Categories for lfs.nl

Where it all began

It is hard to write an introduction for pages which do not exist yet. Usually these pages of a book are written last, when the contents of the book are known. It is the place where the reader is given an clue of what to expect, the place where acknowledgements are made. Only rarely do i read those pages thoroughly myself. I skip to the contents, the index and the bibliography. You might wanna do the same thing, so i can indulge myself here a little further.

It is hard to write an introduction to pages which do not yet exist. I did set out some guidelines for myself though. I will try to think of these pages as a public diary, a sketchbook. This will give me some freedom, not everything i do needs to be ‘perfect’ and ‘planned’. Ofcourse this is only to help myself, i am a terrible control freak, often prone to a paralysing doubt about what i do and its value. I actually thought i had given up my work for good; i had found a nice job where i feel happy enough, but quite suddenly i felt the need to rethink my old work, which i made when i was at artschool (’86-’91). The idea of combining my old work and the internet breathed new life in it. For a couple of months i was thinking about this new work. The main reason i would like this to be a sketchbook is that i realise i have to start making things. Its been quite some time since i’ve really worked and i know i have to go through the first disasters before i can come up with some quality – i hope. The internet is a nice fluid medium, where pages can appear and disappear in no time.

I am not sure how these pages will develop, i don’t know how frequent the updates will be. It might be less than i anticipate at this moment. Maybe, when you read this somewhere in the future, you will know more than i do now. Maybe than, where there is nothing now, there will be something for you to discover.

From here to you:

Bon voyage.


Source: 1 July 1997

Published on March 22, 2019 at 6:00 by

My old links

I said it last week on the Superbad post, i will go through my old links and see which ones still work. Yay!

I did do a search for any link which had stopped working. Some have moved. Some have scripts which don’t work anymore. I don’t care. I’m happy with any little thread i found. I’m also a bit sad that so many websites have disappeared. 🙁

A newer links page on lfs.nl is still online.

  • Beliefs
  • ASCII World (http://www.io360.com/v2/yo/asciiworld/)
  • Cybordelics
  • Open source
  • The trap collection (http://venus.aros.net/~jseeley/trapcol2.html)
  • Asynchronous vs. synchronous update (http://www.shef.ac.uk/psychology/gurney/notes/l5/subsection3_3_2.html#SECTION0003200000000000000)| Difference Between Synchronous and Asynchronous | Asynchronous vs. synchronous update
  • The first name of ‘Ellen’
  • Personality Test (http://www.users.interport.net/~zang/personality.html)
  • Symbol © (http://www.symbols.com/encyclopedia/20/2015.html)
  • rec.games.roguelike.angband
  • Heart (http://www.engl.virginia.edu/~enec981/dictionary/termpages/heart.html)
  • Archeology of the Frivolous
  • The finger (http://www.thefinger.com/)| Other link, not sure about this one
  • Handy Board Assembly Tips (http://lcs.www.media.mit.edu/groups/el/projects/handy-board/hbassem/assemtip.html)
  • Quilt Blocks Page
  • Cybertower (http://www.artun.ee/cybertower/)
  • r a z o r f i s h | This still works, no idea if this is the right stuff though – still fun
  • Losing an Architect of Change (http://www.princeton.edu/~progrev/96-97/feb97bm.html)
  • net-art.org
  • The Adventures of the Boy with Immovable Hair! (http://members.aol.com/tbwih/01.htm) | And just to leave you scratching your head, our final link is the Adventures of the Boy With Immovable Hair (http://members.aol.com/tbwih/contents.htm), a series of comic strips drawn entirely in ASCII. And you thought those semicolon winky faces on e-mail were irritating. (Source: http://articles.latimes.com/2001/jan/04/news/tt-11160)
  • Shift
  • Else’s Wepdisein (http://www.redaex.de/privhome/elses-wepseidden/)
  • Mr Ping vs Mr Pong! (http://www.acne.se/netbaby/pingpong/index.html)
  • T A G R A P H I C (http://shinzo.com/6+/laBo/tagraph/hot_tab.html)
  • 16 Color cinema
  • Antimath (http://www.robotwisdom.com/ai/antimath.html) | robotwisdom | robotwisdom2
  • Paper Folding Project (http://www.sgi.com/grafica/fold/page001.html)
  • (e)co-operatief capitalisme (http://huizen.dds.nl/~poetpiet/)
  • flip flop flyin’ (http://freespace.virgin.net/craig.robinson1/fhome.html)
  • i.am/bald (http://i.am/bald)
  • Niemandsverdriet
  • Sub-Pixel Font Rendering Technology
Published on June 7, 2017 at 6:00 by

Drawings

Published on December 3, 2015 at 6:00 by

Important questions

These questions i asked on lfs.nl. I did get 716 important answers. On lfs.nl i do say these questions were inspired by Smash Hits, a UK popmusic magazine. These questions were not a part of presents or the things i made before that, they always were a separate section of my website. It started in 1998 and ended 3 August 2006.

