"A Touch Of Islam" -Textile Samples

As well as illustrating our development process and final solutions through final boards, samples I also did during the project as development, that I decided not to show on my final boards, were also to be presented. All the samples contribute towards my final solutions, which I have illustrated through my 5 presentation boards. Here are some examples of other samples I did which contribute towards my culture project and were equally as important as the samples I presented on my final boards.
Knit samples - experimenting with different techniques from the same image in my sketchbook.



Experimenting with different imagery from my sketchbook and translating them as prints. I have built these prints up starting with lighter colours and building darker colours ontop. In some of them I have scored into the fabric with a paint brush to create a pattern effect, in others I have experimented using discharge ,which takes colour out of fabric, revealing the colour beneath.




Weave samples

I really enjoyed experimenting with weave. I liked blending different colours together and playing about with the compositions of each weave. As well as that I thought using different thicknesses of yarn interesting to see what kind of effect it was going to create. In my second weave sample above, I particularly like the vertical lines woven in.

Mixed Media

For this piece I built up layers of different textured fabric and then sewed ontop creating pattern. I then cut into some of the fabric to reveal layers underneath. It reminds me of a patchwork quilt look.

Culture Project - "A Touch Of Islam"

‘Culture’ can be interpreted in different ways. My interpretation of the word ‘culture’ is about the way of life of a nation of people- their traditions, customs and attitudes , which are factors contributing to making individual countries unique.

I am now finished my culture project so i thought i would post up some of the work I did during the last couple of months. Overall I am pleased with what I produced and I enjoyed translating work from my sketchbook onto fabric. The process of translating onto fabric was probably the most enjoyable part of the project - experimenting with knit, weave, mixed media and Print. Colour and pattern were the most important aspects for me so I concentrated mainly on colour compositions, and focused more towards an exploration of colour relationships, therefore I was able to translate aspects from my sketchbook as abstractly as I wanted. I looked at the work of Mark Rothko, Kate Blee and Ptolemy Manns for more inspiration as my approach and style show similarities to their work.
As I progressed through my development I realised Interior was most suited to my work. When looking through interior books and magazines I wanted an image which reflected the authentic atmosphere and environment of Turkish culture.




These are four of my final presentation boards, showing my inspiration and development process. The boards show what I thought was my best work aswel as trying to illustrate my thought process.

This is my final board - showing my two final samples in context. As i mentioned above, I wanted images which reflected the authentic atmostphere and environment of Turkish culture. I knew I wanted to have a bright colour palette as the bright, strong colours of the Turkish culture were a major inspiration for me.

Feel free to comment.

Reading and Reviewing - 4c And Bibliography

Reading and Reviewing 4c

After looking at these two sources, I could continue researching ideas related to the topic. I think going beyond just these two sources would give me a clearer idea of what people feel about interactive voting and whether or not they want to see more reality based storylines for TV dramas. I think the next step would be to compile a questionnaire with points which are raised from the journal and book I looked at already. What would people’s reaction be to creating an interactive voting system for television soaps? Would it be worthwhile? I would also like to know whether the public would watch more television soaps if they had more realistic storylines.

Within the questionnaire I could also include some ideas for future episodes and ask television viewers which one they would pick and why, as well as finding out how much they care about the social issues raised in soaps at the moment? Would they want them to be more realistic? Or does the audience prefer the melodramatic and televised perception of reality? Does it create more excitement? Finding out where people get their beliefs from and what influences them to believe the judgements they make could also be interesting. Do people actually think about their judgements before making them?

Would introducing this interactive voting system create a big enough impact for making television soaps stickier? Or do people see interactive voting as being pointless because they believe so many other people are voting and their vote won’t make a difference to the final result? Collating reactions to interactive voting that exists already in game shows would be interesting to learn about.

Bibliography

Hawkins, R. P., Pingree, S., & Adler, I. (1987) Searching for cognitive processes in the cultivation effect, Human Communication Research: 13,553-577

Herrnson, PS (2007) Voting Technology: The Not- So- Simple Act Of Casting A Ballot, Washington D.C: Brookings Institution Press

Mares, M (1996) The Role Of Source Confusions In Television's Cultivation Of Social Reality Judgements, Human Communication Research, Volume 23 issue 2, Pages 278 - 297: International Communication Association

Potter, W. J (1991) Examining cultivation from a psychological perspective, Component subprocesses, Communication Research: 18,685-705

Shapiro, M. A, & Lang, A. (1991) Making television reality: unconscious processes in the construction of social reality, Communication Research: 18,685-705

Shrum, L. J., & O'Guinn, T.C (1993) Processes and effects in the construction of social reality: Construct accessibility as an explanatory variable. Communication Research: 20,436-471

Strange, J.J (1993) The facts of fiction: The accommodation of real-world beliefs to fabricated accounts, Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Columbia University: New York

Reading and Reviewing - 3rd Part

My own personal thoughts on both texts

After summarising both texts, I feel I now have a better understanding of Interactive Voting Systems and the way the public feels about interactive voting. These two subjects have a loose connection to my design idea to create a simple electronic voting device connected to the TV for television viewers to vote on future episodes for soaps series.

