Exquisite Corpse_ Jasmin Liang

Description

This project is a collaboration with Whitt Sellers and Eddie Chen. I am transferring the head of my drawing, the body of Eddie’s horseman and the legs of Whitt’s funky cat into p5js.

Fusing the backstories of these three drawings, the final story goes: “I had an old neighbor who is always birdwatching in his backyard. I think half of Chicago’s birds stopped by his backyard at some point. There are always birdfeeders waiting for them. For Halloween, he decided that he would dress up like a cat, because cats are bird-obsessed just like him. They are nature’s most dedicated birdwatchers. Although he would never try to catch a bird like cats would. And there he is, in half of his cat costume, feeding birds in the garden again!”

Group sketches and backstories

Eddie's Halloween Horseman -- "He is one of my roommate in Arizona, when I studied in Arizona State University. We usually do such silly things at home but we felt happy and relaxed at that time. I wanna draw it down because the photo in my phone always reminds me the happy moment with them."

Whitt's Funkycat Zero -- "He is a prior reincarnation of my cat Zero when he was some sort of primal predator, lurking in jungles and climbing mountains. I love watching him lurk around like a little cougar, stalking stuffed animals and us sometimes!"

Jasmin's bird guy -- "This is my old neighbor in Chicago who is always feeding birds or watching birds in his backyard!"

Design Process & Reflection

For me, this was a relatively straightforward project. I used my own functions mostly for repeated shapes like fur-marks. It was very useful when I tried to draw the same shape but at different position. I would simply use a set of coordinates as the starting point, then use (x, y) as parameters to move the shape around whenever a new one was being drawn. This was especially efficient when it involved a method with more than six variables. It made the code very clean and convenient. For certain details and shapes, I found it simply too difficult to replicate in p5.js. So I traced and scaled them proportionally in illustrator and uploaded them as image files into the sketch. Since p5.js might not be the best tool for one to create 2D drawings, the image upload method is a great way for me to work around those complicated curves and shapes. It was especially useful since I can precisely locate the images at the right position. I also had to change the canvas frame width to 425 px to include Eddie's horse arms in a proportionally sensible way. I found the whole design process kind of funny as I was figuring out how to connect cat legs to a human body.But overall, it was a great practice for me to use functions.