an up-to-now unknown degree (useless to draw the lifelong list of video-games,movies,ads,newsflashes not to forget the most subtle of all: reality and needless to say that heaps of books treat this rather spooky subject and discussion panels turn in circles circumventing the real topic:the measurable impact of violence on the mind of the exposed child). Here in the Tirana Museum Dragot has draw huge size stills in a cartoon-like sequence of 6 or 8 images , life size, that is to say the average size of a just-not-teenager . The drawnings (stills sequence) on the wall are emptied of their short historical dimension of a drama which happened in protected police quarters in some capital city (Dragot says" it could be anywhere" .The kids only find the black outlines. On the floor of the museum ,lots of little boxes of 'multi-talent pencil' or wax crayons in a predefined range of colours. The piece is a large sort of "colorbook" and the children have to color in the various segments of the drawings as shown in the pinned up example.. A couple of schoolclasses are invited in the afternoon to color on the walls of this museum, and in the evening ,the piece is shown to the larger public. Has the violence been hidden or substracted out of the raw material (you tube cellular phone videos) and softened in order to protect the children or is the ultimate goal of the art project to accustom the kids to little doses of violence and maybe rediscover the true content?And where is that true content? It seems that the freshly and "disney colored" drawings warn us seriously for the highly manipulated way in which encapsulated violence might reach us since all violence is not visual,but rather subtly merchandised and consumable even for the most innocent sweeny toddlers. Extremely important is the fact that the artist has not forgotten the origin of his found footage and in an adjacent space,the visitor is confronted by the rawness and brutality of the lift off images for the project.The adult side of the piece?The true content? The visitor indeed goes the other way round just as the salmon swims up the river and therefore the result is much harder to take in.Black and white becomes color and color becomes video. This wake-up is directed to the conscience of the adult and leaves him critically behind with it..vision and sound this time.. koen wastijn november 2009

HYENES & RATS by robert dragot

'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations HYENA & RATS On the new work of Robert Aliaj DRAGOT A CERTAIN DEGREE OF FICTION. 'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations . Media are the most powerful predators on our small planet and media travel at the speed of media.It has its own logic.The other thing with media is that it exists as data or pure information and that it doesn't make any distinction between 'good 'or 'bad' ingredients. Only the reader does put the ethical full stop here. And the reader has to be protected or needs a certain kind of immunity in order to surf beyond risk.Because surfing is risky business and that is probably part of the message the artist wants us to understand. Because this daily 'tsunami' or non-stop flow of information is larger than we ,as adults,can digest and one does not need to be introduced in contemporary human behavior to understand that copy-cat attitudes often lead to exponential dramas such as high school shootings or 'hidden' agendas for group suicides (as was the case in Japan a couple of years ago).The point is often children are badly hit by the wrong contents.They simply are incapable to de-contectextualize and put it in a rational perspective. Fragilised people pay a great deal of attention towards the slightest change in the media and are as such more easily exploited.We all were introduced in the subtle strategies sooner or later.Part of growing up.. The artist has been gradually selecting images from the web .Images (stills and cellular videoshots) depicting "indoor" violence .Images which were meant to be consulted and commented by the same sort of people that throw them on this insiders 'stage'. This information, because of its illigal and illicit content is often taken off the web (read censored) under governmental or corporate pressure.It could indeed lead to embarassing incidents between governments or stimulate massive crowds in the streets if well conducted. In this endless stream of visual data ,the artist has saved and selected on 'You Tube' a small series of brutal videostills where Greek policemen were forcing Roma or Albanian youngsters (2 young men) to hit each other in the face harder and harder, under the amused eyes of the servicemen which are supposed to represent the law and order of a respectable member of the European Union.The cellular shots make one think of the pop song and videopiece "True Faith" once realised by New Order in the 80's where in some sort of choreography people were hitting each other in the face..or less popular the performance "Rythm 0 1974"by Marina Abramovic where she assigned a passive role to herself, with the public being the force which would act on her and gradually use more and more violence against her, enjoying the kick of the forbidden.. The You Tube images Dragot luckily saved(before they were removed) were not intended as a popsong neither as an artistic performance but where filmed by policemen with their private cell-phones and shortly after flung on the internet as the worst taste trophies imaginable .These youngsters were publicly exposed in a merciless orgy of cruelty. Now the information is one thing, treating the information is another thing,treating the information in an intelligent and emotionally balanced artwork is a completely different mission. Dragot started to select the crude 'matter' or 'matière première'(found footage on the net) and to sculpt it socially and artistically in order to slide it in collective memory by a rather fresh and funny (read cynical) strategy.Turning them into cartoons.. Doing so ,he manages to expand the dialogue towards a larger group of society . He refuses to pinpoint the artwork as the next cheap sensational micro scandal in the over-and-done-with academy of shock.(dating form the period BC read "before Crisis"). He devoids the sequence of images (selected stills from the shock video posted) of any recognisable realistic detail and turns the reality into a certain degree of fiction:a cartoon which transposes the action on a different level.Thus the artist decides to vehiculise the information into this fragile target we call children . Children are confronted with violence to an up-to-now unknown degree (useless to draw the lifelong list of video-games,movies,ads,newsflashes not to forget the most subtle of all: reality and needless to say that heaps of books treat this rather spooky subject and discussion panels turn in circles circumventing the real topic:the measurable impact of violence on the mind of the exposed child). Here in the Tirana Museum Dragot has draw huge size stills in a cartoon-like sequence of 6 or 8 images , life size, that is to say the average size of a just-not-teenager . The drawnings (stills sequence) on the wall are emptied of their short historical dimension of a drama which happened in protected police quarters in some capital city (Dragot says" it could be anywhere" .The kids only find the black outlines. On the floor of the museum ,lots of little boxes of 'multi-talent pencil' or wax crayons in a predefined range of colours. The piece is a large sort of "colorbook" and the children have to color in the various segments of the drawings as shown in the pinned up example.. A couple of schoolclasses are invited in the afternoon to color on the walls of this museum, and in the evening ,the piece is shown to the larger public. Has the violence been hidden or substracted out of the raw material (you tube cellular phone videos) and softened in order to protect the children or is the ultimate goal of the art project to accustom the kids to little doses of violence and maybe rediscover the true content?And where is that true content? It seems that the freshly and "disney colored" drawings warn us seriously for the highly manipulated way in which encapsulated violence might reach us since all violence is not visual,but rather subtly merchandised and consumable even for the most innocent sweeny toddlers. Extremely important is the fact that the artist has not forgotten the origin of his found footage and in an adjacent space,the visitor is confronted by the rawness and brutality of the lift off images for the project.The adult side of the piece?The true content? The visitor indeed goes the other way round just as the salmon swims up the river and therefore the result is much harder to take in.Black and white becomes color and color becomes video. This wake-up is directed to the conscience of the adult and leaves him critically behind with it..vision and sound this time.. koen wastijn november 2009

pop24 by benj.edwards

Prodigy MadMaze Online Game "Place of Power" graphical screenshots. Artwork by John Prusinski, Al Sirois, Gregg Smith, Kathy Prusinski, and possibly Bette Herod. The game first launched in 1989 on the Prodigy dial-up online service.

A recreation of MadMaze is playable on the web at: www.vintagecomputing.com/madmaze

To learn more about the Prodigy Restoration Project, visit www.prodigy88.com

To learn more about Prodigy itself, visit: www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/07/where-onli...

To read more about MadMaze, visit: www.vintagecomputing.com/index.php/archives/171/prodigy-l...

pop38 by benj.edwards

Prodigy MadMaze Online Game "Place of Power" graphical screenshots. Artwork by John Prusinski, Al Sirois, Gregg Smith, Kathy Prusinski, and possibly Bette Herod. The game first launched in 1989 on the Prodigy dial-up online service.

A recreation of MadMaze is playable on the web at: www.vintagecomputing.com/madmaze

To learn more about the Prodigy Restoration Project, visit www.prodigy88.com

To learn more about Prodigy itself, visit: www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/07/where-onli...

To read more about MadMaze, visit: www.vintagecomputing.com/index.php/archives/171/prodigy-l...

Map to the Cemetery by Matt Lawrence

The St Trinians girls are back, and Rushes, in collaboration with Matt Curtis of Abraham pants, have come up with the goods in the graphics department yet again, throwing their hats further into the fray with not only opening titles but also providing light-hearted graphical transitions, and visual narratives throughout the film to keep up the pace of the latest installment of the franchise.

Using the first film as a reference, Matt Curtis approached Rushes’ MGFX producer Warwick Hewett with an idea that would require the whole of the MGFX department at full throttle for the whole month. “Matt always brings us good stuff to work on, He seems to be on the same creative wavelength as our Head Designer Matt Lawrence, which has proved to be a fruitful partnership in the past across various projects, this one being no exception”.

Rushes was asked to create several elements: An opening title sequence, a main title sting, 4 shot transitions, 5 still graphics and a lengthy, 4 part sequence playing on the Google earth application all referencing the plot line of buried treasure, whilst trying to incorporate a little of the St. T’s girl’s anarchy. The idea gradually developed, and became a coherent and evolving set of graphics which sits in neatly throughout the film; starting with the opening titles and moving through to the final shot transitions.

“Matt’s brief focused on map and map elements being revealed either through ink splats or using ink as some sort of graphical device. As we started to play around with ideas though, it became clear that to get a truly inky feel we would have to shoot real ink splats … I’m glad we did, the transitions, wipes and little inky touches really sell the piece, much more so than trying to fake it with mattes or fades.” Matt Lawrence (Lead MGFX Designer) “Using the shot textures, as well as real map elements really allowed us to go to town on the opening sequence, layering ink footage and map sections with supplied graphics and generated content creating a truly immersive sequence, the idea being to really draw the viewer into the scene, get them involved immediately, make them feel part of the story as soon as it started”

To make sure the work was completed on time and to the high standards Rushes, Matt Curtis and the MGFX team are known for, workflow management was very important. “We split the work up as best we could to ease the bottleneck. While Matt was animating sections, I would be texturing the elements for him to drop in later, then, as they became more fully developed I would move onto a different animation and set that up while Barry Corcoran, our MGFX freelancer started on yet another. Spreading the workload was advantageous to everyone, from the client down, as each section was able to move forward almost simultaneously whilst easing the pressure on any one individual as nothing lay squarely on any one person’s or more importantly one machine’s shoulders” says Brad Le Riche (MGFX Designer).

The end result is yet another successful partnership with Matt Curtis and another film title sequence under Rushes’ belt, with the MGFX boys really starting to carve an MGFX shaped notch in the grain of the title sequence market.

Title: "St. Trinian's - The Legend of Fritton's Gold"

Product: Feature Film Titles & Motion Graphics

Agency: Abraham Pants

Director: Barnaby Thompson & Oliver Parker

Producer: Christian Colson

Production Company: Celador Films

Designer: Matt Curtis

Post Facility: Rushes

Rushes Producer: Louise Hussey

Rushes Assistant Producer: Warwick Hewett

After Effects: Matt Lawrence (Lead),

Brad Le Riche, Barry Corcoran

Cinema 4D: Matt Lawrence

Photoshop: Matt Lawrence, Brad Le Riche

Kat - Graphic by Dave Sanderson

4 3

The seven deadly Flickr sins!

And so too, seeing as we've a little more Missy, we ought to have some more of Kat. Never a bad thing! As I mentioned before, Kat is fairly confident in front of the camera, and in some senses that allowed us to try stuff a little less orthodox. The weather conspired against us heavily on the day of shooting so we got only part of what we wanted done, but amongst those was this. (The talk of further shoots is already on...)

