An Elephant a Day

International Elephant Foundation Elephant's World (Thailand)

Boon Lott's Elephant Sanctuary (Thailand)
Wildlife SOS (India)
The Elephant Sanctuary (Tennessee)

Wildlife Trust of India

Thursday, 27 September 2012

Elephant No. 361: Rubin's Vase Illusion

I had always imagined that this kind of design would be a fairly easy thing to produce, so I thought I'd try it for today's elephant.

Rubin's Vase—also know as the Rubin Face or Figure-Ground Vase—is a famous image featuring a pair of two-dimensional forms, which can be viewed in two different ways. Developed sometime around 1915 by Danish psychologist Edgar Rubin, a selection of these types of images was later published in his book Synsoplevede Figurer ("Visual Figures"). The most successful of these was the vase, which has since been widely reproduced and imitated.

The original Rubin's vase illusion on the left, with an edited version on the right to
make the border more obvious.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rubin2.jpg

The idea behind the vase illusion is this: when two shapes share a common border, the border becomes the thing that guides perception of the two shapes. This gives the viewer two possible interpretations of the image, although the brain can maintain only one at a time. This is because the border can only be seen as belonging to the central image or the side images, but not both at the same time.

Our brains instinctively classify what they see by assessing which object surrounds which. If a coin is lying on the ground, for example, you would likely pay more attention to the coin, and less attention to its surroundings. The brain thus naturally normally sees "figure" rather than "ground".

In a Rubin's vase image, however, there is no clear distinction between figure and ground, and both have equal validity. The brain must thus begin shaping what it sees. When the brain tries to see the entire design as a whole, without fully recognizing either image, it gets confused and starts discarding information until a pattern can be seen. In Rubin's day, images such as this were accordingly used as diagnostic tools.

Some people see simple columns in the photograph; others see pairs of
leaning figures.
Source: http://www.moillusions.com/2006/04/people-trapped-inside-wall.html

To produce an effective Rubin's vase picture, the composite images should be flat, with little or no texture. Most modern illusions of this sort involve the traditional vase, with matching faces on either side, although there are more elaborate versions which involve fully painted scenes.

For today's elephant, I thought I'd produce two versions: one with two elephants facing one another, and one with a bunch of interlocking elephant shapes.

I thought it would be easy to produce these, but neither one was particularly simple. The one with two elephants facing one another was nigh on impossible, as you can see from my final paltry attempt.

I tried every angle of elephants, every shape of elephants, and every section of elephants, to try and get something reasonable. Because of the tusks and relatively smooth shape of the trunk, the vase idea didn't work, and even the insertion of an abstract elephant in the negative space between two elephants took some doing.

I eventually got two sketches that I thought would do.

The image with two elephants facing one another was simple to colour in. The one with six stylized elephants required grey in addition to black and white.

I don't love either of these and, having exhausted every design I could think of to arrive at the version with two facing elephants, I don't think I'll be trying this again anytime soon. At least not with elephants.

Elephant Lore of the Day
Elephants like to swim, but tend to grow restless on sea voyages. In 1933, Princess Alice, a circus elephant in Australia, was being transported by steamer, along with a great many other animals. Swaying restlessly on deck, her feet chained, she was clearly bored out of her mind.

Feeling around with her trunk for something to do, Alice discovered an interesting tap. She played with it for a while, until she figured out how to turn it. It happened to be a tap controlling the supply of steam to one of the ship's winches, so when Alice turned it, it released the winch drum. The clatter of the spinning drum brought alarmed deckhands running to the scene.

The tap was quickly turned off, and order was restored. As soon as everyone had gone, however, Alice turned the tap on again. As one report said, "the wicked gleam in her eyes suggested that she was enjoying the commotion." Alice did this so many times that an engineer ultimately spoiled her fun by turning off the supply of steam from below.

Later, this same engineer was dozing in his cabin, when a snake-like object floated through the porthole, hovering near his head. Leaping out of his bunk in shock, he discovered that it was an elephant's trunk.

