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Blog Post Week 8

Posted on March 4, 2013 by | Comments Off on Blog Post Week 8

@brandonluc01

Many people know of the childhood story Little Red Riding Hood where a girl is going to her grandmother’s house and along the way she meets a wolf who eventually attempts to eat her but Red Riding Hood is saved from the wolf. Leishman’s electronic literature version of the story adds many new elements to the story. Leishman’s interactive story contains very little text, and uses images and music to tell the story. The lack of text forces the reader to interpret the story themselves; the reader could interpret the dark and scary music as foreshadow for the outcome of Little Red Riding Hood or the red images to symbolize blood or death.

Taking older pieces of literature and altering their medium to make the story the author’s own has become more and more popular. The purpose is to stimulate senses that plain text cannot stimulate and create different a message. Marshall McLuhan’s book title “Medium is the Massage” is a manipulation of words to explain that the new mediums massage our senses tand expand the viewers interpretation of the story’s message. McLuhan speaks of the technique used by Donna Leishman, to make Red Riding Hood her own story. On page 41 he says,”Media, by altering the environment, evoke in us unique ratio of sense perceptions. The extension of any one sense alters the way we think and act – the way we perceive the world.”This quote explains that newer mediums and technologies influence the readers perception of the story or message.

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Redridinghood

Posted on March 3, 2013 by | Comments Off on Redridinghood

@PerrinKyla

Redridinghood is a classic fairy tale that everyone knows. The electric medium allows us to interact with the story and tell it in whatever way we wish. Exploring Donna Leishman’s site for redridinghood she explains her theory of how it is possible that the interactivity of point and click destroys the story. In some ways I think that the answer to her theory is yes. For me, I know the story of little redridinghood as one of a young girl and a wolf and a grandmother. Her rendition of this story take an old story and transforms it into a new medium. Marshall McLuhan stated that “Information pours upon us, instantaneously and continuously. As soon as information is acquired, it is very rapidly replaced by still newer information…We can no longer build serially, block-by-block, step-by-step, because instant communication insures that all factors of the environment and of experience coexist in a state of active interplay.” (Pg.63). I think that what McLuhan was getting at was that creativity is not like it use to be. That the interpretations of stories is now becoming more common in the sense that people would rather remake one story into their own then to make up a completely new story. In Leishman’s story there is no specific ending to it and it is also confusing to navigate her electronic literature. I think that it is considered electronic literature but that in order to be a good new medium it should have more options to the user in order to help her prove her theory.

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Redridinghood and Electronic Mediums

Posted on March 3, 2013 by | Comments Off on Redridinghood and Electronic Mediums

@RachaelS_DTC

“Redridinghood” is an electronic literature piece created by Donna Leishman. This piece was created to be read with a specific medium, a computer, which affects the message. The message is affected by this choice of medium because it allows the reader to be interactive with the reader. To continue the story the reader clicks on an item, such as a picture or a window. The reader can also choose between letting Red Riding Hood dream or wake up when she falls asleep in a field of flowers. With an interactive environment, created by the medium, the reader can experience more from the story than reading a book. The environment is important because it also affects the message. “[C]ountersituations made by the artists, provide means to direct attention and enable us to see and understand more clearly” (McLuhan 68). This means that our attention is directed toward a specific idea so we can understand the idea the artists wants us to understand. This is done through the medium used. Throughout the piece, Leishman created everything with dark colors and had eerie music playing to put emphasis on the danger that awaited Red Riding Hood. The author manipulated the reader’s ‘environment’ through the medium, the computer, to allude to the ending of the story. The electronic medium allowed a new way to tell a familiar story by controlling the environment, so the reader focused on a certain aspect the author wanted to emphasize.

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Redridinghood and Electronic Medium

Posted on March 3, 2013 by | Comments Off on Redridinghood and Electronic Medium

@KatieGullans

With the familiar story of redridinghood, a twist on it that allows the reader to interact makes the electronic medium of this interesting. With electronic medium, you can tell well-known story in your own way. Donna Leishman put her strange thoughts together to create a different version of this story. Being electronic, it brings this classic fairy-tail to life.

