Monthly Archives: May 2014

Analysis/Reflection_6

Posted on by
Reply

Consider Sandra’s lecture “Directing Actors” and describe at least a couple of points that you took away from it (even if you’re not the director).

Sandra’s lecture was really great. Her tips were helpful to me, although I was not a director in my programme.

Sandra first talked about rehearing actors beforehand. In her sense, a director had better talk to actors about the story before shooting day. They can have better comprehension about your story. Also, she advised the mood when directing. An actor can easily sense when the director is unhappy and it affects their confidences. Therefore, how to deal with the issue like this is communication. Director is recommend to be relaxed and honest. A good atmosphere could be better for a good production.

Sandra recommended giving the actors the momentum of the prior scene’s emotion. This tips was impressive. One of the readings in Film/TV categories states that if your scene are playing music, you might let actors listen this music. Even though actors are not really on set, their prior imagination is good for their ability to perform.

 

In this clip screened in the lecture from the Coen brothers’ ‘Blood Simple‘ describe what is happening in terms of the edits specifically in terms of the audio and video. Also name the different kinds of audio you can hear.

The ambience sound at night.

Characters conversations.

the sound of object. (i.e handing over the folder, sitting down on a chairs)

This sequence mainly consist of a series of reverse shots between two characters. Audio is a medium or a transition within cut by cut. When editor cuts Character A to Character B, the audio must be consistent. It convince us to believe they are happening at the same time in the same space. In other words, audio connects moving images.

A good example is to learn that if we suddenly cut image to black screen as the audio is still going. We believe the video is still rolling because we still can hear. However, if we shut audio down but keep video, as you can imagine, that could be a mistake otherwise you have a good reason.

 

Keyboard shortcuts. 

Most applications reserve keyboard shortcuts for the functions that use most often. It is really good to learn all of these as it will speed up your editing and additionally alert you to functions that the software developers and other users find important. (You can learn much about the software by looking at keyboard shortcuts). 

Find the keyboard shortcuts for Adobe Premiere and note two or more functions that you’ve never used before that may be invaluable to editing.

Next in Sequence – shift+;

Left Alignment – Shift+Cmd+L

Center Alignment – Shift+Cmd+C

Right Alignment – Shift+Cmd+R

Cut to Camera 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7 – Ctrl+1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7

Export frame Shift+E

 

Participant Contract Reflection

Posted on by
Reply

Semester Participant Contract Final Submission

What did you do well?

What I did well is the insistence. Over the semester, I’ve attended every class.

I complete my participant contract well. I kept writing blog posts every single week, at least 3 blog posts. I try to engage with this class so I’ve done a lot of research about the weekly topic from the lecture or readings.  I film at least one video every week with different content. I’ve finish every week’s required readings. I record the lecture so that I can review it later and understand the idea better.

 

 

What have learnt to do better?

I have a good understanding with the difference with non-narrative and narrative. How does the social network operate in the context. List and narrative.

I have done a lot of Korsakow practise doing some creative stuff.

Korsakow, the notion of SNU.

how Korsakow works and How Korsakow different from conventional documentary.

In my blog post I try to bring up a discussion.

What could you have learnt to do better

I should make more research about the Korsakow. Watching other Korsakow projects is good to know

Also the summary idea of the readings or lecture.

Week11_Vines

Posted on by
Reply

IMG 9693 from Kai-feng Wang on Vimeo.

Some of moment we might always miss. I was standing at the crossing of Elizabeth St and Lonsdale St with my iPhone and Watches. It was very interesting when you were observing the flow of cars and people passing by you. I thought why not make a time-lapse for this amazing moment! So I foregrounded my watches with the dynamic passengers and vehicles at the background in order to illustrate how is time flying! Still and dynamic is another feature in my video. My watches and walking passengers create a great contrast between still and dynamic. I really like this visual effect.

