Impossible Figures
Monday, November 24th, 2008Index: History, Philosophy, Technology
History
The Beginning
My first real impossible drawing, which I remember clearly, was made after noticing an impossible triangle, or tribar, in a children’s magical and mysteries book at the local book store around 1995.
Why I remember it so well is because I tried to draw it at home after seeing it just once, but it was too hard a challenge for me to actually succeed. I ended up going back to the book store with my paper and a pencil to correct and complete the drawing according to the art in the book.
I had been unable to successfully connect all the lines, it just made no sense to draw something that was intentionally wrong. For me, it was a mental barrier to break.
Computer Graphics
Around 1996-1997 when my family got a new PC including some neat software I began drawing impossible figures on the computer in a vector application called Designer. With much delight over the incredibly thin and straight lines it was possible to produce I frequently printed the figures to show my friends and family.
It did not take long until I had filled an entire sheet with figures and thought to myself that I had reached a level of complexity in the figures that made them incomprehensible, uninteresting and even mentally painful to look at.
After that it was seldom that I created any impossible art, but it always sparked my interest when I came across illusionary graphics. Many other things took my attention as I grew up, it was mostly enough just trying to survive being a teenager.
My most complex piece drawn with parallel projection was sketched out and promptly put on ice in 2004, but finished after a few months of intensive work in 2006. It is available right here on this very blog, with the story behind it as well.
Mind Expansion
Later the same year, 2006, I got to think of what unique abilities I have that would be worth developing. Unsurprisingly creating illusions was what came to mind. I started to read up on what other artists there were that are or have been active creating impossible artwork.
Earlier in my life I went by the principle that I should not “taint” my imagination with the work of others, so I would know that what I was making really came from my own mind. But at this time I broke with my old idea and reasoned that if you take in what has taken other people lifetimes to imagine, it should be possible to come up with creations it would take a single man several lifetimes to do.
Since then I have bought a number of books. One I especially liked was Masters of Deception by Al Seckel (ISBN: 140275101X) which takes up a great number of artists with different styles, as well as offering interviews and videos online! It inadvertently gave me names to go on for more information.
I am myself concentrated on impossible figures; that is physical objects that can only exist on a flat surface. But this does not stop me from greatly enjoying other illusions, and I found Incredible Visual Illusions, also by Al Seckel (ISBN10: 078582056, ISBN13: 9780785820567) very fascinating! I have also gotten my hands on books with art by single artists, but they are often much faster to get through as they follow a single thought line, therefor they make less of an imprint on my memory.
New Beginning
At the start of 2007 I decided it was time to seriously pick up drawing my own impossible figures again. As I still thought I had exhausted the challenges with parallel projection drawings, especially after finishing my last piece, I immediately decided that I would be making the figures in three point perspective. A distinct upgrade, I say, to figures drawn in parallel projection.
I had begun to look for solutions to create perspective art earlier, out of curiosity, before I had actually taken my decision to do it. By the time I finally had decided on a work process I had evaluated different applications, add-ons and macros for a few months.
Philosophy
Construction Principles
From the very beginning in the 90’s I have had a few very strict design guidelines for my own creation of impossible figures. Basically I did what I felt was right, how I wanted things, but now I am aware of how I think.
The foremost very important rule is that lines from different surfaces should not be joined at the ends if they are not supposed to be. To me this makes the figure confusing and unclear. Note example below where several surfaces end up with an intersecting point and lines that go into each other. It ends up looking more like a geometrical shape than a representation of a solid object.
Another rule is a variation of the first, but it is more subtle and more of a design choice. I want surfaces to go together like the face of a brick wall, not for seams to go straight across things. This so the figure does not appear to be made up of several individual elements but one solid object.
Then we have a rule about shortcuts to making things impossible. I do my best to keep lines alive. I am very dissatisfied with lines which just disappear or fade away, that is cheap in my eyes.
I go to great lengths to keep these rules, not because I have decided so, but because for me it is the only right way to do it. I will not accept the result otherwise.
