Creative Project (Prototype) #2

Resolution: The World Makes Sense Again

This semester has been a really interesting one in terms of the progression of my research topic and my feelings toward it. I can honestly say that I've never had a semester that was so frustrating , but I've been able to push through and have come to a synthesis moment, to borrow the term from Hegel.

CC 2.0 Generic, Wikimedia Commons

I think one of my problems going into the paper for this class was that I came with so many topics that I wanted to address. Awe was and still is, in my mind, an interdisciplinary notion, and I think that biology, literary criticism, philosophy, psychology, and critical art theory all have important things to say about it. As I studied it more, though, I began to realize that I wasn't the only one having problems figuring out awe. The texts contradicted themselves, everyone used different words for the same things, and the works that seemed to be the most accurate in trying to define awe seemed to be the most abstract and vague and well. You might say that for about three months, I was pretty frustrated and had no idea what I was doing.

Venue Researching for Evolution of Awe

Venue Research and Reading Report
In preparation for submitting to Digital America, I read the following two articles:

Murakami, Kenta. "The Demise of net.art: A Look at Artifacts Past." Digital America. 21 Oct 2013. Web. Accessed 8 April 2014.
Connor, Kayleigh. "The Male Domain: Exclusion of Women in Video Games." Digital America. 30 Jan 2014. Web. Accessed 8 April 2014. 

Venue Title and Sponsoring Organization
Digital America is an interdisciplinary journal open to everyone from undergraduate to PhD. It is funded by an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation through the University of Richmond

The Evolution of Awe

Well, I'm at just over 4,800 words so far for my paper. I've left some wiggle room, as my publication venues allow for submissions of a maximum of 5,000 words. In any case, I'm finally to a premise that I can get behind, and while it doesn't have the same direction or social implications as my previous topics, I think it's a good direction for my research. Here's my thesis, and the link to the paper itself is below that.

THESIS: We are experiencing a transformation of the way in which we experience awe, and while we necessarily move toward an understanding of awe that is not only more abstract in some ways but in other regards less real, our capacity to experience awe remains the same as we actively implement modern technologies in creating awe. As society evolves to be able to meditate upon increasingly complex social, artistic, and philosophical values and issues, so also must our modes of expression and conveyance necessarily take on abstraction as a way of accommodating the ever-complicating human narrative.

Rough draft of the paper

  

Social Proof for Reclaiming Awe

Over the past couple of days, I've been attempting to reach out to communities and specialists that might be able to offer some insight on awe in the world of digital art. 

I started with a few communities of digital artists on Google+, and I posted something akin to the following in each:

I'm currently researching the concept of awe in various forms of digital art. Do you as digital creators feel that digitally native works of art differ from more traditional forms in their ability to produce awe in the viewer? Certainly, the digital medium facilitates a broader range of awe-inspiring subject matter, but does it provide for the same quality of awe as would, for example, looking at a painting or watching a play over seeing an image online or watching a 3D reproduction of the same play?
I'm not sure that there is a right answer, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on the matter in any case! Thanks!

I haven't heard back from anyone on my posts as of yet, but I hope that I'll get some responses over the next few days. I think I'll also post something to the Thinkers community, as I've have good success getting responses from them in the past.

I also wrote to Jeffrey Davis, a writer for Psychology Today who maintains a blog called "Tracking Wonder." The letter I sent is included below:

The Digital Petri Dish: Permutation #3 in B♭ Minor

By Umberto Salvagnin, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0 

Well, I think the biggest problem that I've been having with my paper as of right now is that every time I sit down to write, I am writing a new paper, because my thinking on the matter has shi
fted in one direction or another. My original stance was one highly critical of digital media, and though I felt it was representative of what I had actually experienced myself and witnessed in the lives of others, I didn't feel like it was the whole story. My most recent shift in thinking, which came about thanks to some really savvy feedback from +Eileen and Dr. Burton, has helped me to look at the Internet in a much more balanced light, seeing the good and the bad and recognizing the Internet more so as a tool than an influence--as something that cultures whatever we put into it. The problem is, that has brought me to a new impasse, in that such a stance paints societal "progress" as the source of modernity's awe deficiencies.

Potential Audiences for "Reclaiming Awe"

Intermediate and Final Audiences

1. Jason Silva (Shots of Awe)

Silva has a vast following, and his works have apparently inspired awe within thousands of individuals worldwide. I am going to try contacting him to get his take on the idea of digital amplification--the notion that the digital realm essentially cultures whatever we put into it, both the awe inspiring and the mundane.

2. Google+ Communities

There are a number of digital art and new media art communities (a b c d) to which I'm going to post some of my intermediate work for social proof, and they may be interested in the final project as well. There's another community dedicated to "Digital Biology," and I feel like my discussion of awe and the digital through a psychological/biological approach would probably appeal to some people there.

