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  1. SKETCH 2 Moves App

    April 24, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    I’ll be honest and say that I have a poor memory when it comes to remembering places I’ve been to during my travels in other countries. My recent travel to Hokkaido, Japan, for example. I can only remember specific points during that journey. Sure enough, I could have brought a journal and wrote down the places I’ve been to and what happened there, but what if I only wanted to know where I’ve been to and have photos or videos to help me remember those places?

    This brought us to Moves, an app that acts as a tracker and uses GPS to record your movement. For this sketch, I walked around Melbourne with the app active while simultaneously taking photos and videos. The app doesn’t actually record the places you’ve been to, I actually had to input them myself. I also found that the app doesn’t record the steps taken and times accurately.

    An obvious issue is that you need to have an Internet connection for it to work, so that could be a potential problem when you’re overseas and couldn’t connect 24/7. This brought about a question though, what if it could document the journey offline by having the user manually input the data? In other words, they use the app to help them easily document their journey. They’ll have to input the times themselves, and if they wanted to, the method of travel (e.g. walk or van).

    The video above is an example if the app could make a video narrative out of it. However, considering that I only took a few photos and videos, I did wonder about the problems this would have if the volume of photos and videos taken was larger. Would it scroll up faster? And if it did, would viewers be able to follow it? If they couldn’t then we’d have to design a different approach. Maybe instead of a video, you could touch/click on the location icon and a library of the photos/videos would pop up. Or maybe all the photos/videos would be in view (like in the video), they would automatically play like a slideshow, and the user can scroll down to see it.

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  2. SKETCH 1 Photo Sampling

    April 24, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    During my travels in other coutries, I found that I would rarely ever take photos of my journey. Instead, I would choose specific points in the journey where I found something interesting to take a photo of. This brought about a question, what if we forced ourselves to take photos?

    We  were also inspired by Jonathan Harris’s The Whale Hunt, who documented a traditional whale hunt by taking photos that “more or less matched the changing pace of [his] own heartbeat”. So for this sketch, we were wondering what we could produce if we were to take a similar approach. Instead of taking photos at the pace of a heartbeat, we decided to take one photo every 5 minutes while walking around Melbourne.

    Initially, since we were inspired by Harris’s work, we wanted to make it so that it could be “sampled, where users could choose a certain point in the journey instead of putting it all into one video and not giving them a choice.

    Perhaps it’s because I’ve been living in Melbourne for 2 years now but I truly believe that if I were actually travelling, be it hiking or having a tour schedule in another country, this would’ve been a lot more interesting.

    I found setting up the “one photo every 5 minutes” rule to be really restrictive because during my walk I had a few instances where I wanted to whip out my phone and take a photo of something that looked interesting like a busker or a scene.

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  3. Week 6 Monday: Class Reflection

    April 13, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    Seth showed us a video that explained the concept of “Satisficing”, a play on the words sacrificing and satisfying. It meant that you would sacrifice a bunch of ideas because you were satisfied with one that is “good enough”. Rather than focus on one idea and making it good, Seth encouraged us to think up of a bunch of ideas even if they were terrible and were likely to fail. I quite liked this emphasis on focusing on quantity because this meant that a lot of our ideas don’t have to get thrown out of the window even if they had implications or weren’t “good enough”. So, a lot of pressure has been taken off.

    Try and fail, again and again, only then will you find success. #AdviceforLYFE. #NoSeriously. #CouldIGetAnyMoreDeep. #soawrigeenull #SHUTUPKIM #okay…

    One issue that arose with Project Three is coming up with three ideas based on our first sketches and properly fleshing them out. We often wondered whether we were on the right track. It would be problematic if we went off course and made sketches that weren’t relevant for the project. Personally, I think we’re struggling because we focused on deconstructing Devin’s video into camera techniques and emulating those for Project Two to better understand how it was made, rather than focusing on experimenting with its form.

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  4. Week 5 Friday: Class Reflection

    April 12, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    Darn, I forgot to post this until today. Whoops!

    While I’m very happy about the fact that we managed to finish our presentation within 10 minutes because that was our main goal, I can’t help but lament on how I missed touching on a few points. This being our first presentation, I was actually using it as a way to test a different way of presenting from how I would usually present. Usually I would prepare a script to read off of during the presentation, but this time I wanted to see how I would do if I just remembered the main points and go off on that. I guess it’s a combination of nervousness and lack of preparation because in the end I did miss explaining a few points since my mind would very briefly go blank. One example: I forgot to further explain how the timelapse video I made wasn’t effective. It’s because, in my opinion, there’s nothing of value to watch in it. If I had shot it while it transitioned from day to night, it would be more interesting to watch how the scene changes. That’s what I meant by an “effective” timelapse.
    Well, no use regretting over it now, it did make me learn that I should bring a note full of those points or something. The only problem is, I would most likely take a glance at it and go into a pause to try to collect together my thoughts. *sigh* Hopefully I’ll get better at it.

    About where we’re going with Project Three. It’s pretty obvious that most of the sketches James and I did focused a lot on techniques, rather than on form. So for our next project, maybe we will somehow find a way to use those techniques to create a new form.