Week11_Documentary and Korsakow

Posted on by
Reply

According to Bill Nichols, the reality of documentary is always controversial because what is reality? what we see is reality or what we are told is reality? We might have a long way to figure it out.

In Nichols’s documentary taxonomy, Poetic mode, Expository mode, Observational mode, Reflexive mode and Performative mode are main five documentary modes. Different modes have different functions for the documentary storytelling. For example, expository mode features a voice-over to tell the story meanwhile the advocacy of observational mode ‘no interrupting on the reality’ At this point, Adrian’s philosophy of taxonomy (Week 3 Lecture) inspires me. Taxonomy does not really matter but what it does matter is what they do and how you gonna use. In fact, documentary is telling what filmmakers believe that is truth whether is really true or not. The use of different mode is the best way to con vin audience to believe what filmmakers believe.

Okay, Here is my question. Is any chance to use the conventional documentary modes in Korsakow?  Korsakow is kind of documentary, a new documentary exists in Networked technologies. I found it couldn’t tell a story as same as traditional documentary does. Mainly, conventional documentary tells a story in a linear way rather than fragmentary. However, there is no such circuit in Korsakow. It is really hard to convince audience to understand what we wanna tell…

Week11_House Of Cards, Netflix and ‘Big Data’

Posted on by
Reply

24Carr-articleLarge

House of Cards obvious was the successful hit in American television industry. Not only the great director David Fincher and the impressive cast Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright but also the strategy of ‘Big Data’ produce this extraordinary television series.

According to Forbes.com, ‘House of Cards’ has a number of element which we haven’t seen. It’s the first major TV show to completely bypass the usual television ecosystem of networks and cable operators.  It’s also the first time that a series has released an entire season (thirteen episodes) all at once, for viewers to watch at their own pace.  Finally, it’s the first time that programming has been developed with the aid of big data algorithms.

Netflix is a network television company based on online platform. It has 27 millions subscribers in United States and 33 millions worldwide  followers. Essentially, subscriber is the underlying element and Netflix knows it. Netflix has great confidences while releasing ‘House of Cards’ in a brand new way rather than conventional because no one knows more about audience than Netflix itself.

How Netflix knows ‘House of Cards’ would be a hit? Netflix’s CCO, Jonathan Frieland said, “Because we have a direct relationship with consumers, we know what people like to watch and that helps us understand how big the interest is going to be for a given show. It gave us some confidence that we could find an audience for a show like ‘House of Cards.’ ”

How much data does it have at its fingertips? According to GigaOm, Netflix looks at 30 million “plays” a day, including when you pause, rewind and fast forward, four million ratings by Netflix subscribers, three million searches as well as the time of day when shows are watched and on what devices.

In other words, the success of Netflix is Big Data. Netflix is able to know every information about subscriber by collecting data in every second. In fact, difference from other television companies is Netflix actually is feeding what audiences want rather than force audiences to choose.

 

Week11_Lecture

Posted on by
Reply

Does the design of the interface force the users attention to follow certain lines of focus as opposed to others?

Interface shift the relationship between audience and narrative. You are bale to tell your story by designing the interface. On your interface, you can indicate sort of relation of your content in the project.

In Korsakow, you can use many thumbnails, texts and images consisting of your interface. The point is how you are going to make the database visible and draw the information to audience.

If a shot’s meaning can be changed why create lives when and if the film maker specifically linked the clips together?

In conventional videos, you could edit your footage on your timeline so you are able to create a narrative to illustrate your flashback. You hardly do a flashback in Korsakow due to the program not having a timeline but fragmentary videos on an interface

Ending is kind of the fundamental thing throughout the film. Most time, audiences care about the ending much because a conclusion affects the entire things. How it ends is a reflection of the whole project.

Should sound be used differently in a Korsakow project than in a linear film?

Korsakow is different from all of linear narrative film, it is a fusion of different elements. It is complex meanwhile  it also provides more space for our creativity.Sound is not necessary to synchronise with images as conventional movie does.   Perhaps, doing a non-sync sound can be a hit in Korsakow because it could be amazing.