I think this can be similar to graphic design in a way because you put things up differently and to get people’s attention to get the message across, but tell a story differently. An example I have is when I took intro to graphic design, the first project we did was recreating the story of Jack and Jill with a paper filled of symbols and pictures we could use to help tell the story. I recreated my story by having two birds fly up to the top of a tree to get a worm. Then one bird(Jack) was shot down with an arrow. And the other bird(Jill) was shot down after. This tells the basic idea of the nursery rhyme, but it a new way that other people may have not seem before. The electronic medium could really enhance something like this, as there are many options with video and photoshop.

A page that stood out to me in “The Medium is Message” is the one about environment. It says “Environments are invisible. Their overall patterns elude easy perception”(Agel). It shows a picture of buildings above, then on the next page, it shows it’s on the water. I interpreted this as a new way to see things that you didn’t see there before.

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Redridinghood

Posted on February 26, 2013 by | Comments Off on Redridinghood

The electronic medium has transformed literature in a multitude of ways.  In Donna Leishman’s work, “Redridinghood”, the virtual surface provides a means of visual, touch, audio, and interactive objects.  You are given different options while navigating throughout the story, which allows the viewer to become an active participant in the story.

 

Marshall McLuhan states, “Electronic circuitry profoundly involves men with one another” and “We can no longer build serially, block-by-block, step-by-step, because instant communication insures that all factors of the environment and of experience co-exist in a state of active interplay.” (p.63) Leishman’s piece is a good example of this move away from the step-by-step formal organization, and the growth towards a larger scale human experience and interaction as a group or whole entity, rather than the singular focus of print.

 

The electronic medium has also made it possible to take a classical story and reinvent the manner in which it is told, this gives it the opportunity to once again gain interest by means of a new delivery in a more appealing package. McLuhan says, “The method of our time is to use not a single but multiple models for exploration.”  By using a multi-sensory approach, Leishman is maximizing the experience others have with her story.  It gives the author and audience a more connected experience where proximity is not an issue and interactions are produced.

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SHY BOY

Posted on February 19, 2013 by | Comments Off on SHY BOY

Shy Boy is full of digital art, and inspiration. This isn’t only literature it’s another way to express how one is feeling. I have chosen to observe Shy boy because this poem speaks more than a shy boy. It expresses life of most children. This poem has colors, animations and the capabilities to only be watched on a computer that is compatible with the codes. (Hayles 1) The colors, animations make the poem seem so much more than the words being spitted out letter by letter. It intensifies the meaning by a lot. Because this digital art work requires a computer to be able to read, it uses HTML codes. A huge digital art work producing way of art. Shy boy is a classical way of presenting a digital art work. Without these HTML codes those who consume this poem wouldn’t have gotten the full expression that this shy boy poem is really pleading out to them. It would have been boring, lousy and most likely wouldn’t catch anyone’s attention. When I first started to watch this poem I was impressed how it had its very own website, it was plain so the reader could get the full effect from the fading’s, colors and animations from what the producer wanted the consumer to get. #DTCV #SHYBOY #ANIMATION #EXPRESSION

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Blog 6: Electronic Literature

Posted on February 19, 2013 by | Comments Off on Blog 6: Electronic Literature

@kylemcgee77

“Unlike a print book, electronic text literally cannot be accessed without running code” (Halyes). With this quote in mind, I feel that “Shy Boy” by Thomas Swiss is an accurate example a work that is “born digital.” There are many reasons why authors create digitally born works. In terms of “Shy Boy,” the reason is to evoke specific emotions. Swiss uses text animation such as fading and bold facing to set the immediate tone of the piece. The music that is used in the piece also affects the mood. Electronic literature like “Shy Boy” tends to break the mold of traditional still text such as a printed book or newspaper. By using text animation and sounds, electronic literature keeps the reader’s attention and connects with the reader more efficiently. The text in “Shy Boy” continues on with or without the reader and creates excitement. In a printed piece of literature, the plain text doesn’t ever movie or produce sound. It may provoke inner thought in emotion, but only if the reader continues to pay attention to the text. The reader’s mind can wander off at anytime and lose the connection. Electronic literature uses many tricks to keep your attention. For a piece of work to be labeled as “digitally born,” the work is created digitally. It cannot be reproduced in a physical form. That is another reason why “Shy Boy” is a great example. Electronic literature may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but I feel that it really allows the reader to connect to the piece of work.

