View on page for MAR 340 web final
Stop-motion animated short, shot with digital still camera, edited in Final Cut. The scenes were unplanned, but premeditated in an ambiguous way, and shot on location in the Ceretana grain elevator. My main character was modified by destroying his antique authenticity with flexible copper to be able to animate him. The audio is from the LP soundtrack to Once Upon a Time in the West, composed by Ennio Morricone, titled The Man.
Final project open assignment. This was an experiment in stop-motion. The process was filmed, then still frames were captured and composed in Final Cut. Audio was used from a previous recording of the V-Tech Little Smart Talking Spelling Book.
Project 2 open assignment. Audio clips recorded and processed in Peak, scanned plant material and photos manipulated in Photoshop. From that source material, both audio and images were filtered, effected and composed in Adobe After Effects.
Aiming to create an audio and visual environment (or scape, to pun the plant stalk), I tried new techniques to take concepts I have been developing (ex. Tricycle or even earlier with Zahlen) in audio and visual interaction to another level in my work.
I wanted the audio to interact directly with the video, rather than simply reflecting similar changes. In order for this to work, audio layers were made to relate with corresponding video layers and both were filtered and effected with precisely the same keyframes; visual effects are linked directly to audio effects. For example, while a video filter (ex. saturation) was applied to a visual layer, an audio filter (ex. high pass EQ) was applied to its corresponding sound layer, and both were changed at the same rate, amount and moments in time. Opacity related to volume for all layers.
Project 1 open assignment. Edited in Final Cut Studio Pro:
A mismatching of images and audio sourced from public domain films from archive.org, which happened to be sex education films in this case, but had nothing directly to do with the final subject matter. My intention was to play with the idea of communication, while experimenting with styles and techniques possible with basic editing.
More on artistic interpretation:
I wanted an abstract piece that explored several different techniques of manipulating sourced film, however I also wanted it to hold some continuity. I feel I accomplished this by breaking it into different scenes, separated with a repeating and continuous element. For this, I used a video from an artist sculpting the bust of Abe Lincoln, and edited out every moment in which he or his hands appeared in the frame. A music clip from a Moog record, Switched on Nashville, backed these clips.
I wanted to thread the video together with the concept of communication, or mis-communication rather. Manipulating and mis-matching audio and images lent to this topic. The different scenes, each utilizing a different technique, were each commenting on different ideas involving communication.
Scene 1: One man sits awkwardly in silence as the other introduces the film, setting the mood and explaining what you’re in for. “Some of you may become somewhat uncomfortable as parts of this film unfold.”
Scene 2: The lady has something to say, but is having trouble expressing herself. “Everybody, we should talk, today!”
Scene 3: Typical of teenage female communication; they yap at high speed, consumed with the importance of what they are saying, but to anyone unfortunate enough to be in ear-shot, it amounts only to a high-pitched cacophony of indistinguishable jabber.
Scene 4: Two persons talking directly with each-other, but coming nowhere close to a logical conclusion or common understanding, in fact only pretending to make sense of what the other is saying.
Scene 5: We can see him talk, we can hear him talk, but we have no clue what he’s saying, and really could care less.
Scene 6: The wise old lady provides the conclusion. “Normal, powerful, mis-information and wrong attitudes that are all around us.”
Bugaboo.
Processed in Adobe After Effects, mixed in Final Cut Studio. Audio recorded and processed in Peak.
I had previously composed a project in a Music Technology class, in which all of the sounds were sourced from this same toy. i wanted to further the concept by sourcing the images from it as well. I reused the small library of processed sounds that I had, and recomposed the audio to work side by side with the images.
This project was an exploration of a number of techniques and ideas I hoped to (and have continued to) utilize in many further projects.
Assignment: Create a short 3D animation. Include animated text.
I used a Webdings font in a text “path” and figured out how to use multiple nested compositions to achieve the result of these faces turning around 3D cubes.
While the main objective was to achieve a simple aesthetic result while becoming more comfortable in 3D, I was also hoping to present symbols and emotion for interpretation by the viewer.
The sound is a snippet from Mort Garson & Jacques Wilson’s “The Zodiac Cosmic Sounds” LP.
:: :: I hopefully fixed the problem some of you were having with video. If not, you might try updating your Quicktime player, and let me know if that does the trick. If anyone is still having problems, please let me know. thanx! 78speed@gmail.com ride ‘em cowboy! :: ::
HOW TO WALTZ
Assignment: Create a 10 second animation using image masks, and what we had learned thus far with the software. Created in Adobe After Effects. This was intended for the splash page / intro to the Vintage Vinyl Revival web site, when I get that running some day.
The sounds are from the How to Waltz LP. I animated the dance step diagrams from the instruction manual of the same record. The 3D background is of some of my 78 rpm discs.
CHANNEL SURFING
Assignment: Similar to Project 1, but rather than still images, use provided moving clips to create a story/motion design with some element of narration. I had fun fiddling with and abstracting the video, which I mismatched with audio sampled from my records, (who would have guessed?) and from the movie “UHF.”
Here’s the first video post. Over the next few days and weeks, I’ll be uploading the digital design projects I’ve created so far for the Media Arts (MAR) program at the U of M, starting chronologically from a few semesters ago with 111 - fundamentals of Media Arts Production. Old news for some of you.
ZAHLEN
Assignment : to create a story/motion design from provided still images and include some sort of narrative or spoken element. I distorted the stock images beyond recognition in Photoshop and mashed them together to create moving textures in After Effects. I was working with the idea of that which is foreign or unrecognizable, and was going for a “W.T.F.?” to provoke a variety of reactions. I took the audio from an old german language record and cut it up to make it even more foreign and nonsense-ical.
The text translates loosely:
This is a fundamental course in colloquial speech. It’s notable that with this method you will achieve: correct pronunciation of what you wish to say, and a clear understanding of what you hear.
zahlen = numbers
