Done

I can't believe it but I've finally finished and exported my movie :D!
I'm so happy with the way it turned out. I'm still scared that compared to everyone's its not that good but since this is my first time creating a project like this I have to say I'm very pleased with the result. I'm also really happy with all that I've learned regarding Final Cut Pro. I want to get a mac just so I can use Final Cut Pro to make more movies on my own time.

I also can't believe the class is over! I'm glad I took this class, even though I really don't know what kind of mark I'm going to get I feel that I've learned a lot and acquired skills that are really going to help me in the future. I'm glad I know more about Photoshop, Imovie and of course Final Cut Pro.

Looking Back I encountered many difficulties. There were of course lots of computer related ones, such as everything being deleted from the scratch drive and having to start over, trying to get a song from my Ipod onto the desktop, and learning how to do the most basic things on Final Cut and Imovie. There was also personal difficulties I encountered like Getting over being shy and filming in public and trying hard not to procrastinate because a project like this takes ALOT of time.

But by making friends in the class, going on Lynda.com and just diving in and doing something new I got over these difficulties and ended up not only creating a project that I'm proud of but getting a true experience too.

Almost done

So class is almost finished for the semester and so is my movie :D
I've been working really hard on it and I hope it's going to come out ok. I haven't seen anyone else's movie so I'm kind of scared mine wont be as good but because I'm not in Cin/com I'm proud of what I accomplished.
Working on the movie was hard. I encountered some difficulties like all my work getting deleted because of the new thing with the mac labs, then I had trouble figuring out Final Cut Pro and I gave up on trying to get a Youtube video into my movie. Although working with Lynda.com and Alex Sediva was really helpful. Alex was really nice and helped me a lot with adding effects. I really like using final cut pro now and would love to learn it really well because I think I could make so many interesting things on it.
I think this was a really interesting project and it really made me realize how much work goes into even one minute of film.
Even though I found this class one of the hardest, I enjoyed it because you definitely see your hard work pay off in the end.

Working on my movie

Ok so I haven't posted in awhile but I have been working on my stuff. I started off with Imovie because I had used it once before to make a movie in my grade 11 class. But I really needed more effects and I didn't feel I could do what I wanted to do with Imovie. So I switched to final cut pro. All of last class I was trying to figure out how to use it and I was getting really frustrated but for some reason when I came back this class things got a bit easier. I also got help from Alex and that was really great! I made a lot of progress and have alot of footage uploaded and edited. I even added an effect. I sped up a few of my clips so they look like they're being fast forwarded and I think that it looks really good and works well in the context of my movie. Now I just have to shoot the last of my footage and learn a few more effects and I think I'll really be on my way to creating an interesting project.

Filming Frenzy

Okay so i haven't put up a post in awhile but thats because i've actually been filming like crazy! I went to rent a camera from the audio visual department but it turns out that if you don't want to return the camera by 8:30 am you get charged 50 cents an hour! I know that doesn't seem like a lot but i wanted to rent it for over 48 hours so yeah i moved on to plan B! Borrow my friends camera. So far it seems to be working. I filmed all day on monday and i got some great footage on fri, sat and sun night too!. I've also come up with a lot of ideas.

For the beginning i think i will start off with black and all you her is the sound of an alarm. Then it will fade in to a digital clock and all you see is the time. Then my characters eyes will open and her day will begin. There will be a short scene of her on the way to school and then a montage of her doing all her work in various places such as the classroom, her locker, the library, on the train etc. In the background there is going to be techno music. The music is going to get louder and louder as the day progresses. By the time the music is blasting loud my character will be in a club and the montage of her partying will begin. If i can edit it the way i want too I think this video portrait has the potential to be really good.

I'm excited because at first i procrastinated alot and I was really shy about filming things in public. However once i got into it i have really been enjoying looking at life through a lens.
Anyways I'll try and do a better job of keeping you posted!

-Jess

Ideas for the Video Portrait Project

For the video portrait project I decided to create a character. I want the character to be a girl who lives this sort of double life. During the day she is a quiet,studious girl who gets good marks in school but at night she is a party animal.

