The Golden Ratio, Phi, The Divine Proportion.
These are all names for a very unique number or proportion which can be seen in nature, famous works of art, and architectural structures alike.

In math, we’ve recently been learning about the number 1.6180339887, or Phi, and the many ways it has been applied to real world scenarios along with being found everywhere in nature. Of course, we weren’t just learning about Phi alone. This was part of our Radicals and Exponents unit in math where we got our first real taste of “pre-algebra” and the newfound difficulty of the concepts that were being presented to us. So before we started learning about the golden ratio, our teacher made sure that we were fairly well aquatinted with the math that Phi deals with. To make sure we actually were well aquainted, we did a lot of worksheets that looked like this…

I won’t go into much more detail about the worksheets we did as essentially it’s just a matter of solving little equations. What I’m going to be talking about is the project that went along with all the math we were doing but more specifically, the golden ratio.
So we were assigned to make some kind of creative piece of work that includes the golden ratio, however we chose to represent the golden ratio, and to label it with all the measurements afterwards. I, along with probably two-thirds of the class, chose to do a drawing filled with golden ratios. Here’s how it went down…

So I started off with some brainstorming. I was really struggling to come up with an idea for my drawing as nothing really seemed like it would work for me. I remember that we were introduced to the project before the ski/snowboarding season began. Why is that so important you may ask? Well if you are one of my friends reading this right now, you would know that I get really riled up right before the ski season starts. In the pre-season, I’m constantly thinking about snowboarding so I figured that it would be a good idea to transfer some of that excitement to my project. I was going to make my drawing about snowboarding one way or another…

I scoured the internet for a picture of a snowboarder as it’s surprisingly difficult to draw one from scratch. I found this one which I particularly liked…

And I used that picture to trace the snowboarder on Paper53. What I didn’t realize is that for the detailed and layered drawing I was hoping to create, Paper53 isn’t the most effective app to create the drawing I wanted to make. Instead, I used this app called SketchesPro and I have to say, I hated it when I first started using it. Like most apps, there’s always some kind of learning curve that you have to get over to become really good at it. My problem was that I just didn’t really know how to make the best out of the app. In the beginning, I felt like I could’ve been doing the same kind of work on Paper53, until I discovered the usefulness of the layering tool given to us on SketchesPro. It works wonders and it allowed me to go from this…

To this!

So where do the golden ratios come in to play? That was my question too while I was drawing this because I wasn’t completely sure where to it the golden ratios. This is where a little more planning would have helped as I essentially kept drawing before thinking and coming up with more and more ideas for my drawing. The end product that you’re about to see demonstrates my mid-drawing integrations of the golden ratio and although they weren’t included in the most creative ways, I think that them just being there makes the drawing a little more aesthetic.

Overall, my drawing could be a lot better as the use of golden ratios wasn’t too creative and there could have been more elements to the drawing but I definitely think I did a pretty good job in making an aesthetically pleasing piece of work that applies mathematical concepts to make a good looking drawing.

I think that this was a pretty interesting take on a math project as it’s not too often where something assigned to you in math class can also be something that’s assigned to you in art class. I really enjoyed looking at what other people had to show for their projects and I think a lot of people’s creativity really shined in this project. It allowed for people who might not be so strong in math to demonstrate their understanding through other means of showing it and I thought that was pretty cool.