Adobe Augmented Reality Residency
I recently completed a 12-week Augmented Reality residency with Adobe, where we dug deep into Adobe Aero through a series of weekly experiments. The residency was a great experience that will have a positive impact on my work moving forward.
Over the course of the residency I learned that I thrive and grow the most when I’m including experimentation as part of my process. Previously it was an important aspect of my artistic growth for sharpening skills, but now it acts as the main vehicle for generating new ideas.
I’ve learned to better trust myself and my experience, and push myself outside of my comfort zones — trust that my past experiences will help inform the new explorations and pieces I make with a new medium or tool.
In this piece I wanted to add a layer of storytelling by simply changing the viewing position.
In this Hello experiment I was exploring space and the Hide and Show features in Aero.
Coming from 2D background, learning to think spatially and in an immersive manner took a bit of time to get my head around, but it was a great when I started to think about “space” in a completely different way and I don't think I'll ever see space in the same way.
In this experiment I was exploring colour, scale, transparency, and mood.
AR is an excellent medium for self-expression and an excellent way to add new layers of storytelling to our work which weren’t possible before.
Sometimes we don't have the physical space, or resources, to build large physical pieces. For me, AR became a valuable tool for simulating and testing out some of my ideas, especially ones that I imagine being constructed physically.
I didn't have experience with 3D prior to the residency but after dipping my toe into 3D via Photoshop's 3D workspace, I started to also use Adobe Dimension to help create some of the elements for AR. Dimension was a pleasant surprise for me and it's already started to open up new approaches for some of my non-AR work.
For anyone wanting to get into AR my advice would be: Instead of conceiving an idea, creating the artwork for it, and then trying to find a way to execute it in AR, you may find it more beneficial to bring in existing materials / quick sketches, or the starter assets that come with Aero, and go through a discovery phase first. We tend to treat quick sketches and existing pieces less preciously, which allows us to move on quickly when something isn’t working the way we expected. Trying to execute an idea without knowing the limitations you'll face can be frustrating and can suck the excitement out of learning something new. So just jump in, explore, and have fun with it!
Big thx to residency advisors George and Silka, and my fellow residents Asavari and John. Also big thx to Chantal, Stefanie, Alex and everyone at Adobe for having me be a part of the residency program. It was an absolutely wonderful experience which I'm truly grateful for.
You can view more of my AR projects and explorations on my Instagram.