 3. Jeffrey Davis

Writer and creativity consultant for "Tracking Wonder" (a sub-site of Psychology Today), which is dedicated to the connection between awe and creativity. This is right up my alley, and I bet Mr. David could be a huge help.

Reclaiming Awe: Take 2

We went over some brief drafts of our literature reviews in class Monday, and I wanted to post what I have so far for anyone who's interested in reading. This will hopefully provide a groundwork on which I can build the rest of my paper, though Monday's talks helped me to see that there are a lot of things that I could do to shore up my foundations.

Anyway, here's the link!

Annotated Bibliography for Reclaiming Awe

Working Thesis (which will surely undergo drastic revision): While the digital age affords us seemingly infinite opportunities, with those opportunities comes the danger of destroying mankind's most fundamental and universal quality, his capacity to experience and create awe.

Realistically, you should probably just skip to the end and read my end commentary, because I'm tweaking my emphasis a bit, and that's the part where I'd be most interested in hearing your feedback. Thanks!

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Adorno, Theodor W and Max Horkheimer. "The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception." Dialectic of Enlightenment. Trans. John Cummings. New York: Herder & Herder, 1972. 120-167. Print.

Adorno and Horkheimer propose that modern media encourages passive consumption over true creativity and that in their aspirations toward popularity and industrial utility, they have fallen into a state of artistic or aesthetic impoverishment. This ties into my focus on digital creativity as a means of overcoming the impoverishment and rising from passive consumption to a state of "flourishing" productivity.

Arnold, Matthew. “The Study of Poetry.” 1880. Poetry Foundation. 13 Oct. 2009. Web. 19 Mar. 2014.

In this essay, Arnold proposes that the measure of a work’s poetic or artistic greatness (and I would argue, it’s potential to inspire awe) is based on a combination of personal and historical perspectives. Great works, then, partake of the same spirit as landmark works that have come before--touchstones, as he calls them. This in some sense helps to overcome the sense of subjectiveness that many of us have been struggling with in defining awe.

Outline of Awesomeness...

I have to admit, as did Tara, that I still feel hopelessly lost in trying to define awe in any meaningful way. I feel like I have my own idea of what awe is, but I'm fairly certain at this point that it is entirely different from how others view awe, each of our own experiences having been shaped by our own experiences with awe. I think that is to say that I am experiencing an existentialist crisis rooted in German Romantic notions of subjectivity. There's a mouthful for you. So, in short, I feel less and less confident in my paper topic as I research more and more, and that's not the most comfortable position.

In any case, I think that my final paper will have a substantial portion attempting to address that which has been said before in terms of defining awe. I feel like just about every major literary critic has had something to say of awe, whether they called it the sublime, geist, the aura, or something else, and I want to focus on each of those notions in building a foundation for the notion of awe that I present in my paper.

Another complication is that my paper topic, at least in part, is very negative, and I'm looking for ways to expand it in a direction that is more positive without it coming off as an infantile call to create. That being said...

Outline of Awesomeness...

Please feel free to add information or insert questions or comments or whatever. GoogleDocs has a new "track changes" add-on, so I'd love to see how it works (and I have a back-up saved just in case someone goes crazy on my outline).

I'm excited about my project, but it's definitely taking a lot

of time, and I'm wondering if I should simplify it rather than

botching the wonder. I think a lot will depend on time.

In terms of publication venues, I feel like I am still on track for at least the latter four venues that I listed in this post. I'm still planning on using Buzzfeed as an outlet for the creative portion of my project as well.

And finally, in terms of what's next, I think the biggest part is just getting my paper and project nailed dow
n a bit more. I feel like I'm putting them both off a little bit, as I'm still not really sure about my overall premise or my definition of awe, but I think some of that will work itself out as I put together a more complete draft of my paper and finish up my project. I may need to simplify my project a bit, as it's taken a ton of time and still isn't really in a presentable form. Anyway, I'd love to hear your feedback!

With Wondering Awe: Project Prototype

I've been thinking a lot about what I'd like to do for the creative component of my final project, and I keep going back to that phrase, "create the wonder." I've been really impressed with a lot of videos that I've come across as I've been researching awe, and the more I think about it, the more I want to create a video to get my ideas across. One of my central ideas is that while the digital--when used purely as a mimetic tool--conveys only a diminished sense of awe,  its creative and synthetic potential supersedes that of traditional mediums. Though art or writing or music can draw us in and bring us to a state of wonder, film and other more modern media formats have the potential to combine the best of art, music, writing, etc. in a single, unified, immersive work. The wonder of the digital age, though, is that creation of such works is no longer limited to large production studios, especially with vast bases of open content through Creative Commons licenses. Building on this notion, the focus for my final project will be a video that combines original writing (narration), an original piano score, and Creative Commons video clips in an effort to awaken viewers to a new reverence for traditional sources of awe and instill within them a new determination to utilize modern modes of creation to inspire awe.

