Lost & Found

Description

For this project, I was partnered with Chenwei Zhu and provided with a description of a sentimental object that is now missing. The description she gave me was: "A big, pink toy bear with a red bowknot on one of its ears. It is nearly as tall as me and it holds a red heart shape object in front of its chest. And it wears a green sweater." Additionally, in order to complete the assignment, I needed to include the following components in my sketch: 2D primitives, fill() and blendMode(), Translate(), Rotate(), Push(), Pop().

Design Process

My design process was fairly straightforward because I was given a pretty succinct description of what Chenwei was missing. I started with the background where I created a blue canvas with RGB(0, 0, 255). I knew I had to include certain components in the project and was having trouble finding ways to include them in the main subject so I decided to make an argyle-like pattern in the background. I made a series of squares and rotated them and applied the screen blendMode. I made sure to switch the rest of the code to the standard blend so I could get the colors I needed to meet her description and essentially created a series of ellipses and rounded rectangles to construct the shape and features of the teddy bear.

Reflection

The most difficult aspect of this project to me was finding a way to apply some of the required components. The blendMode change in particular was the hardest since color was stated clearly in the description so I didn't want to alter it too much. With the colors pink (255,102,255), red (255,0,0), and green (0,245,0) in mind, I created a standard teddy bear shape with big, rounded ears and a pronounced snout. Overall, the shape I had the most trouble with was the heart. In the description, the teddy bear "holds a red heart shape object in front of its chest." I've always had trouble even drawing a subject holding an object out in front of itself, and this was no exception. I opted to make the heart a part of the sweater instead. I'm happy with how it looks but I could not get rid of a thin line on the right side of the heart without a patch for unknown reasons. In my past work, I often used tools like Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator to design an object and I found myself fairly comfortable making this subject in p5. Though I relied heavily on the reference site, I was not overwhelmed with the lines of code as I was expecting; having the // reference notes helped me stay very organized. I definitely missed functions like rotate and the ability to change the size of a shape by just double-clicking it but I was pleasantly at ease with the whole process. With Chenwei's clear description, the image I created in my head stayed very consistent from paper to code as far as the shape goes and the vibrant colors are exactly what I had in mind.