Graphic art, music and influences

The making of a video to promote my 'Brightness' remix

2010-10-25T12:01:00.000-07:00

Here's a video I (Random Toxy) made to go with my remix of 'Brightness' by Nash Donson.

I'd promised to blog about how I made it so here goes. I'll keep it quick because there's not much to it really. There's a plug-in for After Effects called Trapcode Form and it makes particles in 3D space which can be customised to these cloud-like objects.

These can respond to custom audio input (in this case my carefully crafted masterpiece). Different frequencies can be selected to affect different particle parameters in a various ways. This of course cuts out the need to manually keyframe animation events in time to the audio track which would take forever.

A few camera movements and a bit of colour correction and there you have it – one music video. All made in an afternoon. I'd like to thank my parents, all the guys at Trapcode, Adobe, Apple…

Random Toxy Remix out - 'Brightness'- Nash Donson

2010-10-07T11:53:00.000-07:00

Another of my tracks got released on Beatport today - so I thought I'd celebrate by blogging my ruddy face off.

It's a remix this time. The original is a track called 'Brightness' by a guy who records under the name 'Nash Donson' (he's on Soundcloud - you should check him out).

For the remix I took the feeling of the part that I liked best, processed that part a little, then set about constructing a track around that in my own style. The artist got what I was trying to do and liked it, as did the AR (Riley Warren) at Zero Digital which was awesome. It was quite a new experience for me - having to care that a particular person liked a track.

I hope it sells. Thanks for reading, laters, bye.

Plaid and The Southbank Gamelan Players

2010-06-12T03:22:00.000-07:00

I imagine it shows a little in my music that when it comes to personal influences, Plaid have got to be top five. So, you can probably understand how thrilled I was to discover that Plaid (in collaboration with The Southbank Gamelan Players) were going to gig, just a half hour walk from my front door, at The Mac in Birmingham.

The Southbank Gamelan Players opened things with "a loud style welcoming piece" followed by six beautiful songs - the last of which was a cover of Actium by Aphex Twin. Watching the performers was fascinating and hypnotic, but distracting, so for long periods I listened with closed eyes. The vocals and flute parts were a little bit 'new age' (what else should I have expected?) but the coarse sounding two-string fiddle (when it featured) was a perfect counter to the warm tones of the rest of the orchestra. I preferred the quieter, sparser parts - they made me feel like I was sitting in a wood, catching the sounds of distant creatures (I thing the 'new age' vibe was getting to me).

As good as things were going, I admit I was waiting for Plaid to join in and when they did, well that's when the music really took off into the ether. This is the collaboration that Plaid seem to have been working their whole career towards. Both bands fit so well. The music was lush without being too safe (I suspect a technical fault cut short Plaid's involvement in one of my favourite trance-like tracks which was a real shame). Programmed gamelan electronics and the real thing wove together with quiet glitches, airy strings and warm bass. The music was uplifting and enthralling. A big 'thank you' to all involved.

Got to go - I feel inspired…

'Artificial Colours' is released today

2010-05-18T02:13:00.000-07:00

I'm pleased to announce that a 'Random Toxy' (that's me) track is released today on a compilation called 'Tranquillum'.

It's my first release on someone elses label. So far Zero Records (based in California) seem to be a very professional and friendly bunch so it's going well. I hope for both our sakes that sales go well.

Here's a link:
http://www.zerodigitalrecords.com/fr_zerotranquil

Zero Digital sign up 'Artificial Colours'

2010-03-21T12:25:00.000-07:00

Yes, I'm pleased to announce that one of my tracks (on soundcloud) has attracted the attention of Zero Digital. They are planning to include it on an ambient compilation album they are releasing through 300 online download sites.

I won't let myself get carried away until it's actually happened but I am hopeful.

It's pretty ironic that the track title has one of the words that is spelt differently in America - 'colours' - and Zero Digital are an American label.

I have no idea how it will sell. It's got to be difficult for unknown artists like myself to get a sale.

I don't know what the release date is yet - i'll blog it when I know.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Random Toxy – Zero Zero One EP is released!

