Project #3 – The Route

Everyday when we’re off to our destination, we are always taking the same route either on the train, bus, or driving, hoping to get there on time. But when traveling, we never really take our time to pay attention or take in what’s around us. We’re use to seeing buildings around us and most of us don’t pay attention to the nature and it’s beauty. With the app of  “Walk n’ Nature”, you’ll be able to walk to your destination while also being able to see the nature around you.

One place that will be introduced in the walk will be Columbus Park on Court Street. Starting from the Namm building of City Tech on 300 Jay Street, go south on Jay Street and go towards Johnson Street/Tech Plaza. Turn right onto there, then turn left onto Adam Street/Brooklyn Bridge Boulevard. Turn right towards Adam Street/Brooklyn Bridge Boulevard and then turn another right onto Adam St/Brooklyn Bridge Blvd. Turn left onto Johnson Street, then turn left at Cadman Plaza E, then walk down a little more and you’re at Columbus Park. When you arrive there, you’ll also be able to sit and relax and take in the nature that surrounds you. You’ll see mostly trees and see that it makes a pathway. You’ll also see a fountain that is surrounded with plants. Not only that, but you might also be able to see a farmers’ market. This park gives you the sense of openness and space.

Exiting from Columbus Park, you can head down to Cadman Plaza Park which is only eight minutes away. When exiting, head east, then turn left on Cadman Plaza East. Turn left onto Tillary Street, then turn right, take a left turn, and then take another right. From where you are, the park should be on the right. When you are in Cadman Plaza Park, you are surrounded with nature. Depending on the season, you might get a different feeling of the park. If you go in the summer and spring time, you’ll see all the trees filled with green leaves and see the different type and colors of flowers that are bloomed. If you go in the fall and winter time, you’ll see that the leaves have changed color and it’s all falling. In some parts of the park, you might feel an eerie sense. From all the trees that are in the park, it’s like a small forest. The walkway in the park also makes it feel like a forest. There are benches in the park where you can relax. There is also a small grass area/field where you can play any outdoor activities. Since dogs are allowed in this park, you might see people with their dog. Another park that is kind of similar to this is Walt Whitman Park. Just head north on Cadman Plaza East, turn left, turn right, turn left, and turn left again. The park should be on the left. This park also has a path where you can walk through, benches where you can sit and this park has game tables.

The next location that will be introduced is Brooklyn Heights Promenade. From Cadman Plaza Park, head north and make a right turn towards Cadman Plaza E. Turn left towards Cadman Plaza E and make a left onto Cadman Plaza E. Turn left again onto Prospect Street, then turn right onto Old Fulton Street. Turn left to stay on Old Fulton Street and continue to stay onto Furman Street. Turn right and then just turn slightly left. The Brooklyn Heights Promenade is a long platform and a pedestrian walkway. Here you would be able to see Lower Manhattan’s skyline from across. You’ll also be able to see the New York Harbor, Brooklyn Bridge, and the Statue of Liberty from afar. You can sit and watch the view of the river and see some helicopters fly by. The feeling you get from this place is calm and peaceful. You’ll be able to walk on your own pace and see the views around you.

With “Walk n’ Nature” you’ll be able to go to your destination while also getting to be able to see and pass through nature. This app provides you with either choice of a short distance or long distance from your destination. This app will also tell you a little bit of information about the place.

 

Value-Added Portrait: Phase 3

The painting took me about 2 and a half hours to finish. The animation took me about 1 hour to finish. I spent approximately 4 hours and half of work time from the beginning of the project till the end. I thought the painting part would be very diffcult for me. But I felt like it was not that diffcult and I was having a lot of fun during the painting part. And I hope we can do more painting in the follow-up class.

I couldn’t upload my works since I have used all of my storage quota of 300 MB.)

Project #3: Draft

When people go for a walk there are different things people would like to see or do on that walk. Everyone has there own preferences of what type of walk they like to go on. For example, some people may like a nice quiet and peaceful walk, another person may like an exciting more beautiful walk with lots of sites to see and take in. Also the walk people take can relate to things they like and relate to their personality. Like for me I love to have fun, relax and enjoy the sights, and I also love food so I like to go places with different verities of food restaurants to dine at, either places I’ve never tried before or places I love like chipotle, and I also always want to be sure I have a way to get home from where I am at.