Important questions
My name is
I’m doing
In my pocket i’ve got
and
I like
and i don’t like
Sometimes I think about
I am
Male Female Not sure
Old Young Not sure
Sad Happy Not sure

It has always surprised how different people respond to these questions. They are fairly innocent. Stuff you have in your pockets. Things you like. Things you don’t like. Things that you think about. And then of course: are you male? female? not sure? old? young? not sure? happy sad? sad? not sure?

These last questions to me were always important. Many people didn’t know how old they were. Didn’t know if they were happy or sad. Some didn’t know if they are male or female. It’s not a big message, it is a little one. Still important.

Read more…

Published on September 2, 2015 at 6:00 by

lfs.nl: my favourite ten – no eleven! presents

There you go! Not in any order, just starting at the beginning and seeing where i end up. I will focus on gif animations and flash presents. The gif animations i will actually show here too. The interactive flash animations i will show a screenshot of and link to.

Onlinedance
1 September 1999
A dancing gif animation in a starry night.

ruisdansmeisjeruisdansmeisjeruisdansmeisjeruisdansmeisjeruisdansmeisje

likewise
22 March 2000
A javascript rollover image

I did try to copy the code, but it didn’t go so well. So i show a screenshot here. Sorry guys and galls.

screenshot-likewise

Dream
21 April 2000
If someone forced me to pick my ultimate favourite one, this could be it. For the people watching this site on a smartphone or tablet. Too bad! Screenshots for you.

screenshot-dream1

screenshot-dream2

screenshot-dream3

screenshot-dream4

?
18 May 2000
Writing something?

i-think

My favourite number is 4!
9 August 2001
Nine different options in this flash file. They do change while you move the cursor inside the file.

number4a

number4b

number4c

number4d

Timesharing
12 March 2002
I don’t think i ever had these two points meet each other. And now, while i open the page and watch it, it does happen! There is a variation in the speed and andgle of reflection. And of course the starting point.

timesharing1

timesharing2

timesharing3

timesharing4

timesharing5

prototyped heart
21 April 2003


//a complicated way of doing a heart, by trial and error
//prototyped this time, and adjustable in width, even negative width works, to my surprise

//b = width
//lw = linewidth
//hc = line- and fillcolor
//ha = transparency

MovieClip.prototype.drawHeart = function(b,lw,hc,ha){
this.lineStyle(lw,hc,ha);
this.beginFill(hc, ha);
this.moveTo(0,0);
this.curveTo(b*0.23 , -b*0.26 , b*0.4 , -b*0.1);
this.curveTo(b*0.57 , b*0.07 , b*0.4 , b*0.3);
this.lineTo(0 , b*0.82);
this.lineTo( -b*0.4 , b*0.3);
this.curveTo(-b*0.57 , b*0.07 , -b*0.4 , -b*0.1);
this.curveTo(-b*0.23 , -b*0.26 ,0, 0);
this.endFill();
}

_root.createEmptyMovieClip('mc', 2);
mc._x = 300;
mc._y = 100;
mc.drawHeart(300,0,0xFF0000,100);

prototypedheart

writing
22 May 2003
Random meaningless poetry

writing1

writing2

writing3

writing4

This time
19 January 2005
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 😀 😀 😀 😀 😀

schoolschrift

Dress me up
8 February 2005
Love love this one. Yay!

dressmeup1

dressmeup2

dressmeup3

dressmeup4

dressmeup5

The Answer
22 February 2005
OK OK i got ten.. well, there is one other one. So i’ll change the title of this post! The one music clip i made. It is for a demo of Bloc Party, The Answer. I made this in one evening. 😀

Making this post has made me very very happy. I sang along with whats her name.. Idina Menzel’s Let it go. That went well! I danced a little. I also cried. Pfff. Well, listening to Bloc Party’s The Answer made me smile smile smile. Gotta wind down a bit. I’ll drink the one cidre i have and then go to bed. Or.. just check whats on tv. Maybe a nice movie. I’ll see!

Bye bye 🙂

Published on July 21, 2015 at 6:00 by

Single squares

Yes!

This is work i made starting May 1999 until March 2005. It is made in Flash, but luckily there is also an export GIF animation option, which i used today to export all the movies again. One, Sad Little Square, i couldn’t export as a gif. There is a click button in it, which was impossible to remove.

So. I do feel a huge sigh of relieve now. Truly. This is one of my best works. I watched them all again today, and yes, i laughed. I saw the technique evolving, but not taking over. I saw this little square leading its life, going through heaven and hell. (Yeah yeah, the little square is sort of me. **duh**) It’s place on the front page of lfs.nl was obvious to me from the start.

