Critical Analysis of 3D Digital Art
Minimum Length: 1150 words (maximum 1250)
Minimum Sources Required: None…however, additional material (copy of a visual work) is required (see below).
Be certain that your electronic copy is in the same format as specified in your syllabus…do not submit PDF files, WPS files, or any other unaccepted format!
Works of art and other visual documents — paintings, advertisements, photographs, computer/digital graphics, etc. — communicate primarily through images (or the interaction of images and text). Like any other discourse, visual documents are frequently visual arguments which take a position on a particular topic or issue: the document uses the compositional elements of its image to communicate that position.
For your assignment, you must find some form of modern 3D-computer artwork online which was not developed for commercial use and write a critical analysis of that artwork as a visual argument.
Note that modern 3D, computer artwork is required by your assignment instructions. In other words, you are looking for art that was created through the use of computer technology (i.e., 3d modeling and digital graphics software).
Do NOT use:
images developed in any way for commercial use (i.e., no movie posters, no album covers, no videogames, no advertisements, no commercial images from magazines, etc.)
traditional artwork (paintings, etc.) or photographs
any image which is famous or noteworthy in nature, either due to the work itself (e.g., the Mona Lisa), or its creator (e.g., Michelangelo)
images from any material used in this course or any of your other courses (e.g., an image from a textbook, etc.).
Students should avoid collaboration and strive for originality in selecting their works. If one image is chosen by multiple students, I reserve the right to require that any (or all!) of those students choose another image and redo their work.
In discussing the argument your visual work is presenting, you will invariably have to discuss its formal elements: the visual attributes such as colors, lines, shapes, textures, size, and other compositional factors that comprise the overall work
As a general guide, you should consider the following for your discussion:
What are the claim(s) being made?
How do the formal elements of the piece (colors, lines, textures, sizes, space, shapes, and other compositional factors) contribute to the visual work’s effectiveness in conveying its argument(s)?
Are any argumentative appeals being presented? Ethos? Logos? Pathos?
Considering all these factors, is the visual argument a strong/good one?
Don’t forget that you are NOT participating in the argument presented by the visual work you are discussing (in other words, your essay is not meant for you to join in on that debate)! What you are doing is analyzing the argument being presented by the visual work — how the visual work goes about making its argument. As part of that, you can certainly discuss whether the visual work is effective in presenting whatever argument it is making…but you want to make certain you stay away from entering the argument yourself (again, remember, that this is an analysis of an argument).
Include a copy of the visual work you are analyzing with your essay. You’ll need to digitally cut-and-paste the image into MS Word: place it on its own, separate page at the back of your essay (it should be the last page). If you choose a color image, the copy for your digital submission must also be in color (if a hard copy submission is required by your instructions, a color copy of the visual work you chose is preferred, but not mandatory).
To avoid being required to cite sources, for this assignment you are to discuss your own observations of the visual work’s formal elements and discuss the possible argument(s) it presents, using ONLY the work itself as your context.