 

On the walk I chose to do has all the aspect I like and look for when I go for a walk. It has a place for transportation that is why it the walk starts by the A train on Jay St, the walk continues on to the metro tech area where there is a chipotle my favorite fast food restaurant and next to it is Five Guys: burgers and fries which is one of my favorite places to get a burger and free peanuts. There is a spot in the metro tech area that you can sit and relax and enjoy a book, eat your food, and just sit there and take in some fresh air. The end of this walk ends at the McLaughlin Park which has very nice basketball courts and I love to play basketball it is my favorite sport. When I think about taking this walk I get excited because all of the things I could do on this walk there is a little bit of everything beauty, fun, and relaxation.

The Pitch

You only live once thus you need to break off from your everyday routine and do new things every day, try new things, see new things. Enjoy life for what life is. And with this app it does just that. This app (The Beauty Finder) takes you away from your everyday boring walk to school and leads you in a new walk that will excite you and appreciate the way our planet really is. Although walking along Jay Street is the fastest way to get from the A/C/F/R station to City Tech, a route that passes Bridge Street, Hoyt Street, and Jay Street would be a better way to start the day because it offers The Beauty Finder users beautiful inspiration.

When you’re walking in a city, your experience could change completely just by a wrong turn in a single block. One minute you’re walking along a crowded artery, the next you’re on a quiet residential street. In New York, there are so many different views and places all in one spot due to the diversity of this great city. Some people probably develop favorite routes, from either getting to and from their home to their work, school, and even the local grocery store. However when it reaches the time to go somewhere unfamiliar, like in a new neighborhood or city. Now what do you do? Which path do you take? You can look on a map or you can just type in your new destination it on your smartphone. But what you don’t realize is that will show you the most direct way from where you are to where you are going. Now some people may say that’s a great thing, they want to get to their destination as fast as possible, but what they also don’t realize is they are missing out on all the beautiful things they could see if only they spend an extra 20-30 minutes on their route to their destination. Does that faster route and smaller roads mean beautiful gardens or garbage and rats? It’s impossible to tell. Until now with The Beauty Finder.

They are so many beautiful routes you can take around New York City that will worth your wild, but the main focus today is a beautiful route from Hoyt – Schermerhorn, Brooklyn, NY, United States, to New York City College of Technology. By using The Beauty Finder, I will show you why you should invest your time in an extra 15 minutes of your daily routine from the train station to City Tech.

Instead of getting off the train at Jay Street MetroTech Station and walk for about 3 minutes to reach city tech, let’s take a new route and see the beauty around the City Tech Community. This new route will only take you about 16 minutes, 13 minutes more than your usual walk to school. While on this new route you will see so many beautiful things you have never seen or even know about. This walk will worth your wild. You can walk this route both in the day and in the night. In the day you see everything every little details; the beautiful buildings, streets, trees, art on the walls and much more. In the night, you see the beauty of the lights as it sparkles in your eyes. In addition to this route’s beauty, aren’t you hungry in the morning or even in the afternoon after a long day at City Tech? Well this route offers you a range of restaurants and fast food chains where you can grab a quick bite to eat or even sit in for a while. Walking through Fulton Street, you can sit down and eat a delicious pancake or whatever your taste buds are craving that day at IHOP. Or if pancakes aren’t your thing, maybe a quick bite of Burgers and Fries suits you better or even Chipotle right in the middle of Jay Street and Bridge Street, called Metro Tech.

This part of the City Tech neighborhood is very busy, which is part of the reason why there are such a high number of restaurants so close together. When you first walk through the center, you are greeted by the beautiful pleasant scent of the Chipotle Mexican grill restaurant. Also when you’re eating don’t you want to look at something beautiful instead of burying your face in your smart phone? That is why this section has put a lot of expenses in constructing this business site so that it creates the beautiful view for people to appreciate as they eat.

Also in this section of this beautiful route you can see the fall season take effect as the trees are stripped from their leafs, as they turned brownish-yellow. You can see them fall from the trees and blown by the wind as the children tried to catch them. You can hear the laughter and yelling of the young children socializing with one another in the park area rather than seeing them on a smart phone like every other place you go. You can also take a breath of fresh air and relax on a park bench and observe the beautiful art pieces that are placed all around the park area. This walk will clear your mind and will make you take a minute to appreciate the beauty of this city. And in addition to this new route and seeing beautiful things you will be exercising by walking an extra 13 minutes which is great for your health!

To summarize why you should take this route instead of your old boring two-minute walk from the Jay Street MetroTech train station to City Tech, this new walk you will show you the beauty of the City that will make you appreciate waking up in the morning and coming to class. This walk will give you a chance to unwind and loosen up while you gather some thoughts. This that is very helpful, especially for someone who had a long day and need to take some time to garth themselves back together. Walking and socializing is a great way to relieves stress because you are putting the stressful things aside for a moment and enjoy the time and the things that are around you during that moment. By the time you reach the end of this route and entered the A train, your mind will be at ease because you took some time to slow things down and relax for once. And the best part is, it will only take a short 15 minutes out of your way which is worth the while. For this reason, I would highly recommend that you consider this route for the app The Beauty Finder.

