Friday 12 December 2008
Pre-Production!
Here are some of the documents we used in the pre-production of 'Daddy's In A Band', beginning with our proposal -
Daddy’s In a Band
Proposal 12/11/08
Daddy’s in a band is a four minute documentary following a day in the life of a single father as he juggles the troubles of caring for his young son, whilst also dealing with the stress of becoming successful in his rock band.
The documentary will be set in Raunds, a small town 20 miles from Northampton, where our character Tom Robbins and his 4 year old son Liam live.
Our story will chronologically record an average day for Tom and his son. We will be documenting the highs and lows of their every day lives whilst observing from a ‘fly on the wall’ perspective. We propose to film this documentary on the 19th of November 2008.
Starting in the morning, we will film the routine of getting ready and the walk to school. During the ten minute walk, we will film him talking and joking around with his son, using long shots as well as close up profiles to give the audience both the wide and the finer perspective. The audio will be gentle morning (walking music).
This opening sequence will be used to demonstrate that our story is about an everyday father-and-son so that we can build upon this image as the film progresses – which will later be contrasted by a substantial amount.
In the next sequence we will be following the private time of Tom as he goes about his daily rituals of household chores and composing music. This is the point where we get to know him better through a series of informal questions, finding out about his past and how he came to be in the current situation. We will then learn his hopes and fears as we move on to discuss his views on the present and the future for both himself and Liam.
As he goes about his song writing, we will be finding out details of the band and the contrasting side of his story. This is one of the ways that we are going to build up the overall energy of the film.
We will be using a talking head style of documentation allowing extra cutaways for post-production. This sequence will be done mainly with medium shots with close ups on his face and his hands (for cutaways and to demonstrate his abilities in creating songs and playing guitar etc). The mask of the contrasting side of the story will be slowly unveiled to the audience from this point. This, we feel, will also display the emotional depth of their relationship. The bond the Father and son have is an immense dependence. Something that we can hopefully pick up on, this will again increase the energy of the film.
As it nears the end of another school day, we set off to pick Liam up from his class – however due to the complications with filming at schools, we have decided to have Tom and Liam walk through the front door with them in the same clothing they did in the morning to show that time has passed. The audience will accept this cutaway as natural as nothing ‘new’ has been shown. This will not only save hitches with filming at school but also practically speaking, moving the crew around. The next shot will be the pair leaving the house with, setting off to the park for a bit of father-and-son time. The subsequent shots will follow-on from the park playtime to dinner, which will be in the park with chips on a bench somewhere. The style will be similar to the morning scene in which the more emotive side of the story will be further investigated. However, we will start to build up the other side of the story at this point – by perhaps switching the style of audio to something a little more ‘upbeat’.
The succeeding sequence will be the pair once again returning home to get ready for Toms’ gig – during which we will be able to interview Liam informally and alone, finding out about this amazing 4 year kid. Further questions will enable us to gain insights on his thoughts and views on daddy and his career. This will be a build up towards the other side of the story too. When they return to the house we want to have a few clips of Liam sat behind his own miniature drum kit and answering some simple questions, if we include this into our documentary we will be able to get another view on the situation that the father and son are in. As the questions are directed to Liam we know we will get an honest account of his thoughts due to his age and our audience are likely to be moved by this approach.
We will then attend the gig with two cameras, one onstage and one downstage. We will film Tom at his gig whilst Liam is sat backstage/within the crowd to watch his father.
This part of the film will be the ‘gem’ showing the contrasting side of his life. Most of it will be long and medium shots to show less attachment (series of close-ups conclusively leads the audience to feel more personally in-touch). However close-ups will be included during the shooting stage to ensure enough editing material is available for post-production.
We may want to pursue this bit as if he is out there rocking the world, far beyond reach of his child to enhance the contrast between the emotive and the supposed-to-be successful detached side but somehow deep down Tom and Liam knows that there’s something special they have and nothing will change that – and that is what we are trying to show.
We find this story unique and exciting. We feel in most peoples’ minds the idea of a rock star and a gentle caring father simply can’t coexist. We wanted to investigate how this is possible and most importantly, we think it’s a heart-warming story with a twist that’s worth telling.
At the end of this, we hope the audience will be able to hold back prejudice against single fathers and the general perspective of ‘single parenting is bad’. Although we are only students, we feel that this is an important part of the society that is often misinterpreted and under-valued – hence the making of this documentary, to show the public even with such an ‘extreme’ career, a good father-and-son relationship can still be maintained. We think that it is important to put this message across as there are so few single dads in the UK. In 2004 there were 254 single fathers as oppose to 2829 single mothers, Only 2 percent of families had a single father. This shows that Tom is in a fairly unique position and yet he manages to juggle being a good father with trying to become famous.
Here are some of the storyboards we drew up -
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Daddy’s In a Band
Proposal 12/11/08
Daddy’s in a band is a four minute documentary following a day in the life of a single father as he juggles the troubles of caring for his young son, whilst also dealing with the stress of becoming successful in his rock band.