I've already begun writing out the script, and I've been recording tidbits of music, trying to figure out a general flow for the piece as a whole. I want it to reach a point of climax that is paralleled in the language, music, and video simultaneously, so I've been trying to figure out how to convey that in each medium. Also, I've been going through Creative Commons videos on Vimeo and downloading ones that have moments that I like.

The End of Art and Awe: Hegel in the Digital Age

From the title, you are perhaps expecting this post to be a depressing, cynical attempt at tearing down our modern notions of art and wonder, and if that's the case, then I have to apologize: this will surely disappoint. To understand what I really mean in saying "the end of art" or "the end of awe," though, we have to have a foundation in German Romanticism and, more specifically, in the art
istic philosophies of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.

Hegel is perhaps best known for the eponymous Hegelian dialectic, which suggests that through the recursive struggle and interplay of thesis and antithesis--of action and reaction--mankind has, at various times, been able to arrive a state of synthesis or resolution, wherein he is able to achieve real progress. In his Introduction to The Philosophy of Art, Hegel applies the dialectic to the progression of art, stating essentially that the highest form of art is that in which the sensuous form (the work of art itself) and the spiritual form (the ideas conveyed by the work of art) find harmony or resolution. "[T]he perfection and excellency of art," he writes, "must depend upon the grade of inner harmony and union with which the spiritual idea and the sensuous form interpenetrate" (376). Hegel suggests that in lower forms of art, such as sculpture or architecture, the thesis and antithesis of spiritual and sensuous forms have yet failed to reach an equilibrium. The highest form of art--the end or aim of art in Hegel's view--is in poetry, wherein the art itself is capable of conveying the full import and meaning of the spiritual or philosophical idea. This was not to imply, however, that art had or would come to an end or that poetry represented the final destination of human expression and artistic representation. Rather, poetry was the degree of synthesis to which mankind had climbed up until that point.

How to.. Awe in Simple Life Discoveries

It is fascinating to me how many processes we can learn through digital media. We can do anything in many different disciplines at the click of a button. We don't even have to be with the person.

It's amazing how even simple things are on the internet. Before, like I am pretty sure all of us learned, you had a family member show you or you just heard and learned yourself. I think the thing that is awe-some, in an unsettling sense, about this one is the lack of dependence I feel we have on others. Why don't we ask for help from real people? Are we embarrassed? I'd like to think so, that's why people turn to the internet for way more embarrassing things than not knowing how to plunge a toilet.

How to plunge a toilet. (by two adorable old ladies)

We also turn to the media for more complicated things like how to beat a video game. We can go through whole processes with someone else showing us how to solve it.   Here's an intro on how to play Minecraft, which can also catch you up on the times.
Then here is a boy that plays the game Slender with you and helps you solve the game! It's incredible how much we can help people now from across the world. (The guy in the first video has an awesome accent.)

I was talking to my mom the other day about how anyone should be able to cook anything they want now a days because they can watch it step by step online. A video can turn anyone into a cook. In this day and age anyone can master anything. It's amazing!

You can easily learn a new skill you've never tried before. Digital media has made us crave learning like nothing else has, except maybe books. With the visual element we can learn much faster!
Learn to juggle, pick up a new skill, in under five minutes.

 You can connect through your devices in another way too. Take a screen shot of what you're doing on your device and send it to a friend and this erases all ambiguity of what you were trying to help them with. With technology we've taken a lot of the ambiguity out of things.

We can also connect to people of a different field. We can get the best of the best instruction on something we've never done from someone who is well-trrained in the area. That normally costs a lot of money. This how to shoot a gun according to the marine corp.

This is how to build a PC Computer Part one of three. Becasue it's on the internet we can stop and do a part and return to the video. There is not need to take a class and waste time getting there and home. You just do it from the comfort of your couch. The internet saves us lots of time.

This is a video of How to Be Irish. A little silly I know, but this is awesome because of the way it can transport you across the world into another culture. Talk about interconnectivity of the internet. You can be some where else as well in your living room.

This perhaps is the most interesting part of the internet for me. How by watching a screen we can become more physically healthy. No one looks at it that way anymore but think about it. It's incredible. How to get better Abs in 3 minutes.

Digital Media sources can also explain how we think. We can understand our own brains. This video is  about how violence affects how children think.