Project #3(pitch)

We all go about our lives trying to get to where we need to be. For most people that live in the big city they want the fastest way to their destination. Rather they take a crowded train that causes frustration or dealing with road rage when it comes to heavy traffic, it seems as though people don’t care about how their journey to their destination is. Instead of being surrounded by busy streets filled with honking cars, getting shoved by commuters and listening to all the rowdiness that goes on in the city, why don’t you enjoy a journey elsewhere. What if I told you to take the time out of your busy day to relax just by walking in a change in the environment. By taking a route that eliminates rambunctious noises, you’ll be rewarded with a more tranquil atmosphere.

 

On one of our sample routes, we found a stroll that is pleasant and has a big pay off in seeing the city in a more serene setting. This sample route was taken during the season of autumn and around the time of 2:30pm. The trees in each location had their leaves in warm colors such as yellow red and orange which will provide you with a cozy feeling as you try our route.  You’ll first start off by exiting the Namm building of Citytech through the general floor. When you are outside turn left and make your way to the corner of Jay Street. Once you see Mclaughlin Park make another left and keep on going until you hit Cadman Plaza East. As you venture your way there you will notice that you are moving away from the commotion from the construction site. On Cadman Plaza East to your right you will enter through Cadman Plaza Park. When strolling your way through the park enjoy the calm aura of people having lunch on the benches, the mass amounts of trees that engulf you and the sounds of birds chirping. When you see an open field, in front of it there is a circular flower bed filled with vibrant red yellow and orange flowers. Go around the flower bed and exit the park so you can be on Clark Street and Cadman Plaza West.

 

Clark Street is part of the residential area known as Brooklyn Heights. As you are walking through Clark street at first you will pass by some sushi restaurants, cafes and lounges. The area has a low noise level so you can have a peaceful meal at one of these establishments. Through Clark Street you will also pass by apartments with gorgeous lobbies, smooth arches on the windows and houses with fine detail on the gates and stairways. Another sighting you will see if you look up in the northeast direction is The Freedom Tower. Once you see Willows Street make a right and continue your way through the calm environment of the neighborhood. The whole Brooklyn Heights area not only provides people with housing but there is a lot of trees and plants around that gives an inviting feeling into the area itself. The neighborhood itself doesn’t have much activity so you can enjoy the sights of these living accommodations while strolling your way through. When you see Cranberry Street make a left and walk down to where you hit Columbia Heights.

 

You will make a left turn and enter through Brooklyn Heights Promenade. This is a nice place to relax yourself whether it be after a long walk or to unwind from a busy day of work. Remember seeing The Freedom Tower earlier? Well as you continue walking downwards, you will reach the destination on our route which is a marvelous sighting of The Freedom Tower along with the whole tip of Manhattan. You will see the prosperous,active city while sitting on a bench relaxing to the sounds of the waves from the East River that separates Manhattan and Brooklyn. From this location you will get to see other landmarks such as the Brooklyn Bridge, Governors Island and The Statue of Liberty. There are many pier ports that are filled with activities such as handball, ice skating, basketball and rock climbing.This location is great to visit throughout all the seasons and is beautiful in both times of night and day. While there is lively activity it doesn’t affect the serene atmosphere from where you are currently at.         

 

While many apps provide people the quickest way to get to places how about one that offers people a long journey to endure. There’s people that enjoy strolls and like to embrace each moment they experience in it. Coming later this year, there’s an app called “Serene Crossing” that will guide you to an adventure that will fill your heart with content. This app will provide you with plenty of peaceful destinations as well as find the most leisurely route for you. It is just all up to you to make that choice to take in the calm energy around a lovely stroll.       

 

Project #3: the route

Taking a route to walk around in city, people might see many beautiful buildings, quiet road, and the nature. These scenes could help people feel relax, or even make their day. However, now days construction side are allover in the city, its very hard to find those places close to each other, or make them connect with shorter route. People who live in big cities need to go to this places to release their pressure. With this app, you can easily discover many different route that guide you walking through the city to see those beautiful scenes, and feel the city’s quiet side.

Here are five places we are going to see in our detour today, they are Cadman plaza park, Columbus park, First Unitarian Congregational Society, Pierrepont street, and Brooklyn Heights promenade at the dead end of Remsen street. These five places are all around the Brooklyn Heights, they are very beautiful and quiet. While taking the walk, people can see many special buildings, the buildings themselves are very old, but they really stand out in that area with its different appearance color and style. The roads are small and quiet, even though there are still cars drive by, but they don’t make much noise, becasue of the small road they drive very slow.

