Category Archives: Projects

Project Brief 4 Reflection

Obsession is defined as an idea or thought that continually preoccupies or intrudes on a person’s mind. The over-arching theme for our Project Brief 4 linked all the students’ work together, as well as allowing us to branch off and explore this particular theme through our own interpretation. Initially it was challenging to think of an individual theme to branch off ‘obsession’, as there were so many different paths to go down. Beginning with the idea of balance, with further brainstorming, I finalised my theme to “Gravity”. With this, I wanted to breakdown the perception of gravity, creating illusions with movement, exploring the freedom that flight and slow motion provide, with use of film and digital effects. Vladimir Frieder’s journal article, “Overcoming Gravity: Pushkin on Freedom and Art” had an interesting perspective on comparing gravity to life as he states “the kind of freedom and ease enjoyed by Pushkin do not come easily; they are the result of overcoming the gravity of earthly life, its injustices.” He relates gravity has a sense of stabilisation in one’s life, and I found that very intriguing, as without gravity, everything on Earth would be crazy, and therefore, challenging gravity would create a form of chaos.

Nake Frieder mentions in his journal article, ‘Spectacular Bodies’ (2002) that “the human body has… been a prominent subject of art through almost all its eras and styles” and to execute the idea of gravity, I incorporated the human body as my main subject and worked with a high level tumbler performing gymnastics skills on a sprung floor and trampoline. I utilised this to enhance the idea of movement especially with flight and rotational actions involved with majority of the skills he would perform as the freedom of movement and expression of the dance and art activities allowed [establishment] of homeostasis between self and world. (Rebecca Burrill, 2010). I filmed landscape shots to portray the flight, and some close up shots and mid-shots to highlight the movements of the body, however majority of the work was done using iMovie and Premiere.

Utilising these programs I was able to manipulate the speed, the angles, and the cropping of the footage. By employing slow motion to certain parts of the footage, it allowed the viewer to distinctly observe the multitude of movements occurring, however, I only utilised this editing skill on some parts of the film to maintain the viewer’s attention. To really accentuate the questioning of gravity, some of the film was reversed, played back to front, and I also placed some of the footage upside down and mirrored it against the other screens, as I had 4 small screens within the “Crossbar template” playing at the same time, as that is not able to occur in real life, all movement is in the same time, and whatever comes up, must come down.

Screen Shot 2015-10-20 at 10.35.42 pm

The main issue was the lighting and colouring of the set. However, I was limited to the choices of places to film, as I required certain equipment for the Project Brief to be produced. Therefore, I placed the gymnast in all white clothes to stand out from the accumulation of colours surrounding him, as well as the colour represents light, and purity, adding a sense of freedom of flight to my work. The colours came across dull through my lens and thus, to enhance the idea of freedom and elevation, I manipulated the colours in iMovie to become more saturated and vibrant. The array of colours also worked well into falling into the theme of challenging the perception gravity, as it enhances an abstract, pop culture aesthetic, to make it look a little unreal, as these particular movements do not occur in reality.

Creating the audio was the most challenging part of this Project. There was already so much occurring in the film that I did not want the sound to distract the viewer from the footage and therefore, I manipulated the same spring sound on repeat. However, utilising the program Garageband, I placed the same three audios over the top, and altered one of them to keep a consistent beat through the entire piece and then I manipulated the flex range in order to create an unusual, abstract edit to the audio to enhance the idea of distorted reality in terms of the perception of gravity.

Screen Shot 2015-11-02 at 3.42.29 pm

There were a few disappointments in the screening of my work at Signal, the footage was grainy, one of them was over-exposed, and one did not match up perfectly on the windows. However, overall, I was content with the finishing work for Project Brief 4, as I believe I conveyed my theme across the four pieces of footage and thirty-second audio. The film worked well with representing my theme, portraying the ideas of gravity, freedom and flight, through abstract colours, being obsessed with movement and the distortion of time and speed within my work.

signal exhib

 

References:

1. Burrill, R 2010, ‘The Primacy of Movement in Art Making’. Teaching Artists Journal, vol. 8, no.4, pp. 216-228
2. Frieder, N 2002, ‘Spectacular Bodies’, Leonardo To Now, vol. 35, no.4, pp. 455-457
3. Kantor, V 2000, ‘Overcoming Gravity: Pushkin on Freedom and Art’, Russian Studies in Literature, vol.36, no.1, pp. 50-61

Project Brief 4

Finally, here is my last assignment for media this year, completed. I struggled to create this, with minimal footage and audio tracks, I think I’m happy with what I have made from it. My theme is Movement/gravity, identifying the point of flight and the feeling of freedom when amongst it.

