On the Road in China

Backpack

As I've traveled in the world, finding inspiration around every corner, I've often wished that I had my digital tools with me. This is where the idea for A Digital Artist: On the Road in China came from. I decided to make my wish a reality.

I knew I had to keep the backpack light, as I was the one who would carry it through China. My goal was to take only a backpack and a small carry-on bag. I chose a backpack that was designed to carry a computer, so it had good padding in the main compartment. There was a compartment for flat things, like folders, and another compartment for loose stuff. It even had a cute little Apple logo on it.

Deciding what to put into the backpack was a thoughtful process, as I didn't want to forget anything important, nor carry anything extra. In the end, the combination of hardware and software was perfect. When I weighted the backpack on my bathroom scale it registered 13 pounds.

Before I tell you about the specific stuff that went into the backpack, I'd like to take a moment to say a BIG THANKS to the sponsors who made this project possible: Apple Computer, Olympus America, VST Technologies, Extensis, Alien Skin Software, Iris Inkjet Printers, master printmaker Christopher August and Unet Internet Service in Beijing.

Computer

Mac PowerBook G3
Apple Computer let me take a PowerBook G3's along for the trip. This was the heart of the project, as everything centered around this powerful machine. The improvement over the 34ooC that I had taken to Thailand was dramatic. The additional RAM and hard drive space was especially helpful in processing and saving the panoramas as well as working on high resolution Photoshop files. This model included a 250 MHZ processor, 96 MB RAM and 5 GB hard drive.

Zip Drive

VST Internal Zip Drive
The internal zip drive from VST added less than a pound in physical weight, and gave me the peace of mind knowing that all of my work was backed up on the 4 zip cartridges I brought along. Each day I would archive the photos and panoramas onto the cartridges for safe keeping.

Camera

Olympus D340L Digital Camera
This megapixel digital camera was the primary capture tool used in China. Everyday I would take photos, either individual shots, or a series of 12 to make the panoramas. I had a lot of fun with the camera, as it offered a way to share what I was doing with the local people. Many Chinese had never seen a digital camera before and were delighted to see the photos in real time.

The two 8 MB smart media cards allowed me to shoot a total of 36 high quality photos. The PCM-CIA card allows the cameras memory chip to mount directly on the PowerBook desktop as it's own volume. This made accessing and downloading the photos a breeze. Typically, I would begin offloading the photos from the smart media cards onto the PowerBook once I was in transit again.

I packed 8 Olympus rechargable batteries and the very compact Olympus Battery Recharger. The camera uses 4 batteries at a time, so this allowed me to recharge a set during the day. The Olympus batteries were great as I would typically go for two full days before having to change them. Recharging the batteries took about 2 hours.

Graphics Tablet

Wacom Artz II 6x8 graphics tablet
An important part of my hardware setup was the Wacom graphics tablet and pen. Thin and lightweight, it fit right into the backpack. The tablet provides a natural and intuitive way to illustrate, paint and manipulate my artwork on the computer. The pressure sensitive pen allows me to draw just like I would if using a brush or pencil.

Imaging Software

Adobe Photoshop 5.0
I've been using Photoshop since 1989, it's like a favorite paint brush. For all of the things I do, from digital photography to soft illustration, everything goes through Photoshop at some point in the process. See the Gallery page for how I used Photoshop to create the art that resulted from this project.

Adobe Illustrator 7.0
Illustrator is the tool I turn to whenever I want clean lines and complex shapes. Whenever I want text to bend along a path, or distorted in some way or another, I'll use Illustrator to get the desired effect. Often the shapes and text drawn in Illustrator are incorporated back into a composite Photoshop file.

QuickTime

Apple Quick Time VR Authoring Studio
Making QuickTime panorama movies on location was a very fun process. The panorama movies are made from 12 evenly spaced photos centered around a 360 degree space. QuickTime Authoring Studio makes stitching the 12 photos together a simple process.

I used a monopod to keep the camera at a consistent height while shooting the photos. Russle Browns QTVR Angle Locator (a 17"x17" piece of paper with the 12 angles indicated on it) also assisted in keeping the photos evenly spaced. Further assistance came from using a garbage tie attached to the bottom of the monopod for better visual feedback on spacing.

