Monday 28 April 2014

Photography Evaluation


this idea of taking my film 13 which i proposed at the film pitch i was glued to this idea and after speaking to Rosie how i would take this idea further and develop it through my photography, so i came up with the concept of having these five images in a Ken Burns effect using transitions and effects to portray 5 different visual surroundings of how 13 sees things through effects such as a pixel, 2 thermal styles, a x ray style and an glitchy scanner style. So basically this piece is about 13 a robot and how he visualises things in five different styles. i wanted to make this piece more personal so i decided to take photos of my family and use these as the final five as this would be more effective then just having photos of random people. however the only downside to this project was not getting in enough feedback sessions and should've have proberly done a more in depth artist research and more experiments. however after installing my piece and seeing it properly displayed i am happy with the outcome and believe that when viewing this piece you would easily get what its about. as i wanted to incorporate effects in this piece rather then just having it displayed as photos which would've been bit plain and boring. overall i am pleased with the outcome and how it turned out.

Photographers and Experiments

Erick Johansson - photographer who uses photography as a  way of collecting material to realise the ideas in his mind.

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Nick Veasey - a photographer who works with x - ray and scientific equipment to create unusual imagery


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Linda Alterwitz- an artist that uses a camera that detects radiant heat instead of light uncovering hidden thermal signatures in every day life

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Film Predator using the thermal style of this as an inspiration

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link below is to a wikipedia page about Ken Burns
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Burns_effect


basically i knew what i wanted the five photographs to look like so i researched online and found specific photographers and artist and film inspirations that work with these media such as x ray, thermal, photo manipulations and photographic transitions. the first photographer i found Erick Johannson uses manipulation to create a somewhat surreal image, the second being Nick Veasey using scientific equipment to produce his weird photographs the third being Linda who uses thermal cameras to produce unique and different photographs the forth being from the film Predator and how this thermal style appeals to me, and also stumbled across the ken burns effects. below are some of my own experimental photographs and tryouts of these methods too see how if they would work to portray 13 POV.

 these are some of the photos which i had taken and some of which i have manipulated as you will see below
however i admit some of these photos are pretty shit quality but it was just experiments to see weather the desired effects would work or not.





 taken outside my bedroom window
capturing peoples movements

the tunnel leading to my flat which i admit are blurred and not good photographs but again these were just experimental tryouts.




 these are the experiments which i had done in relation to replicating the Linda work which i believe works and can be pulled off as one of 13 visual pov.
 this tryout is of rob a fellow class pupil trying to show how 13 would see his surroundings  and how he would see human beings trying out weather this effect would work for one of the final images which i believe does but would have to make it more realistic and noticeable to get a realistic looking x ray effect so the viewers would know what effect this is.





Group Film Evaluation

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Overall i think this project has been an fun and exciting experience and getting to work with Lauren, Josh and Lydia has been a good experience to work with motivated individuals.. as we as a whole group were very committed and motivated at all times to create a professional looking film. i feel my work has improved and i have gained a lot more info about the technical sides of film and lightings through the different workshops which we had and the creative writing tasks and the experimental films that we had watched has definitely broaden my mind about films in general and what goes in to making an effective and professional looking film. 

the screening of our film was a success and we as a group were happy with the comments and feedbacks which we got in all it was positive. i feel that we as a group equally came together and produced a successful film with inputs from each group member to convey the message of how people change when moving away from home. however i could've of spoken more during the screening of the film being a producer i believe i should've talked a bit about the filming process but thought Josh and Lauren had pretty much spoken about all the key aspects when filming. having learnt from this i need to be more social in terms of getting my own opinions and experience across rather then delegating it to other group members. 


Photography- using photoshop


using photoshop to manipulate the five images - how i did each photograph.
this thermal image i started by adding/applying a hue/saturation, then duplicated the image and then added a filter blur. I then set the blending mode to overlay then merged the layers together, i then duplicated the layer and applied another filter blur setting the blending mode to overlay and merging again. i created a new layer and filled it with white setting this blending mode to overlay and not merging it. i created another new layer and set a dark blue background and added a filter clouds and set the blending mode to overlay and opacity on this layer to 57%. created another new layer again and filled it with white setting blending mode of this layer to difference final step i duplicated the background layer moved this layer to second from top under white layer and set blending mode to darken to gain the above effect.