Here are my four 8 second videos, and 30 second audio track:

Project Brief 3

Nowadays the world of art is much more diverse, artists have moved far beyond the traditional art forms of painting, drawing and sculpting into a digital revolution of photography, video formatting and more. The artist we formed a documentary on was Arie Rain Glorie, and his main art medium was video works, installations and curating for other emerging artists. Conducting an interview requires a lot of work. We had to seek permission first by emailing him, and then arranging a suitable time for us to meet to film. Elle, Nicolette and I planned our interview questions before we arrived, researched his work through his website, and then we hired a Canon DSLR, tripods and the Media 1 video recorders to capture our project. Elle and I did the filming and we originally had issues with finding a location to shoot as the photography rooms were locked and classrooms were too noisy. Thus, we decide to film his natural working place, in his studio at RMIT. We set up two cameras, one up-close to represent personal thoughts and emotiveness and the second further away to establish the location and quirks of his personality, such as hand gestures, and the way he works.

Nicolette focused more on the editing, she cut down all the unwanted footage and in class we worked as a group to put all of it together, making decisions on how we wanted to portray Arie, and what we felt was important to present in the documentary. Utilising the program Premiere we put the footage together, and we decided that we would demonstrate his love for the art world, and his sense of “place” within it as a main focus for our film. We utilised his artworks to explain his artistic ability and the way in which he works as well as his time with testing grounds. We had a couple issues with filming, as the camera was on auto-focus and therefore, kept adjusting while filming which caused a lot of distractions. Another was that Arie said “um” quite frequently during the interview and didn’t answer in full sentences, which caused confusion and repetition. Nonetheless, we worked on minimising these issues to being displayed in the documentary with cutting of footage, and putting external photographs and footage over the top of his voice, creating a narrative throughout the documentary.

Arie Rain Glorie is an amazing, introverted artist with so many intricate and creative artworks, as he states he likes to make his work “kind of familiar but the audience wont be able to quite place where it’s come from”. Arie’s work relates to Gaston Bachelard (1969) as he states, “imagination argues the values of reality”. Arie describes art as his lifestyle, it his “constant thought” and he wishes to produce his diverse place of thought of life through his work, especially video works. He is dedicated to the art world, not just as an artist but as a curator as well. He curated a trilogy series entitled “Love/City” which was set up at Testing Grounds. Arie enjoys challenging the place of the traditional art viewing, he wishes to defer from museums and galleries and create a new sense of place for artworks to be displayed and this is why he chose Testing Grounds to view his curated project. This is also accentuated by his work itself, Arie loves working with videos as it allows him to manipulate time, place and space, in which one cannot do with live performance. This also coincides with Michael Jackson’s book, “At Home in the World”, as he expresses that “life cannot be pressed into the service of language”. There is never conversation or narration in his works, he rather communicate his thoughts through art and have the audience decipher their own meaning.

Project Brief 3 was the most challenging so far, I say this as working in group dynamic does allow a little difficulty when it comes to task allocations, finding similar availability to meet up, and you have more people to rely on than just yourself. I have had a lot of trouble with group assignments this year, not one assignment has run along smoothly, and therefore I favour working individually. However, Elle, Nicolette and I worked really well together, and although our timetables clashed we managed to work around it. We assigned tasks to be done by certain dates, and when things, out of our control, did not go according to plan, such as, response from Arie, and extra footage needed to complete the film, we worked cooperatively to solve the issues. Communication within our trio was excellent; we met up at every class, twice outside university, and had a constant group conversation on Facebook. Overall, I am happy with the final result of our assignment and how we reacted to the problems we faced, as we produced an documentary that represented Arie, his work, his creative ability, and his sense of place amongst the art world.

 

References:

Jackson, M 1995, At Home in the world, Duke University Press, Durham, pp. 1-8

Bachelard, G 1969, The Poetics of Space, Beacon Press, Boston

Project Brief 2 | From Here to There

In a city that is over-populated with shops, restaurants, offices, and schools for society to socialise, eat and live within, there are limited parks for these destinations. Car parks are essentially a “place” to leave your car to go to your real “place”, and therefore sparks the question is a car park considered a place or non-place? “If a place can be defined as relational, historical and concerned with identity, then a space which cannot be defined as relational, or historical, or concerned with identity will be a non-place” Marc Auge (1995). Although a car park may contain history with customers, it doesn’t form a significant historical reference or a sense of identity and thus lies the question is a car park considered a place?

