Reflective Practice - Presentations of my peers

Other Reflections:

Alicia:

Minecraft – Markus Persson

Retro Style Sandbox Game

Zoe Edwards:

Herb Lubalin – Logo Designer 1918-1981

Grid System

Clever use of letters

Meaning through Typography

Influenced by Bauhaus

Has influenced – Alex Trochut/ Si Scott/ Marian Bantes

Cat Walker:

Si Scott – The secret of Drawing

Paper Sciccor Stone

We are Bitch

Mary Hemmingway:

The graphic Language of Neville Brody

Design Ethic – True to Principles

Innovation – Blur Typeface 1992

Assimilation of Influences

Designed over 20 typefaces

Futurist Influence

Art Director of Face Magazine- typography – A continuem through magazine & work

Fuze – qtrly publication- A typeface experiment with digital language

Examples of work: Tribeca for Issey Miyake.

Art Deco- 1920’s – Derived from an exhibition held in 1925

Artists who used Art Deco- A.M. Cassandra

Architecture: Style Visible in Golden Gate Bridge

Font: Art Deco has it’s own font.

Film: Style visible in early Batman film+Metropolis & Metropolis the Japanese animation

Duval Guillaume: - Design agency

Known for work with Alfa Romeo & Carlsberg

Lotus Craving cup animation

Helvetica

Sans Serif typeface of Swiss design created in 1957 by Max Mledinger

Translated means Swiss

Similar in style to Ariel

Used heavily

There is a short film on YouTube called The Film Helvetica document film.

Jorn Kasphul

Born 1980

Worked Alone freelance

Joined an international illustration Agency called DUTCH UNCLE

Known for ‘Nature at it’s best’ Humanimals

ANIMAL ABC

Sir Clive Sinclair

Sinclair Radionics Ltd

1^st calculator 1972 / ZX Spectrum 1982

Watch Micromen BBC 4

Swiss Graphic Design – also known as International Typographic Style

Pioneered by Joseph Muller Brockman

Founded San Serif Typeface & Helvetica

Invented the Grid system that is now the framework for design elements on a page.

Birth of the Home Computer 1976

Steve Wozniak & Ron Wayne

Apple 1 sold in kit form originally

Apple inc founded 1977 – original logo featured Isaak Walton sat under a tree

Apple pioneered the GUI (Graphical user Interface) & the 1^st paint programme.

How to make ILM sound boring

Reflective Practice

Presentation of ILM

Although not on the list to present today I opted to get it out of the way rather than stew on it for another week.

How did it go?

Q: How did you make a company as exciting as ILM so boring? Was the question Neil put to me after my talk.

Harsh? Maybe but I could have gone down one of two routes. I could have included lots of video clips of famous movies, each showing one of numerous state of the art effects that ILM have brought to the big screen. OR I could have chosen instead to try to squeeze all the reasons ILM is so successful into 10 or less minutes. Choosing this option is bound to have cost me marks but what’s done is done and I am left to reflect on my decisions.

Braver in future? Choosing not to include any film clips was probably a cop out as I’ve seen my peers struggle with clips not playing and detracting from the talk.  Also working in Keynote rather than straight into PowerPoint makes any conversion a risk as text formatting seems to go awry.

My own failure was not choosing a subject matter that I chose personally and leaving it late in the day. The company choice of ILM who are so large and has made such an impact means I had to dilute the facts down and so having done the background reading made for hard decisions when it came to editing things down into what were 15 slides. Mary sets the benchmark.  Given the success of Mary 

Auriga- Texture Mapping

New Task:

Texture Mapping:

Given my obvious failure to produce a worthy 3D Model for Auriga then in an effort to find my true talent I have been assigned the role of chief texture mapper. My immediate enthusiasm has been quelled slightly due to my lack of use of Photoshop. My brief introduction during Term1 will need to be built upon if I to produce the goods on this task. 

The plan: I’ll start by getting some texture images from the web. The characters I need to texture include, A wraith, Athena & a Chariot.

