The Real Final Project

My final project consisted of an original song that I recorded, wrote, and played. It's an instrumental with programmed drums, bass, acoustic guitar, strings, English horn, and clarinet. The strings, English horn, and clarinet were created with the keyboard.

http://www.cs.iupui.edu/~jsellmer/musicPlayer/playlist_albumart.html

I also decided to play and add a very amateur video with the song.

http://www.cs.iupui.edu/~jsellmer/Sequence 01.f4v

Abandoned Final Project

After spending way too much time on this project, I decided to move onto something else

http://www.cs.iupui.edu/~jsellmer/glassConcert.wmv

Cannes

More images

Master Assignment

I selected Jonathan Singer as my study of a master. He's a podiatrist that had to give up his practice after developing Parkinson's disease. He develop a complete pictorial library of botanicals for the Smithsonian.

Here's his website:
http://www.botanicamagnifica.com/

New Media Scavenger Hunt

Since I work at St. Francis, I found myself noticing how they or I use new media. Here's the five I came up with.
1. Epocrates- A database of medicines the replaces the PDR(Physician's Desk Reference)
2. Tracking Board- This is a digital board that tracks patients in the ER and urgent care.
3. Digital billboards- There is a billboard that announces all the new deliveries that says things like "It's a boy......Born to Bill and Sue.....named Dakota.........7 lbs. 5oz........... Now when you're searching for newborn babies to kidnap, you know where to shop
4. Medicine dispensing Kiosk. You need 30 mg of Torodol so you go to the Kiosk, insert the patient's name and ID and it dispenses it like a Pez dispenser.
5. Envision. This is a method to display all radiologic test to a physician that signs in to the system. From there, they can pull up any Xray they need and view the film

Class of April 13

Susan Tennant taught today's class since Beth was tied up. We talked about the definition of New Media for the first part. After our definition we read the definition in the mission statement composed by faculty. Later we discussed political things and grass root movements. We also discussed the possibility of the internet changes that may come including paid internet and government interference and how this would effect free speech. We are to find 5 types of New Media outside the campus for our next project.

What the Bleep Project

Hey, guess what! I AM my project. How easy is that? I am the compilation of every decision I have ever made in my life, as each of us are. Every project I've made so far for this class also demonstrates quantum physics and infinite possibilities. This is something unavoidable. We think of possibilities, we decide on one, we accomplish that task, maybe we don't like the results, then we decide again, and the process continues.
Sorry if this seems like the easy way out, but it's an obvious assignment.

What the Bleep

We watched Watch the Bleep in class on Monday. It was a compilation of books I have read. Many of the speakers were familiar to me and the concepts came from A New Earth and A Course in Miracles. It was about creating your reality and being a co-creator in life. I liked the effects and humor.

Tree Surgeons

I'm celebrating tree surgeons. I tried to upload my video to the post but it didn't had lots of lag time. You can view it at

http://www.cs.iupui.edu/~jsellmer/treeSurgeonCompressed.mov

Class of March 23

Today we did a group project. Five of us assembled a bobble head from garbage and newspaper. Other projects involved making apple sauce with the help of a policeman and bringing back trinkets from the "arson site". Hopefully our bobble head will be posted with a video.

Mirror, mirror, on the wall

I'm carrying my word with me now

My Word

Wood

What if.........final project

What if I attached a camcorder to my motorcycle and made a video.....how easy that would be.
What if I did little segments of home-made instruments.
What if I practice the guitar enough to play a classical piece for a project.
What if I made a real frankenstein monster with old surgery parts and brought him to class
What if I did interpretive dance
What if I made sock puppets
What if I did my original plan of recording music
What if I made after effects to go with the music
What if I used the music in my portfolio
What if I did a funny video
What if I made a hologram of Sponge Bob
What if I did an underwater video while scuba diving
What if, while doing the underwater video, a shark swallowed my camera
What if I designed a quilt
What if I made pottery for the first time
What if I designed some clothing
What if I knitted a sweater
What about designing some jewerly
What about designing a piece of furniture
What about adapting Macbeth in 3-d using animals
What about writing an alternate ending to "Children of the Corn"
What about training ants to spell words with their body position
What about creating a web game
What if I made a comic book
What about designing a painting, then making a digital print of it
What about making a grayscale portrait
What if the classroom was turned into a haunted house
What if a true seance was conducted during class and Jack the Ripper joined us
What if Creature of the Black Lagoon was refilmed using stop motion graphics.
What if a creativity ceremony was performed in class involving the sacrifice of one student to satisfy the creative gods
What if I drew the short straw
What if I composed an opus for straw, garbage can lids, wind chimes, and recorder
What about writing a play for monkeys
What about pop art
What if a made a recipe for a new dessert
What if I modified my most annoying commercials with a voice-over
What about stand-up comedy
What about styling someones hair and spray painting it green
How about dying a cat pink
What about writing a children's story and using flash to tell the story
What if I filmed sky-diving
What if I filmed surgery
What if I filmed an IRS agent tax deducting his lunch
What if I brought paint to class and did color blending
What if we turned the class into a watercolor class
What if we did yoga
What if the final project was on gutter cleaning tips

