Stop Motion Photo Montage - Example.

Well, looks like word has got out about my outcome as it has CLEARLY inspired OK Go music video 'WTF'.

Well not exactly but I had the trailing-thing idea for the photos (or whatever you would like to call it) already written down in my sketchbook. Sigh, I must stop inspiring all these people!

(For the record I realize people can get the same ideas, it just I thought of this all by myself before they did it! The swines.)

Here's the video, and I kindly ask that while you watch it, grit your teeth together and shake your clenched fists at them on my behalf. Cheers.

Jamie

Don't you just love Google?

In particular, the books section, where you can read (some of the) books online?

Follow these links to two reads I'm flicking through for my Film Noir Outcome:

Film Noir: Berlin to Sin City By Mark Bould (2005).

http://books.google.com/books?id=enmJR4LclVIC&printsec=frontcover&dq=film+noir+books&ei=eEwyS5fFMZuMygSQzNS4AQ&client=safari&cd=3#v=onepage&q=film%20noir%20books&f=false

Film Noir By Alan Silver, James Ursini and Paul Duncan (2004)

http://books.google.com/books?id=MRf4Rh_4kOgC&printsec=frontcover&dq=film+noir+books&ei=eEwyS5fFMZuMygSQzNS4AQ&client=safari&cd=1#v=onepage&q=film%20noir%20books&f=false

Film Noir - Contextual Awareness.

I recently finished reading Amelia's essay on gender and feminism called:

"Do you agree with Jeffreys (2005) that gendered practices associated with beauty fit the UN’s concept of harmful cultural practices?"

It was a really good read, although I'm not a sociologist and I don't know much about Jeffrey's work, I understood the essay fairly well.

One part I liked in particular and find applicable to my Film Noir short is the part about fashion and appearance:

"The purpose of inducing women to concern themselves with their appearance is to instil a belief that women are defined by their outer appearance (Erdman in Callaghan, 1994). Jeffreys cites Dellinger and Williams: women felt that to lack makeup in the workplace was to appear not ‘credible’ or ‘healthy’ (1997: 151 in Jeffreys, 2005). Silvermann observes that men’s fashion, particularly the suit in the workplace, has become uniform. Whereas women’s fashion has many more fluctuations and possibilities (1986, in Finkelstein, in Davis 1997). This indicates that women must prove their functionality through appearance (Haug 1983), there is no such requirement for men, his functionality is unquestioned. Fashion is often portrayed as being inherently linked with women... Further, many items of women’s fashion are seen to be directly indicative of their personality...Therefore, Valentine’s proposal, that a woman’s appearance reflects her moral worth, seems reasonable (in Callaghan 1994). There does not seem to be any items of male clothing with such explicit connotations, indicating man does not need to prove his morality, suggesting he is regarded to have inherent worth...

...Valentine explains that morality is characterised through compliance and deviation from rules. It has been shown that women’s personalities have been associated with their bodily appearance (Erdman in Callaghan, 1996) and their appearance is controlled by the instigation of rules (primarily in the form of norms). So by controlling women’s bodies, in this way, is to control their personalities (Turner 1984, in Valentine, in Callaghan 1994). Women are obliged to prove their worth through their appearance but this is a fruitless task because the norm presented to women is largely unachievable, so women become preoccupied by a constant striving. Leaving men free to act, make decisions and concern themselves with issues of importance while women’s energies are diverted to the task and role of appearing (Berger n/a in Radner, 1995). However, this oppression commonly goes unnoticed."

So for example with my characters, the pro-tag will only have one set of clothes whilst the female lead will always have a new outfit. And through her outfits, it will connote her self-worth and moral worth as well as her personality. This will be worked more on than the Pro-tag's ensemble, seeing as how Man is commonly linked with mind rather than body, we will be concentrating on the pro-tag's thoughts and ideas - which links in well seeing as he's our narrator. I'm liking that I have these links to my work now, it makes it more justifiable and generally seem better researched (and hopefully more believable).

Big thank you to Amelia for lending me this essay and generally helping with this aspect as it's helped an awful lot for my character structure.

TTFN

Jamie

Where have you been in the past 2 weeks Jamie?

Work placement at Warner Bros. that's what.

Quite cool, typical placement in the sense that they don't set you too much work, but I worked in a nice environment with nice people. Possibly coming back in January as a Runner!

Another book.

Admittedly I didn't read all of this, but in between my tutorials 2 weeks ago, I went to the library for some research. They only had one or two books, but I came across this encloypedia for Film Noir. Fairly useful although I did know many of the key terms already - they didn't have 'MacGuffian' though! Very disappointing. So I re-capped on some certain bits and bobs.

Jamie

Youtube Account.

I thought it might be a good idea to post my youtube account here, so you can watch all the videos I have favourited for my research.

http://www.youtube.com/jamiekyle

Tutorial with Peter Anderson.

I had a tutorial today, Peter generally liked my work and said I have substantial research. But not a lot of visual research/work at all. So here's the list I made during the tutorial that will help me steer into the right direction.

- Explore the medium of film-making - an artist draws everyday, if you're going to be filming, you need to be out there filming.

- Get behind the camera - you need to get a feel for the camera and experiment with it so you know you have used all possible angles/shots/techniques to get your best shot. Your best shot might not be the one you originally thought of.

- More Visual Research.

- Choose a scene, and film it 10 times. This way, similar to point 2, you get to explore all of the scene and what works best.

It was good to get another persons perspective, especially Peter's who has worked on moving image and stop motion animations before, so he knows what he's talking about.

Another few points for myself that I need to do:

- Brothers Grimm Research.

- Animation Research.

- Storyboards for all 3 outcomes.

- Script for Film Noir.

- More location shots.

- Sound test for H & G. Find Narrator.

- Sound in general.

Wish me luck.

Jamie

Film Noir - Social context.

I've re-read another book recently 'Ways Of Seeing' By John Berger. I read this originally during my Foundation year at Chelsea Art College, but when I recapped it a week ago, I really understood more of it.

It's a good read, I recommend it, it talks about gender particularly well, and has some interesting points.

They talk about how Women are made solely to be viewed, and to be born a woman is to be born in the alloted and confined space into the keeping of men. Some quotoes:

" And so she comes to consider the surveyor and the surveyed within her as the two constituent yet always distinct elements of her identity as a woman."

"Men survey women before treating them."

"One might simplify this by saying: men act and women appear. Men look at women,. Women watch themselves being looked at. This determines not only most relations between men and women but also the relation of women to themselves. The surveyor of woman in herself is male: the surveyed female. Thus she turns herself into an object - and most particularly an object of vision: a sight."

These are really good points to consider for my female lead in my Film Noir film, seeing as I'm going for an almost exaggerated character roles for both leads. So to follow these suits for the female would strengthen the character basis very much so.

Jamie