The starting place is CityTech the whole walk will take about 30 minutes.

Turn left walk out from CityTech to Tillary street. Then turn left again to cadman plaza. (Cadman plaza park)

Turn left walk across the block .(Columbus park)

Across Cadman plaza W follow Pierrepont street walk to hanry street (First Unitarian Congregational Society)

Turn left walk two block to Remsen street, then turn right, walk all the way to the end (Brooklyn Heights promenade) You can see the skyline of Manhattan, Enjoy your day.

 

Value Added Portraits: Phase 4

Overall, this project was a fairly new experience for me on a personal level. I wasn’t too familiar with painting before we worked on it. Its not my fortay nor my go-to use for expression through my work. However, it was interesting to revisit it after so many years. Ive done abstract work before, but never with paints. I was kind of disappointed with my final product, even though i put in a great deal of effort in it. But building on that, I want to be able to improve and practice more with paint.  Also, it was a great illustration on the terms and words we learned throughout the process. I have a firm understanding of what value is, and how to take advantage of high key values and low key values to distinguish our ideas.

Project #3 (Pitch/Draft)

Beauty, the quality of being physically attractive is something that the user who downloads this app will encounter. My co-workers and I, Ayano Morishima are making an route simulator known as “Route & Beauty” (Or Road to Beauty) that takes the user to a journey that can lead them to a beautiful location. Many people uses other apps to locate their shortest and fastest route, so that they could get to their location much faster. What if there is a app that can take you to the location, where the route is short, fast, and beautiful?

Many apps from the apple store contains route simulator that pinpoints to the users location and calculate time to show them different option in best or shortest route to get there quickly. However, is it time that the users want to save up to get to their destination? Sure, people want to get there quickly and do whatever they needed to do. But what if there is an app that can change the users surrounding views? Think about it, looking at the same route over and over is boring. The user might already know whats built there, even if they are blind! Our app focuses on people’s daily route and time, however what is different is users can use this app to encounter a new places just by taking a different route. Simple right? By changing just a little routine of users route to the final destination, and even if it takes just an extra few minutes, sure the surroundings of the users view will changes; maybe dull to beauty.

One of the ongoing project route starts from the Voorhees building. This building is a center for engineering technology for students who does to NYC College of Technology. Once you left the building to make a right, you will see a big road. If you turn right again, you would encounter an entrance of Brooklyn Bridge. Brooklyn Bridges connects the two boroughs, Manhattan and Brooklyn crossing over the East River. As you go further straight, you will see a huge park called, Cadman Plaza Park. A huge park where you can play any sports. Walk to right and left again, where you will encounter location called, Brooklyn Heights Promenade. As you go in though this location, and keep walking straight, you will see a Brooklyn Bridge Park Pier 2. Place where it features in basketball, handball, etc. Finally you go back to turn around from where you are looking at the pier. Go straight and you will see the same park again, go further more where you turned right to encounter the Brooklyn Bridge. Without turning right to the bridge, than go straight. You will see NYC College of Technology, as you keep going you will see a whole different scenery than before. More busy and modern structure to each buildings. Finally, you can take a subway, A,C, and R train.

These exampled location is a place where the users will encounter in the app. Such as the caption below will pop up to explain a little information that the user could do, when they arrive at certain locations. Many volunteers contributed to this route making, so that it shows the best time to go to the location, where it also shows the “best time” to go to the location at the top right corner. An example for the location above is, “the best time to go to the location” is between 2:30pm to 5:30pm. One of the volunteer commented, “It is a great place to go, especially since it is quite. You can see how houses are made of different structure comparing it to different locations. Going with friends or family would be a great way to explore a new route!” Thanks to our volunteers, this app does contain other features, such as little game that satisfies the users time traveling, voice active system where you use it like Siri, time countdown where it countdowns time to get to the location, and

Seeing different surroundings would motivate users to look though into new location, where they haven’t discovered yet. By using this app Road to Beauty, not only they gives the best option in shortest route, but to think about the user’s preference in showing beauty for getting to their location. Many people looks for quick way to get to the destination that they are seeking. However what if there is a route that is short and beautiful enough to make you use this app again? Why won’t you not give it a try?

Value-Added Portraits: Phase 3

My broad value range and narrow value range collages both took 3 hours each to complete. My painted collage took 8 hours to complete. The digital collage took 2 hours and 30 minutes to complete. The 3D Anaglyph took about 20 minutes to complete.