#dtcv

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Digitally Born

Posted on February 19, 2013 by | Comments Off on Digitally Born

Shy Boy

Not only is it literature but it is also digital art because of the way it is presented. You not only read the poem about a Shy Boy and how he see and feels about himself but see a visual representation of the emotional state he is trying to convey. What makes this digitally born is that the authors would not have been able to present it in this particular way without its origins starting in the digital world.

Being a bit of a geek myself I always look at the source code of web sites that interest me so I can see how they did it. One of the first things that I noticed was that the code used was very minimal. I was expecting to see a huge amount but it is ten lines of code. The active part of the poem, a .swf file that is used for vector graphics, is stored on their server and does not activate until a user clicks on the ‘enter’ link.

As stated in Hayles’ Electronic Literature: What is it? In chapter three part of the genetic material to be born digitally is to have code embedded and part of the interpretation process. We read this in paragraph six:

“Unlike a print book, electronic text literally cannot be accessed without running the code. Critics and scholars of digital art and literature should therefore properly consider the source code to be part of the work, a position underscored by authors who embed in the code information or interpretive comments crucial to understanding the work.”

Audra Mann | @WSUVcollegeMom

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Electronic Literature

Posted on February 19, 2013 by | Comments Off on Electronic Literature

@PerrinKyla

The piece of electronic literature that I chose is Shy Boy by Thomas Swiss. This is an example of a “born digital” work because it was created on a computer and it is read on a computer. Similarly the definition of electronic literature is known as a first generation digital object created on a computer, meant to be read on a computer (Hayes). Electronic literature is not something that is just been digitalized like a book that was printed and the put back onto a Kindle for people to purchase and then read on a device. A “born digital” piece of work is something that the user can input things, see things visually and hear things. The story of Shy Boy is provided for the reader after pressing enter on the webpage. It was designed so that each line is separately put onto the screen for the reader to read and take in. In my opinion it seems like the designer Michael Cina and Thomas Swiss worked together to make a design that would cause the reader to feel a sadness for the Shy Boy each time it is read. The grey and black colors provide a sad feeling to the reader. The one thing that bothers me about electronic literature like this one is that with the colors and layout the reader is not really able to form their own emotions about Shy Boy because there is instantly a feeling of sadness because of the colors being so dark.

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“Shy Boy” elit

Posted on February 19, 2013 by | Comments Off on “Shy Boy” elit

@CailinJohnson

“Just as the twentieth century saw an explosion fo interest in the book as a medium, with an impressive canon of artists’ books and other experimental practices exploring the potential of the book as an artistic and literary venue, so electronic literature has seen a growing body of work that interrogates networked and programmable media as the material basis for artistic innovation and creation.” (Hayles). Electronic literature such as “Shy Boy” by Thom Swiss is not the same as printed literature. True electronic literature cannot be experience the way it is meant to be experienced on print. It uses code, color, animation and movement to created emotion, meaning and feelings out of a piece of work. “Nevertheless electronic text remains distinct from print it literally cannot be accessed until it is performed by properly executed code.” (Hayles). “Shy Boy” creates a very sad emotion with the use of the black, grey and white colors that flash on the screen as blocks. It also creates a feeling of sad emotion by the slow way the text moves across the screen. This type of art cannot be recreated by normal text. You would not get the same emotion from the story because you would not be able to have the movement of the text that creates the emotion to go along with the actual story. A “digital born” text cannot be correctly represented by print. Without the use of electronics you will not get the full work of art because it is created in something that it can only be fully experienced in.

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