LU JIA



  • LOST AND FOUND

  • FORM GENERATOR

  • EXPERIMENTAL CLOCK

  • EXQUISITE CORPSE

  • ANTI-SURVEILLANCE TOOL

  • EXPERIMENTAL CAMERA

  • BITMAP GAME

  • CONSENTFUL INTERFACE

  • DATA PORTRAIT

  • TRANSLATION DEVICE

    • EXPERIMENTAL CAMERA

    DESCRIPTION

    My concept is about the reality and distorted reality through different perspectives. "As soon as we start putting our thoughts into words and sentences everything gets distorted, language is just no damn good—I use it because I have to, but I don’t put any trust in it. We never understand each other," says Marcel Duchamp. Language is powerful, but language can be so plain when compares to inner thoughts. I feel it’s hard for the others to comprehensively know about oneself. There is always a difference between one’s perspective and the others’. This is where my inital idea from. Then as I developing and experimenting with my camera. I start to modifying my concept as well. My camera lead me to a slightly diffrent direction, which is that a lot of times people just do not spend enough time and effort to get to know a person. But they just quickly define what the person is like based on limited impressions. And often the reality gets distorted due to incomplete knowledge and through rumors. Through the lens of a camera, two different versions of "reality" are presented.

    DESIGN PROCESS

    Initial sketches:



    When my eyes are opened, this represent my own perspective. The camera shows a concrete and normal image of me. But when I close up my eyes. The camera presents the others’ perspectives which I cannot see.

    I used the faceTrackr library (https://kylemcdonald.github.io/cv-examples/) to determine whether eyes are closed or not.

    URL to present mode.
    Eyes opened:
    Eyes closed:

    The next step for me was to exploring distortion effects. Then I experimented with slit-scan effect using copy() function. I adjusted parameters in copy() and added a layer of tint() to exaggerate the distortion.

    I choose slit-scan because it always presents a differnt kind of view. Which is full of unclear, and limited point of view. That often the truth that we know something about someone, but not all of the person. Especially during current time, it’s even harder to get to know each other, since we only get to know about each other through limited time and limited approaches. so my impression of others, and their impressions of me are all quite abstract, blurry and unstable.

    Because this is other's perspective, which I can not see. The only way I can know about their perspectives is through words. So I added a soundtrack of people talking and whispering. At the moment when eyes are closed, people start talking near you. And hearing tends to get better when sight is disabled. People's talking and whispering gets louder and distords the reality further. The image is glitching and distorting.

    URL to present mode.
    Screen shots (when eyes are closed):





    Then I want to further the interaction. By presenting a different effect every time eyes are closed. Also indicating perspectives changing. The filter switches between glitching and slit-scan.

    URL to final sketch in present mode.
    Some screen shots (when eyes are closed):






    REFLECTION
    "Seeing" becomes the key of my experimental camera. Perspectives get switched through enable and disable of vision. The camera isn't so conventional since it isn't seem to be made for a person to taking selfie with. It may requires more than one person to see the whole image. When I presented it in the open projecter, I hear people interpret the camera differently. Some people see it as unconscious talking when they try to rest. Some think the distortion makes it a little horror movie like. I actually love how different people interpret it in different ways. Which also bring up new perspectives. That's what my project is showing—differnt perspectives.