Ben Fink lecture

Ben Fink was a very quite man but able to command our attention well, or at least for the majority of the lecture. His early photography of food was really interesting (and made me hungry) and his landscapes had a masterful use of color in them. I felt however Ben suddenly took an awkward turn in the end and lead the audience down a path that they weren't prepared for. He started showing some rather darker work that no one was quite ready for and were having trouble following what point he was trying to make. It's not that I think that we as a school couldn't handle it or relate to it on some level, it's just that it seemed like a sudden shift in topics and it left many feeling detached and uncomfortable.

Art DiFuria lecture

First of all I enjoyed this lecture because it was spaced out evenly with humor which is always good for an art history lecture. I think I misunderstood what the lecture was supposed to be about because I assumed it would be some sort of argument about European art in general but actually he only focused on one man. DiFuria focused on Van Hanskirk who spent most of his time painting Roman ruins. It was interesting to see how he depicted what considered the highest of human achievements in ruins to illustrate that all physical things will end. He was apparently also a illustrator and would translate many of his sketches and paintings into etches and prints. It was interesting to see in one painting, Van Hanskirk included a self portrait sketching out the building featured in the painting. All in all in wasn't what was expected but that turned out to be a good thing to me.

revised Hilton thumbnails

Hilton Ad revised summary

Originally I had the script written so that the video would open with the main character and a business partner just finishing a conversation about a project they are working on but decided to cut out the live action altogether. I realized in critique that the transition between live action and stop motion was too abrupt and awkward. In the opening all that will happen between them is a handshake stop motion style and then the main character will 'walk' to the table to eat while the second person will walk the opposite direction. When the main character approaches the table and sits down there will be a cut to areas around the common area. The first cut will be to the full refrigerators that are stocked with frozen goods. A frozen dinner will hop off the shelf and travel to her destination. Then a cut to the cereal bar will show individual cereal pieces hopping out to meet a bowl and spoon at the end of the counter and travel to her table. A cut to a mini fridge below the cereal bar will show yogurt hopping out of its shelf. Then a cut to a bowl of fruit where an apple will jump out and scurry down the table. Now the cut will focus back to her at the table but the aforementioned food items will line up assembly style and parade in front of her while she chooses an apple. Then the apple will sit in place but slowly have bites removed out of it until its a core then disappear. The character will then stand up and leave. The camera will cut to a wider position to show her leaving the table and moving through the common area. The next cut will be of her getting in the elevator. She finally arrives at her room and walks in. When she's inside she sets her purse down which crawls away and throws some trash into the recycling bin which also walks away. She then goes to the fridge and removes something to heat up and then places it into the microwave. She then moves to the couch and picks up the remote. The final shot is of the television with the Home 2 logo which can be looped to be the opening and closing title. I was wanting this entire sequence to showcase all the activities you can do in these spaces like having meeting in the common area and all the choices you are able to make like with the food options. I also wanted to showcase all the nice features like the full kitchen area and the nice flat screen television along with the common area.

Thumbnails for Hilton ad

experimental footage

New Pitch: props as people part 3

Inspirations:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOLgEyZA4Nw (For Sock's Sake)

http://vimeo.com/1004092 (Sweet Dreams)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-yldqNkGfo&feature=fvw (Food Fight)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBjLW5_dGAM&feature=SeriesPlayList&p=4CF1524B28F8F557 (Western Spaghetti)

New Pitch: props as people part 2

Aesthetics: Since there will be no dialogue throughout the film all the reactions of the characters will be making noises such as mumbling and grunting. I want the sound to be very dramatic in some areas, especially in the climax of the story such as orchestral themes. The lighting will be high contrast like for instance in the beginning when the lonely can is going about his life in the kitchen, I want to often cast him with a heavy shadow while other items seem to be highlighted. The camera frame will have to be handled in a manner so that when a character is reacting to something, i.e. frightened, he will need to shake but the means of shaking him (a wire or hand) will be filmed out of the shot and while edit cut to a wide shot. To demonstrate the cans moving they will roll around on a surface instead of mimic walking by bouncing. Again I feel that overall sound will be the key to this piece and will have to be handled closely.

New Pitch: props as people

Synopsis: For our next pitch we have to utilize objects as people or characters and I've decided to make a story based around items in the pantry. The story will focus on a store brand, plain can who goes about his normal boring life wishing that he could be noticed. One day in his travels around the kitchen he notices an advertisement for a way to change boring old cans into high end name brands. He ultimately discovers that being the center of attention may not be the best thing for him.

Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story

After watching the short film by Todd Haynes I must say that overall I really enjoyed it. It was really amazing how believable and convincing a bunch of Barbie dolls and some well done voice overs can make a movie come alive. At many points in the movie I felt completely immersed into the world that Todd created and really believed I was watching the interactions of Karen and her family even while staring at a static Barbie smile. The sound is what made this film and catapulted it from just a bunch of dolls into a serious and sympathetic plight of a young star dealing with a horrible eating disorder and ultimately losing. The film actually made me feel upset of how little her family members knew about the situation and even Karen herself. Only by the time it was too late did anyone realize that it wasn't just about skipping a few meals but a serious control problem, fears of gaining weight and a distorted body image. The fact that the dolls were always filmed like real actors would be between the positioning of the camera and the lights added to the reality. I still can't wrap my mind around some of the scenes and how the did them. I understand that any parts where a hand would have a appeared in the frame they just used wires, strings, and careful editing but some scenes were so impressively planned out that it made me automatically love this film; the party scene in Karen's new apartment was such a great part and it still blows my mind how they did it. The only aspects I didn't enjoy were all of the unreadable text and some of the footage of people in the middle of the film. The real footage at the beginning and ending were a nice sandwich but some of the ones in the middle broke the illusion for me. I see myself coming back a watching this film again and again.

Last Digital Cinema class we watched Maya Deren's Meshes in the Afternoon. Overall I thought the film is visually interesting if nothing else. It was much more experimental in camera techniques and story than I was expecting from a film from the 40s. I was confused about some aspects of the plot and I think some of the more subtle symbolism just went over my head. It is definitely one of those movies that needs to be watched multiple times in order to catch every single piece of information. I thought from a technical standpoint it was very impressive with its use of multiple figures filmed separately and complied together, Dutch angles, and use of close ups with the actors eyes. At times (I think mostly due to how old it is) I felt the music was too loud and in some cases was distracting from the movie but overall it set up a nice atmosphere. Again, the camera techniques were the most impressive and revival some movies today (especially the scene where the actress is losing sense of gravity and hangs onto the walls and staircase for support).

Pitch Project

I've been thinking about our society's relationship with food lately. It seems more unhealthy than ever and I was thinking about what we really put into our bodies and how they can affect us. My proposal is about a teenage girl, Lauren, sitting at home playing video games one night. She previously purchased a really cheap, brightly colored (and cleverly marketed) bag of chips at a store. While consuming said chips she starts slowly hallucinating, first with hearing some strange noises, the colors in her television changing drastically, and finally when she goes to the bathroom, she sees spots. After sleeping off the effects, she realizes that the chips were the cause of her problems. She finds a strange ingredient listed on the bag and looks it up online to discover that it has hallucinogen-like side-effects. While she's online a chat window opens up. A friend of hers that off-screen had been with her when she purchased the chips asks her how they were. Lauren replies that it "was only a $1.50 for the worst day of your life." and that to "next time read the label."

Elysium: Self Critique

Project Elysium

Main Idea: Our group came up with our portait project in our first meeting. We had similar ideas but our story was built on top of Joe's original idea, a terminally ill girl with expansions to the character such as the inclusion of a separated lover.

Source Idea: The source was Joe's original idea, that we all slowly added details to to make the character more complex. Not all ideas were accepted into the final idea and some people ended up with more of their ideas in the script than others but everyone was given a fair chance to have their input and vision heard. Also not all of my ideas we accepted into the story either but most of the ones that did tended to be what seem small ideas through the use of props but I felt they eventually became central to the character's identity.

Key Emotion: The focus of the project was on the idea of despair and longing of the main character. In the story as she's dying she dreams of her departed lover before finally finding peace.

Synopsis: Its the story of a dying woman who is distraught with her current situation who through a dream of being reunited with her lover is able the come to terms and pass on in peace.

Theme: Our main idea is the thought of forces beyond one's self being used as a means to help encourage or improve the life of a person.

Strengths: I think our strongest idea was in terms of lighting techniques because we really built around the idea of using different lighting sources (the lights included in the kit with blue gels and not, fluorescent lights, and even a flash light) to really set up the reality of the character and differences in plains of existence.

Problems: We started slow at the beginning of filming and we probably could have all had more practice with the equipment beforehand.

Journal Notes: I learned that I am much better at lighting and learned that each person in our group was good at different things. While we all had a hand at doing everything, I found that certain people were better at tasks than others.

Inspirations for upcoming project

Art Direction and Subject Matter:

The Lovely Bones (2010)

What Dreams May Come (1998)

The Others (2001)

The Crow (1994)

Art Direction:

August Rush (2007)

Pride and Prejudice (2005)

Minority Report (2002)

Let The Right One In (2008)

The Matrix (1999)

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)

Coraline (2009)

Where the Wild Things Are (2009)

Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004)

First Project