Matariki and Puanga Art Activity

Recently our students have been completing an art activity based around the celebration of Matariki and Puanga in New Zealand.   We have recorded the process for this in the slideshow shown below.  At this point in time it is the holidays in New Zealand - we will be printing during this break and adding to this slideshow as a result.

This was created by our seven and eight year old students in New Zealand using Tinkercad and a selection of art materials.

Puanga - 3D Printed Art/Mixed Media

 

We have now completed the final version of the Punga/Matariki themed art that our students have been working on as part of our artwork theme this term.

We have detailed this over a series of posts on this blog featuring the different aspects of this process.

It started with the use of Tinkercad to create the constellation, AR/VR and projecting it onto a range of backgrounds.

We have also discussed how we have then used Pic Collage filters to create art work that can stand alone or in this instance progress through to a 3D Printed mixed media version of the print featured below.

In the example left we have combined all of the elements of the artwork together with the 3D Printing.   The base is black paper combined with pastel work (for the 'Southern Lights') and white paint to represent the stars.   The 3D Printing in this example shown is the 'cotton candy' that has been featured in a number of prints on this blog.   

In the example shown left the lettering used 32g of filament which has a price point of $0.80c.   The print took one hour and eleven minutes to complete.   

The challenge moving forward is for the entire class to complete the 3D Printing - there is a balance required between printing something that can look effective on the artwork and not printing anything too small that does not print due to its size.

Matariki and Puanga - AR/VR versions of the Art

 

As we have been detailing here on this blog we have a focus this week on an upcoming event of national significance - the Matariki Celebration (which is also Puanga in our geographic area).

As preparation for this we have been working on artwork that is based around using our 3D CAD design, our use of AR/VR tools and our ability to create physical objects (which in this case the final output is a piece of mixed media 3D Printing and art).   

As we have described and noted on this blog a number of times in recent years it is also possible to use Tinkercad as a tool to create an art project particularly when you cross the Tinkercad App with another App - a favourite of ours has been to do this with Pic Collage and the filters that are associated with this app are only becoming more inventive and unique with the onset of using AI as well.

The image shown left is an example of the final stage where we are heading.    This is showing the black background with the southern lights creating by using black paper, white paint and pastel crayons.

Onto this background we have used Tinkercad's ability to project its AR/VR and moved the virtual design into the physical space.   We still intend to print the design (and use glow-in-the-dark filament) but this shows our students and ourselves what the final design just might look like.   We have student who also have created a Matariki visual (in the above photograph) and used the text options in Tinkercad to name each of the stars.    We are now going to 3D Print the files for the art to then be layered on top of the art for the final design.    Print times vary but as we are only printing the lettering and the stars we do not anticipate it will be unreasonably long (or expensive)

Puanga - 3D Printing Art Prototpye

 

We have talked about the process of our students using Tinkercad to create an AR/VR image of the Puanga constellation which is visible in our region (instead of Matariki which is our nation wide holiday) 

We have started the process of early physical prototype of this with the intention of creating some form of a mixed media work.   The intention is for the students to paint a background and then have the 3D Printing attached to the background.   In early testing (shown left) some of the lettering stood out however while the lettering was solid the smaller stars had some difficulty being glued into place.   The students need to refine their design and ensure that the star had a flat back to it.   The lettering were sized large enough in this example to be glued directly to the background.

In an example like the one shown left (when the picture was taken prior to the print being removed from the plate).    Some of the stars shown left which worked in a context of the AR/VR work - but when converted to a physical 3D Print the size of the print the stars did not prove to be robust enough.

The stars will need to converted to physical print and then checked by the students.  It may well be that the AR/VR design should be increased in dimension to ensure that that it remains viable for the art.   

Finally the check that needs to be made to ensure that the glue can maintained and not have the pieces of the printing falling off at a later point.  We have used PVA glue in a first attempt and will be checking this over the coming days to ensure that it allows the design to remain in place.

3D Design Puanga Art Piece

 

We've explained the process where we've been identify the group of stars that makes up the Matariki constellation of stars that is celebrated as part of our national holiday.

Regionally there is some variation - in our area where Auroa School is based, Taranaki, we celebrate rather than Matariki, Puanga.    You can view the difference between the two celebrations here.

While it is important to understand Matariki for our students, it is equally important for us to focus on Puanga.   For this we used the knowledge that we had built from the process in the last few days.

