CC Assignment 5 : Anti-Surveillance Tool

Description

For the context of this assignment, I imagined that it was 1943 and that we were using the clock tower in Messina to communicate activties related to La Resistenza, without being detected by the Nazi-Fascist regime. We communicate using the the imagery and time of the clock face of the city, which we are able to change. It is important to use the clock for three reasons: La Resistenza has to remain secretive, timing is important for the planning of missions and activities and the clock conveys other information besides the time of day. There are three entities that would be the sender and receiver and would use the clock as a visible but unsuspecting code : members of La Resistenza, the allies/citizens of Messina, and the members of the church where the tower is a part of the building. The medium of the encoded message is the clock's face and the time, which communicates the time, place and information of meetings.

Design Process

For this assignment, I used previous knowledge and skills from the experimental clock. I also used the new skills of creating a loop and rotate() pattern. I was able to create a clock that can be manipulated and reveals its astrological symbols to be relevant to the message. First step is to mouse click the clock, which reveals the layer of astrology symbols underneath, and then shows the symbols that would correspond to the location of the meeting. The astrology symbols would correspond to different meeting areas in the city of Messina. I tried to match the clock colour scheme to the actual clock tower with dark and gold colours.

Reflection

There were a couple of issues that I faced while doing this assignment. It took quite a bit of trial and error to have the clock and the underneath layer of astrology symbols to match and be on top of one another. I tried to enable a mouse selection process to go over each symbol, but I only was able to adjust the blend mode of the entire clock to reveal the symbols underneath. I also wanted to find a way to remove the flicker when the mouse is Pressed. I think that when I first approached this assignment, I tried to preview the tutorials to think of a design. The loop and grid coding gave me the idea to maybe use a circular concept for the message. I also wrote my response to the week's reading about the resistance against Benito Mussolini and fascists during World War II. This led me to think of the famous clock tower of Il Duomo di Messina. Messina is a city of Sicilia where there was Resistance efforts against the Axis power. I felt that this assignment tested my ability to code for functions! If I was to do this work again, I would have the secret message be more contemporary and not so encapsulated in a time period. In historical context, I guess my idea is a visualisation of a method of coded messaage using a very physical space and location.