for the x ray effect i opened the original photo and duplicated it then removed the colour of the image by inverting it. and increased the shadow of the image. then opened the a skull image from the internet and moved it in front of the photo and positioned it accurately within the faces. and reduced the opacity of the skull to 40% and added a colour overlay and duplicated the layer and then added a filter blur and invoked the image to get the greenish x ray look.

for the pixelated effect i first duplicated the background layer, then added a mosaic pixel effect. then added a layer mask then using a brush revealed parts of the face i wanted to show and lowered the opacity of this layer to 75% to create this effect.  

for this second thermal effect i used a quick selection tool and selected the person then added a gradient map and merged the layers then added a hue and saturation then added a filter noise simple yet effective process.


for this scanned line effect i first created a new small document and made it 2by2 pixels then got the pencil tool and painted the top two pixels black. leaving the bottom transparent. then made this in to a pattern. i opened the image and dragged the pattern i made over the image setting the blending mode to multiply to create this scanned/ TV look a easy process to make a photograph interesting and effective.


Sunday 27 April 2014

photography final five images

1st visual look Thermal
2nd visual look TV glitch 
3rd visual look X-RAY


4th visual look pixilated 
5th visual look infra red thermal 


original 

original

original

original
original







The five images at the very top of the page are the edited versions of the 5 originals photos. whilst thinking and doing research and looking back the unit brief and how this project is about reflections and looking back at old memories/ looking towards the future i decided to make this project a bit personal and take photos of my family and edit these in different styles to show 13 the robot from my film proposal sees his surroundings how things would look from 13 POV point of view.

to make these more effective and interesting rather than just having photos when presenting i will have these five images animated in their appropriated styles for example the x ray photo i will animate that having this photo fuzzing the pixilated photo i will have this one pixilated with the squares moving, the thermal i will have this in a sort of radiated look. the coloured thermal i will have this with the colours changing and final the TV glitch this will be animated with that similar effect from our R.A.M title sequence all these effects to show 13 POV point of view, this will be done in after effects and will have exported as a MOV file so it can be presented on the screen.

Group Film Role - Producer

this is the story board in which the director had asked me to draw up.




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i know its in the wrong order and that actual storyboards are not supposed to be in this order but it was just a quick sketch to show this video would look like.
and how Lauren the director liked and was on board with my idea in using a green screen to portray peoples memories and how she liked my idea of the video being in the  layout it is currently in.

Group Film- Video editing

the editing process of the video was one of the most stressful due to gathering the donated clips from the people we interviewed and taking it in after effects to do the green screen due to how some of the clips which we had filmed we had some heavy exposed light on some people and when it came to editing these heavy exposed clips would turn out crackled in after effects which was hard to get around.  and another was arranging these clips in the right order for the film to make sense for the viewers.
as josh is the editor of the film but we all came together as a group and edited to get the process done quicker with inputs from each of us. 


tom interview putting his donated clip in the background 



edri using the key light in after effects to fix the green screen


charlie- arranging her clip in the time line of the film



using audition to produce the voice over for the film taking out key words from each interviews

photography final images

screen shot

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this is screen shot of my final photography images, when presenting my final 5 i wanted something different and simple yet effective because the idea behind my photography is about robot 13 from my film and how he sees/ visualises his surroundings and how things would look so i decided to animate my images in after effects and present them as a animated piece as it is a digital piece. so i decided to portray the following styles an x ray, two different thermal images and a pixalited and an glitchy tv style looks.

Photography idea

my original idea was to have five photos of different people and present them in an portrait style making the peoples faces up of lots of different photos similar to that of the film the next three days.the-next-three-days-movie-poster.jpg

however when i spoke to Rosie about this idea she said it was similar to that of the immersion unit and didn't have any relation to the theme memories. when in our next chat she gave me an idea to somehow use my film idea 13 which i proposed and use this as an photography idea as i am passionate about this idea and wanted to take this idea further within my photography.

Photography Workshop

Playing with light

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in this session we experimented with different lighting and the basics of flash studio lighting and how to operate the equipment. and we practiced how to change lights to replicate the above Steve Jobs photograph. we used studio lighting and a reflector board to create an evenly lit background and a heavy shadow on the right side of the face to recreate the above photograph. below is our recreated photographic using fellow pupil tori.

