Socrates
Socrates
Statue of Socrates
This work represents the three ideas in my Values: the Unexplored, Truth, and Mastery. Throughout his life, Socrates pursued truth by continually questioning others, developing a method of dialogue that helped people move toward more refined understanding. His pursuit did not change even when facing death. Put on trial and urged by his disciples to escape, he refused to answer injustice with deception and accepted death. His message to "live well" also connects directly to my Statement.
Process
A work I made in junior high school
This work was inspired by one of my earlier pieces shown above. From the beginning, I planned three kinds of content—image, video, and 3D—each paired with a mosaic and interaction suited to its theme. Socrates became the image-based work using a triangular mosaic.
Earliest prototype
Work in progress
Original image
Socrates used dialogue to help people arrive at better truths—or realize that they had not yet reached them. I therefore wanted to bring an element of "dialogue" into the work through interaction native to the web. Finding the right form of interaction was difficult, and became the most challenging part of the design.
Truth
Seek truth, not the answer that is most convenient.
Unexplored
Step into territory no one has explored.
The images on the left show my first prototype for "Socrates." You can interact with them by dragging. I rejected this prototype because, quite simply, it did not look good. The static photograph gave no clear indication that it was interactive. I added an automatic transition between two images as the page scrolled, but automation weakened the viewer’s sense of agency. The text mosaic also generated irregular shapes, making it hard to reproduce a beautiful composition. I abandoned this direction and moved to the final implementation.