Alice at an amusement park known as Wonderland City, Sydney, Australia, ca. 1907.
Source: http://circuszooanimals.blogspot.ca/2011/04/princess-alice-
lady-of-wonderland-city.html

To Support Elephant Welfare

International Elephant Foundation Elephant's World (Thailand)

Boon Lott's Elephant Sanctuary (Thailand)
Wildlife SOS (India)
The Elephant Sanctuary (Tennessee, U.S.A.)

Wildlife Trust of India

Fauna & Flora International

Wednesday, 19 September 2012

Elephant No. 353: Anamorphosis

When researching mirrors a few days ago, I came across the principle of anamorphosis, which is something I've never really tried before. Anamorphosis—from the Greek ana (again) and morphe (shape)—involves distorting an image such that either a special device or specific vantage point is required to make visual sense of the image.

There are two primary types of anamorphosis. Mirror or "catoptric" anamorphosis requires a cylindrical or conical mirror to view a distorted flat image. Perspective or "oblique" anamorphosis requires that the viewer stand at a certain angle or distance to view the image. Perspective anamorphosis is most often used in sidewalk drawings and on the painted ceilings of cathedrals, palaces and stately homes. Interestingly, anamorphosis has also been used to "hide" erotic, mystical or scatalogical scenes for the delectation of the initiated.

Two views of the same work by Felice Varini,
illustrating the importance of vantage point in
some anamorphic art.
Source: http://gbcmag.com/2009/11/15/felice-varini-
anamorphic-illusions/

The earliest known example of anamorphic perspective is Leonardo's Eye, drawn by Leonardo da Vinci in 1485. Other Renaissance artists used similar visual tricks, and by the seventeenth century, Baroque artists were using anamorphosis extensively to create large-scale trompe l'oeil murals.

Baroque ceiling of the Church of San Ignacio de Loyola, Rome, using perspective
anamorphic techniques.
Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/j-s-c/4666541124/

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, anamorphosis was demoted from fine art to a novelty, aimed particularly at children. By the early twentieth century, however, artists such as Marcel Duchamps and Salvador Dalí were experimenting with anamorphic illusions, and various artists have continued to play with anamorphosis ever since. In addition to works of fine art, anamorphosis has also returned as an educational toy for children.

Anamorphic trompe l'oeil wall mural by John Pugh.
Source: http://www.aliraqi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=93745

Anamorphosis is also used in widescreen film formats. This allows a wider image to be projected from a narrower film frame. Anamorphosis is used as well in text written on roadways and playing fields.

For today's elephant, I decided to play with catoptric anamorphosis. If you look online, you can find instructions for turning a drawing into a catoptric image using a grid. I looked at these and puzzled over them, thinking I should maybe try to do this old-school. Then I decided that they were beyond my meagre mapping abilities, if I hoped to finish this within a single day. If you're braver than I, you can find instructions for drawing a catoptric image here.

There are also software packages you can download that will convert a basic image into something catoptric. I tried downloading a Mac-based one called "Mirror 1", but I couldn't get it to work properly, no matter what I tried.

Then I remembered that I have Adobe Illustrator. This particular software package has a function that allows you to warp an image into an arc, so I decided to try that.

The next challenge was finding something shiny and cylindrical. This is not as easy as one would think. I looked in educational shops for an anamorphic kit for children. No luck—in fact, I got blank stares when I tried to describe it.

Next I tried a couple of hardware stores to see if I could find a sheet of shiny tin. None of it was shiny enough, and I wasn't sure that even polishing the heck out of it would make it all that mirror-like.

Then I saw a very shiny stainless steel mug in the grocery store. This seemed quite shiny when I put my hand against it, so that's what I chose. It's not all that slim, so I wasn't sure how well it would work, but it was the closest thing I could find. I noticed afterwards that it's not as glassy as I'd thought, and it has a few distortions, but it wasn't horrible.

I started with the suncatcher elephant I made yesterday. Here is the photo I started with, followed by the catoptric version.

And here's what it looked like reflected in my stainless steel mug.

Being quite happy with this, I tried several more:

my repoussé elephant

my silhouette elephant

my Fauvism elephant

my pencil elephant

and my robot elephant.

