Final

Project 4 Proposal

I would like to express my drawing and basic animation skills in this final project for Time-Based. My process for art is very technique driven with theme and overall meaning following second. But for this final assignment I want conceptual value to be just as important and equal to the process.
My first and probably definite idea contains small amounts of video and photograph stills, but a large amount of drawings for animation purposes. I want to explore time, space, and events after death but simplify it with a theme of Norse Mythology. My project will open with a video scene of a cloudy sky and then descend to a shot of a lonely grave site on an open field. The scene of the sky to the surface may transition through animation, but I am unsure. We then see a viking spirit rise from the grave and float back up to the sky which now portrays Valhalla (a majestic place in Asgard where warriors are believed to go to if they perish in battle). The spirit warrior then prepares for combat as he partakes in Ragnarok (series of events including battles with the gods, natural disasters, and eventual submersion of the world in water). I will simplify the entire trial by having the viking slay animated creatures in the company of the gods.
Our protagonist will emerge victorious but I am still figuring out how I want it to end as I do not want to drift from the conceptual part of the project. I want to present an adventure but I also want to emphasize the thought of another world or time completely unnoticed by the living. I am hoping the inclusion of ambient music with subtle fighting sounds and battle tunes will help viewers recognize the other worldly and spiritual quality of the project.

Project 3 Analysis

The video is very much self-explanatory. The idea behind my project was to create a level of a video game with footage of a "real world" corridor with images and sound effects from the popular 90s video game, Doom. The sound and images (in their pixelated glory) are definitely the heart of the piece with the video serving as the simple level in which a first-person protagonist traverses through a basement hallway and up some stairs to end the level. The video of the hallway has a poster filter and added green color to match its evil, pixelated inhabitants. A significant amount of work went into adding the creatures, the point man's hands, the gun, the portal, etc. into the video and making sure they move convincingly throughout the space. I would like to go back and perfect the movement and rotation of nearly all the images now that I've learned a lot about keying. The music will also be familiar to those who have played Doom before. It provides an exciting and intense atmosphere to the piece and further helps provide the video game experience conveyed in my project. Overall I felt the project was a success and I had fun working on it.

I almost forgot to mention my sources...

sounds - www.olddoom.com

images - random searches but also from www.planetdoom.gamespy.com

music - youtube search but there are many variations to this classic Doom song, "E1M1"

Project 3

Final Cut Birds Exercise

Review of Animation Examples

Minilogue/Hitchhikers Choice by Kristofer Strom

I enjoyed this project the most because of its simple presentation and drawing approach. We see a whiteboard and the artist creates many organic illustrations that transition into one another. I assume the artist took numerous photos of the process of creating some of the drawings as well as the finished product themselves and then meshed them together to form a video. Yet some things seem more complicated than that but impressive all the same, like how the artist's hand acts as an eraser in some instances or is able to drag limbs or other parts of the drawings. I love the choice in music and it sounds perfectly with the pace of the drawings and does not distract one bit. It was nice to see some changes in the marker color as well. Overall a great piece to sit down to watch and listen to.

I would like to do something similar but fear I lack the creatively to make the seemingly endless supply of drawings and the time to take as many photos. MIND = BLOWN

Project 2 "And Then It Was Time"

Projects 1 & 2 Explanation

At first I did not know where to start when handed this assignment. But after some thought and thinking back to my sound projects in Intro to Electronic Music, I decided to create a sound compilation to represent the inconsistency of memory and how certain memories are often remembered and forgotten. I wanted to show this by recording actions and voices to create an emotion.

My sound project consists of physical actions (the typing, guitar playing, scissors, soda can, etc.), voices, and sound effects from games, movies, and television. These were all recorded via a Samson C01U microphone. I wanted to create an emotion which I believe is an important part of memory among things that you do and things that you hear. As far as what is 'natural' in terms of the sounds, I feel the typing, guitar playing, scissors, soda can, the ambient noises and voice that play as I am selecting options in a video game, and the alarm beeping fall under that category because they were all happening at the time. Some of the other sounds like the song with the drums, or the news caller, the crowd, and rioters are also recorded with my microphone but they were not happening in real time. My project is essentially a collage of various actions, voices, etc. but it is also a documentation of things running through my head that becomes progressively more chaotic until it fades out in the end like some memories. I felt the typing in the beginning and the end served as the cataloging of such events and hoped people could relate to the quickness and slowness of certain memories.