The documentary will be set in Raunds, a small town 20 miles from Northampton, where our character Tom Robbins and his 4 year old son Liam live.
Our story will chronologically record an average day for Tom and his son. We will be documenting the highs and lows of their every day lives whilst observing from a ‘fly on the wall’ perspective. We propose to film this documentary on the 19th of November 2008.
Starting in the morning, we will film the routine of getting ready and the walk to school. During the ten minute walk, we will film him talking and joking around with his son, using long shots as well as close up profiles to give the audience both the wide and the finer perspective. The audio will be gentle morning (walking music).
This opening sequence will be used to demonstrate that our story is about an everyday father-and-son so that we can build upon this image as the film progresses – which will later be contrasted by a substantial amount.
In the next sequence we will be following the private time of Tom as he goes about his daily rituals of household chores and composing music. This is the point where we get to know him better through a series of informal questions, finding out about his past and how he came to be in the current situation. We will then learn his hopes and fears as we move on to discuss his views on the present and the future for both himself and Liam.
As he goes about his song writing, we will be finding out details of the band and the contrasting side of his story. This is one of the ways that we are going to build up the overall energy of the film.
We will be using a talking head style of documentation allowing extra cutaways for post-production. This sequence will be done mainly with medium shots with close ups on his face and his hands (for cutaways and to demonstrate his abilities in creating songs and playing guitar etc). The mask of the contrasting side of the story will be slowly unveiled to the audience from this point. This, we feel, will also display the emotional depth of their relationship. The bond the Father and son have is an immense dependence. Something that we can hopefully pick up on, this will again increase the energy of the film.
As it nears the end of another school day, we set off to pick Liam up from his class – however due to the complications with filming at schools, we have decided to have Tom and Liam walk through the front door with them in the same clothing they did in the morning to show that time has passed. The audience will accept this cutaway as natural as nothing ‘new’ has been shown. This will not only save hitches with filming at school but also practically speaking, moving the crew around. The next shot will be the pair leaving the house with, setting off to the park for a bit of father-and-son time. The subsequent shots will follow-on from the park playtime to dinner, which will be in the park with chips on a bench somewhere. The style will be similar to the morning scene in which the more emotive side of the story will be further investigated. However, we will start to build up the other side of the story at this point – by perhaps switching the style of audio to something a little more ‘upbeat’.
The succeeding sequence will be the pair once again returning home to get ready for Toms’ gig – during which we will be able to interview Liam informally and alone, finding out about this amazing 4 year kid. Further questions will enable us to gain insights on his thoughts and views on daddy and his career. This will be a build up towards the other side of the story too. When they return to the house we want to have a few clips of Liam sat behind his own miniature drum kit and answering some simple questions, if we include this into our documentary we will be able to get another view on the situation that the father and son are in. As the questions are directed to Liam we know we will get an honest account of his thoughts due to his age and our audience are likely to be moved by this approach.
We will then attend the gig with two cameras, one onstage and one downstage. We will film Tom at his gig whilst Liam is sat backstage/within the crowd to watch his father.
This part of the film will be the ‘gem’ showing the contrasting side of his life. Most of it will be long and medium shots to show less attachment (series of close-ups conclusively leads the audience to feel more personally in-touch). However close-ups will be included during the shooting stage to ensure enough editing material is available for post-production.
We may want to pursue this bit as if he is out there rocking the world, far beyond reach of his child to enhance the contrast between the emotive and the supposed-to-be successful detached side but somehow deep down Tom and Liam knows that there’s something special they have and nothing will change that – and that is what we are trying to show.
We find this story unique and exciting. We feel in most peoples’ minds the idea of a rock star and a gentle caring father simply can’t coexist. We wanted to investigate how this is possible and most importantly, we think it’s a heart-warming story with a twist that’s worth telling.
At the end of this, we hope the audience will be able to hold back prejudice against single fathers and the general perspective of ‘single parenting is bad’. Although we are only students, we feel that this is an important part of the society that is often misinterpreted and under-valued – hence the making of this documentary, to show the public even with such an ‘extreme’ career, a good father-and-son relationship can still be maintained. We think that it is important to put this message across as there are so few single dads in the UK. In 2004 there were 254 single fathers as oppose to 2829 single mothers, Only 2 percent of families had a single father. This shows that Tom is in a fairly unique position and yet he manages to juggle being a good father with trying to become famous.
Here are some of the storyboards we drew up -
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Thursday 11 December 2008
Editing Mayhem!
I managed to upload some earlier versions of the edit at uni today, and here they are!
This first one starts with a shot of Liam at the top of the stairs in silence, as Adam had a song in mind to play over the top of it. It's a good opening shot, and the music fit really well with the footage (unfortunately it's not present in this edit) but eventually we made the decision to use just Tom's music in the film, which I think works a little better.