For the building of this group of stars we wanted to make sure that Puanga is the most significant from the group as it needs to be the focus.

The Tinkercad App was used with the students iPads (we are an #Apple Distinguished School) to create the group of stars.   We then used a specific feature of the app - the ability of the combination of the app and the iPad to AR/VR the design into another location.  We have extensively used this feature for a number of times which we have featured on this blog - you can search for additional examples by clicking on the link in the search box and inputting 'AR/VR'.

Once this had been completed (such as the student shown left, who projected the image onto the sky) the students then applied a Pic Collage feature.    This allowed considerable manipulation of the image - however as we had described in previously some of this manipulation altered the image to the point that the original design was completely reworked, overshadowed or altered.

One of the challenges for the students was to find innovative and creative locations to then apply a filter.  An example of this process was the use of the school playground in the example left.   We have a swing bridge as part of playground, this image here shows the bridge which then had the AR/VR image projected onto the bridge and the filter applied afterwards.

Puanga was labelled to ensure that it was the most significant star and that it was still visible with the differing background.

Further Developing the Matariki AR/VR Designs

 

We have spent a second day looking at ways to apply Tinkercad as a design tool to a creation that we might consider for showing or illustrating Matariki, the celebration of Maori New Year.

We wanted to explore this event and how we might use our students knowledge of tools that we have used in the classroom this year.    This example shown left is a further exploring of the process.  In this example in additional to having the physical representations of the stars the student has also labelled the stars with their names and attempted to place them in the correct order and relative location.  As noted yesterday the student then AR/VR this design into different locations around the classroom and then the general school.

We have also discovered that Pic Collage has developed its own AR/VR design tools so that students can further enhance their designs by introducing local landmarks such as the examples shown left.   In this instance the student is going to refine their design to ensure that the location of the stars accurately reflects the positions of the stars in the constellations.

We have experimented with a range of locations and also experimented with the AR/VR enhancement - our students have discovered that some of the enhancements overtakes the design - for instance some of the students creations of the constellations were replaced by some of the filters.

In the example shown left this shows how the AR/VR can rework the students design.   The students constellations design, AR/VR into a desk of the classroom is shown right.   When the image was then put through a AR/VR Pic Collage (which is the image shown left) the students design had been completely reworked by the tool changing the composition from one of the student designed with the correct placement into one that does not resemble the students creation.   The student wants to refine their prompts using reference to our location and see if this allows the design that they have created to remain in the correct order.   Likewise references to the local mountain, Taranaki, are producing a version that is not seen from our location.  Finally the idea was to look at some kind of art project - and we were thinking about how this might look.   The students are going to explore the printing of these stars, which while it was not the case initially is now looking at gluing these to a painted background to create a multi-media type piece of art.

Using Tinkercad to create Matariki AR/VR Design

 

In New Zealand we have the Matariki Celebration coming up next month.   At our school we have a number of projects that we want to create for this celebration.   When considering this event we also need to take into account location variations such as ourselves in Taranaki celebration a variation of this with Puanga.

We used Tinkercad to create a students versions of the stars.   We wanted the students to create their own version of this group of stars and then project them into different locations and also look at the different grouping of the stars, the relative size of the stars and the different locations so that the group could be recognised.

This work plane from Tinkercad is a students representation of the group of stars.   This was the students first attempt to create this and is going to undergo some revision and reworking.   This version of the cluster also used a basic star shape before the students had the ability to modify and adapt the design.   A number of the students in the classroom had completed different versions of this group of stars.   One had introduced labelling into the design and had the names of each of the stars in Maori written underneath the picture.

Again the sharing of this project with the students had helped them create the ideas and think about different ways that they could use Tinkercad to show this design and how it then might be created.

Once the design was created the next step was to look at locations where the students could use the Tinkercad App to AR/VR the design onto a blank background.   Once this had been completed the students then took the image that was projected and applied a pic collage filter.

This is the design from one of the students (it is shown above) then projected onto the floor of the classroom.   The shapes that are created by the AR/VR image maker are the carpet from the floor and also the walls and the furniture into the classroom.

The students then attempted to look at a number of locations and different filters which they could apply and attempt to find that best that represents the constellation.

Some filters tend to make the design less dramatic and not stand out - and there are some experimenting to go and we are also looking at different filters, exposures and editing of the photograph to improve the presentation.   There will be a number of additional images for this activity uploaded on the Facebook page, you can locate that by clicking on this link here.