SEMESTER 1 Week 1
What am I doing?
Conceptualising the project
The first time the initial themes of this project was conceived was over 6 months ago in the first quarter of 2023. Since then, I’ve struggled quite heavily with narrowing down what exactly I wanted this project to focus on. Ethics of generative A.I., utilitarianism, corporate power, impacts of generative A.I. on both the creative workforce and the future of design. There were so many concerns and issues surrounding the issue. Furthermore, they were all interconnected, so it was hard to truly pick just a few.
Image of: An introductory mind mapping exercise we did to narrow down our ideas.
At this point in the development of the project, I was still informing and educating myself on some of the more foundational around the discourses of Gen A.I.. Our supervisor, Andreas, got us to do a mind-mapping activity. After which, he got us to indicate on parts of each other’s maps whenever we saw a theme that was interesting to us. It seemed arbitrary at first but I later realised that this would be useful to help scope down the themes of the project even further.
Image of: My summarised reflections on the mind-mapping activity.
I went on to summarise some of the core points that seemed to have resonated with my peers. As this is a topic that would definitely impact them (young creatives), it did feel reassuring that there was some kind of interest, especially in points that I personally also resonated with (E.g. Advocating for creatives who may be left behind in the transition).
This will be a common pattern in the coming weeks, but as an important part of my process, I made sure to document everything and reflect upon them.
This will be a common pattern in the coming weeks, but as an important part of my process, I made sure to document everything and reflect upon them.
Image of: My growing collection of raw ideas as of week 1.
Utilising the bulk of my readings thus far, I’ve also been trying to generate ideas as and when I could, making sure to note down every single random idea I could think of. Unlike my workflows for more traditional projects, I foresaw this to be a project where I’d have to push myself with many experiments before I would be able to visualise what the final outcome would be like. I had a goal in mind of making some form of installation that would be thought provoking and help communicate my points clearly. Hence, it was important to have a variety of options, no matter how absurd or stupid they sounded at the start.
Seeing as how I still needed way more information before I could get started, I concluded this week with just the idea generation.
Seeing as how I still needed way more information before I could get started, I concluded this week with just the idea generation.