One thing that has struck me recently about some of the very best portrait photographers, particularly those with a fashion slant to their work, is that very often the traditional rules of portrait photography get played very fast and loose with. Rules of thirds often go out of the window, the idea that you can't crop someone's feet off or their head in half vanish, and the fact you must maintain eye contact dismissed. For me these styles and images intrigue me, as frankly, sometimes taking a portrait that abides by the rules is just plain easy, boring and predictable. What I think makes successfully producing work like this difficult is that you strip away the normal tools for the job and have to rely on a different and ill matched toolkit. Often these images become works of a graphic nature, as though if you blurred your eyesight slightly and just saw the fuzzy outline, you'd be looking at a graphically interesting arrangement of shape and colour. It's like designing a layout instead of taking a photograph. And when you flick your eyesight back into focus you're playing with two hands, an image, and a graphical vision. I can't claim to be even vaguely good at this stuff, just that I'm gonna dabble with trying. So here, is something a bit different, shot at my dining room table, aiming for some shape and tension...

The beautiful bit, well, that's all Kat really isn't it?

Map to the city by Matt Lawrence

The St Trinians girls are back, and Rushes, in collaboration with Matt Curtis of Abraham pants, have come up with the goods in the graphics department yet again, throwing their hats further into the fray with not only opening titles but also providing light-hearted graphical transitions, and visual narratives throughout the film to keep up the pace of the latest installment of the franchise.

Using the first film as a reference, Matt Curtis approached Rushes’ MGFX producer Warwick Hewett with an idea that would require the whole of the MGFX department at full throttle for the whole month. “Matt always brings us good stuff to work on, He seems to be on the same creative wavelength as our Head Designer Matt Lawrence, which has proved to be a fruitful partnership in the past across various projects, this one being no exception”.

Rushes was asked to create several elements: An opening title sequence, a main title sting, 4 shot transitions, 5 still graphics and a lengthy, 4 part sequence playing on the Google earth application all referencing the plot line of buried treasure, whilst trying to incorporate a little of the St. T’s girl’s anarchy. The idea gradually developed, and became a coherent and evolving set of graphics which sits in neatly throughout the film; starting with the opening titles and moving through to the final shot transitions.

“Matt’s brief focused on map and map elements being revealed either through ink splats or using ink as some sort of graphical device. As we started to play around with ideas though, it became clear that to get a truly inky feel we would have to shoot real ink splats … I’m glad we did, the transitions, wipes and little inky touches really sell the piece, much more so than trying to fake it with mattes or fades.” Matt Lawrence (Lead MGFX Designer) “Using the shot textures, as well as real map elements really allowed us to go to town on the opening sequence, layering ink footage and map sections with supplied graphics and generated content creating a truly immersive sequence, the idea being to really draw the viewer into the scene, get them involved immediately, make them feel part of the story as soon as it started”

To make sure the work was completed on time and to the high standards Rushes, Matt Curtis and the MGFX team are known for, workflow management was very important. “We split the work up as best we could to ease the bottleneck. While Matt was animating sections, I would be texturing the elements for him to drop in later, then, as they became more fully developed I would move onto a different animation and set that up while Barry Corcoran, our MGFX freelancer started on yet another. Spreading the workload was advantageous to everyone, from the client down, as each section was able to move forward almost simultaneously whilst easing the pressure on any one individual as nothing lay squarely on any one person’s or more importantly one machine’s shoulders” says Brad Le Riche (MGFX Designer).

The end result is yet another successful partnership with Matt Curtis and another film title sequence under Rushes’ belt, with the MGFX boys really starting to carve an MGFX shaped notch in the grain of the title sequence market.

