new layers: 19th and Mission wall

Shown here: 19th/north 10, June 10, 2007. Pieces by CUBA, KING157, JELOE, π, JASE, TWICK, YOUTH, NATE, BUTER, PEZ and VOGUE.

For a while there I thought the legal wall on 19th and Mission was gone for good. Someone, new owners maybe, had buffed the outstanding BA Crew production with the Chor Boogie characters from 2005, and the blank green wall became a target for tags and throwies. But now it’s recovered some of its former glory with a who’s who of local greats, and even a Dream dedication by King157. Check it out!

reconstructing a wall from video

reconstructed from video

Originally uploaded by otherthings.

Yesterday I met a filmmaker named Dean Mermell, who shot several pieces of footage at one of my favorite walls back in 2002. I was able to reconstruct part of the wall from this video. This is just a rough stitch for now, but hopefully I’ll get my hands on some more detailed footage later!

Best viewed at full size.

Graffiti Archaeology in Archaeology Magazine!

Graffiti Archaeology in Archaeology Magazine!
Originally uploaded by otherthings.

The July/August 2007 issue of Archaeology Magazine features a four-page article about Graffiti Archaeology. It’s by far the most thorough, in-depth article anyone has ever written about the project, with tons of images, and interviews with real archaeologists to get their take on it. I could not possibly be more proud.

June 15 Update: The article is now online. Enjoy!

new layers and the power of scripting

Shown here: cove/eastZ 61, February 3, 2007. Piece by OPTIMIST, throwies by TWICK.

Great news on the production line: I’ve learned how to use javascript to control Photoshop, so I can finally automate some of the really repetitive parts of the grafarc process. What this means in the short term is faster, easier updates to the site! Today: 13 new layers on cove/eastZ, and 15 new layers on ghost/house.

As for the long term: I’ve also started using javascript to do some new and different things with the source material. I don’t want to say too much about it just yet, but it’s going to be very cool. More info as things develop…

Meanwhile, the increasing number of layers on certain walls (especially cove/eastZ with 61 of them) is continuing to call attention to new flaws in our Flash interface. This time, the bottleneck is the fact that before you see a single image, your browser has to download a set of outlines and solid shapes, one pair for each layer. It was never a problem initially, because the files are all very small– but it’s a problem now, because there are so many of them! We’ll need to change a few things to get around that, but I’m pretty sure of how to do it. Stay tuned.