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  5. Sketch 4 ASPECT RATIO

    March 30, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    In this video, there are 3 different aspect ratios used. The first is 4:3 which is basically what videos of the old days used, the second being 16:9 which is what our society uses and prefers now, and finally cinemascope which is normally used for films.

    To be honest, I think I shouldn’t have included the 4:3 ratio. It doesn’t seem relevant now since most videos don’t use this ratio unless they were trying to emulate 80’s-00’s media content. As for the cinemascope ratio, I found that it isn’t very effective here as it doesn’t make the shot feel cinematic. I think if the shot included people having moments together then it might have delivered it more effectively.

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  6. Sketch 5 WARP/TELEPORTATION

    March 30, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    For this sketch, I wanted to see how a travel video would look like if a solid narrative was implemented. It’s about a traveler “teleporting” around Victoria Market.
    The example followed a non-narrative structure. It’s non-narrative because a “story” isn’t presented, not quite. In other travel videos we’d normally see the videomaker talking in front of the camera kind of like a performative documentary.

    In this video, the traveler teleports from her room and ends up on the street. She then proceeds to teleport near the market and finally walks into it. She explores the area while teleporting.
    I decided to have the traveler “teleport” because it cuts out unnecessary bits that don’t need to be shown in the video such as walking all the way to the market. Instead of a simple cut and wipe, the teleporting effect allows for the shots to be tied together instead of it looking like random shots put next to each other.

    The video looks extremely DIY because of all the shakiness and unbalanced framing. This makes it hard for the viewer to take in the scene. My poor editing skills didn’t make the teleport effect look like what I had imagined either. I imagined it looking more like a zoom, warp, fade in effect to a point of interest that both of the shots share. The first and last two shots was came very close to the idea actually. I believe if I had the proper gear like a GoPro then this wouldn’t have been a problem. Except then I wouldn’t be able to see what I was shooting. What a dilemma.

    It was also difficult to find a similar “point” that both the shots could share to tie them both together. I also wished I used my hands and interacted with an object so it actually looks like it’s in first person. I had first thought about using music, but then I wanted to see what it would be like without it first since VicMarket has people playing music in public sometimes.

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  7. Sketch 3 BGM+Things/Places of Interest in good ol’ Melbourne

    March 30, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    This sketch made me understand that the videos Devin makes are tremendously difficult. Maybe it’s because I’m a total amateur for this or maybe it’s because the time to do this project is short, I don’t know. Then again, people usually go on trips for about a week or so. In any case this stuff is no walk in the park.

    The theme for this sketch was “What makes Melbourne CBD, Melbourne CBD” which is similar to the example’s “Things that remind you of Italy”. To help me with this, I secretly followed what tourists would take pictures of which were mostly statues, horses, graffiti, and old buildings with historical value. My route was A’beckett Street -> Swanston Street -> Flinder’s Street -> Queen Street. I also took a detour and went to film the lane with all the graffiti on the walls. When I was done I noticed most of my shots were taken around Swanston and Flinder’s Street. I had gotten shots of:

    • Statues
    • Horses
    • Graffiti
    • Landmarks
    • Trains
    • Uniquely designed Buildings
    • Trams
    • Churches
    • Seagulls
    • Flags
    • People

    I filmed about 180 shots for this sketch. Only 12 ended up in the video. Most of the shots were different angles, frames and such. Some were failed shots because one: too much shakiness (I can’t let ol’ tripod out all the time), two: people got in the way, and three: things like poles and signs got in the way.

    After collecting all the material I needed I proceeded to finally sit down and edit. However, I first needed music. I spent hours trying to find one that was evocative yet subtle. This was the result. Much to my surprise I had to eliminate most of the shots that were usable from the list because they didn’t “fit” in with the music. The music also had an influence on what shot should be in what order, the speed duration, and the duration of the shot itself. The 4 second black shot was also a result of it; I just didn’t have a suitable shot for that segment.

    I’m beginning to suspect that most of the videos were planned before Devin goes into the field to start shooting. I mean, if music has a such a strong influence on how the video is structured, wouldn’t you first find a suitable music to use, imagine what the video would look like with that music, then start shooting? Now I wonder how this video would have turned out if I had the music first and not the other way around… Intriguing.

    What I would change for this video: I would have gotten more indoor shots. It had only occurred to me at the end that I forgot about those shopping arcades in Melbourne.

    What I learned from this is that most of the time buildings should be filmed in a wide shot. Objects on the other hand are usually in medium closeup or close up. This is because unlike a building, an object is relatively smaller and thus require less distance to observe/investigate. It is an exception when the object is part of a scene that needs to be taken in a wide shot.

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  8. Sketch 2 DAYNIGHT360

    March 30, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    There were a lot of day and night juxtaposition shots in the example which highlighted the day/night differences in the area of interest.
    However, I didn’t want to simply shoot a building during the day and then overlap it with how it looks at night. Instead I wanted to do a 360 shot and the idea seemed fun to do at the beginning. Unfortunately, the result isn’t quite what I had imagined.

