Shopping For The Right Piano

Remember back when you were a kid you would go to Grandma's house and she had that little upright piano sitting against the wall? Most likely it was a spinet, and we got to bang on the keys and it was probably pretty out of tune.

Well today the selections are a lot better starting with vertical pianos of different sizes going up to the horizontal grand piano. Starting with the vertical types there is the tallest, fifty two inches tall, called a professional upright. Fortunately all vertical pianos measure in width approximately the same within about three inches. So if you have five feet of wall space, you have plenty of room for a vertical piano. The taller pianos are referred to as "professional uprights" because professional piano players demand better sounding instruments. Most piano buyers in the world buy vertical pianos becase of space limitations. Here in the United States we enjoy larger homes, so we can have the larger "grand piano" sizes. The professional uprights also have the same pedal functions you have on a grand piano, where the smaller uprights have limited usage.

If your question is why people prefer the taller pianos, the answer is quite simple. Every piano is equipped with a sounding board, usually made from spruce, and that is what is referred to as the speaker in the piano. So you realize that the more square inches of sound board we have, the bigger the sound will be. The other factor is the string length. Obviously, the taller the piano, the longer the strings. This means that the bass section of the piano gets fatter, and therefore produces a bassier sound. This provides more depth and warmth to the music.

The shorter the piano, the brighter and more tinkely the sound. Some people refer to it as tinny. So if you can afford the taller types of pianos, you'll enjoy the sound much better. The taller the piano, the more raw materials are in it, and the more expensive it becomes.

Now let's move on the other professional uprights. The forty eight inch upright is generally the preferred size used by most piano teachers and their students. When we were in school, most were equipped with what is called a studio piano which stands forty five inches high.

Lastly we have what is called a console piano. These pianos range from forty to forty four inches in height, and are available in a huge variety of furniture styles. These pianos are generally used for entry level students and are most affordable.

Make A Whiteboard

There are several means to accomplish a whiteboard. Depending on what your end ambition is and the account that you accept to plan with, one of these methods may plan best for you. If you wish to accomplish your own bargain whiteboard or dry abolish lath you just charge a few food and the time to put it calm - traveling this avenue can save a lot of money and does not crave abundant skill. The superior of a DIY whiteboard depends on how you accomplish it, just because the amount of a bargain whiteboard is low does not beggarly that it will attending cheaply made.

Listed beneath are the altered types of ample whiteboards that can be made, their advantages, disadvantages, and the abstracts bare to accomplish them.

For all of these projects you will charge a few tools. About this will require:

- drill

- cement (liquid nails, or something similar)

- saw

- screws or added adapter accessories (hangers, wire, etc)

Melamine Whiteboard

Go to your bounded accouterments abundance and attending for a ample breadth of a artificial searching actual alleged "melamine". This is the aforementioned actual that is acclimated to band showers. It is acutely bargain and will acquiesce you to body a actual ample dry abolish lath for a low cost. Since this actual is about thin, it works best if you attach it anon to a bank with cement or screws in the corners. If this is not an advantage you can put a stiffer abetment actual on it in adjustment to accumulate it from warping. That's about all there is to it. This is acceptable the quickest and cheapest advantage for authoritative your own whiteboard.

Advantages

- Bargain ($35 for a 4' x 8' area)

- Easy to plan with

Disadvantages

- Can calmly warp

- Known to leave "ghosting" marks from dry abolish markers over time. This can be - bargain by approved cleaning.

Plexiglass / Lexan Whiteboard

Again, your bounded accouterments or ability abundance should accept the actual you need. In this case, if you wish to accomplish a plexiglass whiteboard, you should be absent a added cellophane searching surface. Plexiglass can aswell be begin in assorted colors and tints, if that is what you want. Plexiglass is a bit stiffer and if acclimated on the bank should not charge a abetment material. It is easiest to acquisition a section in the admeasurement that you wish for the able whiteboard unless you accept the capabilities to cut it to admeasurement at home. Ascent can be able with or afterwards a anatomy and is calmly done to walls with approved screws.

Advantages

- Assorted colors and tins available

- Stiffer and best lasting

- Apparent cleans actual easily

Disadvantages

- Added big-ticket ($40-$50 for a 4' x 8' area)

- Harder to plan with

Glass Whiteboard

A bottle bootleg white lath can be acclimated in added means than the acceptable lath afterwards some added work. Since it is transparent, it can be acclimated in a freestanding address or adjoin a bank as is usually the case with accustomed whiteboards. The added plan bare with a bottle whiteboard comes in the anatomy of a added customized ascent solution. About there are two means to do this. First, body a anatomy - like a window anatomy - that deeply holds the glass. Secondly, you can administer your ascent accouterments to the behind anon and leave the bottle unframed or with a basal frame. For this blazon of activity you wish to use assurance glass.

Advantages

- Can be added customized as both abandon could be used

- Has a added "advanced" attending and feel to it

- Cleans easily

Disadvantages

-More big-ticket than the antecedent two options and requires added plan ($75 for a 4' x 8' area)

Whiteboard Paint

There a altered types of dry abolish whiteboard acrylic accessible from several companies. The acrylic can about be activated to about any surface, including textured walls. However, the accuracy of the apparent can accept an aftereffect on the affluence of erasing. In accession to transforming a bank or added apparent into a dry abolish whiteboard, this blazon of acrylic can aswell be acclimated to resurface an old whiteboard. These paints about yield 3 to 7 canicule to cure - they charge to cure above-mentioned to use with any dry abolish markers.

