For my final project I created a claymation titled “Theory On Friends and Strangers”, inspired by a mathematical theorem governing group dynamics. I took my projcet in a slightly different direction by illustrating the negative consequences that some group dynamics can have. My video is two acts, the second act is about the negative effects that the group members have each other. I plan on expanding on and clarifying the second act.

My video:

Theorem On Friends And Strangers

My character models:

My ‘studio’:

A page from my storyboard:

A physical representation of inner thoughts, and how I deal with them.  Hidden on campus and in the surrounding areas, only one of the recipients has a chance of finding their 2 inch cube.

Floating spirals with two entrances

traditional feminine craft for traditional feminine worry

you’ll get tired of me

fabric squares batiked and dyed with coffee

First I made a small scale paper model of the structure and then I scaled up.

Then I cut pieces of paper to the size of the the measurements made so that I could wrap the fabric I was stitching around it

There were 6 pentagons and 10 filler equilateral triangles needed to create the shape so I layed out the pentagons and stitched them together first.

Once there was enough put together I pinned the corners of the out ring of points on the dome and tied string to secure it to the ceiling.

I also tried lighting it from inside to see what it would look like.

I had also wanted it to be lit by fire so I tried shooting pics of it near the fireplace.

Here’s me inside it!

So my goals for this piece were to create a sort of geometric shell enclosure and to somehow incorporate the comfort in heat (hence the placement near the fireplace). I wanted it to be a strange extension to a practice I associate with companionship, cuddling by a fire. The shell is sort of a way of protecting and isolating its inhabitants. From the outside it also looks like a strange  geometric creature sitting by the fire. The process proved to be extremely time consuming but I’m happy that it turned out dome/shell like.

I decided to create a wall of fabric, Initially, I wanted to have two walls of fabric hanging from the ceiling, much like a tunnel of fabrics. To me, big sheets of fabric hanging down from the ceiling recreates the atmosphere of a forest: being overwhelmed by the height and walking aimlessly through the trail. I thought it’ll be interesting to recreate that atmosphere in an urban setting.

Behind the scenes. I wanted to dye the fabric first. I’ve never dyed anything so I thought this assignment will serve as a good opportunity to experiment. I got Royal Blue and Sunshine Orange. I thought these colors would successfully convey the ambient atmosphere I was envisioning for the assignment. I kept listening to Ulrich Schnauss’ Celine while making this piece.

I created a prototype of a thread speaker to see if a conductive thread can act as a speaker. Surprisingly, the thread did play music, but it was very faint.

Also, I needed to see if I have to hand sew the thread speaker onto the fabric, or if I can use the sewing machine. I ended up hand sewing the speaker since I found it difficult to control the sewing machine. Because the speaker was in a spiral, I needed control over the needle.

After sewing the speaker onto the fabric, I connected the two ends of the speaker thread to a circuit to see if it actually worked. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get it to work last night, but I’m hoping it was the problem with how I connected the circuit board, rather than the problem of the actually thread speaker.

After over twelve hours straight of tying knots, I was glad the prompt was comfort.

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