There is so much power in the collective human mind of the internet. We can understand so many processes, make some many things we would never be able to make otherwise, improve our health, and even understand our own minds. The internet can create the everyday awe we look for in life and inspire us to see the greater awe in the bigger picture of life.

Science Fiction to Technology Reality and Vice Versa

It's amazing how many technological advances and ideas have come from science fiction.  Science fiction writers have a duty to create cool new futuristic pieces of technology and concepts.  Whether it be the internet, cell phones, or a new way to interact with computers, the ideas created by these authors have often shown up in the real world years later a,not just fantasy, but reality.

The opposite can be true as well: actual pieces of technology that have been developed and created in the real world have been capitalized by fiction authors.  These authors write stories revolving around one particular technological advance, whether it be a completely computerized reality or using a real device in fictional circumstances, these authors know how to monopolize on concepts that culture thinks is cool and new.

The following 10 ideas show just some examples of how literature has affected reality and how reality has affected literature.

(1) Literature --> Reality: The Internet

Years before the internet was ever invented, David Brin, science fiction author, wrote the novel "Earth."  In it, he describes a futuristic world where there is an interconnected computer network.  Hmm, sounds kind of like the internet?  You bet, its name is even the World Wide Web.  But it gets better: it describes the web as the source for all news media, and predicts e-mail spamming and blogging.  The best part, though?  This line (emphasis added): "These are my subvocalizations, I suppose – the twitterings of data and opinions on the Net are my subjective world."

(2) Reality --> Literature: A Second Virtual Life
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik2_61longI
James Dasner has taken the idea of a complete virtual life and run with it.  Last class we talked a bit about Second Life, a complete virtual world.  Dashner takes this idea further and paints for us a picture in which "coffins" are used to put the person in a completely immerseive experience.  The "coffin" causes all your physical senses to experience what you're doing in the virtual world.  Rainy day?  Yep, you can feel raindrops landing on you.  Cold outside?  Yep, you can feel that too.  You can explore any real world location you want, as well as may not real ones.  So, kind of like Second Life, only a lot better.

(3) Literature --> Reality: Robots

Do you know where we got the term "robot" from?  If you said a work of science fiction, you'd be right.  The word "robot' was first coined in Karel Capek's play R.U.R., which stands for Rossum's Universal Robots.  The term 'robot' was used to denote the automata in the 1921 play.

(4) Reality --> Literature: Nanobots

Who wouldn't want to write a book about a swarm of super intelligent, microscopic killer robots?  Or read a book about them?  Michael Crichton, master at science, has written just that.  This is a good example of how writers can take the popular ideas of science that are floating around in their day, and write a best-selling novel about that scientific idea.  Other novels by Crichton that follow this same idea are Jurassic Park, which deals with cloning, and The Andromeda Strain, which deals with rapidly mutating viruses.

(5) Literature --> Reality: Cell-phones
http://mashable.com/2011/09/08/star-trek-gadgets/
Okay Trekkies, this one's for you.  In the Star Trek show, the crew are often seen using small little pieces in their ears to communicate with one another.  This idea eventually led to the formation of cellular phones, or cell-phones for short.  Not only did the devices in Star Trek communicate with each other though, they could also do lots of other crazy things like warn the wearer of impending danger.  Unfortuanlly, our cell-phones can't do that quite yet.

(6) Reality --> Literature: Complete Video Game Immersion

This idea is very similar to the "coffin" idea Dashner writes about, as mentioned in #2 of this post.  Here, though, the idea isn't a free interactive world which is similar to real life.  The idea here is to have just another video game, only make that as real as blooming possible.  In Heir Apparent, Velde picks up on the idea of video games becoming more and more realistic, and proposes that in the future, all video games will be entirely immerseive.  When you fight dragons, you can literally feel their fiery breath.  I wonder how that would work for Mario games...

(7) Literature --> Reality: Holograms

Assuming the above video link actual works when this is published, what you see when watching it is exactly what you think: those are totally holograms.  The idea of the hologram (to this extreme detail and extent) existed as a scientific fiction idea long before anyone was able to come up with the technology to create it.

(8) Reality <--> Literature: The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Life

This one, I think, goes both ways.  Long before we started to search for extra-Terrestrial life, writers such as H. G. Wells was already writing stories about aliens and our contact with them.  Then, after our technology was advanced enough so that we could make contact with aliens, literature once again took advantage of the situation and wrote stories about that actually happening.  Above is a clip form the movie Contact, which was based on the novel Contact by Carl Sagan.  Notice how this scene never could have existed without the technology that is already a present reality in our world.

(9) Literature --> Reality: Gesture based computer interaction

Seeing into the future might still be beyond our abilities, but Tom Crusie's computer manipulating skills are not.  His awesome hand movements and finger flicks seem to be second nature to him, as he moves and expands the images on his computer screen.  Of course, nowdays our computers are finally catching up with that kind of technology which used to exist only in fiction.  Computers are even being developed now that can be controlled by eye-blinking.