Week11_Readings

Posted on by
Reply

Big Data is changing our way to think. Technologies makes data become important. Over the past, we hardly find a thing record our behaviour but technologies now can achieve that. Technology not only makes our life convenient but also are devices to record our day life because modern people interact frequently with these devices, computer, smart-phone etc.

Our information can then be networked in unexpected and unplanned ways. A research project Mappiness operated by the London School of Ecomomics; a free phone app ask you twice a day to rate your level of happiness, relaxation and ‘awakeness’ on a scale of 1-10. Users are asked to take and upload a photo of what’s exactly in front of them so researchers can map photographs of the sites of the feelings of their participating sample at any one time. Therefore, the researchers are able to know the data of the location of respondent phone, time and respondent scores. More importantly, the researcher find out that people are happier in every environment and urban environment.

 

Film/TV_1 Reflection 5

Posted on by
Reply

Question 1

 Lecture 7 Lighting: What was covered? Do you think the content is relevant to your project? And why?

Robin showed us how to manipulate the lighting in different way. He illuminated the differences between hard lighting and soft lighting. The measure of hard lighitng or soft lighitng is depenent on the harsh of shadows. Hard light creates much more shadows on subjects than soft light. We have to consider the shadows and exposure on subject’s face. The manipulate of lighting is how to illuminate the scene or character better. We should correct the lighting while we are filming. Hard light seems more dramatizing than soft light. Thus, we also should think of the atmosphere as well.

Question 2

Select from one of the readings from week 5, 6 or 7 and describe two points that you have taken from it. Points that excite you, something that was completely new to you.

It is recommended to read all of the readings.

The idea of onside and offside key lighting is very new for me. Ideally, a key light should stay on 45 degree off from the camera axis, but actors in film are not always stationary. Lighting also has to be motivated to match the shots. For example, I start a medium long shot in front of the characters to establish the scene. I change camera position to do a reverse shot on characters revealing their conversation. I shouldn’t change my key light position as match 45 degree off the camera axis. Lighting is conspicuous, it makes audiences confused when they notice the lighting is different.

The notion of soft light is a diffused rather than a soft degree of light. Usually, there are three categories soft light: commercially  lute box-type luminaries, any lamp with diffusion in front of it, or light from any source bounced off a reflective surface. A hard light sources can be softened by a bounce or a diffusion.

Question 3

Blow Up is a 1966 film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni.
In this scene note the choreography of the actors, camera, frame and focus. As covered in the lecture describe the things Antonioni would have have to consider when directing the actors and the camera.

In this scene, Antonioni uses many dolley tracking shots. The most important thing is how to keep the shots continuous. There were a several of things Antonioni had to consider as he was these shots. Firstly, the movement of actors is important to know. Camera always follows actors’ movement so cinematographer has to assume what is the best way to manipulate the camera. Secondly,  the movement framing is significant. The camera operator should know where is the starting frame and where is the ending frame. Thus, he could be able to manipulate the frame easily in shooting. The third thing is focus. Cinematographer has to adjust the focus while actor or camera moving in the scene. Therefore, cinematographer should know the focus point of starting position and ending position. Finally, lighting is continuous. As actors move around in the scene, the actors should be covered by lighting all the time.

Week10_Plot and Interface

Posted on by
Reply

No database can function without a user interface.

– Jerome McGann

According to the readings, plot arranges events to take shape in the mind as a single entity. In convention narrative form, plot generates a kind of virtual interface for the developing world. Plot is like a map illustrating every element from a general point of view.

Plot and interface are able to cooperate for a better function. Interface offers a better view for viewers. It provides the database user with access, fast retrieval and manipulation of stored data and mete data. Plot focus attention of a mostly passive listener/viewer held captive by an illusion. Interface is better map that not only illustrate everything for viewer also navigate them to some direction.