Once I figured out how to do this, it was a piece of cake. My particular method was as follows:

1. Open your chosen image in Adobe's Creative Suite Illustrator. I used Illustrator 11.

2. Go to Effect, then Warp, then Arc.

3. Set Bend to -92. This gave me the shape I wanted, but you can play with this on the sliding scale.

4. Because this will give you a reverse/upside-down image, you now need to rotate the image. I did this by going to Object, then Transform, then Rotate. I set the rotation to 180˚.

5. And because the image will generally be quite large, you now need to size it down. I did this by dragging the corners of the onscreen blue box until the blank half-circle at the top measured about the same as the half-circumference of my coffee mug. You can stretch or compress the image as well by changing the proportions of the box.

I'm no expert in Illustrator, but this was the process I used for all the images here, and it worked out quite well. I had to move the mug around a bit to get a non-distorted image, and I needed a slightly taller mirrored surface for the Fauvism elephant, but I was generally happy with the results.

As regular readers of this blog have probably guessed, I like toys and optical illusions, so this little exercise was tailor-made for someone like me. The hardest part was finding something suitably shiny. The next hardest part was figuring out the parameters for distorting the images, but even that only took about half an hour.

I don't think I need a library of these types of things, but I'm happy to have this small selection. In fact, I may even inflict something similar on people as gifts, now that I know where to find a shiny coffee mug.

Elephant Lore of the Day
During the late nineteenth century, Gypsy the elephant was a well-known circus performer. She could play the harmonica and do many other tricks, and appeared quite gentle and amenable in the ring.

Despite her apparent good nature in public, however, Gypsy was actually a mass-murderer with an infamous reputation for killing trainers and keepers. Over a period of sixteen years, Gypsy killed at least eight men before she was finally euthanized.

It also appears that Gypsy's murders were often premeditated. The date of her first killing is unknown, but the first to appear in the newspapers occurred in 1885, when she was performing under the name "Empress" with the Adam Forepaugh Circus. According to a couple of published newspaper accounts, Gypsy had been restless and anxious in her enclosure, trumpeting loudly and swaying. Keepers were at a loss to determine what was wrong. She had been fed, so one of the keepers thought she might be thirsty.

Despite being warned that Gypsy was unpredictable, a keeper named Robert White said he could handle her, and entered her enclosure. Gypsy was calm and quiet as White unwound the chains around her legs. She obediently followed him towards the exit of the enclosure, then suddenly snorted, raised her head, and sent White sprawling with a heavy blow from her trunk. She hit him again with her trunk, then raised her front leg and stamped on his chest.

As White lay there moaning, accounts differ as to what Gypsy did next. One report said that she picked him up and tossed him against the wall, disembowelling him. Other reports said that she stabbed him with one of her tusks. Given that female Asian elephants don't have noticeable tusks, the former is more likely. Gypsy was eventually subdued by a man carrying a spear, led back into her enclosure and chained.

Poster for the W.H. Harris circus, featuring Gypsy and a baby elephant—although
not her own baby.
Source: http://raycityhistory.wordpress.com/2012/03/07/
bloody-history-of-gypsy-the-elephant/

Killing a man was usually cause to put an elephant to death back then, but Gypsy was spared. She was sold to another circus, where her periodic killing spree continued. She also had no compunction about injuring those who offended her. One night, a circus worker removed a bit of Gypsy's hay to make a bed for himself. Gypsy watched as he did this, waited until he was asleep, then picked him up and tossed him against the wall.

After a public rampage in 1897, Gypsy was slated for public electrocution. She was reprieved yet again, when circus owners decided that the publicity made her more valuable than ever. People even began trading on her murderous reputation, suggesting that she would be a good weapon to Cuban insurgents fighting "the Spaniards" on rough mountainous terrain. The letter offering Gypsy to New York-based Cuban insurgents ended with, "If Hannibal found elephants useful in battle, why should not Gomez conquer with Gypsy?"

Gypsy remained in the United States, however, and continued to perform in circuses. She still performed beautifully and willingly, but balked at public parades and often became difficult in her enclosure. One day, however, her luck ran out.

