A professor in Nantou County has used photographs of moths to create more than 300 tile patterns.
Chen Yen-cheng (陳彥錚), a professor at National Chi Nan University’s Department of Information Management, moved to Puli Township (埔里) 18 years ago.
One morning three years ago, he and his wife, Liu Mei-chu (劉美菊), saw moths while exercising near Timu Temple (地母廟).
Photo: Tung Chen-kuo, Taipei Times
With limited knowledge of the insects, they uploaded the photographs they took on their cellphones to the Endemic Species Research Institute’s Taiwan Moth Information Center Web site for help.
Over the past three years, they have taken more than 5,000 photographs, more than 3,400 of which have been shared on the Web site.
They have recorded more than 600 moth species, including rare ones that have prompted visits from experts at the institute.
Chen on Thursday last week said that he originally just wanted to photograph the insects, but after a visit to the Museum of Ancient Taiwan Tiles in Chiayi City several months ago, he was inspired to use the photographs to create tile patterns.
Like butterflies, which are also members of the order Lepidoptera, different moths have different patterns on their wings, Chen said.
Initially, Chen used a mobile phone app to create the patterns, he said.
However, due to limitations such as lower-resolution images and only being able to view the images on his cellphone, Chen said that he decided to write his own program.
The program allows him to adjust the direction, size and other aspects of his photographs, and turn them into symmetrical tile patterns, Chen said, adding that sometimes he adds images of branches or fallen leaves to the background.
The possibilities are endless, he said, adding that he has completed more than 300 patterns.
Liu, who was a university Chinese professor before she retired, has written poems about moths to accompany the images.
Chen and Liu said that a friend had suggested to them that printing the patterns onto coasters, floor tiles or other surfaces could be a profitable business.
However, they said that they just want to share their observations and appreciation of moths with more people, and to do something for the environment.
GREAT POWER COMPETITION: Beijing views its military cooperation with Russia as a means to push back against the joint power of the US and its allies, an expert said A recent Sino-Russian joint air patrol conducted over the waters off Alaska was designed to counter the US military in the Pacific and demonstrated improved interoperability between Beijing’s and Moscow’s forces, a national security expert said. National Defense University associate professor Chen Yu-chen (陳育正) made the comment in an article published on Wednesday on the Web site of the Journal of the Chinese Communist Studies Institute. China and Russia sent four strategic bombers to patrol the waters of the northern Pacific and Bering Strait near Alaska in late June, one month after the two nations sent a combined flotilla of four warships
THE TOUR: Pope Francis has gone on a 12-day visit to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore. He was also invited to Taiwan The government yesterday welcomed Pope Francis to the Asia-Pacific region and said it would continue extending an invitation for him to visit Taiwan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs made the remarks as Pope Francis began a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific on Monday. He is to travel about 33,000km by air to visit Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore, and would arrive back in Rome on Friday next week. It would be the longest and most challenging trip of Francis’ 11-year papacy. The 87-year-old has had health issues over the past few years and now uses a wheelchair. The ministry said
TAIWANESE INNOVATION: The ‘Seawool’ fabric generates about NT$200m a year, with the bulk of it sourced by clothing brands operating in Europe and the US Growing up on Taiwan’s west coast where mollusk farming is popular, Eddie Wang saw discarded oyster shells transformed from waste to function — a memory that inspired him to create a unique and environmentally friendly fabric called “Seawool.” Wang remembered that residents of his seaside hometown of Yunlin County used discarded oyster shells that littered the streets during the harvest as insulation for their homes. “They burned the shells and painted the residue on the walls. The houses then became warm in the winter and cool in the summer,” the 42-year-old said at his factory in Tainan. “So I was
‘LEADERS’: The report highlighted C.C. Wei’s management at TSMC, Lisa Su’s decisionmaking at AMD and the ‘rock star’ status of Nvidia’s Huang Time magazine on Thursday announced its list of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence (AI), which included Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家), Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) and AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su (蘇姿丰). The list is divided into four categories: Leaders, Innovators, Shapers and Thinkers. Wei and Huang were named in the Leaders category. Other notable figures in the Leaders category included Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Meta CEO and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Su was listed in the Innovators category. Time highlighted Wei’s
RSS