The reason we chose to photograph and film this inner city car park was due to the lack of maintenance. Places usually attain some form of respect and require hygiene and preservation. The car park was painted in dust and dirt, the graffiti and tagging from strangers is the main source of colour, as well as there were broken pipes, wires, glass, windows, and rat position on the floor. There is no value for this space, this four wall concreted public space, with faded paint and broken windows are employed as a seven levelled garage.

I aimed to construct my film with a sense of repetition as well as an exploration of non-place. I utilised three different audio clips of cars driving, electricity sparking and a car locking and played them on a loop. The structure of my film was set by displaying a few photographs followed by a short piece of footage to match the photographs of different areas of the car park. This was done to mimic the cycle of the public’s abuse of the car park, collect ticket, drive in, park, drive out, dispense ticket.

Another focus on my film was to question the meaning of the text on most of the walls, as across all levels of the spacious parking lot were plastic signs. The Government’s signage possessed titles such as “no parking”, “no standing”, “exit”, “no exit”, “no entry” and “entry” all over the walls. From a non-place perspective, the car park is never considered a place that you would stay. It is a pathway to where your real destination is, the arrows lead you in, and lead you straight back out again.

Marc Auge states in his Non Places – Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity (1995), “the distinction between places and non-places derives from the opposition between place and space.” I strongly agree with this statement as it explores the importance of place and the insignificance of space. My definition of a place is somewhere that attains value, that’s respected and is of liveable conditions, a space is empty, only utilised when it is necessary, no one would choose to go to the car park unless they were to utilise it for it’s purpose, to park your car, or take it home, no one just wants to “hang out” at their local parking lot.

References:

  1. Auge, M 1995 “Non-Places – Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity”, Verso, London and New York.

Project Brief 1 | Media 2

My home is in a state of transition. I believe that one’s home is where one feels at most comfort, for me that would be house. My family is in the process of packing up one home and unloading another, and therefore, I’ve aimed to portray the juxtaposition between these two houses. Although, they contrast in physical form, the importance is that both houses bring shelter, warmth and happiness to my family and I as that is what I considered to be my true home, a place where I can relax and share amongst my loved ones.

My photographs and videos depict the obvious contrast between the two houses, which are coincidently directly next to each other, separated by a large fence. These mediums explore the texture in the vintage bricks compared to the rendered walls of our modern home, the clutter, darkness and dirt in contrast to the large spacing, light and emptiness. The images from the new house don’t evoke as much emotion and narrative as the images from the old place.

Furthermore, as our rental house is so small, I went from spending most my life in my own room to sharing it with one of my siblings. It’s hard to find your “own” space in such a crowded environment and that’s why I wanted to employ clutter and mess in the photographs and videos of the rental home. In contrast, the renovated home was neat, pure and open. It’s almost as if the new house expressed freedom as my personal environment had been put on pause whilst living in this temporary household.

It is scary saying goodbye to one house but it’s even scarier going back to my original home that has been completely transformed. It’s difficult to regain that sense of nostalgia from a place that has been upgraded, the markings and imperfections that were created by us have been knocked down and painted over. Although we have lived in our rental house for a year, due to the six of us being forced to share such a smaller environment, it developed a new level of closeness between us. That is why I’ve focused my audio recordings on my family and the sounds that remind me of home as no matter which infrastructure we live in, it still sounds the same.

It wasn’t hard leaving my own home as I moved next door, I still felt as though I was apart of the same environment. I would hear the aeroplanes fly over our house, the cars on the main road zoom pass, the wind in the winter swing fast by our windows. The laughter, arguments and footsteps of my family surrounded me, as the walls are just as thin in this home as it was in my last. As I mentioned before, it’s hard to discuss and describe my home environment when I’m shifting between a household that marked 18 years of memories in which was refurnished and a house that contained only a year of my life, and that is why contrasting the two would depict the changes in light and darkness but the similarity in social dynamics.