2009-10-28T17:29:00.000-07:00

My first EP is now available for purchase on Digital Tunes website. Here's the link:

http://www.digital-tunes.net/releases/zero_zero_one_ep

Its a 4 track affair. They were selected because I consider them to be 'finished' and quite accessible. They work well together also I think.

'Traject' is maybe my favourite track although others seem drawn to 'The Sun' which is fine by me. "Full Scale Map" has provoked the most comments on the Soundcloud site so far (all good).

The next move for me is to go on as much of an online promotion onslaught as I can manage. I wonder what my chances of getting it reviewed are - and could I cope if the review was bad?

Hello Digital disappointment and Groove Armada joy

2009-10-21T04:41:00.000-07:00

I'm an idiot.

I had the foresight to book a day off ages ago to go to 'Hello Digital' this year. Aren't I good. Just one small problem - its full. I didn't realise that its a 'conference' and not a 'convention' (where you can just turn up). I was so looking forward to meeting like minded people. Who knows where it could have led me. I'll track down as much info about what happened as possible. They'll be lots online no doubt.

I resolve to be smarter with my next chance - 'YouPlusUs' later this year - assuming its on. Ill get a web page ready so I can tie all my internet threads together.

Ending with a positive.

Groove Armada were great at 'Eclectricity' on Saturday just gone. They had a sexy spandexed front woman and a set of mostly new electro-rock tracks for her to get stuck into - all a little bit Goldfrapp. They went down well considering no-one had heard any of the songs before. We were right at the front so we didn't miss a single shake of her ass.

Biggest track of the night - Superstylin'.

Later.

Concentric Ribbons

2009-08-16T09:45:00.001-07:00

ConcRibbons02
Originally uploaded by Ian Gavin

This one of three images - all made in Cinema 4D. The technique is very similar to the concentric circles. It needed something else though so I added the 'noise', which is actually an exploded cube with the fragments rounded using hyper-nurbs.

I may animate this. A fly-through could work well.

Stripey Goo r4_4_0124b

2009-08-10T10:09:00.001-07:00

Stripey Goo r4_4_0124b
Originally uploaded by Ian Gavin

I'm very pleased with the results of these things. There is a 'trick' to making them and they're not drawn one bezier curve at a time but I'm not saying any more than that.

The parallels with Op Art of the 60s is quite nice too.

Motion303

2009-08-10T09:50:00.001-07:00

Motion303
Originally uploaded by Ian Gavin

This is an attempt to collage some 3D elements together in photoshop, use some of my own custom photoshop brushes (background) and use some photoshop splatter brushes.

The results were OK so I pulled the whole thing into Illustrator and put some of my own custom elements and funky blend lines in.

My own 303 logo and typography was added at the end.

The result is a little bit clichéd but a least I've had a go.

I may do myself a poster print of this one and/or lay some more vector elements in at a later date.

Concentric Circles from a 3D model

2009-08-03T10:10:00.001-07:00

CC01, originally uploaded by Ian Gavin.

The outcome of this particular experiment is not very original, I know, but the technique enables me to generate this along with variations in seconds.

Its made in Cinema 4D by exploding three sets of simple lines (in this case from typography outline vector of a letter 'B') and lathe rotating the through 360 degrees. There are plenty of variables involved that can be easily adjusted to change the result (eg. the explosion speed)

The fact that makes the resulting image interesting (to me) is the way the light falls on the rings. Some are lit right to left and others visa versa. This is because the exploded line fragments are rotating perpendicular to the image plane so some of the resulting rings are concave and others are convex. The colour variations are a result of this effect also.

See more like this at http://www.flickr.com/photos/iangavin/

The Big Push

2009-07-29T17:12:00.000-07:00

I've put a stack of new images onto flickr (over the last few weeks) and set myself up a twitter account (today) so its time to continue my blogg, only this time with more of a hope of it being read.

If I'm going to really do this properly I'm gonna have to get my time better organised. What's the best thing to do? Put aside a time of the day to tweet/blogg? Get up an hour earlier maybe. I just don't know at this stage. How do people stay on top of all the new social networking routes?

