Mashable Assignment

Article 1

How ‘Ralph Breaks the Internet’ created that princess scene (you know the one)

The article, “How ‘Ralph Breaks the Internet’ created that princess scene (you know the one)”, is aimed at Disney fans, kids, artists, animators, and movie goers,

What if princess Vanellope from Wreck it Ralph met all the classic princesses?

Would Disney studios sign off on a project like that?

According to co-director Rich Moore, the Ralph team knew from “day one” that they’d be making fun of their own movies. “It felt like, if everyone else does it, why shouldn’t we?”
Well, Disney did, actually. The idea originated with screenwriter Pamela Ribon. It’s a lighthearted moment, and a pleasantly shocking one. Not only do the Disney princesses lounge around in their comfy clothes and bond over their shared traumas (turns out a lot of them have been kidnapped or enslaved!), they crack knowing jokes at their own expense.
Would it work? It was a “tough crowd,” she said. “Any minute, I felt like they were going to be like, ‘Shut it down! Get out! No!'” Contrary to her fears, however, the scene was a hit. The audience applauded, leadership signed on, and the Ralph team got started straightaway on making Ribon’s vision a reality.
Right now, the classic princesses seem to be getting all the attention, in large part because Disney has made the sequence such a central component of their Ralph Breaks the Internet marketing campaign. However, Spencer stresses that the moment is “integral” to Vanellope’s story.

Disney being Disney, of course, that meant minding all the details. Each princess had to look right, sound right, move right. Her individual personality had to shine through, and remain consistent with her historical characterization, even in the weird world of Ralph.

Animators and designers visited the park to explore the settings (like the Disneyland Dream Suite, which inspired the princess room in Ralph), and speak with the “face characters” who play these characters each day.

Mark Henn, the legendary animator whose credits include The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, Pocahontas, Mulan, The Princess and the Frog, and Frozen, returned to animate some of the princesses again for Ralph Breaks the Internet.

Head of animation Kira Lehtomaki and her team also painstakingly studied the old Disney classics to incorporate “as many opportunities as possible to find these iconic moments and put them in the film,” she said.

The actresses who’d originally voiced the princesses were called in to reprise their roles

Is the idea to showcase the classic princesses strong enough to warrant another movie, possibly Wreck it Ralph 3?

Is it possible more movies featuring classic princess with their updated versions of their characters and outfits be in the works for production?

Original Article: https://mashable.com/article/ralph-breaks-internet-princess-scene/#3rlIZE5rBiqq

Article 2

Augmented Reality Brings 3D Street Art to Life

Artists, animators, digital media, art fans, and just about anyone looking for something awesome to check out, should watch Leon Keers videos and view his street art.

Artist Leon Keer has worked on a large number of 3D street paintings around the world.

Because these street paintings have to be viewed from an exact vantage point, Keer is looking for ways to create a bigger visual impact for the spectators and add information.

How can he bring more depth and interaction with his audience by fusing technology with traditional art, possibly 4D?

He uses digital design programs to create animations, paired with technology from mobile phones to provide an interactive experience for his Audience while viewing his traditional street art pieces.

It works by standing in an exact vantage point for viewing the 4D street art. And the audience needs to have a cell phone with an internet connection with a downloaded app.

Next the users cell phone detects an image from the street art, on screen, and then the image cues an animation to play on the users phone.

Leon explains the process of figuring out how to allow the audience to interact with his art and describes the process in which he creates the viewing angles, as well as the subject matter and how they will interact.

He also discusses using digital media paired to current technology, and how to combine the for an enjoyable user experience.

Are people bored with traditional art with the availability of technology?

Is the mixture of digital and traditional media the future of art?

Original article: https://mashable.com/2013/04/25/3d-street-art-augmented-reality/#h6F.42w6duqD

Article 3

A museum without walls: How the Met is bringing its ancient collection online

Artists, sculptors, painters, art collectors, museum goers, is the targeted audience for this article about digitalizing the museum in an online registry.

“How often do you get to photograph a della Robbia?” Coscia said while he worked. “Maybe once in a lifetime — twice if you’re lucky.

How should the reach of a museum extend beyond its walls?

Dr. Miriam Posner, an assistant professor of Information Studies at UCLA, said. “Every museum has to decide what its priorities are.”

the Met has staked its flag on the side of open access; in 2017, it released 375,000 images of its public domain art objects on its website under Creative Commons Zero (CC0) license.

On Thursday, it went further. An API, or Application Programming Interface, is a tool that allow computers to read and analyze a changing set of information.

How does a museum go about making their collection digital, and how do they offer it to the public?

The process begins with curators who often request photographs of the objects.
Every piece of physical art comes with its own metadata — the artist, the date, or any other descriptors.
Then specialized art movers in the Met’s riggers department bring the piece into the studio, if it’s able to be moved. A photographer is assigned, based on their expertise
Photographers then capture all the details requested by the curators, as well as whatever they notice on their own.
Photographers work in a dark studio using cameras shooting in 100 million megapixels that convert raw files into a 600 MB .TIF file
The department uses top of the line cameras, lights, and software
Once a photographer has secured the perfect shot, they send it to advanced post-production to get it ready for distribution.
Photo editors clean up the enormous photo files pixel by pixel
Photo editors also make edits that photographers can’t in real life, like removing something that couldn’t be physically be removed
Next its off to the digital team, which has 60 employees working on the website and building new digital tools and content.

How good will the data base work?

Google engineers manually uploaded the Met’s work onto its platform, that process is slow and painstaking. The API will enable the Google platform to ingest a huge amount of dynamic data at once.

The Met has now released a public API connecting to over 200,000 open access pieces in its collection. The museum is launching the API in partnership with Google, which is using the API to pull these objects into the Google Arts & Culture app and web archive.

Some professionals working on the program to bring the Met to the internet have said:

“I would never make a blanket statement like everybody has to digitize,” UCLA’s Dr. Posner said. “For some museums, it’s hard enough to keep the lights on.”
The Hammer Museum in Los Angeles has a specialized collection of European, American, and contemporary art. Its project manager for digital initiatives is Philip Leers . “We create digital resources that highlight parts of our collection that we think are important, or hidden, or that we have something interesting to say about,” Leers said.
Compared with the Met’s 1.5 million object collection, the Smithsonian has 155 million objects. Digitization has provided the Smithsonian with the ability to actually make that gargantuan archive accessible, so it has made it a priority.
“Putting art on the walls is always going to be what museums do,” the Hammer’s Leers said. “But for a first time in a while, [digital] is putting a broad array of possibilities in front of us, and asking us to choose. Which can be uncomfortable, and scary, and exciting.”

Original article: https://mashable.com/article/the-met-museum-api/#.DWhsOqDdsql