Motivation
Creating these figures makes me feel a bit unique as most impossible figures that are published are created in parallel projection. I still draw that kind of figures, but what challenges and motivates me is to then render them in a perspective view. In addition I strive for perfect correctness, no bent lines or untrue perspective to cheat your way to a complete structure, that is the perfectionist in me at work.
Why I still make few-colored simple-structured figures is because then they are possible to validate. The lines are perfectly straight so you can with ease trace them to their vanishing points; they are not a bumpy rock wall or other design which would have made it less clear. This is a design choice I have to remind myself of as I sometimes myself think a figure can look a bit bland. Then I try to add surface details which does not confuse the viewer.
Technology
Work Process
I start witch sketching the ideas I get. Usually I come up with them when I am not trying to, spontaneous creativity, while riding my bike, vacuuming or other less brain intensive activities. This means I have to remember the concept I had imagined until I get my hands on pen and paper. Usually I carry a tiny notebook in my pocket as I use it at work.
The time between the drawing board and working on the computer I use to think of what to create in the 3D application, Google Sketchup. What I would need to get a smooth start when doing the 2D work. When I think I have a good idea of the entire process to a finalized figure I start the actual digitizing. Why I use a 3D application at all is because these illusions are very dependent on the camera view, from which direction you look at the object. I save a lot of frustration compared to starting with just three perspective points and draw the entire thing from scratch, and then redraw it every time it ends up not working. I do still end up remaking or entirely scrapping things as I deem them impossible to realize, but that is just a part of the process.
From 3D I go to 2D, in Autodesk AutoCAD. I pick out the perspective points retroactively and start adding, adjusting and removing whatever is needed to finish the design. Sometimes it is fairly quick and easy, and sometimes it can take many focused hours. When I have finished the actual figure I add a frame and the background grid before I export it for coloring.
Coloring is usually quite quick. It depends on how many different colors that are needed, how many different surface directions there are and especially if there are gradients. More colors simply adds decisions, more angles increase the number of light and shadow layers and gradients are usually a hassle to get to do what I want, in Adobe Illustrator, oh the pain.
When done with everything I export the final result and a wireframe as PDF and PNG, then I shrink the PNG and add a link to this blog and adds the post to the site! Done!
I have documented this process, or rather steps of it, in video form; use this link to filter out the progress videos I have posted!
File Naming Convention
I include this here as it helped me lower the amount of confusion during the creative process a great deal. This means I can use more of my effort on actually creating things instead of managing things, as well as leaving me with a very satisfying nice looking file tree.
Across the three stages on the computer where I make my figures I end up with a lot of source files. At first they were very confusingly named which caused me quite a bit of grief, but I eventually organized my files so they automatically sort in a historical order. The file types I get are mentioned below, as well as my naming convention.
Red.3D is SketchUp .skp files, Green.2D is AutoCAD .dwg files and Blue.color is Illustrator .ai files. Also, the Gray.export files are in the AutoCAD .dxf format, which I use both when exporting from 3D to 2D as well as from 2D to coloring. The bold numbers are where the change has occurred, and it is always the last number in the file name.
- Name_01.3D
- Name_02.3D
- Name_03.3D
- Name_03.export
- Name_03_01.2D
- Name_03_02.2D
- Name_03_02[a].export
- Name_03_02[b].export
- Name_03_02_01.color
- Name_04.3D
- Name_04.export
- Name_04_03.2D
- Name_04_03[a].export
- Name_04_03[b].export
- Name_04_03_02.color
This way even if I make revisions to formats earlier in the process the files will still keep the right order on the disk. The intermediate formats have the same name as their source file which makes the export process almost nonexistent, just click and it is done! When I split the AutoCAD file into layers before opening them in Illustrator I export them with square brackets at the end, which is what I found worked to keep the file order even if more files are added later. At least under Windows.
Now that you know how I name my files you can deduct things from the image filenames in the postings, as I keep them intact when publishing them online. The higher the number the more time I have spent at that specific stage of the process, basically.
