Serial Planes Part Two

The Brainstorming Began.

Foam board is the construction material

But that doesn't limit what the central

Idea can be.

 I looked at cylinders and cones.

 I thought about abstract shapes and forms.

 I also began to think about 

some representational pieces and ideas.

 Grass and surfing, snow, rain and fire.

 The sea with fish, a shark and a SCUBA diver

hanging from above was one idea I really liked.

 I briefly toyed with the idea of a castle

but I I wasn't sure about how I would

separate the layers to make it 3-D

AND keep it interesting.

Deciding to do something representational

I looked around for some interesting forms.

The Gargoyle had a lot of appeal. 

 Staring out over the city, they look scary

And fascinating.

 The Rain clouds held appeal as hanging piece.

It provided an opportunity to add in many layers

using simple repetition.

A dead tree held some potential

but even though it held appeal,

I wanted to do something different

from my other projects. 

 This image had some appeal. 

The snowman had some character.

 I really liked the idea presented by this.

The idea of using layers to create a positive image,

Like a bas relief.

But it looks complicated.

 I liked the idea of sculpted shrubbery.

A two -fer, plant and sculpture.

Clouds, water and a sun in the distance.

This is a chance to produce size, depth and scenery.

But with the heavy winter, snow was on my mind.

So I went with a snowman for my model.

Serial Circles.
Arranged to create a ball.

 The tops and bottoms of the lower two sections were flattened slightly
too keep the structure from rolling away.

 The top piece didn't look right, so I left off half to present a flat surface.

I tried it with a face, but it didn't look right. So I left it off.

 The sections were staggered in size like you would expect with a snowman.
The bottom section could've been made a little bigger, but I was keeping with the times and kept him slim.

 Every snowman needs a hat. In order to contrast the rest of the round
pieces, I made the top hat squared off. I left open holes in the top to keep
the structure open.

 Putting the arms on, I used pieces left over from cutting the circles for the body. The points reminded me of sticks. I tried to add some layers to
the arms, maybe add a little depth, but there wasn't enough material to
do it correctly.
The broom took a little work. I tried to make the bristles straight and nice,
but that didn't look good. So I used similar pieces as the arms.
The result was more of a pitchfork than a broom but it worked.

The final assembly has glue and toothpicks keeping the bottom sections
held together. The hat and the head are loose, allowing the snowman
to look in different directions.
The lower sections are arranged the same direction because it didn't look
right to alternate them. They aligned better facing the same way.


The final result is a posed snowman, one arm down and one hand up,
holding the scary broom. The hat is slightly askew, adding just a tiny bit
more attitude to the snowman.

Serial Planes Part One

This is the First Phase of the Serial Planes project: The Altered Book.

The connected planes of this book were changed to produce something different. 

Something Not a book

The Book was de-covered and then cut in half. The two halves will be later joined with one laying mostly flat to allow the pages to open up and the other half standing with the pages opening out.

 The hardest part was laying out the design and then cutting through over 250 pages of paper. This was done to make the shape more organic and include negative space.

 After lots of cutting and some rolling, the standing half of the book began to take shape.

 With some folding and more folding and a little bit of hot glue, the second half of the book expands out.

The Final Product: An arrangement of serial planes that look nothing like the original book.

The two halves have been joined together perpendicular to each other. An added twist was brought about using a small section of illustrated pages. The dark pages offer a contrast to the other mostly white pages.