[Trucker]

Ok, I'm new here, so apologies for barging straight in with the questions, but right now I could just do with a helping hand.

Basically, in september, I'm going to be going into my final year of a computing degree and I need some ideas for my dissertation. Coming up with ideas really isn't a problem, but when I started this degree I somehow thought it would be slightly less technical and more forgiving towards my natural artistic tendencies. Well, it's not. But, that's where I'm at right now and I may as well make the most of it.

Rather than building a program that tells you what the temperature is in Moscow I want to move towards a more artistic and satisfying project - something which I can enjoy putting my time into and gain some experience that I actually value.

So, this is what brings me here. Anyone have any general ideas on a technical computing project which will nicely incorporate an artistic mind? What would you do?

I'm interested in all ideas


Cheers

[Tzan]

Maybe this site will give you some inspiration for simple art based apps. Although it sounds like you need to do something more impressive.

http://ryer.dk/default.aspx

There are 4 apps here, with some settings.
Sand
Bugs
Hair
Weed


Feel free to ask the author a few questions here:

http://www.javagaming.org/forums/index.php?topic=12931.0


Good luck

[Trucker]

Thanks Tzan

I'm just looking for general stuff, and that site's pretty interesting. To be perfectly honest, I haven't dabbled much with digital art so I'm really trying to see what's out there, what's possible and what can come in useful to me. I don't so much need specific ideas, just a starting point and some inspiration.

[Gort]

Consider:

A user initiaited factal computation model that illustrates the propagation of cellular life, population or any other like characteristic

Human Computer Interaction: use your artistic side to find a balance between front end UI design and function. A model based on the principles of ubiquitous computing may do well here.

Remember that in the todays world of technology in computing, design has and will continue to be in the front for creating products and solutions that users find compelling to use and engage with. What can you offer the masses? Meditating on that might give birth to some microcosmic, granular based concepts within. Look around. There are problems everywhere; there are better solutions as well.

Read Maeda's Simplicity
_________________
- Tom Carter

"You can't stop the waves but you can learn to surf" - Jack Kornfield

[Trucker]

Gort, I like your way of thinking.

That's good stuff, and a good argument to incorporate artistic design into a technical project, I'm going to have a look into that.

Many thanks.

[Ian Jones]

www.setpixel.com

www.meso.net

Some interesting experimentive work. I'm doing a research project for university which has similar outputs.

I'm sure you've had some cool ideas before, just think about what design problem it addresses and approach it along those lines as Gort suggests. The world of interaction design, ubiquitous computing, physical computing etc is vast and has plenty of potential.

[cheney]

I am confused, so perhaps you can help me. If you are in your final year of earning a degree do you mean your bachelor's degree? If so don't you need to write a master's thesis before moving onto a doctoral dissertation? I ask this because there is a massive difference in scale of research. You can typically get by with an 80 or 90 page master's thesis, but dissertations are typically around 300 pages. In order for my rhetoric professor to complete his dissertation on allegory of the Matrix he researched 210 fan websites and read 81 books on allegory.

In addition to heavy research your dissertation must satisfy an enthymeme, or create new knowledge. The ultimate advise is to pick a subject you are comfortable with not so much that you interested in, because you are going to need an incredible amount of research either way and you need to defend your idea.
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http://prettydiff.com/

[Trucker]

Sorry, I'm doing a BSc undergraduate degree at the moment. Dissertation, project, Piece of work, I don't know, they're just all words to me, which is why I naturally feel I need to move closer to art, it's closer to the way I think.

And no, I'm not going to be doing 300 pages (closer to 15 ), so the pressure isn't that great.