(10) Reality --> Literature: Anti-matter device

Good old Dan Brown.  He is the master at smart thrillers, and Angels and Demons is no exception.  In this scene from the movie, based of the book, we see anti-matter coming into contact with regular matter.  If we weren't BYU students with a college education, we might think to ourselves, "anti-matter?  There's no such thing, that only exists in science fiction."  The truth is, anti-matter as a concept was thought about in real science long before it hit the pages of science fiction.  Here, Dan Brown is just taking that scientific truth and making bank with it.

I Can Feel You Through the Screen: Emotional Connection via Digital Medium

I feel the most awe in the digital landscape when I come across things that make me feel things through the screen per say. The message and presentation is so powerful that for a moment I forget that I'm only watching a reproduction, or reading an artificial preservation of their words. It's really only a bunch of code and a screen producing my experience, but nevertheless these experiences can be incredibly real. For me, these types of digital experiences often come through the form of recordings of slam poetry, blog posts, or Pinterest quotes, just to name a few. I've listed a few of examples of things that have brought me awe through the digital below. They are in no particular order.

1. "My Honest Poem"

I've watched/listened to this poem more times than I can remember. There is something within me that resonates deeply with it. The tone changes in his voice as the poem progresses are really powerful, and the poem is best experienced being watched and listened.

2.  "Touchscreen"

"When our technology is advanced enough to make us human again."
This poem describes the negative side of the digital evolution in such a way that never fails to leave me resenting technology and the artificiality it can engender.

3. "If I Should Have a Daughter"

Sarah Kay is brilliant and I'm jealous of her talent with words.

4. "The Fringe Benefits of Failure"

I don't go to Harvard, but thanks to technology I could listen to this amazing commencement speech by J.K. Rowling. She never fails to amaze me with her ability to transition from jokes to wisdom so seamlessly. This speech changed my perspective on life and accomplishment, and made me love the Harry Potter series only that much more.

5.  Run.

I first saw this on Pinterest. I love the type that looks like handwriting. It adds a human element, which makes it seem more real and reminds me that there is a life outside of screens that can only be dealt with through bodily activity, not just mental activity.

6.  Love, Taza

I am obsessed with following this adorable family's life in New York City through their mom's blog, and this blog post made me cry. It wasn't the first one of her blog posts to do that, either.

7.  Mumford & Sons lyrics on Pinterest

I never realized just how beautiful these lines were from their song "Sigh No More" until I saw them designed like this on Pinterest.

8.  "When Memory Began to Matter: The Story Told in Modern Literature and Philosophy"
Being able to watch this inspiring and intellectually stimulating discussion between BYU professors that ultimately left me awestruck was an experience that would not have been possible twenty years ago.

9.  National Geographic photography

Oh how I love this website and all of its free desktop wallpapers.

10. Skype

Whether it's across the Pacific Ocean, from Mexico to Utah, or from Washington to Nevada, Skype connects. Every time I use Skype, I am flabbergasted that it is even working in the first place, not because it's unreliable (although that is sometimes the case), but because it's amazing! It's a wonderful thing.

Lyrics for Miles

As I've been thinking of ways in which the digital media awes me, I've realized that lyric videos are capable of producing an element of awe for me. While most of these videos are unrelated to my final project, there is a video that I will share at the top of my list that connects to my final project, and I'll explain it there.

So without futher ado:

10. Ke$sha's lyric video for her song C'mon is absolutely ridiculous. And it doesn't do for me what some of the other videos do, but what I love about a lot of lyric videos is that they show you a glimpse of the artists mind, and how they view the song. In the case of this video, I don't think it really does that, but it's still fun to watch a bunch of kittens dance across a screen.

9. Honestly by Hot Chelle Rae

I liked the way that they used several different mediums within the video. The messaging from the iPhone, the neon colors to show partying, the design elements that expressed the feeling a little bit more, are all things that really add a mixed element of awe to this song. I just didn't think it was as clever or expressive as it could have been.


8. We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together by Taylor Swift

What I really liked about this video was that it was done almost entirely through stop-motion. There were so many creative and unique moments in this video. There are many things that fans would recognize as being specific to Taylor and her style, such as her use of the color red, her love for vintage records, and the number 13 to name a few. Very creative and clever.


7. Payphone by Maroon 5
*Disclaimer: this is the unedited version, so there is a lot of swearing. I hate that part, but the rest is pretty awesome*

I love the elements of Graphic novels/comics. It was a really cool and unique element.