Neil has suggested that due to the resolution required I should maybe use scanned images rather than off the web.

A list of textures:

Wraith:

Athena

Chariot

Drawing with Katrinka

Drawing

Monday 21^st March 2011

Drawing with Katrinka

Today’s morning session was held with Katrinka whose aim is to teach us, among other things, Scale & perspective.

We started out by having a brief talk among the group to try & establish each persons own background, skills & drawing experience that they bring into the sessions. Surprised: I was surprised to hear that not all the ‘concept’ artists had a traditional ‘art’ history background, Alishia in particular not having studied art at GCSE level, though clearly she has plenty of ability! This was a little comforting given my own lack of any previous education in Art and having to draw on only the person work from decades ago.

Task Set: The task set was to begin at the start and apply some simple fundamental skills to drawing a candlestick and vase. The point being to get the ‘scale’ of the still life items onto paper in their true scale. Measuring and setting up some simple boxes took the bulk of my time and was slow going. The whole session was slow going and will take time for me to work on before it comes naturally.

Monday 28th March 2011

Drawing with Katrinka

Better pace, translates onto paper.

The whole session today was much more rewarding. It helped working in the Life drawing room as it was a better atmosphere and allowed us to focus on the task without outside distractions. The task: Another still life consisting of an easel with draped fabric, a vase & a stool on a table. A marked contrast from the previous week this time the exercise was to be more reliant on what we could see and putting this on paper quickly.

Each piece took no more than 10 minutes with many only lasting 5-6. Different medium. Having access to charcoal, pen, pencil & ink allowed more variety and added to the experience. Praise: It was great to get some praise for the work produced and the only negative is the fact I left the work in the classroom and the next day it had gone ;(

Really looking forward to the remaining weeks and hope to build a lot on this taster session. Hopefully Easter will afford me some free time to get a sketchbook started and get a proper collection of work together. If I’m ever to put a portfolio together then this is the way fwd! 

The Success of ILM (INDUSTRIAL LIGHT & MAGIC) cont..

1993Landmark Computer Graphics:

For the first time, digital technology was used to create a living, breathing character with skin, muscles, texture, and attitude. This breakthrough expanded the filmmaker's canvas and changed the cinematic art of storytelling. ILM's contribution to Jurassic Park is widely recognized as a high watermark in computer graphics and a pivotal moment in the history of cinema.

1995: Fully Synthetic Speaking Character

Industrial Light & Magic created the first fully synthetic speaking characters with distinct personalities and emotions for Casper.  Whereas Jurassic Park had six minutes of digitally animated dinosaurs on the screen, the ghosts in Casper are on the screen for more than 40 minutes.

1996: Facial Animation

Industrial Light & Magic's proprietary facial animation software brought the 3D digital character of Draco, the star of Dragonheart, to life.  With the voice and facial physique of Sean Connery as their guide, ILM's team of animators redefined what could be successfully shown on screen.

1999: Realistic Digital Human

The Mummy starred the most realistic digital human character ever seen in film.  Featuring totally computer-generated layers of muscles, sinew and tissue, the ILM team again elevated its artistic and technical skill level in bringing a digital character to life.

2000: Performance Capture w/ Real Time Feedback:

Building on the real time 'on-character' motion capture system ILM developed for Star Wars: Episode I, The Phantom Menace in 1997, the team expanded its capabilities to provide Director Stephen Sommers with similar on-character capture which could now be dropped accurately into 3D space derived from the filmed plates in real time. The resulting system combined flexibility with unprecedented speed allowing the performance for ILM's CG Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo) to be directed as it would be on a traditional set.

2001: Ambient Occlusion

ILM developed Ambient Occlusion in an effort to produce a greater level of realism for the CG imagery in Pearl Harbor than had ever been produced before. By providing accurate shadowing and directional lighting information Ambient Occlusion allows renderers to create realistic and efficient lighting effects. Since it's development, the technique has become widely used in the field of computer graphics.