I am pleased to hear that most interpretations of my sound project was the idea of struggling to write a paper (the typing) because of the many distractions we are presented with whether it'd be movies, music, games, etc. This is something I did not think of but is as equally noticeable in my piece.

The next step was to develop a storyboard to help think of images to go along with our sound project. My sketches required little thought and seemed to resemble the aggressive tone of my sound piece. But it was something I was not entirely dedicated to. Some images are completely abstract such as the flashing of lights in sync with the beeping of a fire alarm, and some are more recognizable in relation to the specific sound that is playing (the rapid images of me playing the drums). My goal was to create an emotion while demonstrating the quickness and slowness of memory and I feel the video project does that more successfully than just the sound piece alone.

Project 1 Responses

Anthony -

I enjoyed the subject matter of misplacing a valued camera and the audio quality of retracing your steps throughout certain places on campus. The sound of running and walking from destinations was great and recognizable. Everything appeared cleanly meshed together including the crowd. It really felt like we were accompanying you on your quest to find your lost camera. Your comments and collection of thoughts were an important addition but I felt you were to calm for the situation.

Ryan -

Having contributed to your piece and pretty much knew your intentions for the project, I say the outcome was a success in that music produces memories. Your guitar playing is very crisp and phenomenal and I enjoyed listening to our conversations and your thoughts on the project. I like how in a sense the memory became the process of us talking about the project and how music triggers memory. It was relaxing and the inclusion of Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here" (good stuff) was nice to listen to. It is interesting how we did not even consider the meaning of the song and it's relation to your goal with the project other than it was a mellow tune to listen to and reflect on. I do think the video clip that is triggered and used as an example memory towards the end could have been transitioned better considering most of the dialogue consists of you or me talking.

Kara -

Let me just start off by saying that I really enjoyed the eerie atmosphere of this piece and could not help but randomly smile during class because of its strong unsettling impact. I like the subject matter and how its supporting sound effects makes everyone flinch. Such ambiance and sounds of danger is what i found myself often using in my work. I like how the sounds tell the traumatic story rather than hearing someone talk about it.

Photo Still Thoughts

"Between You and Me" by Patryk Rebisz, 2005

This piece is very well done. The amount of photos used in this video must be in the thousands. The still is about a woman who goes missing after an unfortunate encounter in the streets of NYC and a witness only possesses the woman's dropped camera as a means for locating her. Although I have read the story prior to watching the video, I could understand how someone may find it either confusing or that it suffers pacing issues. But I believe the pace corresponds positively with the progression of photos used to create the video. The picture and sound quality doesn't appear to be crisp, but they are fair, and I personally liked the instrumental music used during scenes. However, I was not a fan of the voice effects used during certain parts. They appeared tacked on and unnatural.

I chose this video because it was the most engaging to me and relied on "moving" images to narrate the story rather than a voice. I would love to incorporate this style of photo stills in my project but i do no have the mind or time to produce the large number of photos. I will however try to allow the sound to tell the story as this video's images do.

Missed-Class Sound Comparison

"America is Waiting" - Byrne/Eno, 1986

This compilation contains funky guitars, drums, and synthesizers accompanied by obscure, indignant radio or television broadcasts. Throughout the sounds we here a robotic "America is Waiting". There are no images or videos with the piece, but the message suggests that America needs to make some sort of change but the content addressed is unclear.

"Get Down, Get Down" - Emergency Broadcast Network, 1995

Both sound excerpts portray a sense of urgency. However, unlike "America is Waiting", this video consists of looping broadcasts, amongst them a short clip before Bud Dwyer's suicide, and a movie clip featuring Harrison Ford, to create a rhythmic audio track. Both pieces are chaotic in nature and could be hard to get into but become more unified as they progress.

UbuWeb Sound Responses

Man Ray Interview

This interview is from the documentary, "Man Ray - Prophet of the Avant Garde". The one minute recording consists only of the artist himself, without any background music or sound, explaining the principles around his work. He says that objects bear no meaning to him and that he disregards the aesthetic quality of an object completely. Man Ray states that he is against craftsmanship but that the world consists of many craftsmen, few of which are dreamers. By that he means few craftsman explore beyond the object or work itself. He then mentions a project in which he found a seemingly uninteresting iron and placed thumb tacks on it in an attempt to make the object useless. However, he then states that nothing is useless and that you can always find a value with some of the most extravagant items.