A series of short visual stories about a little square who explores the world, is happy, sometimes sad, often tired, fights and has sex.*

Not based on any real life events.

So, i’m happy to publish the square series once more, as gif animations. It is of lower quality than the flash swf files, but the animation is basically the same.

I started out simple, with Happy single square. I had only worked with Flash for a couple of weeks. The day after i made Tired single square, because yes, i was tired after the busy day before. Making something new, something i felt worked, something exciting, it does make me feel tired. I suppose it does that to everybody being creative.

The following stories were of me visiting hell, fighting demons, traveling through the world, getting help from an angel, dancing, feeling sorry for itself, dreaming, remembering, having sex, making an end and continuing anyway.

And then a five year break. The last three are from 2005. They are wider, there is more happening outside of the square. I curse too.

I’m not sure which ones are my favourite. I do like Memories. Good morning world i like too. But really, i do like them all. From the simple first ones to the more complicated last ones. And as a series, yes, i do think they are among the best things i ever made.

So there. I made the animations repeatable. Else you would need to reload the page each time. But really, if you do wanna see these animations in their original format, go to lfs.nl and follow the links from the front page. I do think i’ll be posting these animations on facebook and twitter over the next days. That is how much i like ’em.

Enjoy!

Happy single square

1-happysinglesquare

Tired single square

2-tiredsinglesquare

Single square goes disco

3-singlesquaregoesdisco

Single square meets single square

4-singlesquaremeetssinglesquare

Red square vs. green square

5-red-vs-green

Two single squares

6-2singlesquares

One cute single square

7-cutesinglesquare

A night to remember

8-nighttoremember

Good morning world

9-goodmorningworld

Silly single square

10-sillysinglesquare

Helter Skelter

11-hellterskelter

A good night sleep

12-goodnightsleep

Memories

13-memories

5 Squares

14-keeponmovin

One night stand

15-onenightstand

The end

17-theend

Square goes pop!

18-pop

Check

19-squarecheck

Hellbent

20-hellbent

Go!

21-go

Published on July 15, 2015 at 6:00 by

My work

The first year at art academy was glorious. It was 1986 – 1987. I was living by myself for around nine months. The first year was introductory, with a week long travel into Germany in autumn. I loved sculpture, drawing, art history. I loved it all. I remember working with plaster in sculpture. I collected the plaster dust which other people dropped and made small work with it on the floor. Geometric and organic shapes. And of course completely unable to save them. For an assignment for a drawing class, something with weaving, i started to use paint over the entire paper and cut and use it over each other. I actually wrote a paper about Scritti Politti for art history. Pretty sure it was all a lot of nonsense, but i loved it. Still a shame i never got that paper back.

After that first year it did go downhill. I tried painting. That didn’t work, i got a zero and had to choose another subject. Photography and ‘monumental’ (sorry, no idea how to translate that) was better. It did get more serious. I got more serious.

I’m not sure why i started to make self portraits. I know we had an assignment early, maybe even in the first year, to draw yourself. I made these sketchy drawings, which didn’t look like me at all. Later on i started to make photos of myself. First at home, later in the school studio. I still don’t completely understand why i made these. I do know i looked pretty in the photos. I don’t think i was aware of that in my daily life.

My exams art academy work i used in Homebase, Feel me – Free me – Fuck me. The photos were large, around 1 square meter each. The text was done with transparencies in the darkroom. It was just before Photoshop took over. The photos were from different sessions. I do think the first two were made in the school’s studio with studio lighting. The third one i made at home with flash light.

I’m not sure about this work. I do see the work that went into them. It’s just, they do not speak clearly to me. They feel like an intermediate work to me now.

In 1994 i started to work at the printing office. It was hard work, but also a lot of fun. That was the time we made the christmas cd. I sang my own song.

In 1995 at work we got a modem and an internet account. I took that home during the weekend. I loved it! I started to play muds. Micromuse was the first world i visited. I worked on building an old Greek part in there. Windsmare was my first game world. I started playing other muds. I also started to play Angband, a roguelike game.

In 1997 i started my own website on ~ellen on home.luna.nl. Which to my surprise is still there! I went through my links just to see if any were still life. The only relevant one today is Superbad. Which is still one of my favourite websites ever.

The years after that are documented on lfs.nl in these text presents:

The past nine years were crowded with playing World of Warcraft, especially raiding. The past 4 years were busy with work. Trying to get it, trying to make enough money to keep living.

The last five months have been hectic. From ecstatic happy to truly sad.

I’ve met some old friends again. I do feel my life is much better than were i was a year ago.

I do know i will not get my old life back. Too much has changed. Some friends got children. It’s different. Everyone’s life has moved on.

And me? I got a bit of time. A bit of money. To make this website work.

Please.

Published on March 4, 2015 at 6:00 by