In the beginning was the word.
And the word was DS106, and the URL, DS106.us. Two things now amaze and stagger me in writing this round-up:
1) My first piece of art (if you could call it that) was only on 20th May 2013.
2) Including this blog post, I have just shared 100 items!!
Regarding the date, that must have been the start of the DS106 “open course” which has brought such a wealth of online chums. I’m hardly surprised that in retrospect it has turned out to be such a momentous date, because the 20th of May would have been my Dad’s birthday. Amazingly significant things always happen on that date – i.e. I also sold my house on that same day after a long two year slog; this was also a pleasant change from the year before when I got chased across a field by a herd of cows and damaged myself diving under a fence to escape. Thanks Pop.
DS106 item that got away. 20th May 2013
100 items!!!!
Excuse me whilst I swear profusely in disbelief. But, here is indeed the evidence, of what is possibly a liberal estimate as it does only include entire and completed items and not sounds and videos that contain more than one asset. It also does not include the several items that “got away” and were not released – such as the Giant Baby above, which was not the image finally shared.
Animated GIFs and GIF-a-chrome
In an earlier round-up last summer I described the joy of mastering the animated GIF (in Fireworks), and this time I can add the joy of GIF-a-chrome and GIFs-to-music largely thanks to John Johnson. Also the revelation that GIFs are just great for animating! Dur! I have 12 animated gifs in total. And now, for the first time, animated gif that also got away.
Photographs on Flickr
Six photos last year and now a total of 32, mostly on Flickr, with the occasional one unreleased. Recently I have loved creating tree-art and inspired by other DS106 photographers and now wander round with my camera asking “what would Cogdog do?” Most proud? Love “Grand Canyon Man”.
Musical and sound productions
Mostly pulled together in Garageband, my 3 sound recordings from last summer have grown to 20 items, although a piece about “Arc Welding” is yet to be inflicted on the community. There includes two adverts (“Dynobog, cleans the loo” and Andrew Sisters-stylee “Pork and beans“). There includes four songs (“Million MOOC songs“, “OER knees up” (with spoons), “Song number inflation” and my recent Christmas hit “Ding Dong Andrew Ng on High“).
The item which transformed my thinking most at the time was the “Gone with the wind” sound track which I blogged about and made me appreciate the importance and essentialness of music to cinematography. RESOLUTION – do more about this in 2014.
Radio production
Two joint efforts! Just one joint production back in the summer of 2013 “Who threw that custard?“, and some small input into the masterpiece that was the 2013 Christmas MOOCtivity. This was my first “live” radio session, and something that I intend to add to my list of RESOLUTIONS! Again, no donkeys were harmed in the Christmas MOOCtivity production.
Poems and writing
No poems this time which is very amiss. Only one piece of writing, but with 7 blogs on my other site SCOOTER, and this blog making the 16th on this site, I make that 26 pieces of writing in total since the very start. I am particularly proud of tdc636 “Knees-up-land” – the invitation to write about a fictitious town, and also tdc649 “OREO story” which spawned from Beware the Cookie Monster’s daily create.
Video productions
Two by last summer created on an old PC and Pinnacle studio, but the transition over to MAC has been a perilous one, and somewhat limited the creativity, but I am getting there. 8 videos shared, including 3 straight from iPAD and Photo Booth which don’t really count. The MAC iMovie did enable me to produce “Gone With the Wind“.
Round-up, round-up
I think by the end of this round-up I realise how important these random bursts of creativity are for my sanity. I actually do mentally need these activities however small as they are an important diversion away from work. I do need the “buzz” of a larger project, and love recording vocals. My RESOLUTIONS, to find out more on:
1) What is really behind that Andrew Sister’s sound?
2) Music in cinematography.
3) Nature’s own art – photos and gifs.
And finally,
None of this would have been half as fun, or indeed at times possible, without the lovely person in my life, who has been ignored, gone hungry, been the subject of art, and worst of all, starved of beer. RESOLUTION? To try harder in 2014 🙂
Thank you Cogdog Art.