2003: Subsurface Scattering Techniques

ILM's Research and Development department received its seventeenth Sci-Tech Award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the development of practical methods for rendering skin and other translucent materials using subsurface scattering techniques.

First Extreme Close-up CG Human Character

Sunny, the digital baby in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events marks the first film to feature a computer graphics human character seen in extreme close-up.

2006: Imocap: On-set Performance Capture

ILM develops Imocap, a revolutionary image-based performance capture system for the production of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, a film that would later earn the company its fifteenth Oscar, the BAFTA for Visual Effects and six VES awards. Among the system's key attributes are its extremely low footprint on set and ability to operate in any and all conditions.

2007: Fluid Simulation:

To create the epic sea battle for the third installment in the Pirates of the Caribbean series ILM brought to bear all of the fluid simulation knowledge that they had gained over the years creating effects for films such as Perfect Storm, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest and Poseidon. The centerpiece of the sea battle is the half-mile wide CG Maelstrom that required the simulation of over 15.5-billion gallons of seawater and additional simulations to create subsurface bubbles, foam, spray, splashes and ship wakes. The software environment for this "virtual water tank" was ILM's proprietary system Zeno. PhysBAM, the fluid dynamics engine that operates within this environment was written in collaboration with researchers from Stanford University. The engine was parallelized so it could be run across 40 processors and even so, it took quite some time to compute. The renders for these passes took anywhere from a couple of minutes to 20 hours per frame.

2008: Fez Animation System

With the large body of complex facial animation required for The Spiderwick Chronicles ILM pushed its R&D team to develop a replacement for their award-winning 'Caricature' system, which had been originally created for the 1996 feature Dragon Heart. 'Fez', as it is called, is a next-generation system developed at ILM that takes a unique approach to complex facial animation allowing for greater flexibility with regard to artist interaction. Two modular interfaces were developed: FaceDon which helps large teams of animators stay "on model' using a sort of virtual model sheet in the form of a facial library of preset expressions, and FaceSelect which allows for the fine-tuning of animation performances utilizing an interface based on human anatomy.

2009: Verte GPU Engine

Creating a massive firestorm the likes of which had never been seen on screen before might seem difficult enough but this, in combination with the fact that the fire needed to be completely directable and now you've got a true challenge on your hands. That is exactly the situation that the ILM crew found themselves in whilst creating the effects for the sixth film in the Harry Potter series. Rather than piece together hundreds of practical elements shot on a soundstage, the team took a different tact, they developed a new software system that would simulate high-resolution, photorealistic fire that was 100% CG.

REFERENCE:

Books:

Mark Cotta Vaz and Patricia Rose Duignan; (1996)

Industrial light & magic: into the digital realm /

Virgin Publishing, ISBN/ISSN: 1852276061

Smith, Thomas G; (1986) Industrial light and magic: the art of special effects.

Columbus Books, ISBN/ISSN: 0862871425

Journals:

3D World – article on Rango (March 2011)

Article:

The Times, Maher, Kevin. (2011) Animation: the future of film? (Times, Play, Saturday 5^th March)

DVD: Film

Minority Report, (2002) Film DVD Extras, Special Features including ILM Featurettes.  Twentieth Century Fox.

STAR WARS, (2004) Trilogy, DVD Bonus Material, 20 Century Fox.

DVD: Music

Williams, John, (1997) The Empire Strikes Back, The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack.  RCA

Web: 

Company:

http://www.ilm.com/

http://www.imdb.com/company/co0072491/

ILM –Creating the Impossible – How ILM changed cinema forever

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOga2Mf8KQI

http://moodle.staffordcoll.ac.uk/file.php/1037/nm_pdfs/ILM.pdf

Lucas Film Spin Offs:

http://www.thx.com/about-us

Feature Films:

http://www.rangomovie.co.uk/

Lucas:

http://www.evancarmichael.com/Famous-Entrepreneurs/538/summary.php

People:

http://www.digitalmediafx.com/Features/ubiwerks.html

Future & Legacy:

http://www.lucaslearning.com/

Present Day Success:

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/paramount/rango/

http://www.3dworldmag.com/2011/03/05/3d-world-141-the-making-of-rango/

The Success of ILM (INDUSTRIAL LIGHT & MAGIC)

Given my upcoming presentation on the success of ILM I thought it appropraite to post some of the findings from my research and maybe, if your lucky a few choice images from the many I have collected during the project.

