7

Though these videos had the same joke behind them, they were completely different in the actual way the joke was presented.  One followed the joke almost exactly while the other used a different approach, but still kept the main point of revenge that was within the joke.  Contrast and Affinity would be the obvious thing to talk about here.  They both have a male character who is hurt by a girl (one physically and one emotionally) and the both of these guys take revenge on the girl giving her a taste of her own medicine.  The other binary term to look at is Active and Didactic.  This is most evident in the way the joke is delivered in both videos.  In the second video the joke is obvious, she embarrasses him, he embarrasses her in the same way.  This would be didactic because the joke is being shown to the audience.  In the other video the joke is more active because the audience has to figure out how everything comes together and how the revenge the boy got works for the joke.  As far as line goes, there is more of that evident in the first video, such as the stairs that appear twice and represent something suspicious.  Space has some differences in these two video’s as well.  In the second there is open space that shows the emptiness of the room but also the space between the boy and girl.  In the first video this is the opposite as the two are very closely framed together throughout the whole classroom scene.  Though these videos have differences they both explore the boundaries of the joke and make it interesting for the viewer through visual keys.

9A

I think that doing this video game assignment was relatively easy.  We all had an idea of what we wanted to do and since we all grew up playing the same games we had the same references, which helped a lot for how we chose what kind of game to make.  One thing that we could have gotten across in the presentation that wasn't explained completely was the graphics.  I think we could have drawn a better character for our game but the idea was still there so that's okay.  Our strong point was the idea of the game.  I think everyone understood it and liked it a lot.  I think that the easiest part of this project was discussing the mechanics with my group.  I say this because you don't really need to have any sort of confusion, every button does what it says and that's it.

8B

8A

Kay-Anne, I am emailing you my audio because it won't attach for some reason.

5a

I was drawn to the original image because of the uniqueness of it.  I still don’t understand the full concept, but the long piece of cloth he’s holding creates a line across one of the lines associated with the rule of thirds.  However, I thought that I could take the rule of thirds to the next level so I reframed it so not only the cloth was on one of the lines, but the boys body was also.  Because his body is bigger than the cloth it affects how the lines are perceived by the viewer.  We start from the bottom left and go up his body till we get to the cloth and then move across the shot to the right.  There is both contrast and affinity between these two pictures because the boy the cloth is still the main thing our eyes are attracted to, however in my cropped version you are lead to the cloth by the boy.  I believe that the original photo was taken the way it was because the photographer wanted the focus to be on the cloth for artistic purpose.  Also the way the boy is framed in the original leaves even space on both sides of him, where in mine one side is very closed and the other is very open.  This creates an affect of unevenness and throws off the balance of the image also helping to direct your eyes to the left side of the screen where his body is.

5b

This scene is a great example of Quinton's directing genius.  There are few things we can look at that make this such a well shot scene, such as the rhythm of the shots.  As the dialogue goes, the shots move almost rhythmically back and forth from Travolta to Jackson, because of this we get into the groove of seeing those two closely framed shots coming until about 50 seconds in where we the shot changes to Travolta turning around.  That brings me to my next point which is the use of framing and rhythm as a team.  Because we're used to the rhythm of the shots going back and forth, when it doesn't happen we feel as if something's wrong or different.  Along top of this, the framing of the shot has Travolta's gun right on one of the lines associated with the rule of thirds.  This leads our eye to it and then BOOM, marvin gets shot in the face.  I think that was Terrantino's mindset when he shot this.

Pencil-Bomb

Soundscape

Finding Your Howl

Here you can find the the article that I am about to explain called Finding Your Howl.

The story that I enjoyed more was the story of Mumon. The basic idea of the story was a group of endangered wolves were taken out of the wild for protection then after having offspring were released. This was bad because they had forgotten how to howl, and they were forced to live in fear without a leader. Mumon, the main character from this point on goes on a journey to find his howl and become the alpha-male to save his pack from extinction.

Flaum uses this as a way of saying, the only way out of our prison that we place ourselves is straight through it. Or we must, “break the bars” if you will. Either way I think this is a good representation and I really enjoyed reading this article.