It is hard to make comparisons between the two texts as they are both looking at different aspects but both still relate towards interactive voting as well as improving my understanding of both topics. Both pieces of research show that their ideas are credible through their extensive experiments they did. The role of source confusion text draws attention to people watching television and adopting this distorted view of social reality, so when voting for specific storylines, in my design idea, it would seem appropriate to suggest realistic events. The purpose of allowing the public to decide on a storyline, which is more linked to the real world, is to make television soaps more appealing, so people can relate to them, not to encourage the adoption of a televised perception of reality. The implication for concern is that if television strengthens the cultivation effect that the world is a dangerous place, then people’s judgements based on that may restrict what they do and affect how they view others. This brings my attention to the other text – people are more likely to take part in an interactive vote if what they are voting for is believable and interests them. Providing a simple electronic voting system to vote for realistic issues and displaying immediate feedback from the public will hopefully encourage viewers to want to watch more reality based dramas, which will create less fiction-to-news confusions. Having read about the connection between TV viewing and social reality judgements it makes me realise that soap stories should try to depict as true to real life scenarios as possible, based on reliable sources. In this era, it would be impossible to depopularise television but perhaps it is the responsibility of TV companies to try and make news and fiction programmes less visually similar to reduce the potential for confusion for viewers, (as proved by the study), and to consider more carefully the way people are portrayed in, say, soaps to keep the story lines more true to the real world.

After reading into the electronic voting system text I would say that when casting an interactive vote, keeping it simple and less complex is best so that there will be a higher degree of accuracy and errors are less likely to affect the outcome. If a large percentage of the final vote was collated from viewers accidently clicking the wrong button so casting unintentional votes, then this might stop people from voting in the future for which storyline they want to see ,so defeating the purpose of having this opportunity to involve lots of viewers. The answer is to keep the device simple and not show too many options on the screen as confusion may lead to frustration and then loss of concentration and interest. If the storylines were more reality based it might also pull in more light television viewers, so making television soaps even stickier, which was the initial reason for creating this Interactive Voting System.

Reading and Reviewing Part 2

Source 2-


Herrnson, PS (2007) Voting Technology: The Not- So- Simple Act Of Casting A Ballot

The Accuracy Of Electronic Voting Systems

This chapter “The Accuracy of Electronic Voting Systems” is taken from a book by Paul s. Herrnson called Voting Technology: The Not- So- Simple Act Of Casting A Ballot. Any evidence and assumptions made about the voting systems are based around elections across USA.

This article highlights that voter error may have an impact on the choice of candidate in a closely fought election and these errors are mostly related to the type of electronic voting system used alongside the complexity of ballots in some states in USA ie multimember & straight party elections which add to the overall confusion for voters.

This chapter discusses the accuracy of the different voting systems available. The author does highlight that most electronic voting systems are accurate and mistakes are often minimal and they keep up to date with the voting statistics. Evidence suggests, however, that voters don’t always vote for their intended candidate for various reasons- they push the wrong button, they don’t understand how to use the system nor the layout of the ballot , they don’t realise they can vote for more than one candidate, they want to change their vote and the system automatically moves onto the next part, they vote for the candidate just above or below the intended candidate-proximity error, they move on before choosing an option so don’t cast a vote at all, they don’t write in a candidate’s name properly, they forget to complete the fill- in parts eg In a San Diego mayoral contest, there was an issue about whether to count the large number of ballots where voters failed to fill in an oval, signalling a write-in vote.

It’s impossible to monitor voters’ intentions because of the secret ballot, as they cannot be asked if they voted the way they intended, nor can they be watched during voting.

The author conducted a highly credible, fictitious field/lab study over several weeks during which they observed voters in the booths, acted upon questionnaires they handed out to voters to receive feedback and experienced researchers tried out the voting systems. They also watched while people cast their votes and helped them when necessary to make their intended votes. Types of errors and accuracy levels of different systems/ ballot designs were identified from the results.

The results from the field study showed that an important issue is that the more difficult and complicated voting systems are, the less accurate votes are going to be. The complexity of some types of electronic systems lead to confusion and loss of concentration on the task eg wheels and buttons and navigating to the next place. The study found that methods used on the electronic systems are the source of the difficulties voters experience. It highlighted that failure to fill in the oval beside a write-in vote( only 72% successfully cast a write-in vote in the study) can result in the vote being uncounted. (as in the San Diego mayoral contest)

The author says they acted upon questionnaires they handed out to voters to receive feedback and they relied on the observations from the studies they undertook to gather more information. They also watched while people cast their votes and helped them when necessary.

The study reveals that most voter errors will not affect the outcome of elections as, in the real world, they are decided by large enough vote margins that their outcomes are not affected by voter error but where elections are close eg same- party control of the Senate, a close election can mean the difference between Democrats or Republicans taking control, so voter error may have or, could already have had, major political consequences.

The author suggests that introducing training sessions may be a solution to reducing voter error, so voters will eventually become familiar with the systems. Of course it would be very difficult to ensure error-free voting, but in the case of a close contest, the potential is there for voter error to affect the outcome, which could impact on public policy.