Here come the stats:

About ILM:

Ø    Founded by George Lucas in 1975 (Spawned out of Star Wars) Lucas set up a company to make the special effects for Star Wars and this became ILM.

Ø    Located in San Francisco & Singapore.

Ø    Set the standard for visual effects for over 30 years.

Ø    At the forefront of the digital revolution.

Ø    Continue to break new ground in visual effects.

Ø    Serve the motion picture, commercial production & attractions industries.

Ø    Created VFX for nearly 300 feature films

Ø    Played a key role in 10 of the top 15 worldwide box office hits of all time.

Ø    Helped drive the evolution of visual effects.

Mastered tradition arts of:

Ø    Blue screen photography

Ø    Matte Painting

Ø    Model Construction

Pioneered the development of:

Ø    Motion control cameras

Ø    Optical compositing

Pushed the boundaries of effects technology.

Since the 80’s led the way in their use of computer graphics & digital imaging.

Developed breakthrough software techniques such as:

Ø    digital compositing

Ø    morphing

Ø    simulations & enveloping.

Ø    film input scanning

Ø    wire removal

Ø    motion control

Ø    Imocap & the EXR file format.

During my reflection and commentary on this ground breaking company I discuss how the success of ILM reminds me alot of Pixar, and in deed the two are connected with Lucas being the most obvious link. When we looked at 'The Pixar Story' it was the mixture of artistry and technological progress that both combined to  make them so successful. 

These aspects are what I will base my slides and commentry on in my talk. 

Here are just a few and a few slide images so not to bore you with science...

1975: Motion Control Photography

Start Wars

Traditional techniques simply would not work for filming the elaborate dogfights Director George Lucas had envisioned so, led by John Dykstra, the team developed a camera system that could be controlled by custom-designed, hard-wired electronics and thus record and replicate exacting camera movements time and time again. In addition to camera pan, tilt, and roll movements, focus and changes in aperture were also preprogrammed. The system, dubbed the Dykstraflex, utilized a camera mounted to a crane arm, which in turn rode on a dolly track. The Dystraflex represented the first in a long line of motion control cameras developed at ILM.

1985:First Completely Computer Generated Character

ILM made further breakthroughs in computer graphics with the creation of the first completely computer-generated character in a feature film, the "stained glass man" in Young Sherlock Holmes.

*Note to self – Use image of scene in church with armored man (off website)

*The Goonies - A group of kids embark on a wild adventure after finding a pirate treasure map.

Back to the Future: In 1985, Doc Brown invented time travel, in 1955, Marty McFly accidentally prevented his parents from meeting, putting his own existence at stake.

1991: First computer Graphics Main Character

Industrial Light & Magic created the first computer graphics main character with the T-1000 in Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

3D Modelling

Exploring Specialist Pathway

MAYA

3D modelling of assets. 

3D artists to work from completed concept designs and create 3D models.

After all the tutorials, book work, study of character modelling professionals I thought I would be able to knock up a 3d character model no problem. How wrong I was. On reflection I would be able to squeeze a month of Mondays into one blog entry that went along the lines of … “Struggled with 3d modelling of Zeus for most of the day” Got frustrated, Lost Motivation Went home a broken person. After each session I viewed art history as ‘light relief’.

Each session I would try a different approach, some times with a little success, sometimes with non.

Techniques:

 Poly Box Modeling

Ø  Block Modeling

Almost always start with a cube.

The basic block modeling was relatively straightforward, not that I didn’t have some difficulty at first. Once I got a feel for the need to get blocking in large areas and grasping how each represents an area of the model then getting the basic shape was not a huge issue. 