In terms of narrative, it is clearly personal and meant to be viewed in its entirety. The artist is expressing his opinions and ideas and the recording appears to be nothing more than a piece within a larger, more constructive journal.

Experiments in Disintegrating Language - Charles Verey, Blood Rumba and Morning Was 1971

The artist, and I use that term cautiously, states that Blood Rumba and Morning Was was created while he was a full time art teacher and that the piece reflects the constant pressure of working. Both pieces are poetic in there language as it is unclear what exactly the speaker is saying. There is no background noise to accompany Verey except the sound of Verey rapidly tapping his fingers on a table. Verey's words seem consistent with his tapping but inconsistent in the way he rigidly and sternly speaks them. The overall feeling of the poem is tense and uncomfortable. As a narrative we definitely feel what kind of unsettling pressure the speaker is experiencing now, but do not know what happened at the start or if it will ever end.

Reaction to Audio Logs

This American Life - Notes on Camp 1998

Honestly, I had a tough time analyzing this piece because I couldn't connect with it. The recording consists of interviews and sound excerpts from various camps. There is also a narrator who tells us about specific camp activities as well as his experience with the camps. A lot of it is very personal because we get to listen to children discuss their life in camp and their life outside of camp, most of which prefer the the former. I can relate to many of the emotions the kids experience while they are in a place of comfort and fun much like the camps, and the wish for it to never end. But I can't say I have ever experienced the excitement of camp nor do I wish I had. I may just be labeled as one of the people who don't quite understand camp life which is also addressed in the clip. I should mention that I did enjoy the raw quality of the sound clip and the tune of the harmonica between excerpts.

Janet Cardiff - Her Long Black Hair 2004

The first thing i want to say is how amazing the sound quality is, and how you need to listen with headphones to fully experience the surrounding adds a whole other layer to the art. It's an excellent attribute next to the sound itself containing urban and nature noises. A voice calmly but mysteriously guides the listener through Central Park and its perimeter. The narrator and sound effects provide an amazing visual reference for the listener. You become wrapped in the environment much like when reading a story. At certain points, the narrator will command you to take out a photograph associated with the work and depicting the scene in which the listener is currently stationed at. It is a nice addition despite the recording and the photograph being many years apart from the listener's current time. But that is the point, you are suppose to experience different time frames of emotions in relation to nature, other people, and your own physicality.

Janet Cardiff - Dreams: Telephone Series 2008-10

There is no audio recording for this piece. I can imagine the telephone series being either unsettling or relaxing depending on the dream and the mood in which the artist communicates with us over the phone.

Robert Ashley - She Was a Visitor 1967

When I first hear "She was a visitor" I expect another sentence afterwords describing the subject. However, that didn't happen. Instead the artist calmly repeats the sentence exactly the same over and over again until the piece comes to an end. We only receive some sort of progression through the ambient and ominous background noises which seems to describe the subject further for us without words. At times the sound effects clash with the voice as if fighting for power. But nonetheless the overall mood is eerie and suggests the subject is some type of paranormal entity.

John Cage - Excerpt from Silence 1969

The first thing I noticed when listening to this clip is the breaths the artist takes before each phrase or sentence. There is no background noise or music with the piece so you are forced to focus on the content and relation of the sentences, and the way in which the artist presents them verbally. The excerpt no doubt has to do with energy and greed associated with the United States in the 60s or 70s but the artist creates visual images and metaphors to describe it.

Orson Welles - War of the Worlds 1938

Although I have heard of War of the Worlds before, I had no idea what it was about. So the whole broadcast was confusing to me at first. The introduction by Morgan Freeman followed by Orson Welles is mysterious and horrifying in its content. The new version by Freeman contains background music that further strengthens the gravity of the situation, an impending invasion by extra-terrestrial life. Because this is a radio broadcast of the 1930s, we are presented with traditional brass and orchestral music of that time period. It's a great privilege to hear the broadcast in it's raw yet rare quality. I could imagine a wife listening to the radio at home or a man at work listening to the broadcast. You suddenly become placed in the 30s. However, it is tough to analyze this as an art piece because it was not intended as such. But nonetheless the power of radio, especially during that time, is effective. The reports and interviews regarding the martian invasion are discomforting and convincing and could possibly create chaos for listeners who did not catch the broadcast's introduction.