Title: "St. Trinian's - The Legend of Fritton's Gold"

Product: Feature Film Titles & Motion Graphics

Agency: Abraham Pants

Director: Barnaby Thompson & Oliver Parker

Producer: Christian Colson

Production Company: Celador Films

Designer: Matt Curtis

Post Facility: Rushes

Rushes Producer: Louise Hussey

Rushes Assistant Producer: Warwick Hewett

After Effects: Matt Lawrence (Lead),

Brad Le Riche, Barry Corcoran

Cinema 4D: Matt Lawrence

Photoshop: Matt Lawrence, Brad Le Riche

HYENES & RATS by robert dragot

'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations HYENA & RATS On the new work of Robert Aliaj DRAGOT A CERTAIN DEGREE OF FICTION. 'Schematic' is the key-word for the new pieces Dragot proposes in his participation of the most recent edition of Onufri show in the Museum of Tirana. By 'schematic' ,one has to understand the essential outcome of an information, the reduction to the purest single element , the 'graphical' outlines of an image or the retransformation of the specific into a prototype form of decrypting in order to be more easily read by a larger group of people. More easily read and looked at or the way comics or cartoons function. Not only does Dragot turns his attention to a larger group of people by using the technique of cartoon but in this specific case to the most fragile part of it:the children. Dragot ,once again, deals with the daily information which reaches us in succeeding "waves" of images, good and bad news(preferably bad because it does better feed our voracious appetite for sensation and thriller-like kicks , camouflaged banalities or one-hour scandals which often tend to disappear before they really destroy reputations . Media are the most powerful predators on our small planet and media travel at the speed of media.It has its own logic.The other thing with media is that it exists as data or pure information and that it doesn't make any distinction between 'good 'or 'bad' ingredients. Only the reader does put the ethical full stop here. And the reader has to be protected or needs a certain kind of immunity in order to surf beyond risk.Because surfing is risky business and that is probably part of the message the artist wants us to understand. Because this daily 'tsunami' or non-stop flow of information is larger than we ,as adults,can digest and one does not need to be introduced in contemporary human behavior to understand that copy-cat attitudes often lead to exponential dramas such as high school shootings or 'hidden' agendas for group suicides (as was the case in Japan a couple of years ago).The point is often children are badly hit by the wrong contents.They simply are incapable to de-contectextualize and put it in a rational perspective. Fragilised people pay a great deal of attention towards the slightest change in the media and are as such more easily exploited.We all were introduced in the subtle strategies sooner or later.Part of growing up.. The artist has been gradually selecting images from the web .Images (stills and cellular videoshots) depicting "indoor" violence .Images which were meant to be consulted and commented by the same sort of people that throw them on this insiders 'stage'. This information, because of its illigal and illicit content is often taken off the web (read censored) under governmental or corporate pressure.It could indeed lead to embarassing incidents between governments or stimulate massive crowds in the streets if well conducted. In this endless stream of visual data ,the artist has saved and selected on 'You Tube' a small series of brutal videostills where Greek policemen were forcing Roma or Albanian youngsters (2 young men) to hit each other in the face harder and harder, under the amused eyes of the servicemen which are supposed to represent the law and order of a respectable member of the European Union.The cellular shots make one think of the pop song and videopiece "True Faith" once realised by New Order in the 80's where in some sort of choreography people were hitting each other in the face..or less popular the performance "Rythm 0 1974"by Marina Abramovic where she assigned a passive role to herself, with the public being the force which would act on her and gradually use more and more violence against her, enjoying the kick of the forbidden.. The You Tube images Dragot luckily saved(before they were removed) were not intended as a popsong neither as an artistic performance but where filmed by policemen with their private cell-phones and shortly after flung on the internet as the worst taste trophies imaginable .These youngsters were publicly exposed in a merciless orgy of cruelty. Now the information is one thing, treating the information is another thing,treating the information in an intelligent and emotionally balanced artwork is a completely different mission. Dragot started to select the crude 'matter' or 'matière première'(found footage on the net) and to sculpt it socially and artistically in order to slide it in collective memory by a rather fresh and funny (read cynical) strategy.Turning them into cartoons.. Doing so ,he manages to expand the dialogue towards a larger group of society . He refuses to pinpoint the artwork as the next cheap sensational micro scandal in the over-and-done-with academy of shock.(dating form the period BC read "before Crisis"). He devoids the sequence of images (selected stills from the shock video posted) of any recognisable realistic detail and turns the reality into a certain degree of fiction:a cartoon which transposes the action on a different level.Thus the artist decides to vehiculise the information into this fragile target we call children . Children are confronted with violence to an up-to-now unknown degree (useless to draw the lifelong list of video-games,movies,ads,newsflashes not to forget the most subtle of all: reality and needless to say that heaps of books treat this rather spooky subject and discussion panels turn in circles circumventing the real topic:the measurable impact of violence on the mind of the exposed child). Here in the Tirana Museum Dragot has draw huge size stills in a cartoon-like sequence of 6 or 8 images , life size, that is to say the average size of a just-not-teenager . The drawnings (stills sequence) on the wall are emptied of their short historical dimension of a drama which happened in protected police quarters in some capital city (Dragot says" it could be anywhere" .The kids only find the black outlines. On the floor of the museum ,lots of little boxes of 'multi-talent pencil' or wax crayons in a predefined range of colours. The piece is a large sort of "colorbook" and the children have to color in the various segments of the drawings as shown in the pinned up example.. A couple of schoolclasses are invited in the afternoon to color on the walls of this museum, and in the evening ,the piece is shown to the larger public. Has the violence been hidden or substracted out of the raw material (you tube cellular phone videos) and softened in order to protect the children or is the ultimate goal of the art project to accustom the kids to little doses of violence and maybe rediscover the true content?And where is that true content? It seems that the freshly and "disney colored" drawings warn us seriously for the highly manipulated way in which encapsulated violence might reach us since all violence is not visual,but rather subtly merchandised and consumable even for the most innocent sweeny toddlers. Extremely important is the fact that the artist has not forgotten the origin of his found footage and in an adjacent space,the visitor is confronted by the rawness and brutality of the lift off images for the project.The adult side of the piece?The true content? The visitor indeed goes the other way round just as the salmon swims up the river and therefore the result is much harder to take in.Black and white becomes color and color becomes video. This wake-up is directed to the conscience of the adult and leaves him critically behind with it..vision and sound this time.. koen wastijn november 2009