Going online does give the impression that everyone else manages fine - the tweets keep coming - but I hope that that's just because I'm looking at the wood rather than focussing on the individual tree (so to speak).

It could be intimidating but I'll try not to let it get to me.

3D Block Font '27'

2008-05-09T01:22:00.001-07:00

I had a go at a font in Cinema 4D (and a couple of applications of it). Looking at it now, I think some of the letters need a little work. It's called '27' which is a reference to the template of 3x3x3 blocks and its also very close to 26 which is obviously…

I thought that I could make the Cinema 4D file available for sale (would anyone buy it… I don't know).

Fractal Typography

2008-05-07T06:54:00.000-07:00

Again the individual letters were made in Quadrium Flame. I wonder whether anyone else has attempted to make letterforms this way because it took bloody ages. I started with a 'spuiggle' of a fractal and kept randomising the settings on full until I had a 'parent' image that looked a little bit like a letterform. Next I created less random 'child' images from the 'parent' image and the one that looked most/more like the desired letterform became the new 'parent' image and the process is repeated. Survival of the fittest - Darwin would be proud. This took hours and hours.

If you can't read it, it says 'Random Toxy' - which is the name I use when I make electronic music.

Fractals have moved on

2008-05-07T06:39:00.000-07:00

I got a piece of software called Quadrium Flame. Its a fractal generator. I was really surprised how good the images made with it came out. Again, lots of random options but you can choose how far you want to evolve an image with each alteration.

I was pleased with these two. They look almost organic, but give away just enough of their mathmatical form (with repeating elements) to leave the viewer slightly disorientated. Clever computer.

Stripes - More Op art influenced 3D

2008-05-07T06:05:00.000-07:00

Another theme in Op art is stripes, and they are perfect for use in 3D - they really emphasise the shape of forms. I combined the stripey treatment with Cinema's ability to random generate elements to make this image - and I've used this trick a lot since. I made the main form in this image slightly transparent to see if I could cause a moiré effect (it can happen with dots quite well also).

I'd like to see 'random generation' options appear more in DTP progams like Adobe Indesign and Illustrator. Its a great tool.

Op Art Influence

2008-05-07T05:37:00.000-07:00

Still in the spirit of not using Cinema 4D in the usual way I started a series of 'Dotfield' Images. I love op art, so I probaby had that in mind when I made these. This one isn't even a render of the perspective view panel in Cinema but instead the side view.

I think these would be good to animate aswell.

Explosion

2008-05-06T06:42:00.000-07:00

This was also made in Cinema 4D also. I was trying to stay away from 3D clichés (like highly polishes reflections). I like the idea of using 3D software but it not being so obvious that I have.

I think these look a bit like petals.

Abstract

2008-05-06T04:43:00.000-07:00

Yes 'abstract' is a word you'll be seeing a lot of on here. This image was made in Cinema 4D (a great bit of software).

I was doing a Saturday afternoon tour around the galleries in Birmingham (home) looking for some pictures to liven up the flat walls of my flat. I couldn't see anything that I really liked that I could afford so I decided to make something of my own and here it is. The print is on a box canvas. It's about 16 inches tall and I'm really pleased with it. The print process muted the colours somewhat, but it actually made it look better.

And that's where it all started (I'll catch up to writing in the present tense soon I hope). I really got the 'making images for the hell of it' bug. I'm a commercial graphic designer by trade (since 1990) but never really thought of making images for their own sake.

Now, I'd quite like to start selling them, maybe do some exhibitions, but I'm finding that it's quite hard to get computer generated art taken seriously. It's true that it's quite easy to make images quickly with a computer, but I spend ages thinking and labouring on new ideas (new to me anyway) just like any artist working in any medium.

Launch

2008-05-06T04:27:00.000-07:00

If you're here by accident then goodbye.

If not, then thanks for coming. I can see that you're all ready sat comfortably.

At this moment in time the plan for this blog is to post up some of my graphic art (so there should be plenty to look at), talk about it, talk about music by myself and anyone else, talk about influences, life, apologise for my grammar, blah, blah, blah.

Thanks to James Bentley. He's a work colleague who said just enough to make me want to copy his idea of doing a blog.

It should be fun.