My Lyrics:
K’naan – Until the Lion Learns to Speak

“Until the lion learns to speak
The tails of hunting will be weak
My poetry hails within the streets
My poetry fails to be discreet
It travels across the earth and sees
From Somalia to The West Indies
It knows no boundaries, no cheese
It’s studied in parts of Greece”

These lyrics mean a lot to me just looking at the first two lines. I think this means that you have to find your voice just as Flaum said to become what you are destined to be. Though the rest of the verse is mostly just bragging it makes the point valid that he has found his voice and now it is heard everywhere. This is inspirational to me to one day have my work seen all over the world.

Blog Assignment 1B

The first suggestion I want to discuss is the #3, which talks about the tolerance of ambiguity. In Media 205 we learned that many new TV shows come from old ones, with minor changes in the plot or focus. This shows how ambiguity is extremely important to the creative process. You can look at a show that was successful and find the parts of it that might have not worked, and then take those parts out and add some other ideas to make a whole new show. Just as the article discusses Edison saying he didn’t fail 800 times, he just learned what wasn’t right, we can learn from our past choices to make better decisions on the future. Another example of how to implement this would be in the writing of a film. In the process of writing a film, just as any other story, the ending can be the hardest. However, with the toleration of ambiguity you can keep trying different endings to see what works best, and ultimately come out with the best ending.

#8, perhaps, may be the most important part of creating, and I say this for personal reasons. When I’m writing a long paper, or doing a lot of math problems in a row, I get stuck; my mind starts to wonder, and everything I look at seems the same. The only thing I can do to get past this wall is to back away from it, and forget about it for a little. Whether this be hopping from piece of work to the other, or just forgetting about work completely to go watch some South Park. The point is, this break allows my brain to stop working and possibly find some new routes for the ideas to flow when the old ones are blocked by something. Before I discovered this idea of taking breaks I would spend countless hours sitting at my desk trying to force out ideas that just couldn’t find their way through. Though the ideas might be there and you can feel them coming, sometimes it’s a good idea to let your mind rest and calm yourself to where you can think more rationally. You’ll be surprised at how much easier problem solving is.

The last idea I liked was #12, Look for Happy Accidents. I believe that this is very important in any creative field, because it goes along with the idea of brainstorming, but almost puts fate in charge. If you go about your work and keep your mind closed off to ideas other than what you are expecting then you won’t ever discover something new. Now, that’s not to say that all new ideas are great, but like the article said, some of these extremely important items that people use daily came from accidents. I’m not a very faithful person, though I do go to synagogue for the high holidays, but if you wanted to look at it as “a higher power” telling you to follow that path, by all means. However, I believe that accidents just happen sometimes, and if you’re lucky enough to stumble across a good one, you should definitely take it. For instance, one time I was trying to come up with an idea for a commercial for my high school’s television show, so I went to the best place for commercial ideas, the television. As I flipped through channels I came across one of my favorite shows, Scrubs. This is important because I came in right as the opening was on, and that’s when I got the idea. I knew that we were looking for a new opener for the show, and why not something that everyone recognizes and loves like the Scrubs opener. This little accident, though hardly and accident gave me a great idea for a project that I wasn’t even planning on working on.

The last part of this blog entry asks me to choose one of the prompts, so I chose the one about making new connections. For #4 the prompt asks us to make 3 parallel lists of nouns, verbs, and adjectives, then look for intriguing connections between them. Here’s my list:

Nouns: Horse, Mountain, Car, Talon, Fountain, Book, Crystal, Skin, Cup, Goal
Verbs: Jump, Punch, Fly, Explode, Lay, Sing, Whine, Draw, Buy, Hold
Adjectives: Fluffy, Smelly, Loud, Bright, Vast, Old, Shiny, Greasy, Small, Bouncy

Using these 3 lists of words I came up with endless ideas, for stories, scenes in a movie, or just junk that didn’t make sense. However, like idea #3 said, you need to tolerate ambiguity and keep moving on. I think this prompt works really well for that.

Blog Assignment 1A

I am aspiring to become a film director, and one person who inspires me as an artist is the director Quinton Tarantino. In my opinion, he is one of the most talented directors ever and proves it in every single movie he comes out with. Yes, a lot of his writing is gory and usually vulgar, but you can’t deny the artistry that goes into his work.  He devotes so much time and commits himself fully to the screenplays that he writes.  His trademarks are what really make me enjoy his films though.  This goes along with the idea of Contrast and Affinity.  His possibly most famous reoccurring theme is the use of the trunk and hood point of view shot in his films. A video of all of these upward angle shots can be found here:

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Kay Anne Darlington

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