Ø  Modeling according to muscle Flow

Looking at the later models V1.6 onwards I think I could see how my model of Zeus incorporated some degree of muscle flow especially in the shoulder area. Whenever I looked to focus on a bicep, triceps and calf I would try to remember how Jeff Unay would go about reflecting his knowledge of anatomy into the models he was making in 3D and trying to stay true to the basic topology of muscle flow. Having a limited polygon limit made it difficult to produce a character with flowing muscle while limiting your self.

Default T poses:  Creating the model in the T pose as advised was not something I achieved. Why? Because I followed the image plane too closely, therefore working to the letter of the model leant I got over dependant on the drawing and as a result the model suffered.  Not following the T pose meant the hand of the Zeus character was too close to the body so I got too cramped up and working on the inside of the hand was often obscured by the body. In future I would definitely have the arm extend away to form the T pose. It would eliminate some of the frustration of what was already difficult.

Scale: Establish Overall Scale early on.

Task: To build a 3D model of Zeus that would fit in the Chariot I was modeling also. To ensure this I referred to the way Jeff used a ‘measuring tool’ within Maya to ensure the scale was true to the character he was working to. I was able to work out in Maya how the ruler tool could be activated and therefore, with a little playing about was able to ‘measure him up’ for his chariot.

Ø  Working with Image Planes

Using the Image plane was useful when modelling and something we had covered in classroom based tutorials. Setting the planes up in the first instance caused a few problems but once there were beneficial. As noted above I did become over dependant on having the planes in the viewport and once Neil agreed for me not to follow the image it was quite a ‘liberating’ experience! Straight away I found the modelling was more intuitive and less ‘modelling by numbers’.  Keeping the image in a finder window so I could refer to now and then but 80% of the time was done without it. 

Reflective Practice Presentation 1

As part of the Formal Assessment for Reflective Practice we have been asked to make a presentation of 15 minutes about a success story in your chosen field of study. 

Reflection: Confession. I was asked to submit the subject of my presentation in reading week but didn’t make a decision so didn’t submit. I have now submitted another studio as my proposed subject. The Studio is Laika who are based in

LAIKA/house. A dynamic community of filmmakers, designers and animators guided by a legacy of 30 years of animation history* and fueled by the vision of NIKE co-founder Phil Knight.

Notorious for our skills in storytelling and character performance, LAIKA/house produces every type of animation** in every medium***.

**Cel, Stop Motion, CG, Flash, Motion Graphics

 ***Television, Film, Advertising, Internet, and Branded Entertainment HELLOOOOOO!

*As with my submission for Creativity & Social Context 

I await Neil’s agreement before proceeding with in depth research.

Till then I have made a copy of my last presentation from last term but renamed the project and began to assemble some new screen shots that I can use in the new presentation with “Keynote’: As noted in a previous blog to tackle a programme like ‘Flash’ not having the time to learn given other, more pressing tasks I would rather build on the features of ‘Keynote’ Staying True to my Apple routes! 

The Medici - Money & Art

My Notes:

Cosimo Medici “God father of the Renaissance”

Wealth was not enough for Cosimo, he wanted wealth to transform into power & prestige so he become a patron of arts.

Why did art need a Patron? Because artist’s did not sell work at this time.

They only worked when they were commissioned to do work.

In time 70% of renaissance artists came to be working in Florence.

One of the artist Cosimo supported was Filippo Brunelleschi who was an architect not favored by the mainstream for his odd, difficult ways. Cosimo took a risk in supporting Brunelleschi in his work and set him the tast of completing the roof of the Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence. In 1436 after 4million bricks & weighing 37,000 tons he completed the inward curving vault. This became a symbol of Florence & Tuscany. In art Brunelleschi’s greatest contribution was his invention of linear perspective that went revolutionised Art.

Other Renaissance artists taken on by Cosimo were Donatello who became a close trusted friend of Cosimo. Best known for his sculpture David that was the 1^st time since Roman times a freestanding nude in bronze had been attempted. The sculpture was frowned upon at the time by mainstream thinking & was very much at the cutting edge for the nature of the work.