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we learnt how to operate various types of equipment such as soft box, diffuser and beauty dish using these equipment to create different lightings. the soft box which we used made a soft light. just as the other lights would create different moods.

Friday 11 April 2014

Sound Induction

Future Sessions!

Session 1 (31st Jan): Introduction to Experimental Sound!
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Session 2 (7th February): Location Recording!
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Session 3 (14th February): Studio Recording & Foley!
 - Room G23. - 5 Groups!
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Session 4 (21st February): Tracklaying in Adobe Audition!
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Session 5 (28th February): Editing in Adobe Audition!
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Session 6 (7th March): Mixing in Adobe Audition!
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Session 7 (14th March): Working Session!


quote below i had to put mention as Walter Murch is one my favorites editors.
‘Humble sounds had always been considered the 
inevitable accompaniment of the visual — stuck like 
an insubstantial, submissive shadow to the object 
that "caused" them’.

Walter Murch, 2000


Technical Standards!
•  24 Bit Resolution 
•  48 kHz Sample Rate 
•  Mixed to -10 dbfs 
•  Recorded as .WAV or .BWF (PCM) 
•  Submitted as a Quicktime (.mov) file !- format in which we had to export it to. told in our first sound lesson.

Links and notes/ project planning

http://www.lynda.com/After-Effects-tutorials/After-Effects-CS6-Essential-Training/97575-2.html

http://prezi.com/c6eebs69epsg/visual-effects/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

http://prezi.com/gcj01lxlqdto/after-effects-overview/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

http://www.lynda.com/After-Effects-CS5-tutorials/apprentice-series-advanced-animation/78545-2.html


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxrjsHSbHkY&feature=share&list=PLC35E6010877A7A6B&index=1

project planning

http://prezi.com/xva74aclnnsp/time-art/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

these are all links such project planning after effects key framing and animating a still which we covered in our earlier classes with Simon before the xmas break.





Further Reading /Related Sounds

these are links to articles to artists we have looked at in our classes as one article in particular the Walter Murch article has given me a more understanding to how sounds work within films.


http://filmsound.org/murch/stretching.htm

http://www.creativetourist.com/articles/art/sheffield/inside-the-circle-of-fire-a-sheffield-sound-map/

http://thewire.co.uk/in-writing/columns/nick-cain-on-florian-hecker_s-chimerization

Process


taking the trains that i wanted to use i have taken them in to illustrator and outlined the trains as this would be easier to animate in after effects having spoken to simon. below are the finished outlines.


below are the the interiors and railways which i have chosen to use for these certain trains. the first two being the futuristic design taking reference from the HS2 how there planning on building railways through country sides. the third and fourth images being the present train layout and the fifth and sixth  images depicting the past.
                                                                                                                                                                           



Final video / Evaluation

my time art final piece i am ok with but not entirely pleased or happy with due to how visually its not what i had in mind to look like and how its not clear and pixilated.  being an after effects project and having done tutorials with simon and having looked online i still found it difficult to try and get it the way i visualised it, as i wanted to try and get a similar look to that of the film the third and the seventh which simon had shown us during one of our classes.
as in after effects i tried to produce a similar looking feel to my film of course of which did not work out.
how within my video i wanted to portray how trains over time have changed from the old to new to adapt to todays world and error.
if we had a chance to redo or remake our time art video i would have used more tutorial times with Simon and would of have made this video another way by using matte paintings for the backgrounds as  Photoshop is my strong point and would have proberley depicted the trains in an cartoon style similar to that of Thomas time art and would have kept it simple, As the final video which i have submitted  i am not happy about it.


Development /research

i had to consider the types of trains and time periods which i wanted to portray within my time art film.
and what time periods interested me, as this was the feedback i got from some of my fellow pupils and tutor.

so having researched online i came across this link below of different train types and different functions of various trains.


however having found this link and constantly going on it. i wanted to go for the old victorian times and depict one of the trains from this error to show the vast progression of change in style and aesthetics. 

i will use modern trains from today. but the issue which i had to consider when talking to simon about was the concept of future and how trains will have aesthetically and visually changed, however after speaking to simon he told me about this HS2 in which i decided to look at.

HS2 being a planned high-speed railway between London Euston, the English Midlands, North West England, Yorkshire, and potentially North East England and the Central Belt of Scotland. 

taking in consideration could this be the possible future.

possible future below