Oversound - Self Initiated Project - Google Map

View London Oversound Walk in a larger map

Here is a link to the customised google map I created to chart my journey for this project.  The map shows my route, as well as plotting each of the locations in which I made sound recordings and provides a short description of my experiences on each route.

Will Self, Urban Psychosis Lectures

A fascinating lecture I attended recently as part of the research of my on going, self initiated project.  Will Self discusses the topics of traveling in the urban environment among other things, a theme which is perfectly suited to my own activities and intentions with this project.

Secret language gif

My first attempt at creating a gif to represent my alphabet.. currently basing it on the trend in geometric shapes that is prevalent in contemporary graphic design blogs at the moment.  Each layer of this gif was photocopied from a transparency as a metaphor for the process of duplication all memes must go through to become successful. 

More info graphics and Virus visualisation

Firstly a beautiful info graphic that made me consider using something similar to track the progress of memes as past of this project -

http://vimeo.com/19088241

More stuff on the subject of viruses, this first piece is a moving info graphic on the spread of viruses

http://vimeo.com/22371716

The second piece is actually showing the formation of microscopic bacteria.

http://www.virology.ws/2010/02/03/now-playing-viral-plaque-formation/

Virus Video and Meme Doc

Some interesting bits I have been looking at recently as part of the on going research for my meme alphabet project.

Firstly,  This interactive piece demonstrates the different aspects of viruses, an avenue I am still considering for this project -

http://www.yourdiscovery.com/anatomiesof/virus/

Secondly, a short documentary from the Vice creators project on the subject of Memes.

http://thecreatorsproject.com/blog/the-mystique-of-online-viral-imagery-video

Unknown Alphabets - Gif

Been considering using the humble gif as the format for my final alphabet.  I can think of nothing more suited to the concepts of internet culture, memetics and repetition then a Gif.  The one below interests me in particular as it acts as a really nice metaphor for the spreading of ideas.  (Source: iwwo, via my-tumblrisbetterthanyours, via http://ultrazapping.tumblr.com/)  -

Graphic Design Memes

I have been considering the function of memetics in contemporary graphic design as part of my on going secret alphabets project.  Trends, like the memes I have previously studied for this project, show the spread of ideas from designer to designer, as certain aesthetics are seen on blogs, emulated and mutated in the work of designers whos work is then fed back into the blogs sphere to further perpetuate the memes growth.


In response to this I have been trawling a selection of design blogs recording some of the most prolific trends, upon which I intend to base my alphabet.  The following blogs have been the basis for my research -


http://www.manystuff.org/?cat=1

http://graphic-porn.com/

http://www.qubik.com/zr/

http://www.lanciatrendvisions.com/en/trend-wall

http://ultrazapping.tumblr.com/

http://www.buamai.com/image/tag/graphic-design

http://reform.lt/

http://www.baubauhaus.com/graphic-design/page/1

Some sounds for SIP - London Oversound

The first few sound sample recordings I made for my sound art self initiated project are on Soundcloud and can be found here - http://soundcloud.com/you/sets

Not all uploaded yet, but all images, videos and samples for the project have been made and passed on to my collaborators..  Very excited to hear the results! STill not sure of that title though.

Secret Alphabets Research - Witch house

I have sort of gone back to the drawing board with this project lately, after my attempts at growing bacteria yielded interesting yet ultimately unsuitable results. 
Since then I have been reconsidering the topic of memetics and looking for other examples upon which to base my alphabet.  


I started thinking more about other internet based memes, aside from those of the humorous kind, the majority of which have either proved too juvenile, obscure or complex to form a decent basis for a writing system and as such I started looking at the culture of Witch House, a musical genre which was born and almost entirely sustained via a network of internet blogs, forums and myspace pages.  


As a genre title Witch House is in its self something of a meme, as explained in this interview with Travis Egedy of the group Pictureplane - "Different people started posting about it on blogs, and it sort of became an internet meme. And someone attached the name witch house to the sounds that bands like Salem were making—the slowed down, spooky, Goth juke kind of stuff." "...But, at the time, when I said witch house, it didn’t even really exist...".


Despite coming under criticism as a loose and poorly defined genre, there is a unified asthetic of typographic and visual trends that have become intrinsically linked to the genre, in particular, the use of obscure keyboard symbols as band names, e.g;  †‡†, †▲βU∩∩Y▲† and GL▲SS †33†H.  As the genre title might suggest, these aesthetics are all linked to themes of the occult and have also inspired a slew of beautifully LO FI videos and animated giffs from fans and musicians a like, some favorites I have posted below

Despite only really gaining recognition fairly recently, this genre is now (by internet standards at least) old news and the buzz around it has dissipated, its attempts at exclusivity and uber underground aesthetic the source of a fair amount of ridicule.  What really interests me about all this however, is that this genre is a perfect example of memetics working to produce something artistic and creative and perhaps most importantly, the use of typography as a meme.