Random Etc. Notes to self. Work, play, and the rest.
…And You Will Know Us by the Shape of Thames
Pete from Trulia sent me and Eric a copy of Simon Foxell's Mapping London, and I've been poring over its pages for the last couple of days.
Visually, my favourite map is definitely the one entitled "Social and Functional Analysis", which has a beautiful cellular structure:
But lest I get too involved with the aesthetics or content of any one particular map, or the print quality of the book, or the sheer Londonness of the thing, there's also the "Fetish Map of London", whose description warns:
[Chris] Kenny draws attention to the way that maps can become fetishised objects, by creating links between Kongo fetish figures—with their nailed in 'pledges' or 'commitments'—and the pins in a wall map. His map of London is covered in such pins, tacks and nails to the point of rendering it almost unitelligible.
Normally that reference would be enough to keep me quiet, except I'm delighted to find that I'm mentioned in the book, on page 137 for my Travel Time Tube Map. Sadly the link is a little muddled (pointing people to del.icio.us instead of here) but I hope that can be corrected in future editions.
That aside, the book is of a very high quality and full of historical and contemporary mapping gems from all kinds of sources, including many that I can't find anywhere online (who says print is dead?). I've taken a few snaps of my favourites so you can get an idea of what's in store if you buy a copy, and I can definitely recommend that you do.
I'd been saving this title for a potential Pecha Kucha presentation, covering 20 different maps of London, but it doesn't look like happening any time soon. Meanwhile, maps of London are on my mind: watch this space for some new ones coming soon!
On How It Is
The answer to the question, "Why did you get your hair cut?" is a bit like the answer to the question, "Why are you vegetarian?". It's not one that I really have an answer for, save that I once had long hair but now I don't. So it is that once, I ate meat, but now I don't. That's just how it is.
Late to the party
Thanks to prompting from Jack, I'm now available on AIM as TomCardenUK, as well as my usual IM haunt of MSN Messenger as tom [at] smileyface [dot] com (but I'll never answer email at that address, so don't bother using it for anything else).
Update: tom.carden on Google Talk, if you were wondering.
Metropop Denim interview
Clayton Cubitt has posted an interview with me about our collaboration for Metropop Denim. A behind-the-scenes piece is now available at on the Processing.org exhibition.
Over at Generator.x, Marius Watz points to a similar piece he made for Nike Asia.
Destination: Whipping Trees
This year I was privileged to have some of my work accepted into the architecture section of London's Royal Academy Summer Exhibition.
The piece, "Destinations", shows a day's worth of simulated passenger movements across an airport check-in concourse, rendered in a slightly smoky way (at least that was the intention). The actual piece was approximately 90cm long.
© Copyright reserved YRM Limited 2004.
Whilst browsing the exhibition, I had a real shivers-down-the-spine moment, when I came across some sketches by David Nash of his sculpture, Ash Dome.
Copyright © 2004 Crown Point Press (used without permission).
The sketches were eerily reminiscent of a VRML project I completed late last year called Whipping Trees:
(You can view the interactive version here, it requires Cortona on the PC, I don't know if it runs on a Mac.)
It turns out Nash was over 20 years earlier than I was, and his work actually exists in full-size real-life (lick-it-it-tastes-like-a-snozzberry) physical form too (Annely Juda Fine Art has images, but don't allow deep links, tsk). I have resolved to visit it at some point soon, and to send him an image of my project.
A Brief History Of Me
For any readers who don't know me, here is a brief overview of some of the things I have been involved with recently.
Non-realistic Rendering In Immersive Environments
Is there an 'uncanny valley' for rendering quality? For our EngD group project, Sheep Dalton (Ovinity), Monica Martini (Martini Architects), Sean Varney (Soho Cyberscan / Framestore CFC) and I built a model of an Indian Temple and a non-photorealistic OpenGL rendering engine for use in desktop and immersive VR systems.
Social Network Visualisation
A social network visualisation for the students, alumni and staff who have been involved with the MSc Virtual Environments in the Bartlett (UCL's architecture school).
Algorithmic Art
A series of pixel-exposure techniques using the Processing environment.
Virtual Trees
Whipping trees, a VRML world and a study in dynamic growth, responsive form and emergent spaces. Completed as part of Methods of Synthetic Construction 1. You can view all our VRML coursework on the course website. This work was significant for me because it involved taking what were effectively several small sketches (pieces of code) and combining them into a single piece of work, with a narrative and a sense of cohesion.
2D Robot Simulation
At Leeds University, I started the development of a Bio-inspired Evolutionary Agent Simulation Toolkit, a project initiated by Seth Bullock and ably continued by David Gordon (now of Framestore CFC). Whilst I was there, I also took part in a Bio-inspired Computing reading group, worked on an interface for playing poker against evolved neural-network players, and investigated the possibility of doing image processing with artificial life.
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