Class of March 2

Today we talked about Plato's Republic and final projects. The discussion focused on how we have unlimited possibilities for a project which is making some students unable to come up with an idea. We talked about limitations and the tendency to place unnecessary limitations on ourselves because it keeps us in our comfort level

Plato's Republic

Well, I read the whole article and now I realize why I never read any Plato. Never before has anyone over-valued the intellect as much as Plato. He rambles on in his delusional mental static and shapes his conversation with no input from his "yes man". No wonder I hate Western philosophy so much. To put Plato in a time-line, he preceeded Jesus by 500 years and was a contemporary of Loa Tsu, the father of taoism. While Lao Tsu valued awareness, Plato valued the intellect, even though their lives overlapped and they lived during the same time. If Plato lived today, he could have gotten some Prozac to turn off that incessant jaw music and mind manure. Total ick!

Class of February 23

We tried to develop plans for final projects by group discussion. I decided to record something since I haven't done any real recording for a very long time. This class will allow me the opportunity to revisit an old composition and add unconventional elements to the recording. Maybe I could add some video if time persists or develop an After Effects project with the music
We experimented with a singing bowl and talked briefly about a reading assignment from Plato. Some loose ends were tied by discussing an egg project that got overlooked.

Bliss

Since working on my homework hardly could be called blissful, I decided to re-spend my time playing guitar. I used to play all the time and gave it up when life got too busy. I'm rusty now and my callouses are long gone.
Considering a class project, I decided my project could be to record and write an instrumental of some kind that could incorporate the guitar and get me back to playing. If writing a song is appropriate for a final project, I'd like to do that!

Class of February 9

I spent my class time working on another class that I'm having difficulty with. I thought I'd spend a little time doing that and move on to something else, but it never happened. I was too tired up in the problem. My class is N342 and I was hung up on an assignment, so I spent the time watching all the videos and looking at examples that might help me figure out the assignment. It's not glamorous, but that's what happened.

Plastic Bag Solo in E Minor

To hear a solo done on plastic bag go to
http://www.cs.iupui.edu/~jsellmer/plasticBag.mp3

Plastic Bags

My plastic bag will be around long after my physical existence.


Please watch the related you tube video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnUjTHB1lvM&feature=related

People are truly apathetic to not have produced legislature against the production of plastic bags.

Fourth Class

We watched a movie about a hearing impaired lady that plays multiple forms of percussion. She's involved in teaching other hearing impaired students. She approaches music in a visual and tactile way since she has decreased hearing. Vibrational pressure and visual cues from the movement of the typamnic membranes direct her in playing. She also leans into her instruments to get additional vibratory sense. However, she's not as hearing impaired as she lets on. She has perfectly articulated language so she maintains very good vibrational hearing. Her student, in the movie, by contrast, would have been considered deaf, as evidenced by her speech. I think this lady has really marketed herself well and knows alot about image personas. Her movie was very bohemian like and had an artistic flare. This movie is a good example of how we compensate with our other senses when one sense is impaired. I found it interesting how she looked at everything as a potential instrument!

Deaf

For the senseless assignment, I decided to be deaf. I attempted this by using earplugs and earphones that covered the ear. The reason I went with the earphones, in addition, was because I could still hear with the plugs. I found myself tuning in to the most minute sounds that you wouldn't normally notice. That's when the headphones were added. I have to say, I could still hear some louder sounds even with both plugs and phones. I became aware of my breathing, since this took over my field of noise. Next came my carotid pulse which I tuned into. After that, I heard a baseline ringing in my ears and my stomach growling. After my ears began to hurt from the plugs, I exited the experiment. I tried to get computer work done since that didn't require hearing. I didn't leave the house and I lasted no way near 3 hours.
Doppler would make a great new sense. It's the measure of the change in frequencies based on the distance an object is to you. It could aid you both in hearing and seeing. Bats use a type of doppler to find food and it sometimes substitutes for sight. You can also notice doppler by a passing siren on an ambulance. The ambulance sound is more high pitched as it passes you and has a lower pitch with distance. It could also help you underwater. So when you grow those gills you'll be all set.

Making Peace

There may have been something that happened after class that I'm not aware, like someone getting injured from a falling chair. If that's the case, I need to know that.
However, if all that happened was misplaced chairs and blackboards being used as blackboards than no apology or peace offering is needed. Everyday, in that classroom, there has been writing on the blackboards and chairs out of place, so if that's the problem, apologies need to be made for EVERY day in class. This day was no different. Classrooms are designed to facilitate learning and this classroom was used appropriately.
If there's more to the story (like an injury I'm unaware of) someone please let me know.
If someone lets themselves get upset over misplaced chairs, they don't have a very promising future and will go through life permanently offended by whatever circumstance comes their way.
I don't think anything was broke or vandalized. Again, there may be something that happened that I'm unaware of.

