Literary License Blog

Propaganda Poetry

March 27, 2014 by michellechandra in Python

It’s time to write a program to make a poem! I decided to make propaganda poetry for Reading and Writing Electronic Text. Hopefully very bad propaganda poetry.

I dug up some books from the library and compiled a text file with war slogans from World War Two posters (British and American.) I also created a text file with headlines from The Economist (always mysteriously poetic!) and threw in my corporate mottos to the mix for good measure.

I think the results are actually pretty good for being fairly nonsensical. Here are my favorite poems that were generated. (You can find the code for the program at the end of this post.)

Poem One
Relearning old lessons
we trust
All that glitters is
kill

This is the enemy.

Keep that lumber coming!
Is your trip necessary?
Grow vitamins at your kitchen door.

Just a good afternoon’s
Bad ventilation ruins ammunition.

Poem Two
Buy victory bonds. Invest.
Come into the factories.
United we are strong.
Do it! Keep ‘em firing!

The daily diary of
neighbor, State Farm is there

A few careless words
If you are bombed

→ Read more

Tempo and Pacing – Coding for Emotional Impact

March 23, 2014 by michellechandra in Processing

Next up in Coding for Emotional Impact, we are looking at tempo and pacing. How fast does a pattern change, and how long does a pattern need to be established for change to be surprising? How fast is something progressing (beats per minute – tempo) and how does tempo create an emotional feeling? Are things moving quickly or slowly? For instance, when tempo is faster, things feel more frenetic, hurried or urgent versus when things move slowly.

I took a previous sketch which draws circles and lines in a rotating pattern and used frameCount to introduce new patterns over time. The pace/tempo is consistent, and I would say maybe a moderate pace but I am not entirely sure.

In the beginning, an initial pattern is established:

The pattern is established long enough and repeats for long enough that when it changes (with a completely different effect and rotation direction), the change is jarring and surprising. → Read more

ITP ListServ Visualization: Getting My Gmail Data Using Python Gmail Library

March 18, 2014 by michellechandra in Data Visualization, Python

Today I figured out how to use this Gmail Python Library to fetch Gmail data for my ITP listserv visualization. First up, I installed the Gmail Python library by cloning the GitHub repo to a folder on my local computer.


git clone git://github.com/charlierguo/gmail.git

1

2

3

git clone git://github.com/charlierguo/gmail.git

In Terminal, I changed directories so I was in the directory where I saved the library.


cd /Users/michellechandra/rwet/gmail

1

2

3

cd /Users/michellechandra/rwet/gmail

I then installed the GMail Python library:


python setup.py

1

2

3

python setup.py

And opened the Python Interpreter in Terminal:


python

1

2

3

python

and ran these commands to log-in to my Gmail Account:


import gmail

1

2

3

import gmail


g = gmail.login('username'. 'password')

1

2

3

g = gmail.login('username'. 'password')

This command accesses messages labeled “ITP” in my Inbox: → Read more

Data Representation: ITP ListServ Visualization

March 18, 2014 by michellechandra in Data Visualization, Python

I am tackling what at times feels like a herculean Data Representation project, although on paper it sounds easy: visualize the connections between folks who use the ITP student listserv. In 2007, Joshua Knowles did just that.

This post is about how to not tackle this project.

For my first attempt at getting my gmail data, I ran this Python script and downloaded 6,126 emails (as separate text files) sent to the ITP listserv from Sept 5, 2013-Present. Luckily, Gmail has been archiving these emails for me in a separate folder in my Inbox (plus one for me!) I then attempted to adapt one of Dan O’Sullivan’s Gmail Word Count Processing sketches in order to loop through each text file, grab the From and Subject line and write to a CSV file. This turns out to be exactly the kind of sketch that crashes Processing. It’s just too much data for Processing + my computer to manage given I do not need each email (and all of that data including attachments) for this project. → Read more

Collapsing Time and Memory with Instacollage

March 14, 2014 by michellechandra in Creative Process, Photography, Processing

For Recurring Concepts in Art, Joelle and I are taking my Instacollages and remaking them without technology. The process of deconstructing my original project has forced me several times over to reflect on the motivations and process that led to Instacollage.

Joelle found this great quote which sums up collage and juxtaposition quite nicely:

“In nature we never see anything isolated, but everything in connection with something else which is before it, beside it, under it, and over it.” Johann Goethe

Instacollage

One of the things you learn as photographer is that there is a process that happens by which we become familiar with our surroundings to the point we stop “seeing.”

→ Read more

Ideate, and Repeat

March 14, 2014 by michellechandra in Creative Process

“Before you have focused your thoughts you are all over the place, because you are searching. You are feeling. You are looking for things. You do not know what you are doing. You are lost. You are in a maze. So thinking is number one in the design process. The design is the product of your thinking.”
-Paul Rand

Python: Corporate Motto Mashups Part Deux

March 6, 2014 by michellechandra in Python

For my second pass at my Corporate Motto mashups, I recombined mottos by splitting each motto based on a certain number of words and recombining the mottos into a new motto.


import sys
import random

stuff = list()

for line in sys.stdin:
	line = line.strip()
	stuff.append(line)

slogan_a = random.choice(stuff)
slogan_b = random.choice(stuff)
slogan_c = random.choice(stuff)

#print slogan_a[:10] + slogan_b[10:]

slogan_a_words = slogan_a.split(" ")
slogan_b_words = slogan_b.split(" ")
slogan_c_words = slogan_c.split(" ")

first_part = " ".join(slogan_a_words[:4])
second_part = " ".join(slogan_b_words[3:])
third_part = " ".join(slogan_c_words[5:])

print first_part + " " + second_part + "." + " " + third_part

#print first_part + " " + second_part

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

import sys

import random

stuff = list()

for line in sys.stdin:

line = line.strip()

stuff.append(line)

slogan_a = random.choice(stuff)

slogan_b = random.choice(stuff)

slogan_c = random.choice(stuff)

#print slogan_a[:10] + slogan_b[10:]

slogan_a_words = slogan_a.split(" ")

slogan_b_words = slogan_b.split(" ")

slogan_c_words = slogan_c.split(" ")

first_part = " ".join(slogan_a_words[:4])

second_part = " ".join(slogan_b_words[3:])

third_part = " ".join(slogan_c_words[5:])

print first_part + " " + second_part + "." + " " + third_part

#print first_part + " " + second_part

The first round of mashups returned some funny results, but mainly mottos that almost sounded like they could be real mottos. Some of my favorite ones: