Project 3. Other work

Authors own work

Back Up Plan

Just in case my animation for 'Bacchus and Ariadne' did not turn out well or could not be used for whatever reason; I developed a back up plan. It is based on the Michael Landy exhibition of recreating an image of something. This made me think about Tom Hunter and how he recreates ancient paintings and puts a modern twist on them e.g. 'Woman Reading Possession Order' (1998). I researched into the Pre-Raphaelites and paintings from the Renaissance to choose one that i could recreate. I had to think realistically for this project as I do not have the means or the time to recreate a painting on such a large scale as tom Hunter.

I decided on the painting 'Ophelia' by Sir John Everett Millais (1851-2) which Tom Hunter also constructed a response to ('The Way Home' (1999-01)). I chose this painting as I already had a few ideas about how to shoot it in a modern way.

Response to crit
- You could enhance the photograph to make some of the colours stand out better and make it brighter (I did look at enhancing this photo on Photoshop however, I found that it did not really make much difference as it easily became overexposed and looked over-coloured)
- The photograph is instantly recognisable, so unlike the animation you do not need to do any pre-explaining about what the image is and where it has come from

Project 3 Final Piece

Response to Crit

- Sound (don't know what sound is needed, but something is needed in the background)
- Keep it going (what happens next? continue the story. The audience want to know more)
- The name at the beginning help the audience to recognise the painting, and that the animation relates to the story behind the painting
- pop art feel to the style of animation
- different style than the audience have seen before. thought that it was interesting and new

Project 3. Day 5

The main obstacle that I faced when trying to make the animation was how to film it without moving the camera. I managed to overcome this by creating a contraption that suspended the iPad above the paper where I was working. It looks rather low budget but it worked really well. I used three lamps when filming this so that the light was equally concentrated throughout the frame.

Project 3. Day 4

Storyboarding

After discussing my idea with various people I came up with a slightly different idea to what I was previously going to do. My new idea is that I am going to recreate the story behind the painting 'Bacchus and Ariadne' by Titan; by using animation. I will do this by taking photographs of random people in the street, I will then cut them out (going with the forcing the situation upon them idea) and use stop motion animation to put it all together.

Authors own work

As a backup plan I have decided to do a photo shoot for if this all goes to pot at the last minute. My photo shoot will be revolving around the idea of modernising old paintings. I am thinking of using 'Ophelia' by Sir John Everett Millais. But instead of having her drown in a lake/ stream as the original and Tom Hunter's. I will have my model drown in the bath (not literally).

Week 3. Day 3

Ideas for work.

I want to work with Greek and Roman Mythology for this project. I was thinking that I could copy Michael Landy's style of work by picking apart the Gods and Goddesses and doing my own adaptation of it. I could also recreate the paintings that I choose in a modern setting e.g. 'Bacchus and Ariadne' I was also playing with the idea of maybe using my family and de-constructing them in a similar way.

Authors own work

I have chosen to look at 'Bacchus and Ariadne' as I think this is a highly emotional piece and it is a work close to my heart.

Authors own work

I have decided to use 'Bacchus and Ariadne' by Titan rather than 'The Birth of Venus' by Sandro Botticelli as I feel that shooting this photograph could be a little awkward looking at the whole idea of the painting. I think I shall look at the photographer Tom hunter for this project as he has done a project on the re-imaging and modernisation of renaissance paintings.

Response to crit
- Take photographs of people randomly  (not staged etc.) take them out of their scenes and then put them all together (force the situation upon them)
- stage the photoshoot- use lighting (spotlights) to make the two main characters (bacchus and Ariadne) stand out. all the other characters are slightly darker and less in focus.
- get people to stage the stances then cut them all out and put them back together again

Week 3. Day 2

We went to carious galleries around London for research for out new project: Transcription. Some of the exhibitions like 'Saints Alive and Corrine Day's exhibition I found very interesting and inspiring.

I found Day's work different to the rest of the images that I have seen today; she has a mix of staged photos as well as unstaged work. I thought that her work was very personal and unlike a lot of her photography. however, I don't think I will respond to her work as I have worked with her on past projects and I feel that I would not be pushing myself as much as I should be.

Other exhibitions such as the ICA: Lutz Bacher I found slightly strange and did not understand the meaning behind it as it was just some black sand in a room with a smashed mirror.

Jacques Henri Lartique: Bibi

This exhibition showed an interesting, new type of photography that I had not previously seen before. The first being the 'rare coloured glass plates' which had lights behind to enhance the colour. I found that the bright colours captured my attention however, I am not sure how I would respond to this with my own work.

the second display was the 'Stereoscopic cards'  which gave a 3D effect to the pictures. There was a different photo in each eye display (the same photograph but taken at a slightly different angle) this caused certain aspects of the photography to stand out more.

I could create my response to his work by taking a 3D photograph. you do this by taking one photograph then quickly shifting an angle of 30 degrees to the object you are photographing then take another photo.

Home Truths: Photography, Motherhood and Identity
I found this work quite striking and in some cases very strong and shocking. I was drawn to Janine Antoni's work with the doll's house and the spider, I feel that it portrays 21st century motherhood really well. The colours help as they are so bright that they draw the eye straight to the work.

Fred Huning was another photographer that in the exhibition I was drawn to. His work was different to the other slightly discomforting images. Motherhood was portrayed  through reflections, shadows, and pictures of nature; I found this quite refreshing after viewing the strongly discomforting work of the other artists.