This is only the first minute and a half or so of footage, and there are some moments where Tom hesitates, repeats himself, or says things that weren't really important enough to make the final cut, so a lot of it had to be trimmed down.
This second edit starts with the opening we used in the final edit, albeit in a much longer and silent form. The film is starting to take shape a lot more by this point, but it's still too long and there's a lot of unnecessary footage and clutter.
The interview with Tom's flatmate and band member, also called Tom, was cut entirely as we all decided what he says doesn't really add much to the documentary and used up time that could be used to show the relationship between father and son in greater depth.
By this stage the film is way past the embryonic stage, and almost ready to stand on it's own two legs and take it's first formative steps. The intro now has music (but still no titles!), but we had to cut out a major chunk towards the end as I noticed Andria actually wanders into shot in the lower left hand side of the screen. I'm not sure how this glaring error had passed under the radar for so long, so we got rid of it! The first few shots were left pretty much untouched in the final version, apart from a few short snippets of audio for the running length. We also chose to discard the footage of the empty playground when Tom talks about childhood, as the shots seemed a little out of place with the rest of the film and just took up valuable time!
The interview with the other Tom has been replaced with more audio of Tom talking about his relationship with Liam and some shots of him, and a lot of the audio has been trimmed down to remove moments for Tom pauses for more than a few seconds or repeats himself. It's also the first time the shots of the band have been included, and is pretty much representative of the final product apart from the lack of credits.
This first one starts with a shot of Liam at the top of the stairs in silence, as Adam had a song in mind to play over the top of it. It's a good opening shot, and the music fit really well with the footage (unfortunately it's not present in this edit) but eventually we made the decision to use just Tom's music in the film, which I think works a little better.
This is only the first minute and a half or so of footage, and there are some moments where Tom hesitates, repeats himself, or says things that weren't really important enough to make the final cut, so a lot of it had to be trimmed down.
This second edit starts with the opening we used in the final edit, albeit in a much longer and silent form. The film is starting to take shape a lot more by this point, but it's still too long and there's a lot of unnecessary footage and clutter.
The interview with Tom's flatmate and band member, also called Tom, was cut entirely as we all decided what he says doesn't really add much to the documentary and used up time that could be used to show the relationship between father and son in greater depth.
By this stage the film is way past the embryonic stage, and almost ready to stand on it's own two legs and take it's first formative steps. The intro now has music (but still no titles!), but we had to cut out a major chunk towards the end as I noticed Andria actually wanders into shot in the lower left hand side of the screen. I'm not sure how this glaring error had passed under the radar for so long, so we got rid of it! The first few shots were left pretty much untouched in the final version, apart from a few short snippets of audio for the running length. We also chose to discard the footage of the empty playground when Tom talks about childhood, as the shots seemed a little out of place with the rest of the film and just took up valuable time!
The interview with the other Tom has been replaced with more audio of Tom talking about his relationship with Liam and some shots of him, and a lot of the audio has been trimmed down to remove moments for Tom pauses for more than a few seconds or repeats himself. It's also the first time the shots of the band have been included, and is pretty much representative of the final product apart from the lack of credits.
Monday 8 December 2008
Edit Sweet!
We just recently managed to sort out the internet connection at ours, meaning I'll be able to post things on here much more frequently now!
I'm currently beavering away with the editing for our documentary, which is going really well. Premiere is a cool programme, which is pretty easy and fun to use. After making an initial attempt at an edit, then scrapping it after group feedback, I got stuck into the actual edit which ended up at a whopping 5:38, and wasn't even totally finished! We've since trimmed it down to 4:38, and need to shave off about another minute or so to fit in the final part of the documentary. This shouldn't be too hard, as there are a number of shots that either don't quite work, have bits of us or our equipment in shot or simply don't serve much purpose in the documentary.
I've been trying to render the different versions, but currently each time my computer's perished before it's actually finished! I'll try doing it in the Waverly building at some point so I can put them all up here, I've still got each significantly different stage of the edit saved so I can revisit them at any point.
I'm currently beavering away with the editing for our documentary, which is going really well. Premiere is a cool programme, which is pretty easy and fun to use. After making an initial attempt at an edit, then scrapping it after group feedback, I got stuck into the actual edit which ended up at a whopping 5:38, and wasn't even totally finished! We've since trimmed it down to 4:38, and need to shave off about another minute or so to fit in the final part of the documentary. This shouldn't be too hard, as there are a number of shots that either don't quite work, have bits of us or our equipment in shot or simply don't serve much purpose in the documentary.
I've been trying to render the different versions, but currently each time my computer's perished before it's actually finished! I'll try doing it in the Waverly building at some point so I can put them all up here, I've still got each significantly different stage of the edit saved so I can revisit them at any point.