Other artists of note from the Renaissance period include, Boticelli, Leonardo, Michelangelo, Lippi, Altissimo & Gozzoli.

Book Research:

The Medici-Godfathers of the Renaissance

Publisher: Pimlico; New edition (2 Dec 2004) Language English  ISBN-10: 1844130983

A dazzling history of the modest family, which rose to become one of the most powerful in Europe, The Medici, is a remarkably modern story of power, money and ambition. Against the background of an age which saw the rebirth of ancient and classical learning - of humanism which penetrated and explored the arts and sciences and the 'dark' knowledge of alchemy, astrology, and numerology - Paul Strathern explores the intensely dramatic rise and fall of the Medici family in Florence, as well as the Italian Renaissance which they did so much to sponsor and encourage. Interwoven into the narrative are the lives of many of the great Renaissance artists with whom the Medici had dealings, including Leonardo, Michelangelo and Donatello, as well as scientists like Galileo and Pico della Mirandola, both of whom clashed with the religious authorities. In this enthralling study, Paul Strathern also follows the fortunes of those members of the Medici family who achieved success away from Florence, including the two Medici popes and Catherine de' Médicis who became Queen of France and played a major role in that country through three turbulent reigns. Vivid and accessible, the book ends with the gloriously decadent decline of the Medici family in Florence as they strove to be recognised as European Princes. (20040315)

Filippo Brunelleschi's design for the dome of the cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence remains one of the most towering achievements of Renaissance architecture. Completed in 1436, the dome remains a remarkable feat of design and engineering. Its span of over 140 feet exceeds St Paul's in London and St Peter's in Rome, and even outdoes the Capitol in Washington DC, making it the largest dome ever constructed using bricks and mortar. The story of its creation and its brilliant but "hot-tempered" creator is told in Ross King's delightful Brunelleschi's Dome.

King has already established himself as an accomplished novelist, author of Domino, Ex-Libris, and the story of both dome and architect offer him plenty of rich material. The story of the dome goes back to 1296 when work began on the cathedral but it was only in 1420, when Brunelleschi won a competition over his bitter rival Lorenzo Ghiberti to design the daunting cupola, that work began in earnest. King weaves an engrossing tale from the political intrigue, personal jealousies, dramatic setbacks and sheer inventive brilliance that led to the paranoid Filippo, "who was so proud of his inventions and so fearful of plagiarism" finally seeing his dome completed only months before his own death. King argues that it was Filippo's improvised brilliance in solving the problem of suspending the enormous cupola in bricks and mortar (painstakingly detailed with precise illustrations) that led him to "succeed in performing an engineering feat whose structural daring was without parallel". He tells a compelling and informed story, ranging from discussions of the construction of the bricks, mortar and marble that made up the dome, to its subsequent use as a scientific instrument by the Florentine astronomer Paolo Toscanelli

FURTHER READING:

April Blood - Florence and the Plot against the Medici - Lauro Martines

Brunelleschi's Dome - Ross King

Catherine de'Medici - Leonie Frieda

Cosimo de'Medici and the Florentine Renaissance - Dale Kent

Dynasty and Destiny in Medici Art - Janet Cox Rearick

Florence and the Medici - J.R Hale

Florentine politics 1502 - 1515 - Humfrey Butters

Galileo - Courtier - Mario Biagioli

Galileo's Daughter - Dava Sobel

Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling - Ross King

Patronage - Art and Society in Renaissance Italy - F.W. Kent

The French wars of Religion - R. J. Knecht

The Last of the Medici - Harold Acton

The Lives of the Artists - Giorgio Vasari

The Pope's Elephant - Silvio Bedini

The Prince - Niccolo Machiavelli

The Renaissance Bazaar - Jerry Brotton

The Rise and Decline of the Medici Bank - Raymond de Roover

The Rise and Fall of the House of Medici - Christopher Hibbert

The Rise of the Medici - Faction in Florence 1426-1434-Dale Kent

Video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FFDJK8jmms

 Web:

http://www.medici.org/

http://www.pbs.org/empires/medici/

http://www.artist-biography.info/artist/donatello/

On-line Gallery of Renaissance Art:

http://www.pbs.org/empires/medici/resources/gallery.html

Web Links

The Medici Archive Project

The Medici Palace in Florence

The Duomo in Florence

Uffizi: official web site

Museum of Science - Florence

The official web site of the Vatican

Perceptions of Reality

Homework:

As a going away present Neil asked we read up on the following philosophers …

> PLATO<

> HUME<

> KANT<

> DESCARTES<

> BERKLEY<

Research their perceptions of reality and how this impacted on views within the world of art.

REAL v’s REALITY

The perfect Book for Reading Week!

I have managed to loan a book from the local Cannock library entitled.

The Great Philosophers

Publisher: Quercus Publishing Plc; illustrated edition (5 Mar 2008)

ISBN-13: 978-1847243980

This book contained a concise small section, usually 3-5 pages of each philosopher and enough info to gleam what I think Neil was looking for by requesting this background reading.  I have written up a couple of pages in my written text book.

DESCARTES, Rene, 1596-1650

The Method of Doubt –

“ I think therefore I am”

Descartes attempts to:

>Place knowledge upon a secure foundation

> Prove that the self is an immaterial substance capable of existing independent of physical body.

> Show that God exists

Use Doubt as a Filter

Our senses sometimes deceive us

eg: a straight stick dipped in water may look bent.

We might at that moment be dreaming – perhaps you have never been awake?

The film, The Matrix deals with some of these concepts and much has been written about this on-line.

Philosophy and the Matrix - Descartes

http://www.youtube.com/philosophy&thematrix-descartes

In particular The Cogito, ergo sum: I think therefore I am

In order to doubt you must at least exist.

The film delves into this way of thinking and the problems with the external world. “It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth”. 

Metaphysics is branch of Philosophy that asks the question-What is Real?

How do you define real? Real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain.

What computers still can’t do! Think for themselves.

The doubts Descartes rouses are some of the most powerful ever entertained. 

He breaks everything down to its foundations & then builds it back up

Kant, Immanuel 1724-1804

Moral Philosophy

“Two things fill the mind with ever increasing wonder & awe, the starry heavens above me & the moral low within me”

IDEOLOGY: How we feel is morally irrelevant, what matters is, that we do our moral duty which reason alone can establish.

Is appearance any reasonable reflection on reality?

In Summary: The world is the product of the Matrix

The structure of the mind brings forth the world.

Philosophy and the Matrix - Kant

http://www.youtube.com/Philosophy&TheMatrix-Kant

The power of the mind makes it real!

There is always an absolute reality, however it's also reasonable to conclude we will never see that true reality. No matter what technology we create or how we evolve, our efficiency at viewing the true reality will never be more than a perception, even albeit a sharp one.

Philosophy and the Matrix - Baudrillard

PLATO c428-c, 348 bc

“Philosophy begins in wonder”

Philosophers, theologians & artists have been struck by the thought that what we seem to see all around us is NOT THE ULTIMATE RELITY!

This is demonstrated in Plato’s theory, writing & forms.

Introducing the Forms/ What are the theory of forms?

According to Plato, those objects that we seem to see all around is chairs, tables, trees, mountains etc.. Are not what is ultimately real.

They are mere shadows or reflections of the truly real objects – the forms.

Eg. A tree is a fleeting reflection of a form.

1) The FORMS are more REAL

If there was no form of the tree there could be no particular tree.

2) The FORMS are PERFECT

No particular tree is perfect it always posses a flaw. The form of the tree by contrast is perfect.

3) The FORMS are ‘eternal & unchanging’

Our idea of beauty is constantly changing.

According to Plato ‘ While fashions may change True Beauty does not.

The FORM of beauty is Changeless & Timeless.

If Plato’s forms exist where are they?

IF they exist they must be on a higher plane. A domain more real than that revealed by our own senses.