During a parade through Valdosta, Georgia in November 1902, Gypsy took a wrong turn somewhere along the route. Her trainer James O'Rourke was mounted on her back, but had been drinking heavily for the previous 24 hours. Somehow he veered away from the main parade and ended up on a side street. As the crowds shouted that the parade was that-a-way, O'Rourke tried to turn Gypsy, then promptly fell off.

As O'Rourke lay on the ground, Gypsy paused, as though waiting for him to remount. Suddenly, however, she knelt on top of him, crushing every bone in his body. She then rolled him for a distance of about fifty metres with her trunk.

As people tried to corral Gypsy, she got more and more agitated, smashing walls, tossing bricks into the air, and even grabbing a lighting pole in her trunk and shaking it until lights flew everywhere. Eventually she was drawn into a public park, where Police Chief Calvin Dampier took aim with his rifle. Although he had hit her three times, it was only enough to madden Gypsy even more. She took off again, but was eventually cornered a short time later. This time it took only one shot to end her life.

There isn't any information about why Gypsy had become so mean. Training methods were barbaric for elephants back then, so Gypsy may have simply decided that humans were the enemy. She may have had an untreated injury or infection that caused enough pain to madden her. Renowned for her great intelligence, Gypsy may also have just been too sensitive by nature to tolerate the injustice of life in a turn-of-the-century circus. Then again, she may simply have been angry by nature.

Gypsy (standing) with a younger elephant and her
trainer, Fatty Shea, 1894.
Source: http://raycityhistory.wordpress.com/2012/03/07/
bloody-history-of-gypsy-the-elephant/

To Support Elephant Welfare

International Elephant Foundation Elephant's World (Thailand)

Boon Lott's Elephant Sanctuary (Thailand)
Wildlife SOS (India)
The Elephant Sanctuary (Tennessee, U.S.A.)

Wildlife Trust of India

Fauna & Flora International

Monday, 17 September 2012

Elephant No. 351: Altoids Tin Diorama

Over the past several years, people have been using Altoids tins to make lots of interesting things, from tiny amplifiers to little shrines to homes for itty-bitty animals. So today, I thought I'd try making something using an Altoids tin.

Altoids are strong breath mints that were first produced in England in the 1780s. Billed as the "Original Celebrated Curiously Strong Mints", Altoids are characterized by a high proportion of peppermint oil.

Interestingly, Altoids are harder to find in Britain than in the other countries to which they are exported. They have never been heavily marketed in Britain; however, in the United States they are so popular that the brand's owner moved Altoids production to Chattanooga, Tennesee, to be nearer the primary market.

In addition to the traditional mints—currently available in seven breath-freshening flavours—Altoids makes sour hard candies in round tins. Other items such as chewing gum, chocolate-dipped mints, and breath strips have also been marketed over the years, but have since been discontinued.

A selection of Altoid tins.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Altoidstins1b.jpg

In addition to the mints, many people buy Altoids simply to get the handy little tins. Some people use them as simple containers for household items such as paper clips, little sewing kits and coins. Others use them as ashtrays, miniature survival kits and first aid kits.

Typical Altoids survival kit.
Source: http://www.fieldandstream.com/photos/gallery/survival/food/
2006/08/make-survival-kit-out-altoids-tin-and-two-more-life-saving-diy-

And then there are the people who think up wild and woolly ways of using Altoids tins. Even the most rudimentary online search for "Altoids tin" turns up inventive uses such as working amplifiers, flashlights, speakers, a thumb piano, a crystal radio, a barbecue grill, and even a projector.

Altoids tin projector, made by Leonidas Tolias.
Source: http://www.leonidastolias.com/Site/Pocket_Projector.html

Altoids tins are also a favourite plaything for artists. Shrines, dioramas, shadowboxes, zen gardens, coin purses, mouse houses and picture frames are just a few of the uses I've seen.

Elaborate altered Altoids tin by Laura Carson, 2011.
Source: http://artfullymusing.blogspot.ca/search/label/Altoids%20Tins

Although I'm a sucker for any kind of tin container, I only have two actual Altoid tins: one really small tin, and a regular-sized one. I had no idea what I was going to make for today's elephant, but I thought the larger tin might be more practical.

