Category: Reports

IRL Distortion – work from home edition

The exact moment we talked about taking an “IRL distortion portrait” during last week’s zoom call, I looked up and saw my reflection in the back of my roommate’s computer monitor.

She and I had crammed our workspaces together on a table way too small for the two of us – I assume many of you are having similar situations where you’re learning to share new spaces that you haven’t shared before.

The silver lining of me being up close and personal with her screen was this funhouse-style look.

Distortion Experiments

Experiment 1: Real Gamers Only

I tried to take a self portrait in my girlfriend’s glasses as we played Animal Crossing. However, there wasn’t enough contrast between the TV and the ambient lighting (it was dark outside) to see anything other than the silhouette of my hand.

Experiment 2: Skate Park Teapot

We thought it looked like a fisheye skate park video. Unfortunately, the teapot is a little too dirty.

Experiment 3: Yet Another “Funny” Zoom Virtual Background

I wish I had a better webcam so this looked less chaotic, but it’s still funny.

IRLDistortion

I did a few distortion experiments:

through a piece of toilet paper;

through a mason jar filled with water and stirred;

and through the light of a laser pointer (ft. my cat). (Hopefully my iPhone camera sensor isn’t destroyed.)

Learning To Love Myself

I ended up calling my twin brother and following the prompt:

Ask your family to describe what you do.

I think there’s something sweet about this prompt, in that at the core of having family describe you, they want to convey their love.

I tried to make some ambient visual accompaniment to this audio, but decided to just leave it as a sound clip after attempting a few iterations.

Some “Learning to Love You More” Assignments

  1. Take a flash photo under your bed.

    When I got to CMU, I purposefully raised my bed to have more storage space underneath. Unfortunately, as I am mid move-out, it isn’t as densely packed as usual. The assignment also says “We are looking for photos that depict the space between the bottom of the bed and the floor, please do not send us photos if your bed is flush against the floor or if it is a loft bed.” and since I actively use the space for storage I’m not sure how much it counts. But there’s no harm done in taking the picture.

2. Ask your family to describe what you do.
– My Mom: [she] builds and uses existing interfaces so that she can create beauty or amusement for or unique expressions of or enhancements to human life through the medium of technology
– My Dad: I imagine that Jacqui wakes up and checks her e-mail, making any responses that are necessary in  a timely manner. She cleans up, dresses and grabs a pre-made breakfast item and bottle of water on the way to her first class or appointment. In between classes or meetings, she will chat on-line to colleagues about assignments, or about any of the various extra-curricular activities in which she involved. Lunch will be an ad-hoc affair as opportunity allows. As the afternoon progresses, there will be time for some computer work, as well as some on-line diversions for U-Tube, games and topics of interest. Dinner will quite often be part of an extra-curricular group meeting or discussion among friends.  In the evening, there might be a movie or a rehearsal to attend, followed by a late night of scholastic work occasionally punctuated with a board game or puzzle activity among friends.
– My youngest sister Elise (17): I think you go to classes to learn how to code better, do better graphics, etc. I think you make lines of code as part of a bigger program to make it function. I think you work digitally to make both film projects and computer animations.
– My Grandmother: I would say that my granddaughter works on the computer a lot, and she likes to do film, and she likes games. And she tries to create them in the computer. That’s all I know how to say.

I didn’t read her full description until after I had asked several people, so I have more than 3, each with kind of different interpretations of the assignment.