Class of February 2

This class discussed creativity and all its suffices. We also talked about innovation and inquisitive and all its suffices. We discussed what makes something creative. At the end of class we rearranged the chairs and wrote on the boards to discover the response of the next class. Apparently, they didn't take it well because now we have an assignment of making peace with them. Something must have happened that I'm not aware of.

What if..........................

1. What if people never said "What IF....." when revisiting their past mistakes?
2. What if you could download someone's brain....say a concert pianist?
3. What if the Catholic church was held responsible for the 5 million "heretics" they killed?
4. What if farts smelled like lemon meringue pie?
5. What if their were no sex-role stereotypes?
6. What if you could take your arms off at night so you could sleep more corfortably on your side? How would you get them back on in the morning?
7. What if religion focused on cohesiveness instead of divisiness?
8. What if we could call the dead on a cell phone once a year to check in with them?
9. What if killing during war was seen as assassinating your brother?
10. What if Frankenstein were a ballet dancer?
11. What if Hitler had taken more interest in his art than politics?
12. What if Jerry Faldwell discovered he was gay? Would he discommunicate himself?
13. What if you could crawl into a worm hole in space? Where would you end up?
14. What if people just pulled down their pants and pooped wherever they were standing?
15. What if prostitutes accepted coupons?
15. What if "mooning" was substituted for applause?
16. What if you could leave your uterus at home?
17. What if children were infertile until the age of 21?
18. What if you gave everyone one dollar. You still wouldn't have as much money as a CEO's yearly salary.
19. What if jails were destroyed?
20. What if authorities knew they had no real authority?
21. What if you could "mind meld" with a dolphin?
22. What if Budha, Jesus, Lao Tsu and Hitler had to share an apartment?
23. What if you had to have sex with either Oprah or President Bush to not be hung?
24. What if Clint Eastwood had decided to be an accountant?
25, What if pain was a signal that you could turn off?
26. What if advertiser's told the truth? This product is doing badly in a poor economy and we'll be filing Chapter 13 if you don't buy this product.
27. What if people knew how amazing their bodies are and didn't fixate on their illnesses?
28. What if the aliens visited me first?
29. What if people didn't buy into celebrity?
30. What if animals dominated humans? Already been done....Planet of the Apes
31. What if teleportation existed?
32. What if people weren't afraid of the concept of cloning?
33. What if the IRS was replaced by a flat-tax system that didn't allow loopholes?
34. What if you could turn your body inside out? You could just rub food on your intestines directly. There would be a puddle of hydrochloric acid in your chair when you got up.
35. What if we had an exoskeleton, like a lobster. You could just SEE if someone had osteoporosis or bone cancer.
36. What if congress reflected the whole of life with equal representation.....instead of all white guys in suits?
37. What if we don't all see the same color when we say "red". Maybe some of us see yellow or green. We call it what we've learned to call it. Is that why we all have a different favorite color?
38. What if we are interfering when we don't let things be extinct?
39. What if Santa Claus were a pediphile?
40. What if people were quiet for a designated time and all power was stopped for complete silence?
41. What if you could time travel and couldn't find any era that you liked to live in?
42. What if you knew all truths and didn't share them with anyone? Would they do you any good?
43. What if we developed gills and had to go back to the water to survive?
44. What if addictions could be instantly cured?
45. What if people could look up the exact time of their death?

The Egg Class-January 26, 2009

Today we reviewed everyone's project. There were some interesting tangents in the direction the projects went from egg tempura paints, to After Effects, to egg beer, and egg diaries that ended up on the floor. I liked the crucified egg idea alot because of the tie-in with the saying from some aetheist person. It was inventive and thought provoking. It made me think of the recent movie Religulous by Bill Mayher. Usually, if someone precedes their project with "I hope this doesn't offend anyone.".....that means I'll probably like it. People put too much validity to their thoughts and take too many opportunities to be offended.
We discussed the next assignment.....what if.......

Egg Project

Class January 12

Our first class was a "get aquainted" class. We discussed the egg project and "round objects"
My round objects consists of:
Steering wheels
Lids on cups
Stethoscope diaphragms
DVD's
Hoola hoops
Clocks
Merry-go-rounds
Drill bits
Planets in the sky
45 rpm records
Pupils
Potter's wheel
Cheerios
The vortex of a cyclone
The sound hole of a guitar
The sound port of a flute, clarinet, or recorder
The space in the center of the doughnut
The space inside a basketball
The shape of an electron
The nucleus of a cell
The list goes on and on...............

Creating a Blog for Monday's class

January 9th-Created a very crude blog site