David Ko managing director and vice president of Connected Life Asia, Yahoo! by CL Asia

Yahoo! and Maxis Further Partnership to Enhance Consumer’s Mobile Experience by Delivering the First Highly Relevant and Engaging Mobile Advertising In Malaysia

Yahoo! Becomes Exclusive Advertising Partner for Maxis’ Mobile Internet Service

KUALA LUMPUR, June 17, 2008 – Yahoo! today announced a strategic mobile advertising partnership with Maxis Communications Berhad (Maxis), Malaysia’s leading mobile operator. In this partnership deal, Maxis is set to carry a variety of innovative graphical advertisements on its wap portal - The Maxis WAP Portal, that is exclusively sold and served by Yahoo!

Today’s announcement builds on continued collaborations between Maxis and Yahoo! to develop and enhance the mobile Internet experience. In June last year, the two companies announced and have subsequently launched, the industry leading mobile search experience, Yahoo! oneSearch on the Maxis WAP Portal, providing a search experience that delivers instant answers and relevant information to consumers without having to scroll through a series of Web links.

Mobile advertising is revolutionizing the market by allowing advertisers to deliver highly targeted messaging to consumers on mobile devices, and providing the opportunity to adopt unique and innovative marketing campaigns through mobile graphical advertising.

As mobile Internet pioneers, Yahoo! and Maxis will combine their expertise in the industry and knowledge of consumer habits, enabling leading brands to offer consumers targeted advertising specifically created for the mobile environment. Mobile advertising allows consumers to interact and engage directly with the unique marketing opportunities that mobile phones provide, and allows advertisers to deliver relevant information to a highly targeted and engaged demographic regardless of whether the consumer is in the home, office, or on the go. Maxis and Yahoo! intend to roll out the first mobile advertisements on The Maxis WAP Portal in the coming months.

The Maxis WAP Portal records an average of 20 million hits per month and offers over 10 million Maxis customers the largest catalogue of content-rich data services in Malaysia. Maxis customers have instant access to news, information, entertainment and access to mobile internet services on the Maxis WAP Portal.

