animals « Pete Hindle

August 19, 2011

Victoria and Albert Museum Courtyard

On Monday I went to London with Becky and Naomi. Going out with other people means that I don’t usually get to do as much sketching as I might like, but I managed to cram in a couple of bits at the courtyard of the V&A.

Apparently, while I was doing this – and cursing my inability to capture the building better – a woman came and craned over me. So intent was I on getting this quick watercolour done that I didn’t notice! Then we went to see the dinosaur exhibition at the Natural History Museum, which wasn’t that cool because it cost a lot and was full of people touching stuff. However, we did see the Spirit Collection Tour, which was ace, and involved seeing loads of animals in jars. Including an eight meter long giant squid. If you get a chance, go!

July 25, 2011

Wild Sheep

Believe it or not, these are actually wild sheep. I was accompanying my parents to a barbecue, held by some people in their Quaker meeting who had a massive house in the country. The sheep usually graze in the field where the barbecue was held, but had been penned off. They nervously glared at me as I tried to draw them, but I found that singing at them seemed to relax their natural fear of humans.

The next day I tried singing at some nervous looking ducks. Obviously, ducks aren’t such music fans (probably owing to them having no ears) and the wildfowl took off in an anxious explosion of quacking and feathers.

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February 9, 2009

Basic Techniques of Digital Media, Week One

I’d like to say I’m looking forward to it, but it’s an unashamed truism in my family that we look gift horses in the mouth. In fact, we’d look any form of gift animal in the mouth, because animal dentistry is expensive. They just don’t see the positive sides.

Back when I had a tv, I saw a program where Cheetah – the monkey from the 1940′s Tarzan – was in his ape retirement home. He wears pants and smokes cigars, which means it’s a significantly better retirement home than most of the one I’ve been to. Like cats and dentistry, there is no way that you can convince Cheetah to stop smoking those stoogies.

Hey, smoking’s a right.

You can, however, communicate with Koko, the gorilla fluent in sign-language. She’s even demanded that she sees the dentist before; she’s also demanded that people show her their nipples.

I’m not expecting any nipples in my Basic Techniques module, but I do expect the same sort of cross-species confusion. How are those with artistic backgrounds going to get on with the logical thinking processes expected of programmers? Badly, I suspect, from knowing some of my cohort.

Personally, I would like to completely avoid any timewasting with patcher languages. I’m going to nod wisely at your arguments and then point to the smoking chimp wearing a diaper, because there is no way on earth you’ll ever get me to use a patcher language out of choice.

Continuing on, I’d also like to say that I feel this module is going to eat my time right when I don’t have any. I think this should have been the first module in the course, and Theoretical Foundations of Digital Media should have been either special sessions or otherwise shifted. Why?

When I finish this course, people aren’t going to ask me about my views on cyberfeminism. They are going to expect me to work some kind of art-magic, which is what this module is heading towards.