Category: design principles
These are posts that emphasize John LeMasney’s understanding and appreciation of the tenets and principles of design.
This week in Design for the Non-Designer, we return to some key basics in Inkscape. We will explore why, when, and how to save files. We will also cover how to export or import files. I hope you enjoy it, and if you have questions or feedback, let’s talk about it in the comments.
This week in Design for the Non-Designer, we’re going to step away from the basics of Inkscape. We will perform a real-world task: restoring clean lines and edges to a pixelated logo. I discuss importing, bitmap tracing, node-editing, saving, and exporting in Inkscape. Special thanks to NJLLA for allowing me to use the task as an example for everyone!
Hi, friends! I’m going to make a video each week to explore open-source creative tools like GIMP, Inkscape, Krita, Blender & others. This is the first of those videos. It’s about getting started with Inkscape, an open-source vector illustration tool that works similarly to Adobe Illustrator.
Recording and reproducing the senses aside from seeing and hearing (taste, smell, touch) has not yet been fully realized. The recording and sharing of senses is difficult, unless we are talking about seeing or hearing, and even then, there is a lot lost in the capture. We have mastered a very clear record of what we can see in photography and videography.
Recording touch
How do we begin to record what we touch? With haptics, like a remote robot glove, we might be able to record and play a touch. We’re just not there yet. When we are, we may never leave our homes. It’s very difficult to record touch, comparative to capturing a voice message or selfie. Poetry begins to capture touch, great literature approaches the capture of touch, but these require an investment and openness comparative to viewing the selfie. Something that is well written, that explains why something was an overwhelming, rewarding, or delicious experience, can lead to a sense of touch. But the touch itself is lacking. It’s not exactly the same as a GoPro, where you can really see the experience of the author. It’s not exactly the same as recording something with a good microphone, where you have a much clearer idea of what was heard in a given space for a given time.
Recording smells
We don’t really understand yet how to record smells, although perfume, food, and olfactory marketing begins to speak to it. Scratch and sniff stickers have been around a long time, and culinary scientists are adept at convincing us that we are eating meat when we are actually eating plant based protein. A store in the mall may be able to convince you via your nose to visit their shop. Despite this, there is no way for me to capture or share the smell of the oaks at the top of the hill in the neighborhood I grew up in that quickly brings a rush of conflicted childhood memories. There’s no recorder for that, yet.
Recording Taste
We have no idea how to synthetically record or reproduce the sense of taste in the same way as a photo or audio clip. The combination of flavors and ingredients in a dish lead to that particular taste, experience, memory, and imprint. A meal can lead to bliss at the hands of an accomplished chef. Your favorite dish from your mom may pass along with her. Recreating it synthetically is difficult.
You might say that I should just make the dish from the recipe. A recipe is certainly a record of the instructions for a taste, but it does not capture all of it. A recipe is a instructional recording of a dish. But, there may be other things that we are missing in the recipe. If a chef stirs or bastes a certain way, that might not be captured in the recipe. If the chef uses a California based spinach, and I use a Virginia spinach, the taste may be dramatically changed. Even if we recreate a recipe perfectly, it may still not have exactly the right taste, and we may not know why. We haven’t yet done a very good job of recording and reproducing a particular taste in any artificial form.
What if our smartphones could suddenly, faithfully, and quantifiably reproduce our favorite tastes, smells, and touches? What would that feel like? What would it smell like? What would it taste like? How would it disrupt our current paradigms? How would it affect culinary arts, human relationships, and memory?
A while back, I decided to go into GIMP and create an image of me and my sons, but to overlap our faces, and merge them at the eyes, nose, and mouth. It’s a simple trick, really:
- Bring in each photo as layers, preferably where each photo was taken at the same distance and position from the camera, though it’s not entirely necessary.
- Resize your GIMP canvas so that each of the faces will fit, so essentially doubling the original image size.
- Drag horizontal alignment lines from the rulers so that they line up with the original photo’s eyes, nose, and mouth. Drag vertical alignment guidelines out from the rulers to align with the eyes and nose.
- Resize the side image layers so that the eyes, nose, and mouth line up with the alignment guidelines.
- Move the side images so that they overlap with the eyes.
- Create layer masks for each of the side images.
- Apply a gradient to each layer mask so that it reveals the faces to the right and left, but hides the overlapping portion of the faces over the central face.
- Export the image and save the XCF.
I loved this image. I really liked how it captured all of us, and showed our connectivity. For Father’s Day this year, I had them hop in front of the camera again, so that I could recreate the image. I might make it a yearly thing. Here’s the 2020 image:
