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| GenXnow | June 2003 |
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Art in the New Age The artist's palette today consists more frequently of the mouse and monitor than the paintbrush and canvas. The use of digital artwork everywhere is increasing day to day. It can be seen anywhere from the magazine to the silver screen. No longer do you see an advertisement that hasn't one time or another been touched up, clipped, or edited on the computer. What took artists and photographers days before can only take them minutes at a time with today's technology. Digital artwork can be seen throughout the Internet. There are several sites hosting a variety of works like www.renderosity.com or www.digitalart.org. Here, an artist can post whatever type of digital art he or she does, await discovery by the world. Whether a photographer, 3-D modeler, or just digital painter, it costs nothing to be seen by thousands of surfers every day. Adobe Photoshop, one of the more common tools used by artists, allows almost any type of editing. Some simple uses of this program would allow the artist to clean up dust and scratches on a photo, remove unwanted blemishes, or even change the color of someone's hair. More advanced techniques would include watermarking a photo, or even adding people/things to pictures they never appeared on. Superimposing is a good example of an advantage to digital editing. One can take two photos, scan them into a computer, load them in Photoshop, and superimpose them in less than 20 minutes. Manipulating the same two photos in the darkroom and superimposing one on the other is a complicated task. It involves heavy planning and timing (the photographer works with light-sensitive paper, after all) and the process can take anywhere from an hour to an entire day, depending on the complexity of the image. Some artists, such as Gerry Eulsman, prefer to create their photomontages strictly in the darkroom. Eulsman is known for his elaborate montages consisting of multiple negatives exposed on the same piece of paper. What takes him countless hours of planning and obvious patience and talent to create, another photographer can create in half the time, and never step foot in the darkroom. The use of digital technology in advertising is increasing. There are even fully digital commercials already appearing. One can see such an example in the latest Chex Mix advertisement. This commercial was done completely in a 3d modeler to produce an animation, or the commercial you see. Advertising sometimes uses digital editing to increase sex appeal to viewers. Model's legs are made longer, or lips and breasts are enhanced. No longer are the magazines and catalogs society reads created with pen and paper, rather a variety of programs put them together. Computer programs such as Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and Macromedia Freehand, combined with numerous artists and art directors produce a commercial or still ad that is designed to grab your attention. These ads utilize the very same fundamental principles of art -- line, shape, color, etc -- that traditional artists use. Even principles of photography such as the rule of thirds (basically placing the focal point of a composition off center) and selective focus, are used in conjunction with computer programs to produce ads that stand out amid the increasing clutter of visual information a person sees everyday. Is the age of movies with no actors already here? Movies like "Bugs Life", or "Antz" show that an entire movie can be created without the help of actual actors. Some movies in the past, like "Simone" and "Wag the Dog," gave people an idea of what it would be like to be deceived by a digital actor. Most people wrote it off as science fiction. With such innovation as the "Gollum" character from Lord of the Rings, the Academy Awards may soon feature a new category, "best vocal actor." Gone is the day of "what if." It is now just a matter of "when." Jeff Dunehew - http://www.elementalmind.com Sources ... www.renderosity.com and www.digitalart.org |