The panoramas presented more show and tell opportunities with the local people. Just like with the digital camera, they were amazed at the technology. The pano's were even more fun because they were interactive.

Plug-ins

Extensis Portfolio
I used Extensis Portfolio to build a visual catalog of the photos taken. It became my photo album. Portfolio makes it easy to see all the photos in one place by creating thumbnails. Simply clicking on a thumbnail brings up the full size image. It was fun to share the digital album with others who wanted to see what I was doing. Without Portfolio, I wouldn't have been able to keep track of the hundreds of photos I took throughout China.

Extensis Intellihance
Although I was very pleased with the image quality of the digital photos, I found that they needed just a bit of a touch up to make them look their best. Intellihance was the perfect tool for the job. This Photoshop plug-in adjusts contrast, brightness, saturation, color cast, sharpness and other parameters in a quick and easy to use interface.

Extensis Mask Pro
When I began to create digital art based on the images I had gathered throughout China, I often wanted only a portion of the original image. Often the area of the photo I wanted was sitting on a complicated background that would be difficult to remove manually. In these situations I turned to Mask Pro, a Photoshop plug-in, to create quality image masks to isolate only the area I was interested in using. Check out the Gallery to see the results.

Alien Skin Eye Candy
This Photoshop plug-in can create some eye popping visual effects. I find that these types of filters offer unlimited possibilities and I often experiment with them to create the visual effect that I'm looking for.

Calligraphy

Mac Calligraphy pro
I had been searching for a long time, looking for some way to simulate Asian calligraphy on the computer. It wasn't until I found Mac Calligraphy pro that I had any success. The biggest challenge is in creating the initial point at which the brush touches the paper. I use Mac Calligraphy pro whenever I want to add hand drawn Asian characters or paintings to my digital art.

I really wanted to have this tool in my backpack because I would be studying Chinese calligraphy while in Beijing. While there, I had the opportunity to introduce the computer and this software to Mr. Zhao, my professor and well known Chinese artist. This east meets west sharing opportunity was a highlight for me. Mr. Zhao was very interested in the computer and this software and enthusiastically began trying to create something with it.

I couldn't find a link on the web. But on the box there is a Tokyo phone number for the Enzan-Hoshigumi Co., Ltd (03-3479-8270, fax: 03-3479-8050.)

Apple Japanese Language Kit
In order to run the Mac Calligraphy pro software, I had to use a Japanese operating system. I wanted my system to remain in English for all of my other tasks, so I decided to install the Japanese Language Kit. This made it possible to launch the Mac Calligraphy pro software in a Japanese environment.

Web Development

Macromedia Dreamweaver
Dreamweaver is my tool of choice for visually laying out web pages. I find that it offers greater flexibility than the other tools I've tried. Being a visual person, I find that seeing what I'm doing, as I'm doing it is really helpful.

Bare Bones Software BBEdit
Sometimes I just want to see the code in my html page. BBEdit allows me the access I need to my html code. When I began designing websites several years ago, there were no WYSIWYG development tools and I had no choice but to code the page by hand.

Printing

Iris Inkjet Printers
Although I didn't pack an Iris Inkjet into my backpack, I do want to mention that the series of art created for this project will be printed on the Iris 3047 Inkjet Printer using Arches for Iris paper and the Iris Equipoise inkset. Gallery showings of these prints are currently being arranged. Please contact Zama for more details.

August Editions
Christopher August of August Editions is a Master Printmaker located in San Lois Obispo, CA. Chris will work his magic by fine tuning the digital printing process to create a series of 20" x 30" fine art prints. If your looking for an excellent Printmaker, give Chris a call at 805-781-3150.

Internet Service Provider

Unet Internet Access, Beijing, China
My internet connection in China was provided by Unet Internet Service in Beijing. Dialing into an ISP inside China made access more convenient than making an international call back to the United States. Long distance calls to Beijing went very smoothly, and an internet connection could be reliably established. I used this connection primarily for sending and receiving email, as well as sending raw photos back home.