The Allegory of the Cave, also commonly known as Myth of the Cave, Metaphor of the Cave, The Cave Analogy, or the Parable of the Cave, is an allegory used by the Greek philosopher Plato in his work The Republic to illustrate "our nature in its education and want of education". (514a) The allegory of the cave is written as a fictional dialogue between Plato's teacher Socrates and Plato's brother Glaucon, at the beginning of Book VII (514a520a).

Plato imagines a group of people who have lived chained in a cave all of their lives, facing a blank wall. The people watch shadows projected on the wall by things passing in front of the cave entrance, and begin to ascribe forms to these shadows. According to Plato, the shadows are as close as the prisoners get to seeing reality. He then explains how the philosopher is like a prisoner who is freed from the cave and comes to understand that the shadows on the wall are not constitutive of reality at all, as he can perceive the true form of reality rather than the mere shadows seen by the prisoners.

The Allegory is related to Plato's Theory of Forms,[1] wherein Plato asserts that "Forms" (or "Ideas"), and not the material world of change known to us through sensation, possess the highest and most fundamental kind of reality. Only knowledge of the Forms constitutes real knowledge.[2] In addition, the allegory of the cave is an attempt to explain the philosopher's place in society.

The Allegory of the Cave is related to Plato's metaphor of the sun (507b509c) and the analogy of the divided line (509d513e), which immediately precede it at the end of Book VI. Allegories are summarized in the viewpoint of dialectic at the end of Book VII and VIII (531d-534e). This relates to the idea of forms as people struggle to see the reality beyond illusion.


The link between early philosophy & films in the new media age

Platos Alogary of the cave

THE LIFE YOU HAVE LED IS NOT IN FACT HE TOTALITY OF WHAT IS POSSIBLE FOR YOU. AND IF YOU COULD RELEASE YOURSELF FROM BONDS YOU CANNOT SEE YOU WOULD THEN BE ABLE TO SEE THE WORLD AS IT TRULY IS. 

THE LINK TO THE MATRIX - UNCHAINED OR IN THE CASE OF THE MATRIX UNPLUGGED! 

http://www.youtube.com/Philosophy&TheMatrix-Baudrillard

One of three Great British Empiricists, along with John Locke & David Hume.

IDEALIST

REJECTED MATERIALISM

WANTED TO BRING GOD BACK TO CENTRE STAGE

The physical world exists only while it is being perceived.

Berkley’s idealism: “To be is to be perceived”

Identifies physical objects with ideas

Try to conceive of a physical object that exists unperceived.

Imagine a tree that continues to exist though no one observes it.

How else may the REAL & the ILLUSORY differ?

Berkley believes our ideas of real things have a constancy & regularity to them. (They appear to be governed by laws eg. laws of gravity.)

Illusions & hallucinations on the other hand fail to fit in with our other experiences in a coherent way.

Contemporary philosophers rejected Berkley’s conclusions but acknowledge Berkley’s points as insightful & thought provoking. 

HUME, David 1711-1776

The Soul & Causation

“When we consider the operation of causes, we are never able to discover any necessary connection”

In order to be able to know something, or even believe it we must first be able to ‘think’ it. We must at least be able to entertain it as a ‘hypothesis’ to suppose it might be true.

Concepts

Instead of trying to show that it is false we might instead try to show that it is empty that we cannot even entertain the thought it might be true.  One way to do this is to show that we do not possess the relevant concepts.

HUME’S EMPIRICISM – Knowledge / Concepts

>The knowledge of the world around us is ultimately founded on sense experience. 5 senses.

>Every concept we posses is ultimately furnished by experience.

IMPRESSIONS & IDEAS

Sensory Impressions e.g. Apple colour = RED /shape/smell/texture/sound/taste

***** NEW MEDIA (EG. MATRIX,) DOES TAKE INFLUENCE FROM EARLY WORK OF THE LIKES OF EARLY PHILOSOPHY AS DETAILED HERE *****

NEED TO INCLUDE SOME IMAGES TO TIE THIS IN - RE READ & REVIEW THEN IMPROVE******