At first, I wasn't sure what kind of thing to produce. I'm by no means an electronic genius, or I would have tried to figure out how to make something that trumpeted like an elephant when the tin was opened. Or that lit up. Or that featured a little dancing elephant. I thought about making a little stuffed elephant tucked up in bed, but I didn't feel like sewing today. I felt like drawing and cutting things out, so I decided I would do some kind of elephant diorama, since I'm quite taken with mixed-media art created inside Altoid tins.

I determined at the outset that I didn't want to paint or otherwise alter the exterior of the tin. This wasn't laziness on my part, as much as a desire to preserve the original look of the tin. So I turned my attention to the insides.

A couple of days ago, a friend suggested that when I finish this yearlong adventure I should go bond with some elephants in Tanzania's Ngorongoro Crater. Just in case I can't afford it right away, I thought I'd try and make a mini-diorama of a similar scene to tide me over.

I traced out two shapes from artist-quality bristol board to fit into the upper and lower lids of the tin. Because I needed a backdrop for my scene, I then looked online for photographs of the landscape in the Ngorongoro Crater. This is what I came up with, although I won't put in quite so many trees.

Elephant in Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania.
Photo: © Blake Harrington III
Source: http://blaineharrington.photoshelter.com/image/I0000uCj6rW1hJ4s

I drew everything first. For the upper lid, I drew a sort of postcard scene, with Mount Kilimanjaro in the background. Having never been to Tanzania, I'm not sure you can actually see Kilimanjaro from inside the crater, so I may be taking a bit of artistic license here. There are photos online that suggest that Kilimanjaro is visible from Ngorongoro, but you can't believe every caption you read.

For the lower section, I didn't draw anything, since I planned to paint the background freehand, along with a framing strip to go around the inside of the wall of the tin.

Next, I tried to figure out how many little figures I should insert into the scene. I wanted to stagger their placement in foreground and background, but it's a very shallow space, so I didn't go overboard. I drew the figures onto the same bristol board.

I heat-set all the drawings with a hairdryer, then painted everything. In the process, I added narrow tabs at the bottom of the little figures, so that they would stand up when affixed to the tin.

When everything was dry, I started by glueing the Kilimanjaro scene into the upper lid with double-sided tape. I did the same with the backdrop in the lower section, and added the framing strip all the way around. I had goofed a bit on one side of the framing strip, in terms of where the sky met the ground, but it wasn't horrendous.

After this, I cut out all the little bits, pre-folding the lower tabs against a metal ruler. I then glued each of the tabs with a glue stick, and placed them in what I thought was a pleasing arrangement on the lower part of the framing strip. I laid them flat to apply them, then folded each piece forward and creased it sharply.

It took me a while to make all of this, but it wasn't particularly difficult. And I didn't really mind, because it was the kind of thing I felt like doing today.

Although I wasn't sure when I started how well this would turn out, I'm happy with the final piece. In fact, I may just have to go out and buy some more Altoids, just to get the tins.

Elephant Lore of the Day
When she arrived at the Bristol Zoological Gardens in 1868, Zebi was the largest Asian elephant in captivity. Standing three metres (ten feet) in height, Zebi had been sent as a gift to the Zoo by the Maharaja of Mysore.

Zebi was a highly popular attraction at the time, particularly for her antics. She was no respecter of persons or their possessions, and appeared to take great delight in removing and eating whatever took her fancy. She had a particular taste for the straw hats popular among both men and women at the time. If she discovered a straw hat within reach of her trunk, Zebi would blithely pluck it from the wearer's head and eat it.

She also had an interest in wooden objects. Her most famous acquisition was a cricket bat carried by a young boy. Snatching the bat from the child, Zebi quickly reduced it to splinters, then ate it.

Although later elephants acquired by the Bristol Zoo gave rides to children, it doesn't appear as though Zebi ever allowed riders on her back. Sadly, following six months of ill health, Zebi was euthanized in 1910.

Zebi and her keeper Jim Rawlings, ca. 1901.
Photo: © PA
Source: http://www.metro.co.uk/news/pictures/photos-10722/pictures-
bristol-zoos-175th-birthday/2

To Support Elephant Welfare

International Elephant Foundation Elephant's World (Thailand)