Heated dog bowl
Medium: Insulation foam and acrylic paint. Completed: December 2021. |
Exhibition Text:When my dog Taino started getting old, He became more picky with his food. He wouldn't eat his dry food unless we fed it to him by hand. So we tried buying him that wet canned food. He ate that for a while and then a lot of the time he would just smell it and go sit back down where he was. He would eat the food we gave him from our own plates, like eggs and rice but he's just bee really picky about his own food. after I noticed he only liked to eat warm soft foods, I decided to mix some warm water into his hard food or wet food and it would take him a minuet to eat it but he still did. It was kind of a pain having to mix his food with warm/hot water whenever he ate but I knew he needed the nutrients. I so I decided to create a food bowl for animals that heats up food at a temperature that is greatly desired by dogs.
|
Artist Inspiration:
The artist that inspired me for this project was Lawrence Murphy (Murf). I am lucky that he actually came to our class to introduce us to industrial design and all the amazing things that can come out of it. He graduated from Syracuse University in 1980 with a BID. For the past 36 years, he has been designing products for GE healthcare. He is now retired but sticks around to work with students like me. And that is really inspiring.
Experimentation:
I We first began this project with Murf, in September. From there, we have been collecting photos and sketches of our ideas. It took me a while before any "good" ideas formed in my mind. We started by doing some group mind exercises where we would get told a random idea like "Pets in Space". We were instructed to draw the first thing that popped into our minds and we were allowed to switch our papers with the people next to us to see what ideas they had to offer as well. In our next classes, we did more group work and more idea sharing. My initial idea was to create this sort of dog bowl. But I wanted to explore more with some other ideas like making an extendable toothbrush so its easier to brush your dogs teeth without having to stick your whole hand almost into your animas mouth, I couldn't quite figure out how I wanted to execute the idea so I scrapped it and went back to thinking about how I wanted to create that dog food bowl I mentioned before. From there I started created some sketch ideas of what I wanted things to be and how I wanted it to look and operate.
On the days that Murf would come in, he would always have my class working together on creating something or be talking to us about the things he does in his creative process. Another exercise Murf had us do was to look around the room and find two objects and create a relationship between those inanimate things with a partner or friend. My friend Memphis and I chose a relationship between this skeleton that is missing an arm in the corner of the class and this random maniquin arm that is pointing at the skeleton. We said that the arm was pointing at the skeleton because he noticed that he didn't have an arm and wanted to help him out. But the skeleton thought that the arm was making fun of him for not having another arm. So the whole thing was just a big misunderstanding. Murf also discussed to us the meaning of words. And that we could make up any word we wanted and have it mean whatever we wanted it to mean. I created the work ¨glonk" which was meant to express confusion. We were also supposed to create an emoji to show the specific emotion we came up with. I just kind of drew what I felt. I made this sort of distressed looking character. Another thing Murf had us create were a list of things we saw around our house having to do with our pets.
When thinking of what and how I wanted make my dog bowl, I began with making a few rough sketches of my ideas. I wasn't sure what material I wanted to make it out of so I just began experimenting with foam.
On the days that Murf would come in, he would always have my class working together on creating something or be talking to us about the things he does in his creative process. Another exercise Murf had us do was to look around the room and find two objects and create a relationship between those inanimate things with a partner or friend. My friend Memphis and I chose a relationship between this skeleton that is missing an arm in the corner of the class and this random maniquin arm that is pointing at the skeleton. We said that the arm was pointing at the skeleton because he noticed that he didn't have an arm and wanted to help him out. But the skeleton thought that the arm was making fun of him for not having another arm. So the whole thing was just a big misunderstanding. Murf also discussed to us the meaning of words. And that we could make up any word we wanted and have it mean whatever we wanted it to mean. I created the work ¨glonk" which was meant to express confusion. We were also supposed to create an emoji to show the specific emotion we came up with. I just kind of drew what I felt. I made this sort of distressed looking character. Another thing Murf had us create were a list of things we saw around our house having to do with our pets.
When thinking of what and how I wanted make my dog bowl, I began with making a few rough sketches of my ideas. I wasn't sure what material I wanted to make it out of so I just began experimenting with foam.
Process:
I used a block of insulation foam to create the base for my prototype. I used an exact o knife to cut the piece in half so I had a smaller base to work with. I carved a circle/ oval shape in the center of it and intended to carve it out so it would look like an actual bowl. The exacto knife wasn't cutting at smoothly as I initially wanted it to, so I switch to using a box cutter. That worked a little bit better, but still was taking too. much time and was too difficult to use. The blade was dull and chipped and it kept falling out of its holder. My friend Memphis had this battery powered dremel tool that I began to use and I really liked how that was working. That took made it ten times better in creating the shape that I wanted. The only issue I had with that was that the battery just didn't stay charged for long.
I took my project home and I remembered that I have my own dremel tool. I had to plug mine into the wall. I woke up early and began sanding and drilling away at the interior and exterior of my design. I tapered the edges of my bowl and hollowed the inside until I got the shape I wanted. After I did that I used 100 grit sand paper and did my best to try and smooth everything out. I vacuumed up my mess of foam particles and decided I wanted to actually paint the piece of foam I was using. I used a matte black acrylic paint and then painted the whole thing. I noticed that the paint took longer than I had expected to dry, probably because the foam is so porous. So I wanted a few hours for that paint to dry. After my base was done drying, I began to use a deep red paint on a fine brush and painted on the areas that represented where heat would be coming from. I created a squiggle shape along the inside bottom on the bowl. And created small dots of red evenly spread out along the interior walls. After that had dried, I used a mixture of red and orange painted to create a ¨button¨ that would control the heat of the dog bowl. I used and orange paint and created three small/medium dots in a row on the outside of the bowl. The first dot signified low heat, the second medium and third one high.
I took my project home and I remembered that I have my own dremel tool. I had to plug mine into the wall. I woke up early and began sanding and drilling away at the interior and exterior of my design. I tapered the edges of my bowl and hollowed the inside until I got the shape I wanted. After I did that I used 100 grit sand paper and did my best to try and smooth everything out. I vacuumed up my mess of foam particles and decided I wanted to actually paint the piece of foam I was using. I used a matte black acrylic paint and then painted the whole thing. I noticed that the paint took longer than I had expected to dry, probably because the foam is so porous. So I wanted a few hours for that paint to dry. After my base was done drying, I began to use a deep red paint on a fine brush and painted on the areas that represented where heat would be coming from. I created a squiggle shape along the inside bottom on the bowl. And created small dots of red evenly spread out along the interior walls. After that had dried, I used a mixture of red and orange painted to create a ¨button¨ that would control the heat of the dog bowl. I used and orange paint and created three small/medium dots in a row on the outside of the bowl. The first dot signified low heat, the second medium and third one high.
Compare and Contrast:
Although what I have created is a lot different from what Murf has done for healthcare, it still took the same thought process to complete. We both sketched out our ideas on paper or a white board, and collaborated with other people and asked question on how we could make improvements. And I think that is something that is very cool.
Reflection:
In the end, I defiantly think that I could´ve done way better at executing everything. But with the end of the semester coming so soon I felt really rushed in getting everything on on time. I am not completely dissatisfied with what I have completed. Although, next time I do complete a project like this one again, I will try not to feel so rushed so that I could turn in work of a better quality. Overall, I believe that I did a good job using what I had to make my idea became a reality.
A.C.T Questions:
1. Clearly explain and describe how you are able to identify the cause-effect relationship between your inspiration upon your artwork?
- My work is connected to my inspiration Murf because he has helped me, and not only me, but my whole class to complete this project. He made everything so much fun and really got me interested in industrial design. Although they things we have made are very different, the whole process is the same and I find that fascinating.
2. What is the overall approach (point of view) the author (from your research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
- My overall approach was to create something using all the things I had available to me already. I wanted to show my idea clearly so I made it a point not to do anything super complicated with my prototype, because after all, its just a prototype. And Murf really made it easy to do.
3. What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
- in my research, I found that there are so many different things that were already made to help animals. So that made it difficult to try and come up with something original. I´m sure there is such thing as a dog bowl that heats food or water. But this one is my own idea and I´m satisfied with it.
4. What was the central idea or theme around your inspiration research?
- My old dog Taino was the one that inspired me to create this idea. Its sad to see dogs near the end of their life, when they have almost no teeth and struggle to walk with their brittle bones and have trouble eating and even gaining an appetite. So I was inspired to create sometime to lessen their struggle in eating. because at such an old age, dogs need the most nutrients they can get to remain healthy.
5. What kind of inferences (conclusions reached on the bases of evidence and reasoning) did you make while reading your research?
- I found that it was almost impossible to create something 100% original. But I could look around and adapt something for the better. And that is basically what I had done.
- My work is connected to my inspiration Murf because he has helped me, and not only me, but my whole class to complete this project. He made everything so much fun and really got me interested in industrial design. Although they things we have made are very different, the whole process is the same and I find that fascinating.
2. What is the overall approach (point of view) the author (from your research) has regarding the topic of your inspiration?
- My overall approach was to create something using all the things I had available to me already. I wanted to show my idea clearly so I made it a point not to do anything super complicated with my prototype, because after all, its just a prototype. And Murf really made it easy to do.
3. What kind of generalizations and conclusions have you discovered about people, ideas, cultures, etc. while you researched your inspiration?
- in my research, I found that there are so many different things that were already made to help animals. So that made it difficult to try and come up with something original. I´m sure there is such thing as a dog bowl that heats food or water. But this one is my own idea and I´m satisfied with it.
4. What was the central idea or theme around your inspiration research?
- My old dog Taino was the one that inspired me to create this idea. Its sad to see dogs near the end of their life, when they have almost no teeth and struggle to walk with their brittle bones and have trouble eating and even gaining an appetite. So I was inspired to create sometime to lessen their struggle in eating. because at such an old age, dogs need the most nutrients they can get to remain healthy.
5. What kind of inferences (conclusions reached on the bases of evidence and reasoning) did you make while reading your research?
- I found that it was almost impossible to create something 100% original. But I could look around and adapt something for the better. And that is basically what I had done.
Bibliography:
“Lawrence Murphy, IDSA.” IDSA, 22 Mar. 2017, www.idsa.org/lawrence-%E2%80%9Cmurf%E2%80%9D-murphy-idsa.