COORDINATING A GRID ART PROJECT by ed@sito.org, see: http://www.sito.org/synergy WHAT'S A GRID? A grid is the collaborative effort of several image-makers created using a grid of squares which the artists fill with images that interconnect and play off one-another. Grids can take a few hours to a few days to complete, depending on how dedicated and how quick the participants are at turning out pieces. Some grids never reach completion. One participant submits a starting image to be placed in the center of the grid (though there are variants in which four participants would simultaneously submit/create the corner pieces...advanced GRIDDING...not for pregnant women or those with heart troubles). Four participants then create squares that meld into or connect to that starter square. Once that's completed, the exercise progresses with all participants continuing to connect squares to the previous offerings. It's quite fun if you like that sort of thing. Conceivably, you could create a grid on a piece of paper, but the grids we'll discuss here are a bit more...civilized. We'll be using Internet. IRC and FTP to be more specific. The low-down. X number of people meet on IRC with intent to grid. They then set up an FTP directory that all of them can read and write to. With both of these avenues of communication open, it's not difficult to wing the rest. A grid commences. Somebody starts it, we don't care who. People build off of that starter. The process can be orderly or chaotic. You can either pre- determine who'll do what square when....OR you can just use IRC to it's fullest pontential and "call it". Either way you do it, it's best to designate someone as the "compiler" and someone as the "mapper". The "compiler" will keep a running image of the full-sized grid. That is, they will take all the individual pieces and put them together in the proper configuration...and upload the updates periodically to show the participants how it's turning out. The "mapper" will basically keep an ASCII map of the grid. They'll type up a simple visual aid, like this (a 5x5 grid)... . . . . . . . B . . . . a C . . . . . . . . . . . ....and keep it current. It is suggested to assign each participant letter (we recommend the first letter of their first name) and that you used CAPITAL LETTERS for those grid-pieces that are "in progress" and lower-case letters for those that are complete. In the above example, "a" is a completed piece while "B" and "C" are still working on theirs. While everyone should keep their own scribbled-out progress map on paper, the "mapper" should be able to cut-and-paste the ASCII map quickly and easily to IRC at a moment's notice. There are no real rules for GRIDDING, merely guidelines. Adjust what we've given as you see fit. You could (and might need to) have more than four participants, for example. You could (but might NOT want to) have a grid bigger than 5x5. You can do what you want. Here's one simple way of organizing a grid for four people. (the following instructions assume you're part of the SYNERGY project...ignore those parts if you're not or don't want to be... contact ed@sunsite.unc.edu if you'd like to have a SYNERGY ID) ------------------------------------------- THE OTIS *GRID* INSTRUCTIONS! In five ("Seven, sir.")..SEVEN...easy steps ------------------------------------------- THE GOAL: To create a 5x5 grid of connected and collaborative imagery...each square playing off the other, spiralling out from the center impetus. NUMBER OF PLAYERS: 2-4 (or more, with some adjustments) (4 is ideal for this model) WINNING CONDITIONS: completion of the grid TOOLS NEEDED: ftp, paint-software, cerebrum, SYNERGY ID OPTIONALS: IRC (#otis or #panic), cd-player, printer, food THE PROCEDURE: Say there are four participants: A, B, C, and D.... ---------------------------------- PHASE 1 _______ Here's the starter grid... a b c d e _______________ 1 . . . . . 2 . . . . . 3 . . X . . 4 . . . . . 5 . . . . . X=starter image placed by whoever, predetermined pixel size, square in proportion. We used 128x128 per square for our first grid, culminating in a 640x640 final image. It is recommended that everyone sketch out a grid on paper to keep track of progress for themselves. --------------------------------- PHASE 2 _______ a b c d e _______________ 1 . . . . . 2 . . B . . 3 . A x C . 4 . . D . . 5 . . . . . Everyone downloads the X-image and connects their own 128x128 square to it as shown in this diagram. B on top, C on the right, D on bottom, A on the left...etc. Since all are independent of each other, all can work at the same time. Naming of completed parts will be as follows: c1-B.jpg <---"c1" = coordinates, "-", "B"=replace with SYNERGY ID (three letter ID) (ex: c1-OED.jpg) d3-C.jpg c4-D.jpg b3-A.jpg (note: the "X" is lower-case...from now on in the diagrams, this designates a past-phase) REMEMBER: Wait until everyone's finished with a phase to move on to the next phase. This is important because all images after PHASE 1 are interconnected. --------------------------------- PHASE 3 _______ a b c d e _______________ 1 . . . . . 2 . D b A . 3 . a x c . 4 . C d B . 5 . . . . . Each participant then downloads the images that they connect to. For "A", those images would be: c2-B.jpg and d3-C.jpg. "A" would then make the left and bottom sides of their square meld into the downloaded pieces. Save in the "coordinate-ID" filename structure stated above. --------------------------------- PHASE 4 _______ a b c d e _______________ 1 . . C . . 2 . d b a . 3 B a x c D 4 . c d b . 5 . . A . . (narrator switches from third-person to first-person for remainder of instructions...) You guessed it, just download the image you need to hook up to. Save as stated. --------------------------------- PHASE 5 _______ a b c d e _______________ 1 . A c B . 2 . d b a . 3 b a x c d 4 . c d b . 5 . D a C . Keep going! No one said this would be easy! The rewards are tremendous! --------------------------------- PHASE 6 _______ a b c d e _______________ 1 . a c b . 2 A d b a B 3 b a x c d 4 D c d b C 5 . d a c . I think you're getting the hang of it... --------------------------------- PHASE 7 _______ a b c d e _______________ 1 C a c b D 2 a d b a b 3 b a x c d 4 d c d b c 5 B d a c A You're DONE! Now decide on a name for your grid. Have someone concatenate all the pieces and save the results. It's now ready for viewing. Order a pizza, brag, burp, scratch and send a hard-copy to your favorite cyberspace columnist. This design isn't law or written in any other holy book, you can wrench and grind it to fit your needs. This model, though, should provide each of the four participants a variety of challenges and an equal number of images to work with. ---------------------------------------------------------------- VARIATIONS: "Four-Corners": four starter images, in the corners otherwise the same "Add-On": add onto a pre-existing grid using the 5x5 model, the starter for an Add-On grid would look something like.... (let's assume we're adding to the right side) x x x x x x A b . . . x x x x x x c . . . . x x x x x x B . D . . x x x x x x a . . . . x x x x x x C d . . . A, B, C and D are the fist phase, they would connect to the grid-pieces at their left (from previous grid). Lowercase "a", "b", "c" and "d" represent the second phase. You can figure it out from there.