Advantages

- Can about-face non compatible breadth into a whiteboards

- Largest breadth whiteboard accoutrement possible

Disadvantages

- Can be added big-ticket ($65-$250 for a 4' x 8' area)

- Takes several canicule to cure above-mentioned to use

Stick-on whiteboard cycle Whiteboard

There are whiteboard articles accessible that appear in rolls. You abolish the accoutrement from the adhering abetment and administer it to the apparent that you wish to accomplish into a whiteboard. About these tend to be over average apparent superior - the capital breadth of affair is accepting the band like artefact on afterwards wrinkles in the surface. If you yield your time and administer the rolls boring and anxiously it tends to plan out well. These are awash beneath assorted names like "dry abolish rolls", "whiteboard on a roll", and "write 'n wipe" to name a few.

Advantages

- Can be actual bargain (depends on supplier and length/width ordered)

- Added adjustable than a adamant whiteboard

Disadvantages

-Can be catchy to administer correctly

Quadratura and the Baroque

I am very excited because I am leaving next week to travel around Italy for two weeks.  One of the works I am looking forward to seeing again when I am in Rome is Andrea Pozzo's ceiling fresco: The Triumph of Sant' Ignazio in the church dedicated to the Saint.  In fact Art History Blogger readers may notice that I have used this work as the image behind my blog header for the reason that it is such a dynamic painting.

Pozzo (1642-1709) was an Italian Baroque painter and architect as well as a lay brother in the Jesuit order.  Due to this he was commission to create art for several Jesuit churches, both in Italy and in Vienna.  The Triumph of Sant' Ignazio is an enormous fresco, which covers the ceiling of the entire nave and perhaps the best known example of quadratura.

Andrea Pozzo,Triumph of Sant' Ignazio of Loyola, 1691-94
(Allegory of the Missionary Work of the Jesuits)

Ceiling fresco, Chiesa di Sant' Ignazio, Rome

Quadratura is a specific style of trompe-l'oeil painting which incorporates architectural elements into the work to create a convincing illusion of the expansion of the actual space into an imagined space.  In this case the painter used the actual clerestory windows (see bottom image) and painted around them.  Of course the viewer does know that the church ceiling isn't open to heaven above, but it is hard to gauge the depth of the ceiling in person or to know if the ceiling is curved.  In fact the nave ceiling of Sant' Iganizio is completely flat, but Pozzo does a very good job at creating the illusion of great depth.

Oculus from the Camera degli Sposi (wedding chamber)

Andrea Mantegna, 1465-74

fresco, Palazzo Ducale, Mantua, Italy

Quadratura had been used in a few early examples, but reached its height of popularity during the Baroque, particularly in Italy but also elsewhere in Europe.  A well known earlier example is this ceiling fresco by Mantegna created in the 15th century.  However unlike the Pozzo work, this is small and playful rather than dramatic. 

Quadratura was the perfect style of painting to tie in with the qualities in art that are associated with the Baroque: drama, theatricality, dynamic, full of excess and grandeur. 

Annibale Carracci, Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne, begun 1597

Farnese Gallery, Rome

In 16th century ceiling paintings, such as this example by Carracci in the Farnese Gallery, there were some elements of trompe-l'oeil such as the painted cornice as a frame and the four figurative "sculptures" in the corners.  However this is not considered quadratura as Carracci wasn't attempting to create the illusion of another space that didn't exist. Viewers were meant to be delighted and amused by his work rather than awed.  The viewer would instantly recognize a painting, the figures existing in their own space.

Pietro da Cortona, The Triumph of Divine Providence, 1633-39

 Palazzo Barberini, Rome

 Another example is Pietro da Cortona's The Triumph of Divine Providence (seen below) in the Palazzo Barberini in Rome.  The subject matter is the triumph of the reign of Pope Urban VIII.  Here the viewer could see the painting as an extension of their own space.  In person it is difficult to tell which architectural details are real and what are imagined.

 Triumph of Moderation, ceiling fresco (1731) Paul Troger 

Quadratura painting around the perimeter, Gaetano Fanti

Melk Abbey, Austria

 

One reason that the style spread was through a book on painting that Pozzo wrote in Latin which was later translated into German, Tractatus Perspectivae Pictorum et Architectorum.

Later versions of quadratura were used in the 18th century in Germany and Austria and began to use lighter and brighter palates more fitting to the new Rococo style.  One such example is the quadratura painting of Fanti in the Melk Abbey, Austria (above).  The painter Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696-70) also created many ceiling frescos and paintings meant for ceilings, such as the example below.  

Allegory of Merit Accompanied by Nobility and Virtue, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo

1757, ceiling fresco, Ca' Rezzonio, Venice

While Tiepolo did use quadratura in his enormous ceiling fresco in the Wurzburg Residenz in Germany, his typical use of quadratura was more like the earlier Renaissance style.  His paintings were created to amuse the viewer, the opulent style and dramatic compositions of the Baroque now replaced with the playfulness of the Rococo.