Thursday 30 October 2008
Creative Opportunities
This week our journal task is -
"Using your own personal experience, write a few lines that describe how a personal contact has provided a creative opportunity for you"
I thought of two good examples for this, one more kind of career orientated, and the other just good for the soul. The first came about through a drama course I used to take part in. After working with the people there for several months, one of the guys who ran it told me about a film company called Suited And Booted. He gave me their details, and I applied for a short film course, and ended up making a 90 second film about a woman who lived with a moose. The experience was very educational, and also a lot of fun! (Incidentally, as an example of something getting in the way of a creative opportunity, I was invited to a film festival in Spain after our film apparently won something over there, but couldn't go as it clashed with my GCSE exams....which is lame, haha!)
The second example is just through friends of mine. My mate Jack, who I'd known for several years, asked if I wanted to go for a jam with his mate Dorian, who I didn't really know too well at the time. Jack invited loads of people over, with loads of instruments, and, erm, we didn't really get much done. However, after a few weeks of 'band practice', fewer and fewer people started turning up, until it was just me playing guitar, Dorian on drums and Jack providing the vocals. We recorded hours and hours worth of jams like this (albeit with varying degrees of quality!), and eventually got to play a gig, just by pummelling away on our instruments...which was good fun, and the start of a beautiful friendship! =D
"Using your own personal experience, write a few lines that describe how a personal contact has provided a creative opportunity for you"
I thought of two good examples for this, one more kind of career orientated, and the other just good for the soul. The first came about through a drama course I used to take part in. After working with the people there for several months, one of the guys who ran it told me about a film company called Suited And Booted. He gave me their details, and I applied for a short film course, and ended up making a 90 second film about a woman who lived with a moose. The experience was very educational, and also a lot of fun! (Incidentally, as an example of something getting in the way of a creative opportunity, I was invited to a film festival in Spain after our film apparently won something over there, but couldn't go as it clashed with my GCSE exams....which is lame, haha!)
The second example is just through friends of mine. My mate Jack, who I'd known for several years, asked if I wanted to go for a jam with his mate Dorian, who I didn't really know too well at the time. Jack invited loads of people over, with loads of instruments, and, erm, we didn't really get much done. However, after a few weeks of 'band practice', fewer and fewer people started turning up, until it was just me playing guitar, Dorian on drums and Jack providing the vocals. We recorded hours and hours worth of jams like this (albeit with varying degrees of quality!), and eventually got to play a gig, just by pummelling away on our instruments...which was good fun, and the start of a beautiful friendship! =D
Friday 24 October 2008
Editing Test!
Here's a little test using Premiere Pro to edit together several interviews our group filmed the other day. It's pretty rough around the edges and the sound is all over the place, but, hey, it's only a test!
I found this pretty easy to do, which is a good sign for further editing. I still need to figure out seperating the audio channel from the visual one, so I can use people's answers as voiceovers whilst showing other footage.
I found this pretty easy to do, which is a good sign for further editing. I still need to figure out seperating the audio channel from the visual one, so I can use people's answers as voiceovers whilst showing other footage.
Tuesday 21 October 2008
Networking
For our journals this week, we were asked to comment on Jool’s statement ;
“The essential point of networking is human contact. Business has killed networking by making it something for the career orientated person.”
Personally, I’d disagree with this statement. Whilst networking is obviously an essential part of business, it allows companies to expand their reach and for individuals working in business to find and meet more people, I think networking can exist outside of business altogether and for many more reasons than purely financial gain. For example, during fresher’s week at university, students visit bars, clubs, etc. in order to meet new people and therefore gain more from their experience at university in a new city. This in itself could be called networking, even though it yields no monetary rewards (it’s probably actually quite damaging for the bank account, along with the liver), but it’s a prime opportunity to meet new friends and gain more life experiences. This style of social networking may not be as efficient, precise or structured as the kind employed by a business, but it still works very well and it is used by thousands of people who’d never even think of referring to it as ‘networking’.
Sometimes these more social networks can be born out of business like situations, but even still it’s hard to class them as ‘career orientated’. Take things like thriving underground music cultures, particularly evident in the rave scene, communities of people drawn together out of a passion for music and a desire to stage events for people with a similar outlook. The existence of many successful underground dance events owes everything to a dedicated network, and whilst there may be some nice little earners along the way, this isn’t the main incentive or point to organising such an event. It’s the same for many other diverse interests too, like the booming underground metal scene of the late 80’s, built up by many passionate individuals who circulated and traded tapes they’d made of bands who didn’t always have record company backing (appropriately referred to as the ‘tape-trading’ scene). This wasn’t at all business minded, it would have cost a fresh faced tape trader the price of a tape, envelope and stamp to send their bundle of riffs to another like-minded music fan somewhere else across the globe, with only the promise of someone else’s compilation swinging by their way in the near future to show for it (which sounds worth it to me, to be honest!). This stands as a prime example of a thriving, non-career centred network.
I can fully understand the need for networking within a business environment and the important results it can yield, but I don’t think human contact is necessarily driven by, nor relies on financial gain or the need to further one’s own career.