Image 1

Image 1

Image 2

Image 2

Image 3

Image 3

Image 4

Image 4

Image 5

Image 5

Image 6

Image 6

Image 7

Image 7

Image 8

Image 8

Image 9

Image 9

Image 10

Image 10

Image 11

Image 11

image 13 image 15 image 16 image 17 image 19 image 18image 20image 21

FINAL BLOG POST

Overall, it’s been a busy semester but a great one. I’ve enjoyed the media course so far, and I look forward to next semester.

What have you learned?

This course has taught me about the importance of cooperation and collaboration within group projects, it sometimes may be difficult, which is beneficial because it gave me experience and new ways to work on group projects to ensure that we are working as a team. Another element of learning that has occurred would be how to use the video recorder and the zoom microphone, and how to hire equipment in general. This was beneficial for me as I did not have a fancy microphone and therefore, my work was at a higher quality thanks to the IT at RMIT. I’ve also learnt valuable skills with particular programs, especially iMovie and Garageband, my tutor also pushed me to think more abstractly and to add a little more creativity with my work to make it more interesting, he was very good with advice and feedback with my individual and group work.

How have you learned?

I believe that majority of my learning came from peers and my tutorial lessons. The practical workshops were far more beneficial for my learning as I was able to hands on try everything, and speak to my tutor at the end of the lesson to ask further questions. However, when I was unable to attend my tutorials, the friends I have made in this course were extremely helpful, and they spent time with me to help me understand and keep me up to date with the workload that was being handed out. Also with our project briefs, the peer feedback, as well as the tutor feedback also was helpful for me to learn to expand my creativity and to help me improve my skills within the media realm.

What you found most challenging in the course?

The most challenging about the course was the short time we were given the projects. The first one especially took me a long time to come up with an idea, and by the time I had an idea, I had a short duration of time to put it all together, which made things a little bit stressful. Another challenge within this course was definitely the group assignment for Project Brief 4, the teamwork wasn’t there, things weren’t done in time and I had already had problems with one group member in another assignment. Therefore, this task became quite frustrating and stressful because we weren’t essentially working as a team the whole time.

What you discovered about your own creative practice?

I have discovered with my own creative practice to spend less time brainstorming for a perfect idea and to get out, attain footage and let the ideas flow as I continued to move forward. I’ve also discovered that I need to complex my ideas further, and to not stay in a similar idea, to look outside the box more. I have also discovered that I come up with my best ideas when I bounce of other people, when I was in out group assignment, the more we discussed what we wanted to do and our ideas, better ideas came about, and I think it’s very important to make sure everyone is throwing in their opinion so can maximise our opportunity to attain the best idea.

 

Here is the learning graph about Semester 1:

Learning Graph

Learning Graph

 

Links to 5 best blog posts:

Blog Post 1

Blog Post 2

Blog Post 3

Blog Post 4

Blog Post 5

Project Brief 3

Project Brief 3 was based on my sister, Alanna Blundo, and her journey through depression and anxiety, as it was entitled, “Freedom”. It was challenging to find found footage that was relatable as the media portrait was so specific to her, therefore, I looked for nature, as it is calming also, flowers and the calm ocean represented a sense of tranquillity, which is what Alanna was searching for herself. The butterfly also represented development, change, as she grew into a new a better person for herself.

The most successful part of my submitted work would be the interview that occurred, the way she expressed herself on the spot was an accurate representation of herself and her journey through anxiety and finding inner peace with herself. A problematic aspect would be the weather during filming, I wanted the footage to be vibrant and calming, however it was overcast and therefore, I had to work with the filters and temperature and colour exposure through iMovie to portray this.

A key learning discovery was learning to alter the colour exposure of films to represent the mood being portrayed. When she was speaking about anxiousness I lowered the temperature to make the footage more lifeless. Then, when she was being her current self and speaking about yoga, I increased the temperature, and heightened the warm colours on the particular footage.

What I learnt during the making process is that some things may go unexpectedly in a positive way and a negative way, however you must learn to carefully plan and work with what you have. Alanna spent a long time speaking and I had to cut so much, whereas if we had worked on a script together, and she knew the questions before coming in, filming could occurred quicker. Also I need to make sure I plan what day I’m going to film, especially if my footage will be affected by the weather, and the amount of sun being produced that day.