I'm thinking about using moving shots during the day and the still frames to depict her party life. I might incorporate a few stills during the day part or a few moving shots during the night part, I will see how it goes.

For the day part I will have sound bites of school, pencils on paper, clocks ticking, cafeterias etc. For the night part I will have soundbites of clubs and bars, I will have good techno type music playing there will be sounds of people drinking alcohol and smoking. I want to try and create a few images along the lines of "Requiem for a Dream" which is one of my favorite movies and I think it's one of the best edited movies there is.

I will represent this character so I will film myself at school, I will film myself doing homework, working etc.

Then I will film myself downtown when I go out with my friends, I will film bartenders pouring drinks, I will film people smoking.

Overall I want this portrait project to be dramatic I want to use a lot of closeups focusing on different things for example a closeup of someones lips as they smoke a cigarette or a closeup of someones face as they dance at a club or a closeup of someones hand circling an answer on a test.

I also want to use some black and white and of course narration. I think it might be cool to narrate my characters thoughts. I also think it would be cool to have closeups of clocks because time is a factor in my project. I think closeups of the time will help the viewer to grasp the concept of the "double life."

Logos

When we finished learning a little about typography we had to create our own logos on Photoshop using text.

I learnt from the videos on typography that the font choice is really the key aspect to a logo. For instance you wouldn't use the horror chills font to advertise a party place for young children. Nor would you use the comic sans font to advertise a classy restaurant.

I chose to use my name as my Logo. Therefore I thought about what my name should advertise. I decided that I wanted it to look Classy and distinguished I went with a calligraphy type font.

I also wanted this logo to be bold and catchy so I made sure to take up the entire space on the page. I found that by having little room left on the page the logo was very attention grabbing.

For some artistic effect I decided to put the first letter of each part of my name in bold and in a bigger size.





The second logo I decided to create would use only my initials. Since there were alot less letters I decided to play around with each one. Although I chose the same font and font size for each letter I added a different affect to each one. For example I put a "rise" on the J, an "arch" on the R and "shell upper" on the Z. These made the letters fit better together and also made it more then just three letters on a page.



Once I had the letters placed together in a way that I thought looked good I made each letter a bigger font size so that it would be just as attention grabbing and full as my first logo.







For the last logo we were allowed to use image and color. I always prefer when things are simple and minimal. So I took into account what we learned about focal point and what the eye is drawn too first second and third.




I started off with a theme, which was peace then I searched on the internet for a background that would represent that. I thought a cloudy sky would be a beautiful backdrop for "peace."However when I was done writing the text part I found it looked too plain. I wanted to add a silhouette so I searched for one and came up with the perfect picture.





For the text I used a calligraphy font again because it was simple and elegant the way I think the word Peace should be represented. I placed each letter at slightly different heights and spaces so it looked like the word was floating amongst the clouds.

Remix Culture

After reading the article entitled "What Comes After remix" by Lev Manovich I would have to say that we can distinguish between different kinds of remix aesthetics. There is obviously a difference between remixing a song and remixing a political video. One is about sound and one is about the visual components as well as what is being said. Furthermore they have different messages.

A song can be remixed to make it more of a club hit or to show how one song can be interpreted by another artist. The message is more about the music and what is being done musicaally and the primary aesthetic is auditory.

When it comes to a political video the remix is more in terms of the message they want to get out to the public. They may be spoofing it to show how stupid they think one party might be or they may be trying to get laughs by editing together a string of things said by one or more people in power. The aesthetic here is visual.

The art of remixing became extremely popular due to up and coming technology but it has been around for a long time in forms such as collage and montage. Therefore there is a close relationship between remixes made electronically and remixes made through earlier forms. Both can involve cutting and pasting (images, sounds etc.) they are both forms of art and they both take from many sources and combine it into one piece of work in the end.

The similarities between these two forms of remixing (visual vs. audio) is of course the fact that they take certain components and mix them with other ones. They are both works of art and they each have a message.

The differences are of course that they use different mediums and that remixing songs is more common. Also the messages they have can be different. As one is more about the music and the message the DJ wants to convey musically whereas the visual remixing can have a political message or a more serious type of message.

Overall I think this was an interesting article that really brought to my attention how important remixing is to our culture and how relevant it is.