“The essential point of networking is human contact. Business has killed networking by making it something for the career orientated person.”
Personally, I’d disagree with this statement. Whilst networking is obviously an essential part of business, it allows companies to expand their reach and for individuals working in business to find and meet more people, I think networking can exist outside of business altogether and for many more reasons than purely financial gain. For example, during fresher’s week at university, students visit bars, clubs, etc. in order to meet new people and therefore gain more from their experience at university in a new city. This in itself could be called networking, even though it yields no monetary rewards (it’s probably actually quite damaging for the bank account, along with the liver), but it’s a prime opportunity to meet new friends and gain more life experiences. This style of social networking may not be as efficient, precise or structured as the kind employed by a business, but it still works very well and it is used by thousands of people who’d never even think of referring to it as ‘networking’.
Sometimes these more social networks can be born out of business like situations, but even still it’s hard to class them as ‘career orientated’. Take things like thriving underground music cultures, particularly evident in the rave scene, communities of people drawn together out of a passion for music and a desire to stage events for people with a similar outlook. The existence of many successful underground dance events owes everything to a dedicated network, and whilst there may be some nice little earners along the way, this isn’t the main incentive or point to organising such an event. It’s the same for many other diverse interests too, like the booming underground metal scene of the late 80’s, built up by many passionate individuals who circulated and traded tapes they’d made of bands who didn’t always have record company backing (appropriately referred to as the ‘tape-trading’ scene). This wasn’t at all business minded, it would have cost a fresh faced tape trader the price of a tape, envelope and stamp to send their bundle of riffs to another like-minded music fan somewhere else across the globe, with only the promise of someone else’s compilation swinging by their way in the near future to show for it (which sounds worth it to me, to be honest!). This stands as a prime example of a thriving, non-career centred network.
I can fully understand the need for networking within a business environment and the important results it can yield, but I don’t think human contact is necessarily driven by, nor relies on financial gain or the need to further one’s own career.
Saturday 17 May 2008
Final Thoughts On Flash
So, after finishing off my project on Flash and spending a few days enjoying the sun, I'm starting to think about solidifying my reasons for thinking Audio Visual is the best option for me to go for next year.
Looking back on my Flash project, I'm still very pleased with it considering it's the one of the first big interactive projects I've ever undertaken with Flash. There are a few minor presentation points I think could do with sharpening up, such as when text changes size and appearance when the mouse hovers over it for example. In many cases the text becomes slightly off centre and doesn't look quite as good as it could do. I didn't quite get to grips with Flash well enough to execute some of my ideas as well, but this isn't a total loss as I feel I'll be able to approach any more work done with Flash with more confidence and ability now.
Of all the work I've produced so far, I think the ones I'm definitely most satisfied with were the projects in the first term, that included more filming and editing work. I think continuing in this direction would be the most productive and satisfying route for me to take, but I still need to give this a little more thought.
Looking back on my Flash project, I'm still very pleased with it considering it's the one of the first big interactive projects I've ever undertaken with Flash. There are a few minor presentation points I think could do with sharpening up, such as when text changes size and appearance when the mouse hovers over it for example. In many cases the text becomes slightly off centre and doesn't look quite as good as it could do. I didn't quite get to grips with Flash well enough to execute some of my ideas as well, but this isn't a total loss as I feel I'll be able to approach any more work done with Flash with more confidence and ability now.
Of all the work I've produced so far, I think the ones I'm definitely most satisfied with were the projects in the first term, that included more filming and editing work. I think continuing in this direction would be the most productive and satisfying route for me to take, but I still need to give this a little more thought.
Paint The Town Red!
I recently had a go at some wall art at one of my friend's houses on his back wall. Here are the results -
I drew the perilous demon, the little rabbit, and Inta Stella Abe was a collaborative effort!
The whole thing was painted onto plaster or something that was flaking off (hence the demon's gaping eyes!) so it can all easily be pulled off.
And here's a cool stop-motion animation I was shown that uses graffiti and wall art, you can see it here!
I drew the perilous demon, the little rabbit, and Inta Stella Abe was a collaborative effort!
The whole thing was painted onto plaster or something that was flaking off (hence the demon's gaping eyes!) so it can all easily be pulled off.
And here's a cool stop-motion animation I was shown that uses graffiti and wall art, you can see it here!
Monday 5 May 2008
Flash! Ahhh-aaahh!
Success! After frantically trying to figure out why my videos weren't working in Flash when I put the box project online, I think I've finally cracked it! I need to go to 'Import video', then upload the film file that's on the Z:\ drive on the uni computers. I'd been doing this before with no luck, but if after this has been done, if I save the whole file as an entirely new one, also on the Z:\ drive, it all seems to work OK!
Here's another very rough prototype version -
http://maeda.ads.ntu.ac.uk/~n0183775/
The Audio and Sight games aren't on this one, I have in fact finished all of the different portions and segments of the project, but these are saved on a file that's currently sat on my laptop at home...d'oh! I'll copy the completed file onto my memory stick and come in and get it all sorted out tomorow, and then my project should be finished!
