Blackboard Mind Map & Stop Motion Animation

For our new project, titled 'Altered States'; I created a mind map/brainstorm with a partner about what the phrase means to us. I think the title is very broad yet I explored its meaning with an open mind in this mind map using doodles as well as words. It was not a refined process - as CJ and I essentially just took some coloured pens and started drawing and colouring, as artists. I found the activity rather interesting and liberating to do - as I didn't need to think had about what to write or draw, I just did it. It was rather freeing and unlike so many other day to day tasks/activities that I do which made it enjoyable. Another fundamental part of this activity was how there was no external input; all the ideas were our ideas and our ideas only.

We focused on 'altered states'; in particular altered states of the mind. At the beginning of creating the mind map we both did not have a clue where to start to be honest, so I decided to begin with what I actually pictured when the words were said out loud - which were mainly of unusual objects melting - specifically Dali's work 'The Persistence of Memory' - featuring the famous well-known melting clocks which are something of a symbol in the art world nowadays. So I drew the sort of dripping/melting effect below the title, 'Altered States'. From there we began to delve deeper into the idea of the 'states of mind' and how it can be altered by emotions as well as recreational drugs.

CJ and I had the same general idea of the creative process behind the mood board - which is about an altered state of mind, however we almost went off on two slightly different tangents. Mine was very much themed around depression as well as euphoria, which are mental illnesses that are developed from emotions. This is shown by the bloodshot red eye (bottom left) I drew crying blood in contrast with the many different colours of smiling faces. However CJ thought about different types of mental illnesses such as schizophrenia as she told me; which is what she told me her illustration was about (bottom right) of half a face, almost two different halves of a face with words, thoughts and feelings flowing everywhere like a madness. Eventually however our ideas overlapped on the ideas of mind-altering drugs such as the lines of cocaine drawn, as well as the magic mushrooms drawn on the right.

Every step of the way I took a picture in order to create the stop motion animation to show its development (.gif) shown below;

This was created all on photoshop. Although the animation looks rather simple, it was a rather painstaking process. This is how I created the stop motion animation:

1. Downloaded all the photos of each stage of the board and ordered them

2. Using File > Scripts I imported each photo as a separate layer

3. Using the Perspective Crop tool and the Brightness/Contrast tool adjusted each of the 17 photos as they were all taken at different angles as well as lighting. In some places I used the Healing tool to darken the whiter areas on the board.

4. Opened up the Timeline by clicking on Window and create frame animation

5. Selected the visible layers for each frame.