The Selfish Giant

I thought that The Selfish Giant was an amazing film and the cinematography was perfect. The original story is taken from 'The Selfish Giant' by Oscar Wilde, it is not a literal transcription from the book to this play but there are similarities and parallels that can be drawn. It is based in Bradford and follows the life of a young hyper-active boy (Arbor) who, after being expelled from school fro poor behaviour, decides that he is going to sell scrap metal to a local scrap yard to make money for his struggling family. He is accompanied by his friend (Swifty) who has a deep interest in horses (which is emphasised throughout the film).

After reading Wilde's book I can see the parallels and connections between the film and the original story. the scrap yard man (Kitten) is the giant who at first is hostile to the two boys. As the film goes on he warms slightly to Swifty who he allows to race his horse. If we think of it that the horse if the tree in the story and Kitten the giant; this then makes Swifty, Jesus; which would make sense as he is later killed (parallels with nail patterns) and Kitten owns up for his death. This leaves a bit of confusion as to how Arbor fits into the picture. Maybe he is the winter, which comes around wrecking havoc , and is there when the Giant dies (Kitten owning up for Swifty's death as it being his fault) This is quite a harsh accusation but could be true.

Week 3. Day 1

We merged with the new class, we're put into groups and told to come up with a 'Radicle Idea' and tell it to the rest of the class as if it were true. I feel that our group merged well and we all imputed good ideas to form our project at the end of the day. 

Our Radicle Idea was the parallel universes actually exist. We presented our work with a diagram to illustrate what we were talking about. I would have liked to work with film or animation for this task as I think it would be interesting to see how much we could do with such a short time restraint. However the topic that we chose proved hard to photograph or film. 

I think we worked well as a team to reach the deadline and I feel that our time was well spent trying to understand the theories behind parallel universes as we had many questions asked about it.

Day 3. Week 2

Information in brackets is what I think of the comments given

- Crit for item video

Too much text, could have used voice overs instead; (I personally do not like voice overs as I find them really cheesy)

Use more images, different angles of the item etc

Nothing about how I feel about the item now, what effects it has on me now (I disagree with this as I feel I talked about this in my video)

- Crit for Interview

Quite jumpy (this happened while rendering, it is unnavoidable on most videos that I render)

Seemed disjointed from me ; more about my family. Made people more interested in my family's relationships than my past (I did not like the idea of this project so I aimed this video at something that was less about me and more about the people around me, so I do not feel that this is a complaint)

Comedy, all at the right time, knows when to be serious and when to put the jokes in. The jokes were well timed.

Week 2. Day 2

I finished my film for my item. I changed my object to a toy that I was given when I was young. I have used a lot of text in my video as I wanted to protray the felling that I have for the object. 

If I was to do this project again I think I would do it completely differently. I would probably use photographs as I feel that I may have over complicated this project

Week 2. Day 1

I have found that creating the animation for part one of my brief is not viable. It would just take too long I also planned to use Adobe After Effects in my work however i do not know it well enough to be able to use it that much yet. I have now chosen to do a documentary style of Project. I have interviewed six of my family members. I got a mix of responses from all of them which i am pleased with as it will give my work variety.

I used Sony Vegas Pro 10 to edit my work as I do not feel comfortable using After Effects or Premier yet.

What I feel has gone well in the video is that even though it is over 1 minute i have kept up the interest by adding in funny moments. If i could re-edit this project i would keep the flow between each question smoother as sometimes the video jumps a little where i have edited out the pauses and talking that was not needed.

Week 1. Day 3

We had a tutorial on animation and how to use it today. I found it very helpful as it assisted me in generating more ideas for my project. We watched an animation called 'Procrastination' by Johnny Kelly it caused me to think that I could exploit the brief in a slightly different way. In doing this i could talk about myself in a different way and would not have to use a recording of a voice which I am avoiding because I feel that it seems really cheap and boring if done wrong.

Authors own work

This short animation that I created came out more and more dark as I continued through drawing it out. 

Here are a few short animations that I created that I will string together when I have finished the animation.

Week 1; Day 2 LBM

1:3 LBM

We had a tutorial on cameras and how to use them today, I found it very useful as I will now know what to take out of the CLR for what projects.

authors own work

We also had time to advance our ideas for our 'Who Am I' project. I have completed my list of questions for the first section; however I do not know how to use them in my work; whether to use an animation or documentary-style video to show my work.

authors own work

 For section Two I have chosen my object to be a yak statue that I bought from Nepal; as I have many happy and sad memories from that time.

Week 1; Day 2 LBM

We had a tutorial on cameras and how to use them today, I found it very useful as I will now know what to take out of the CLR for what projects.

 We also had time to advance our ideas for our 'Who Am I' project. I have completed my list of questions for the first section; however I do not know how to use them in my work; wether to use an animation or documentary-style video to show my work.

 For section Two I have chosen my object to be a yak statue that I bought from Nepal; as I have many happy and sad memories from that time.

Week 1 Day 1 LBM

We worked on lighting in photography as well as learning about aperture and shutter speed. I found the second two aspects to the lesson a lot easier as I have been taught them previously and have been using them for the past two years in my photography.

1) Authors own. Shows lighting

I feel that the photos that I took today have properly shown the use of lighting. 

The problems that I encountered today was that I was not using a DSLR camera and so I did not have as much power over the changing shutter speed and aperture. I was able to change the settings, however I would have been more comfortable with a DSLR.

2) Authors own. Egg spinning