Here's another very rough prototype version -
http://maeda.ads.ntu.ac.uk/~n0183775/
The Audio and Sight games aren't on this one, I have in fact finished all of the different portions and segments of the project, but these are saved on a file that's currently sat on my laptop at home...d'oh! I'll copy the completed file onto my memory stick and come in and get it all sorted out tomorow, and then my project should be finished!
Tuesday 29 April 2008
Nostril!
Here's an idea of how the 'nose' mini-game in my box project will look -
And here's the original sketch -
And off I go to craft this nose on Flash!
And here's the original sketch -
And off I go to craft this nose on Flash!
AV Presentation
Here are the slides for the presentation on a practitioner for the tutorial -
It's felt a little like two steps forward and three steps back with Flash today, as John helped out and showed me some handy hints, like how to make links change colour as you move the mouse over them and add videos, and I've managed to make things look a little better, but now whenever I upload the SWF file and try and play it, it refuses to show the video and says there's some kind of error...Yet the Flash file works perfectly if I preview it in Flash, and if I drag and drop the file into my internet browser....I don't have a clue why it's happening, but until I figure it out, I can't really put it up on the blog...
Here it is anyway, though, just to see if anyone watches it and can figure out what I've done wrong!
[Upload your own video]
It's felt a little like two steps forward and three steps back with Flash today, as John helped out and showed me some handy hints, like how to make links change colour as you move the mouse over them and add videos, and I've managed to make things look a little better, but now whenever I upload the SWF file and try and play it, it refuses to show the video and says there's some kind of error...Yet the Flash file works perfectly if I preview it in Flash, and if I drag and drop the file into my internet browser....I don't have a clue why it's happening, but until I figure it out, I can't really put it up on the blog...
Here it is anyway, though, just to see if anyone watches it and can figure out what I've done wrong!
[Upload your own video]
Sunday 27 April 2008
Brained!
Here's an attempt at making the 'Brain' area of my box project -
The Avatar from the last project is in the centre, and then around the sides I'm going to place the other items and pixelation projects.
The Avatar from the last project is in the centre, and then around the sides I'm going to place the other items and pixelation projects.
Mouthing Off...
Here's another idea for how the Mouth mini-game in my Box project will work -
Once you've opened up the head, click on the mouth to go the interactive segment. This one is slightly different than the one in my sketch, as when you click the burger I lunge in and take a bite. At the moment I think this looks a little clumsy, I wanted the image to flash up quickly and then disappear without having to be clicked, but it's a little too fast at the moment. As the 'eat' picture repeats a few times, you can get a reasonable view of it, but the final 'eaten!' picture is way too brief.
If there's any way of putting time lapses on things in Flash that'd be perfect, I think, but I may be getting a little ahead of myself here as I'm still very much in the first early stages of figuring out Flash!
Once you've opened up the head, click on the mouth to go the interactive segment. This one is slightly different than the one in my sketch, as when you click the burger I lunge in and take a bite. At the moment I think this looks a little clumsy, I wanted the image to flash up quickly and then disappear without having to be clicked, but it's a little too fast at the moment. As the 'eat' picture repeats a few times, you can get a reasonable view of it, but the final 'eaten!' picture is way too brief.
If there's any way of putting time lapses on things in Flash that'd be perfect, I think, but I may be getting a little ahead of myself here as I'm still very much in the first early stages of figuring out Flash!
Thursday 24 April 2008
Severe Facial Reconstruction
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Here's another attempt at a vague outline for the face. I still haven't quite figured out how to remove or resize borders, but it's getting there!
Opening Up The Face
Finally, Flash has finished downloading! Only took about 8 hours or so...!
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A very crude first attempt at making my face open it's eye and mouth once clicked. This wasn't too tricky to do after studying the code for the quiz for a little bit, after a few attempts I could actually figure out what mistakes I'd made this time and rectify them.
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A very crude first attempt at making my face open it's eye and mouth once clicked. This wasn't too tricky to do after studying the code for the quiz for a little bit, after a few attempts I could actually figure out what mistakes I'd made this time and rectify them.
Hey Ho, Logo!
Here are the results of a nice little logo based pencil storm -
I think this one came out really well, I was trying to make it look like the text you get on the front of Jefferson Airplane albums and in Robert Crumb comics, and I think it looks pretty cool. I really like the idea of using a vaguely psychedelic logo, to fit with the surreal theme of the interactive games.
This one is OK, I'm not entirely pleased with it. I just wanted to try out logos that had more than three letters in them, as unfortunately my name doesn't lend itself enormously well to intricate, crazy lettering.
I tried to make the letters look like rooted, gnarly old trees here, but I don't think the Z is quite clear enough. I like the spindly, aged look it gives the letters however.
