Description

Maple Leaf Earring, 2020
Partner: Jinxin Li

Description of object: What I lost is a maple leaf shaped earring. It not so big, made of gold. Also there are clear lines on the leaves.

Design Process

The process for drawing this maple leaf was very additive. At first, I did a quick google search on maple leaves and then drew some sketches to strategize the coding plan. I reduced the leaf into: a main triangle shape, the stem shape, and then the smaller consecutive triangles that make the characteristic shape of the maple leaf. After establishing the fill shapes, I moved onto the veins and played with strokes and blendMode(SCREEN);

Reflection

The language used to describe Jinxin's lost object was very simple and concise. I enjoyed translating these visual parameters into my interpretation of the image, looking to principles of symmetry, balance, and geometry. My depiction of the maple leaf earring was focused on representing the geometry in a flat, almost pictogram-like way. I am almost certain that the techniques and methods I utilized in the code aren't the most efficient, but they did allow me to explore the literal mapping of line and shape. I wonder if this is the leaf shaped earring that Jinxin indeed lost, or rather a simplified representation of it. I am curious to learn how I could improve this sketch by playing with more dimensionality and tonality in the leaf.