This linear hypertext poetic project is structured by the constraint of following the germination of beans over the course of 23 days, while learning Web design with Macromedia Dreamweaver 4. Each day, Black builds a page using daily photographs of the beans and writing a poem inspired by her impressions of the beans that day.
There is an infectious youthfulness to the project as we see the beans sprout, take root and grow both in the beer glass and in Black’s mind. The page designs and poems are playful, experimenting with layout, line breaks, incorporating images, and with simple animation layers. The ending comes as a shock with an unexpected reversal that has little to do with beans but much to do with an important function of pets for children.
Note: The animations in this piece were created with a Macromedia Dreamweaver 4 feature called dynamic layers, which used DHTML, JavaScript and a tag called MM_timelinePlay. This tag currently only works in Internet Explorer, which maintains backwards compatibility with old JavaScript code. In addition to recommending using that browser to best experience this piece, I must point out the appropriateness of the use of a “timeline” tool and tag in this time-based project.
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