"The mobile phone is poised to be the new media or seventh screen in advertising terms for the simple reason that it is the one truly personal media. Maxis, with our the largest subscriber base and the highest data usage in the country, is in the best position to give Malaysian advertisers the mass market base they desire,” said Kugan Thirunavakarasu, Maxis Head of Product Development and Infotainment.

“Our partnership with Yahoo!, the leader in mobile adverting, shows our commitment to enhancing our strategy and harnessing the power of mobile advertising to create new revenue models.” he added.

"The partnership with Maxis demonstrates Yahoo!'s continued focus on becoming the must-buy opportunity for advertisers and further extends our leadership in graphical advertising across mobile devices," said David Ko, vice president and managing director of Connected Life Asia, Yahoo! "Advertisers and our mobile operator partners recognize the value and unique abilities of mobile advertising and are positioning it as a core part of their digital campaigns. We are excited to work with Maxis to create superior experiences that deliver great value to advertisers and mobile consumers alike."

Yahoo! is focused on creating the monetization engine for the mobile Internet: enabling publishers to monetize their services, advertisers to reach targeted audiences at large scale and with impact, and by providing consumers with enhanced mobile experiences.

[ed. note: i suggest reordering the above... i.e., enable advertisers first, consumers second, then publishers]

About the Maxis Group

The Maxis Group is the region’s emerging mobile telecommunications Group serving 20 million customers as at end March 2008. The Group has a 5,000 strong workforce and has operations in Malaysia, India through subsidiary, Aircel Limited, and Indonesia through PT Natrindo Telepon Seluler.

Its Malaysian operations, Maxis Communications Berhad (“Maxis”) is the leading mobile communications service provider in Malaysia with the largest subscriber base of 10 million as at end March 2008. Maxis operates mobile telecommunications and fixed line networks nationwide as well as international gateways. Maxis’ mobile services are offered under the Maxis brand for postpaid and the Hotlink brand for prepaid. Maxis launched its 3G service - Maxis 3G - in July 2005. In September 2006, Maxis became the world’s first operator to use HSDPA (a high speed upgrade of the 3G network) to roll out residential broadband services.

Since it began operations in 1995, Maxis has won numerous awards. Maxis was named Malaysia’s “Most Admired Company” by the Asia Wall Street Journal in 2006. In June 2007, leading regional industry journal Asian Mobile News named Maxis as “Asian Mobile Operator of the Year” and “Malaysian Mobile Operator of the Year”. Most recently, the company was recognised as “Malaysia’s Service Provider of the Year” by Frost & Sullivan at the 2008 Malaysia Telecoms Awards due to its clear demonstration of leadership in business performance, brand value, sustained service excellence, network quality and product innovation, further reinforcing the Maxis Group’s mission to be a Regional Communications Leader of Choice.

About Yahoo!

Yahoo! Inc. is a leading global Internet brand and one of the most trafficked Internet destinations worldwide. Yahoo! is focused on powering its communities of users, advertisers, publishers, and developers by creating indispensable experiences built on trust. Yahoo! is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.

For more information on Yahoo! Mobile please visit mobile.yahoo.com/

Sawtooth by Redroom Studios

5 9

inspired by the work of our Aussie friend Cheridan (walkinginspace pt2) who is a master of the abstract / graphical composition and rendering...

PosterGenius - Graphical user interface with sample poster by Evan Karageorgos

Screenshot of the optimal reading distance index in PosterGenius, a new software application specifically designed to allow you to create effective scientific, academic and engineering poster presentations quickly and easily.

PosterGenius informs you in real-time about the optimal distance by which the content of your poster will be easily readable in the conference hall. If the distance is good for an average conference area, PosterGenius marks the index with a green background color. Otherwise, it marks it with an orange or red shade, depending on how severely off-range this distance is, therefore indicating that you should adjust the type size accordingly.

www.postergenius.com