This one's kinda cool, I was trying to make it look like the band Carcass' logo -
I like the idea of recognised logos saying something different, as it's a little subversive but at the same time seems to being paying homage to it's source inspiration. Carcass were one of the first death metal bands I ever got into, and as I view my interest in music and especially metal as an extremely major part of my life, it'd be cool to include it here. However, I'm not sure that using someone else's logo as the main one for this project is an enormously good idea, and I also didn't do an enormously good job of the lettering. The E is hard to make out, and it looks like there's a T in there, making it 'Ketz'. Back to the drawing board perhaps?
Like the previous logo, this one was an attempt at spoofing a band logo, this time it's Obituary's -
The big problem here is that the symmetry, a big part of what makes this logo so effective, is totally lost when it's reduced to just three letters....which, I probably should have guessed before I drew it out...ah well!
This one was another attempt at making the logo a little more interesting than just my own name, and seeing how other words would fit around it. I don't think the lettering here is too great at tall, but it'll give me some idea of how it could look!
Once again, any more ideas will be put up on here!
Boxing Clever
Here are some of my ideas for the box project -
The 'box' is actually a large cartoon version of my own head. It's shown in the above doodle with it's eyes and mouth wide open, but I actually think the idea would be better if you're greeted by the drawing with it's eyes and mouth and shut, and then once it's been clicked, my scalp disappears to reveal a brain and the eyes and mouth open up. After this, the eyes, ears, nose and mouth will all lead to little interactive segments, and a careful click of the cortex yields my Avatar, pixellation, and some of the items I'd put in my moodboard.
The Mouth!
This idea is pretty simple, it basically just involves clicking on the burger to take repeated bites of it, until the whole thing is devoured, at which point you'll return back to the main screen.
The Ear!
Again, a pretty straightforward idea, where you click the guitar to let a beautiful chord ring out, and the musical note is sent into a nearby ear, causing it's owner great happiness.
The Nose!
Here, you're confronted by the sight of a character with an enormous nose, and you can either watch him bask in the luscious scent of a nice flower, or recoil in horror when faced with a particularly unpleasant waste disposal unit...the choice is yours!
Then, after the frivolity of these four senses (I should probably think of an idea for a game for Touch too, to involve all five), you can enter into -
The Brain!
Here you'll find things like the Avatar, pixellation projects, and some items I consider to have great personal value.
A Flash Of Inspiration
I've recently been playing the game Wario Ware, on the Nintendo Wii. The game consists of a large number of small, surreal mini-games which are frantically hurled at you, giving you a matter of seconds to figure out what you have to do, and then do it! The tasks you have to perform in each mini-game range from the mundane to the bizarre, after playing the game for about 5 minutes you could have already popped an old lady's false teeth back in, tuned a guitar, picked a nose, run a marathon, shook hands with a dog, or, even better, made Mario jump on top of a Goomba...! It's a very obscure, frantic experience, but one that is never less than hilarious. Recommended for large groups of people, as the multiplayer mode that has up to 12 people passing a single remote between them and using it in a variety of strange ways to play the games is good fun!
I liked the idea of small games that make pointless or everyday tasks seem surreal, exciting and funny, so I thought about how I could make similar small interactive games on Flash.
Once I think of some more ideas for this project, I'll post them up on here!
I'm trying to download a trial version of Flash from the Adobe website, but it's taking forever...after two hours it's still only at 17% done! If it's not up and running by tomorrow, I'll head into the Waverly building and see if I can make basic structure for the box/head!
The 'box' is actually a large cartoon version of my own head. It's shown in the above doodle with it's eyes and mouth wide open, but I actually think the idea would be better if you're greeted by the drawing with it's eyes and mouth and shut, and then once it's been clicked, my scalp disappears to reveal a brain and the eyes and mouth open up. After this, the eyes, ears, nose and mouth will all lead to little interactive segments, and a careful click of the cortex yields my Avatar, pixellation, and some of the items I'd put in my moodboard.
The Mouth!
This idea is pretty simple, it basically just involves clicking on the burger to take repeated bites of it, until the whole thing is devoured, at which point you'll return back to the main screen.
The Ear!
Again, a pretty straightforward idea, where you click the guitar to let a beautiful chord ring out, and the musical note is sent into a nearby ear, causing it's owner great happiness.
The Nose!
Here, you're confronted by the sight of a character with an enormous nose, and you can either watch him bask in the luscious scent of a nice flower, or recoil in horror when faced with a particularly unpleasant waste disposal unit...the choice is yours!
Then, after the frivolity of these four senses (I should probably think of an idea for a game for Touch too, to involve all five), you can enter into -
The Brain!
Here you'll find things like the Avatar, pixellation projects, and some items I consider to have great personal value.