IMG_7763

Project Brief 2

I considered myself to be a “people person”. I would never survive alone, it’s not that I don’t like being alone but I live off another’s energy, opinions and presence. I am very indecisive and respect my peer’s opinions, I can’t upload a photo on Instagram without sending it to 6 people to check which one is the best or if it will be a satisfactory upload. I’ve always lived in a big household, 9 of us if you include my dog. There is rarely ever a time when I am alone, if no one is home I’ll arrange to go out or I’ll visit my friends or boyfriend. I don’t like missing out and so the only time I’m ever alone would be when I’m in my bedroom and even then I can still hear everyone still home.

I am very passionate in the art of photography, it was my favourite subject in year 12, and I’ve owned my own camera since I was 11 years old this is why I used a multitude of photographs as the main artefact in my film. With about 204 photographs I shaped my parents, siblings, best friend and boyfriend and inserted a picture of my eyes every now and then as a reminder that although most these photographs are not of me, this is about me.

I presented the poem I created in orange font, as this is my favourite colour. The colour also indicates enthusiasm, happiness, creativity, determination and encouragement, which are attributes that I portray. I play the audio of the piano in the video, I don’t take lessons anymore but I still play the instrument as I find the sound therapeutic and peaceful, and this is about the only time when I am silent myself. The other audios are raw conversations I’ve had with people presented in my film as I never stop talking and that is mostly how I stay connected with all of them. I aimed to edit the clips to be quite short and quick, quick changes between each different footage as it represents my lifestyle. I’m always moving and I have a short attention span and with that and the rest of the qualities in my film, is how I’ve expressed myself into this “self-portrait video”.

Project Brief 1

Self-portrait #1: Energetic

Photo 1

In this photograph, I utilise my face to symbolise my identity, and then my hair to represent I am loud and enthusiastic person. All together, especially with my hair caught in a chaotic motion, represents my energetic personality.

 Self-portrait #2: Wired

Photo 2

With the use of the PlayStation controller replacing my eyesight, I am expressing my love for digital technology. I am obsessed with the video game Spyro, I spend majority of my time either on my laptop, my phone, or watching television. I’m rarely in an environment that doesn’t connect me to Wi-Fi or have a strong 4G connection.

 Self-portrait #3: Inception

Photo 3

I began this image by taking a photograph on my laptop of me first, and then setting it to full screen. After many attempts I was able to capture myself where I was aligning the picture with me. This digital inception portrays my ability to stay as the same person no matter the situation. Although you’re looking at a photo of me in a photo of me, I still look the exact same as I fail to change myself to suit someone else’s standards, as I advocate maintaining a strong identity.

 Self-portrait #4: Lost

Photo 4
This last photograph depicts my blindness about my future. I hate when events and life is not predictable, as boring as that seems., that’s just how it is. I am still unsure of what I want to do when I leave university and it scares me, and this digital image indicates me confused and lost about where I am going next.

 Video #1: My second home

Work is considered my second home, I have been involved in gymnastics since I was a child, and I have been a gymnastics coach since I was 12 years old. This is my 7th year of being a coach, and the coaches especially are counted as my second family.

 Video #2: Hamish

I spend a lot of my time at home, and so does this little guy, he is respected as another family member in our household. He sleeps on our beds, eats with us, and watches TV with us. I’m home a lot with him and although he doesn’t understand, he brings such a sense of comfort and love, and yes I know I’m speaking about a dog here but that’s how it is.

 Audio #1: Work

I love my job mostly because of the children I meet and get to work with. I have come across hundreds of children in my time as teaching and they never fail to make my day. Most people dread going to work, yet I go there knowing I’m going to leave in a great mood.

Audio #2: Family
This recording was of majority of family having a regular conversation in our lounge room. We speak loudly and argue quite a bit but it’s just the way us Blundos communicate with one another.

 50 words to describe you:

I felt that the best way to have 50 words to describe myself would be to have my closest family members and friends pick around 5 words and send them to me. I am aware some words are repeated but I just copied and pasted what one would say. Some I can agree with, some are questionable, but nonetheless here they are:

“Breath taking, amazing, goddess, beautiful, charismatic, strong, loud, funny, Nice, friendly, creative, disorganised, messy, fast, flexible, sporty, childish, lazy, caring, funny, loving, loud, and full-on, funny, energetic, lively, friendly, caring, foot hater, sarcastic, smart, funny, loud, funny, outgoing, happy, beautiful, charismatic, ambitious, annoying, funny, outgoing, smart, fat, ugly, chat”.