    There were some issues that surfaced when I did this. One being finding a good spot to shoot a 360 shot that can really show how the city lights up at night. Another spot I could think of is the pedestrian bridge over South Yarra river but that one has high pedestrian traffic. Imagine me, sitting on the middle of the bridge. That’s narrow. I’d just be a nuisance. Most people are really polite. When I was on my shooting rounds, many would stop in their tracks to avoid crossing in front of my camera’s gaze on the sidewalk. And besides, even if I did shoot on the bridge, people who do cross would just obstruct the view.

    Anyway, this sketch was not easy. What I had imagined was a 360 day shot that would seamlessly transition to a 360 night shot. What do I mean by seamlessly? I would include an object that obstructed the view, say, a pole. Then with my wizardly awesome editing skills (*cough* that was sarcasm if you didn’t catch on *cough*), when the pole comes into the frame, I would overlap the other side of it which on this video would be the left, with the night shot. However such a feat was not possible because I didn’t shoot the 360 night shot at the EXACT same spot and angle. I wasn’t going to sit there for the next 2 hours staring off into the distance doing nothing. I didn’t even bring a book to read with me. So again, lack of preparation was a problem.

    I couldn’t even fix it by overlapping the frame with the F sign in it during post-production because the difference between the day/night pole’s appearance was so glaringly obvious.

    Another problem was the lack of smoothness over the camera’s rotation. The video in the end seemed a bit choppy and at some point it looks like it was rotating a bit too fast for the human eye. This is largely due to my tripod’s inability to rotate smoothly. I got it for cheap though so I guess that’s fair. Thinking back on it now, if I shot this in 60FPS instead of 25FPS like I did here and slowed it down, or used a warp stabiliser in post-production, it may have looked better.

    In summary, 360 shot needs a wide area to work with. Lack of preparation was an issue. Pole botched editing solution. Camera rotated too fast and choppy, I blame my tripod. Need high quality gear.

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  9. Sketch 1 TIMELAPSE

    March 30, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    Timelapse shots are surprisingly not as easy to make than I had thought.

    While exploring the city I found that the best locations for a timelapse shoot in a city tend to be places with high traffic and days with blue skies (best served with clouds). This is because if I were to shoot a stationary object with nothing moving in it, it would just be a…well…a picture. For this sketch I have juxtapositioned 2 timelapse shoots. Looking back on it I wish I shot the first one during the night as the scene seems very bland during the day. A problem with this is that I shot this in RMIT Bldg. 80 on the tenth floor, and I assume that it would be closed come night time. This means that access to certain locations with good shooting value can be restrictive. Or maybe I’m just not very good at finding high shooting spots like rooftops with free access in the city. So if you’re gonna shoot something in timelapse, find a place that’s open to the public at all times. It also didn’t help that there was a glass wall in front of my camera which resulted in the birth of that annoying light reflection flare in the video. Thanks to that I had to rely on my camera’s AUTO function be which meant I had no control over how the scene looks.

    For the next shoot, I chose a nice quiet spot next to the South Yarra river. I had to move the camera several times in order to find that sweet spot (good angle, good framing, no obstructing objects) and this took a good 15 minutes. I had originally planned to shoot this part of the video as it transitioned from day (more specifically during sunset) to night. Unfortunately, my camera was on the verge of dying as its battery sat on its last bar of energy. This is totally due to my lack of preparation. Which brings us to the next part of why timelapse videos aren’t easy to make; they’re time consuming. Unless you’re shooting it in a private space or you’re not worried about letting someone nick your camera when you go to the bathroom, you absolutely have to sit next to it during the whole shoot. Of course, this is only if you’re by yourself. So if you ever plan to shoot for an hour or two, bring along a friend you trust.

    A question that came to mind when I made this; why not just speed it up by increasing the speed duration? Why timelapse? I’ve done both to answer this and simply put, timelapse is better for long duration shots because it’s much, much faster than when sped up.

    Narrative-wise, timelapse scenes such as the ones in my video are great as exposition shots. This is because they are framed in a wide shot as opposed to a close-up. The viewer can more or less get an idea of where they are and just how busy that area can be. It’s very important to consider how a shot is framed for a timelapse as well as how long you want it to be at the end. In our example, the timelapse shots usually go for about 5-7 seconds so I’ve chose 6 seconds as the minimum for the video.

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  10. Concept Statement

    March 30, 2015 by kimberlyteoh

    After much deliberation, James and I decided to choose devinsupertramp’s  Italy Takeover! Rome, Pisa, Vatican City in 4k as our online video example.
    We would describe the example as a travel video that highlights scenic locations in Italy. For this project, we will produce 10 sketches which analyse the narrative/non-narrative form of this online video practice. Each of these sketches will focus on different aspects of the work as a way to understand how it has been made and how relations have been formed between shots to create a narrative/non-narrative structure.

    1. Highlighting places/things of interest in Melbourne + Background music.

    2. Aspect ratio – how is the video any different when put in a 4:3 and cinemascope aspect ratio?

    3. Slider shot

    4. Syncing cuts to music

    5. Colour grading

    7. Stabilised shot

    8. Timelapse

    9. Day/night cut

    10. Warping/Teleportation – With the magic of editing, the traveler can teleport! Shot in first person perspective.

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