A Flash Of Inspiration
I've recently been playing the game Wario Ware, on the Nintendo Wii. The game consists of a large number of small, surreal mini-games which are frantically hurled at you, giving you a matter of seconds to figure out what you have to do, and then do it! The tasks you have to perform in each mini-game range from the mundane to the bizarre, after playing the game for about 5 minutes you could have already popped an old lady's false teeth back in, tuned a guitar, picked a nose, run a marathon, shook hands with a dog, or, even better, made Mario jump on top of a Goomba...! It's a very obscure, frantic experience, but one that is never less than hilarious. Recommended for large groups of people, as the multiplayer mode that has up to 12 people passing a single remote between them and using it in a variety of strange ways to play the games is good fun!
I liked the idea of small games that make pointless or everyday tasks seem surreal, exciting and funny, so I thought about how I could make similar small interactive games on Flash.
Once I think of some more ideas for this project, I'll post them up on here!
I'm trying to download a trial version of Flash from the Adobe website, but it's taking forever...after two hours it's still only at 17% done! If it's not up and running by tomorrow, I'll head into the Waverly building and see if I can make basic structure for the box/head!
Thursday 17 April 2008
Erase A Head...
Here's a very, VERY rough 3D version of the head idea for the box project.
The 'stuff' flying out of his head would be all the objects inside the box, kinda bursting out of his cranium. His face looks pretty daft at the moment, but I've still got a lot of work to do to him! I'm not even sure if this is the idea I'm gonna pursue yet, but I thought drawing it out in 3D might help me get a better picture of it.
The 'stuff' flying out of his head would be all the objects inside the box, kinda bursting out of his cranium. His face looks pretty daft at the moment, but I've still got a lot of work to do to him! I'm not even sure if this is the idea I'm gonna pursue yet, but I thought drawing it out in 3D might help me get a better picture of it.
Quizmania!
I finished making a little quiz using Flash in uni today -
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This was pretty satisfying, as I went from being totally bemused by Flash to catching a fleeting glimpse of how it all works and fits together. Hopefully once I get hold of a copy of it I'll be able to get to grips with it even more.
[Upload your own video]
This was pretty satisfying, as I went from being totally bemused by Flash to catching a fleeting glimpse of how it all works and fits together. Hopefully once I get hold of a copy of it I'll be able to get to grips with it even more.
Thursday 10 April 2008
Thinking Outside The Box!
Mmmm, a nice, mellow Easter break has come to an end, and it's back up to the fine city of Nottingham for more work and mayhem!
I sketched out a couple of really, really rough ideas for the box project. At the moment, these vague concepts are -
- the back of a truck, and a suitcase, to make it seem more like the objects contained inside are portable and active, rather than just heirlooms sat inside an old dusty box.
- erm, the inside of my mouth, or sat inside my recently lobotomized skull, to tie in to the identities project and to give the impression that the objects are actually a part of myself.
And here they are -
At this stage these ideas are all just in embryonic forms, but as they progress I'll post them on here.
I sketched out a couple of really, really rough ideas for the box project. At the moment, these vague concepts are -
- the back of a truck, and a suitcase, to make it seem more like the objects contained inside are portable and active, rather than just heirlooms sat inside an old dusty box.
- erm, the inside of my mouth, or sat inside my recently lobotomized skull, to tie in to the identities project and to give the impression that the objects are actually a part of myself.
And here they are -
At this stage these ideas are all just in embryonic forms, but as they progress I'll post them on here.
Thursday 6 March 2008
The Longest Day Of The Year
Here's the avatar moving about with the environment -
This time round, I tried to make each of the heads have their own individual time to move in, so it gives the viewer space to see what each one is doing, rather than just a flurry of fluctuating faces. The Super Ego reacts in time with the Sun setting, keeping a watchful eye over it's environment. Once the Sun sets, this sends the Id wild, before the Ego calms them both down and readies the Vessel for another voyage. Meanwhile, the Soul keeps surveying it's surroundings with childlike wonder...
I'm also happy with using Stonehenge as the environment for the Avatar, because it holds multiple meanings for me. On a more scientific, universal level, having the Sun and Moon rotate around it shows the passing of time, and the Avatar remaining constant and whole through this process. It also represents a sacred site, one that is shrouded in mystery and obscurity, yet also a place of worship, and a mutual meeting ground to celebrate the longest day of the year. I really like the connotations of community, humanity, passion and achievement that Stonehenge brings, and, on a personal level this time, it has many fond memories attached to it. I used to live very near to Stonehenge, and as such it represents a part of the Earth that I spent many of my formulative years in, which is something I'm very pleased to be able to pay tribute to with my Avatar. Plus, many a good time has been had at the various Summer Solstices, watching the stars and dancing amongst the stones with all manner of glowing, positive people. The Sun and Moon and general blackness in the background suggest space, the galaxy, universe and infinity, which puts my Avatar and it's various aspects of self in perspective quite nicely.
The Ego -
The Id -
The Super Ego -
The Vessel And The Soul -
My Avatar -
Finally, here's a tiny tribute to the beautiful sounds that have guided me through tonight's work -
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