Online Portfolio of Michael Wach

Processing is a free, open source, Java based cross platform programming environment that’s great for algorithmic art. I could go into a lot of detail about the background of processing, but you might be better off checking out their official website for yourself.

Instead, I will walk you through the first baby steps of learning how to program with Processing. Fear not, this won’t be hard. I think even mom and dad can follow me on this blog post!

The first step is to get yourself a copy of processing. Click here and select which download matches the type of computer you are using. From what I’ve seen so far, Processing runs directly from the folder you extract Read More...

Charity Pictures is a local Phoenix nonprofit organization “designed to improve the quality of life for civilization”. Charity Pictures also severely needed a website makeover. This is a project I’ve been plotting and doodling ideas for over a year since they were originally going to have me do it. There were tons of ideas for designs. We needed something that looked cool and related to motion pictures.

The original idea was to have an entire desk with interactive props sitting on top of it. Each prop, such as a camera, or a reel of film, would take you to a gallery related to that medium when you clicked on it. The challenge was taking a real photo of a charity pictures desk and cutting out each prop in a way that could later be programmed interactive. If you’ve visited the Read More...

Not even a week before the official launch of demitregarza.com, I met with this local Phoenix visual effects artist, Demitre Garza. Not only was this week his 21st birthday, but he was also graduating with is bachelors at Collins College. Now he needed a place on the web to show off his demo reels. I’m not the only person that knows how to use Photoshop; Demitre began putting together a design. The original plan was to have about four or five different pages: home, reel #1, reel #2, resume, and contact. The design was good, but we didn’t use it.

After almost four days (eight different website designs), we began to worry if the design would take longer than the actual website development. I sat down in front of Photoshop that evening and created another new website design (Design 9). This time, I made two pages. Each page Read More...

Now that my semester is over, I have a lot more free time to work on all of those long lost projects. I’m basically finished with my website for now, besides going back and uploading older content. So the next project is my dad’s website.

For those of you that don’t know, Wach Gallery is the name of my father’s business. He buys and sells “Fine 19th Century, 20th Century & Contemporary Photography”. Last year I built him a custom tailored PHP and MySQL content management system. Since then, I’ve learned a lot of new things. Now, I plan to take this intermediate site to professional.

The front end mainly Read More...