6. Roar by Katy Perry

I love the use of emoticons in this video. It is really clever, especially in this day and age when so much of what we do is smartphone related.


5. Daylight by Maroon 5

This project took videos from people all over the world talking about the things that they hate, the people that they love, and the things that they wish they could change. It's a touching and inspiring video. I think the awe-inspiring element of this video is realizing that as humans, we all experience similar pain, and that we aren't alone.


4. Still Into You by Paramore

Clever. The typefaces used are eye-catching and exciting, and the text does a good job of acting out the lyrics. Also, I just love the shadow puppets. That really wowed me, as it was an element that I hadn't seen anywhere else.


3. Lions Roar by The Hush Sound

This video was shown to me in my Graphic Design class while we were discussing the power of typefaces, and how they can be used to convey a concept quite clearly. What I find to be particularly impressive about this video is the way in which that is accomplished. It's beautifully designed, and I feel like it adds a lot to the song.


2. Wide Awake by Katy Perry

I love the way in which this lyric video combines the lyrics into a Facebook format. I really enjoyed the way in which she combined so many different elements into this video. On a deeper level, I experienced a moment of awe when I realized that all of the Facebook posts shown were of highlights from her career up until the release of Wide Awake, which talks about falling from cloud nine. Did you find anything awe-inspiring about that?


1. This is the one video that has to do with my final project. Dr. Burton has already shared this on Google+, but I love it so much, and I find it so awe-inspiring that it really just comes in first on my list. I love the way that dance is incorporated with graphic design, how authentic the movements of the dancers are, and how there is more emotion that is expressed because the drawn dancers can do things that might not be possible in the real world. It's a stunning work of art.

Listening to Awe

I've looked a bit at how music inspires awe earlier in the semester and created an awe playlist on ?Youtube of just songs. I'd like to look at sound in more than just songs though. What is it about the auditory that inspires awe? What happens when we combine listening with other senses? Let's see.

Welcome to Night Vale Official Logo
by Rob Wilson

1. Reading vs Hearing From 2:04-3:07, the following quote is spoken in this Welcome to Night Vale episode: "In response to our town's steadily-declining tourism industry, the Night Vale Tourism Board addressed our town's complete lack of appealing destinations - like uncensored art museums, hotels with door locks, and snake-free restaurants. NVTB Executive Director Madeline LeFleur said some travelers think they need to 'see things, like monuments, or the majesty of nature, or spectacular musicals, or eat regional/cultural foods in order to have a good time on vacation. But they don't!' 'You don't need attractions to have a good time!' she added. 'Just use your imagination! In fact, come to Night Vale, where 'we will show you fun in a handful of dust,' as the new NVTB slogan says."

Reading the quote alone can inspire awe. The words itself could be a definition of awe ("you don't need attractions to have [an awe-inspiring experience]"). What happens, though, when you listen to the soft voice of Cecil? Welcome to Night Vale often has dangerous things happen to the city, but the soft voice of the radio host seems undisturbed by what we may find disturbing. It's almost ironic. Or perhaps it's a juxtaposition emphasizing the dangerous/serious with calm. What does the soft hearing do to the serious reading? Does it add to the awe? Can you have irony in awe?

The Technological Terror

Technology obviously can instill awe in us. It can show us how incredible someone's imagination is (and their intellect too). And also how the technology can help us in so many ways.

But how many times does technology prevent us from exploring the true experience? Or make the experience better? 

Photography captures the moment. It shows us a different way of thinking about life. And technology combined with photography can enhance that experience or detract from it. 

Here are some examples of how photography has developed with technology. 

1. Google Glasses 

http://reviews.cnet.com/google-glass/

These are so cool. They pretty much project the screen in front of your eyes. Literally another lens in front of your eyes, changing your world. Like all those movies where they have the computer in front of their eyes and it's so techy and futuristic? Yeah.

Do we need a digital overlay on our life? And what would that do to our emotions? To our sense of awe? Would it diminish the experience? Or would it enhance it? And would it ever get too far? Would we all use these and never take them off because our normal living existence would become cheap?

2. UBI Camera

http://www.engadget.com/2012/03/28/ubi-camera-frames-photos-with-fingers-fails-to-call-you-fabulou/

This camera lets you use your fingers as the view frame. I love this revolution of using your body to take photography, getting away from the digital world and reverting back to the tedious way of taking pictures. Once again, does technology inhibit or enhance the experience? Would this technology help us to get away from technology? And can that even exist? Does this create a new perspective on life, seeing everything through a physical view finder? Does it limit the ability to see and appreciate everything?

