My first assignment for this course was to create a sculpture that was no more than 12" inches in any dimension. I decided to base my design off of a sketch I did while in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which felt comfortable for me because of my vast experience with two-dimensional art. Considering that it was also my first sculpture for this class, I was not as confident in my skills or the tools that were available to me.
Below are pictures of my process:
My initial thought was to create a wooden version of the design that I had viewed. This meant that I would have to cut, carve, and sand the sculpture out of the wooden block above. After longer deliberation, I thought that it would be too time consuming for a small project and decided to move onto laser cutting the design out of a thinner sheet of wood.
My next thought for my project was to use the laser cutter to follow my design. This felt like a much more comfortable method to complete my project. The machine works by following the design on an Adobe Illustrator file, which is something that I am familiar with because of my background in graphic design. I took a photo of my sketchbook design and imported it onto an Illustrator file to trace with the pen tool. Once it was done, I changed the pen width/stroke to .001 for the laser to trace over.
Blow is a video of the machine laser cutting my design:
This is a picture of my final product.
My Reflections:
At the end of class, we had a group critique. I felt like my project was far behind the skill of the other people in my class. I remember thinking that I should have thought further to figure out how I could make a free standing object. This first project was a good way for me to get introduced to the materials and tools available to me. It was also a way for me to break the ice and realize that I had to work on thinking in terms of three dimensions.