3. Touchy Human Camera

http://ffffound.com/image/40feda09218abf8feeb991099702f2003c316e6f?c=9579049

Okay this looks dorky. I know. But I love the idea of using technology to emphasize the importance of human interaction. When you use this camera, everything is dark to you, as if you were blind. But when you touch another human, you can take a picture with the goggles. Using technology to step away from technology. This was invented to overcome the problems with virtual living. For those that only live in front of a computer, with no physical or real contact, this forces them to see it in a different way. The experience comes because of technology. I think that this shows us - when will technology prevent us from ever doing anything real? 

4. Panoramic Camera Ball 

http://www.popphoto.com/gear/2011/10/new-gear-throwable-panoramic-ball-camera

You can throw this camera and it takes a panoramic photo. Combine motion with photography. And without the technology to do this, we wouldn't have this awesome experience. This give us another way of of seeing the world, of seeing it completely. Nature and the sublime experienced completely.

5. Speed of Light Camera

http://www.latestdigitals.com/2011/12/ultra-fast-camera-capture-speed-light/

This camera takes pictures as fast as the speed of light. Enough said. Slowing down nature with technology so that we can experience the awe even more. 

6. Liquid Lens

http://www.latestdigitals.com/2011/12/ultra-fast-camera-capture-speed-light/

I don't really understand how this works. But I guess they put water inside and it allows for endless variations of focus. Again, using nature and what God has given us to find more ways to capture the beautiful moments of life.

7. Collaborative Editing with Picasa

You can use the minds of several people to edit photos - using ideas from everyone. Using technology to have a cross-experience, having the experience with other people. 

8. Ski-Camera Goggles

http://blogs.twincities.com/yourtechweblog/2012/08/19/your-tech-today-i-try-ski-googles-with-built-in-camera/

In those sublime moments where you're going down the slope and you want to take a picture. going along with the theme of combining photography and nature, this solves the problem of having to take pictures while skiing. But I have to wonder if, when we take pictures of that moment, we detract from that experience?

9. Photoshop Power

In this video, it shows how Photoshop can change the complete appearance of someone. The video shows how it changes the appearance of an old woman to look like a young woman. Technology creating illusions. So is this a real experience? Does technology take away from this real experience? Or even photography? Does it detract from the experience? 

10. Photoshop Power in Modeling/Advertising

Nothing is real anymore. Photoshop is used for everything. When is technology an advantage and when is it not? What is real and what is an illusion? What can technology do for us and when does it detract from our personal experience with awe?

What is reality? And how can technology help or destroy our real experience? Can technology help us get closer to nature? To awe? Or does it detract from that experience?

I think that this creates part of the terror in technological awe. How far can it get? What is the limit? And can we ever find a balance between technological advanced photography helping to enhance our life and detract from it? 

When Videogames Win

So I already did a list of what aspects of videogames are truly "awe"-some, but now I want to do a list of emotions that I feel videogames can evoke more or better than any other medium. Essentially, this is a list of emotions that videogames can evoke at awe-inspiring levels.

1. Loneliness

A screenshot from Dear Esther

I just played Dear Esther for the first time this week, and ended up going through it twice. Essentially (maybe--the game's kind of ambiguous), it's a game about a man dealing with the loss of his wife, and that sense of loneliness and longing is recreated by the game itself as you walk along an island totally alone, not even seeing your own reflection to reinforce the presence of humanity in the game's world. To make it worse, the game has 10 "ghosts" that only show up extremely briefly or when you're not looking directly at them, taking away any other human presence right as it's noticed--or even before it's noticed, as most players miss most of the ghosts entirely. No piece of media has ever made me feel so lonely. I actually found myself obsessively searching for the ghosts the second time I played because I didn't want to have to walk through the island all alone again. It's simply awesome to me that the game didn't just communicate that someone else was lonely, it made me lonely in a very real sense.

2. Triumph

This one's obvious, perhaps, but so essential to the medium. Jane McGonigal helped popularize the term "fiero" as the specific word for the feeling of triumph after you've tried something over and over and finally perfected a skill. Essentially, she argues, videogames give this feeling stronger and more reliably than any other activity on Earth. Ultimately, she argues, this trait of videogames should be incorporated into reality as much as possible.

I felt this myself recently as I played through Guacamelee!. The game itself isn't terribly difficult if you're familiar with basic conventions of action and platformer videogames like Super Mario Bros; however, to unlock an alternate ending to the game where you actually save the girl, you have to work ten times as hard to collect five orbs that come at the end of extremely difficult sequences. I spent the better part of a Sunday going through just one of these sequences to try and get it right, but when I did it the sense of relief, triumph, and accomplishment was so tangible it was awe-inspiring.

Yes, vidoegame accomplishments aren't "real," but they're so satisfying and passionate that no other medium even comes close to delivering the same experience.

The Unknown, Everyday Artist Creating Awe

After viewing Eric Whitacre's choir performance, I became fascinated with the idea of finding awe through social means.  It amazes me to think of how many talented people there are in the world that go undiscovered.  While we still aren't even stratching the surface, the internet has become a wonderful key to find awe through local artists that allow us to enter into their creative realm.  To me, even creating a website to upload art is a source of awe (you'll probably understand later on in this post as I lack necessary computer skills).  So I decided for my blog post I was going to introduce you to some of my friends and family who have created moments of awe with their artwork.  Everything I have accessed has been through the internet.  Without this medium the awe of local or aspiring artists couldn't be reached.  This is part of the awe of technology, and finding these inspirations can create excitement and add to the awe of their work.  Hopefully you can find some sort of awe, or even a respect for their creativity, in what they do.

1. Todd Wilson

I have known Todd for years, and I know that he is not only talented, but he is also extremely creative.  When I first saw his artwork when he preferred to work with paint.  His artwork is all around his house.  Everytime I see his work I feel as if I lack creativity in my own life.  He is now going to school as a graphic designer and works with digital art.  This was his interpretation of one of the deadly sins.  I believe that his creativity mixed with his talents, sets him apart from other artist I have seen.

I found this on his blog http://www.toddsartfactory.com/home/gallery/

2. Bola Rapha

Ok, I have to admit this is a video about my husband, but that isn't the reason why I am sharing it.  One of my husband's friends goes to Brooks Institute in California.  He is studying filmography and photography.  While he is still learning about his craft and refining his style, I believe that he powerfully evokes emotion and shares a beautiful story through his shots.  His ability to peace the story together is outstanding and he is still in school.  

I found his video through Facebook

 

3. Davey Miller

Davey is a Ventura local, professional surfer, father, Mormon, and artist.  It amazes me to know that artists live amongst mere mortals.  What I am trying to convey is that there are so many people among us that possess great talents, and so few receive the recognition they deserve.  Through the internet so many new awe inspiring moments can be opened to the eyes of the public.  While he was once a professional surfer, he has now found a way to continue to create through a new medium.  Both pictures I have shared are so different, one abstract, the other celebrates his passion for the water.  

I found his pictures on his personal website http://www.daveymiller.com/

4. Alexi Bullock

She starts with everyday items, and then photographs it.

It is amazing to see your friends reach different levels of success.  Creating new websites through live art is a new concept to me.  Having the eye for organization and color coordination is a meticulous skill that can also create works of art.  Knowing how to reproduce that into a website creatively is a definite skill.  There are different ways of creating art that exceed the limits of a canvas.  http://alexibullock.blogspot.com/

afterwards she creates a website for a company.

5. Ellen Wildhagen

Capturing the moment that tells a story.  While there is an overflow of photographers, and those who own fancy cameras, the awe can't always be captured.  Being able to succesfully manipulate colors and catching the moment can create moments of awe as we construct stories from a single frame.http://ellenwildhagen.com/

6. Morgan Maassen

A personal friend of my husband who focuses on filmography and the ocean.  I wasn't able to transfer the video from Vimeo, but hopefully this video will help you see how he films the ordinary and transforms it to something interesting.  The colors in this video showcase art in film.  It isn't always about the actors, but the person behind the camera can also create magic.

7. Mary Baum

This is where my computer skills start to fall through the cracks.  I wish I could have figured out how to put this movie online but I failed.  Digital moving art is a phenomena that can only be produced through the computer.  Knowing how to make it all connect and work showcases the awe of a patient mind that desires to create.

In order to see her digital moving art you can access it here http://vimeo.com/83344996

8. Aaron Pike

Again my skills are limited, but you can click on the link to hear his composition.  Composing music requires an understanding of how each instrument works together and harmonizes.  Creating an ear for that comes naturally but developing a masterpiece takes practice.  

http://www.aaronpike.com/Samples_files/Fantasy%20For%20Piano%20and%20Orchestra-Faster%20Tempo.mp3

9. Wendy Pike

The typical "Utah scrapbooking mom" is something we probably run into often, yet this is a creative way to showcase new ideas and designs.  While this isn't usually a digital project, others have decided to use the internet to share new skills and showcase their art.  Being able to aesthetically place the pictures while capturing the moment is another form of artwork.

http://thecroppingcorner.blogspot.com/2014/02/welcome.html

10. Vanessa Vogel

Some people are talented and receive great opportunities to create on a larger scope.  Being part of a big company can dim talent, or force creativity, but knowing your craft and loving it showcases the true talent of an artist.  The picture is one that she personally created herself, but if you follow the link the main picture for the movie is something she digitally repurposed.  Although she may not have taken the picture, she enhanced someone else's art through her abilities with graphic design. 

http://www.hulu.com/watch/137355