The idea of this peice didn't come from research, it was the first idea that came to mind after reading the brief so i went with the flow!
I had used Adobe Flash prior to starting this course and so knew the basics and roughly what i could achieve with the software. Although not having used Actionscript or buttons at all I had to gain a basic understanding. The template we were given allowed me to do this plus asking students in the years above and lectures helped!
I had taken a 360degree view of Rome's Colosseum when I was there last year, and so I used these images as the background.
I also had this photo of a Roman Soldier and my sister, and used it to create a game style interation. The idea is to navigate yourself around the Colosseum and when you spot the soldier, take a photo of him.
I got this image from google. Tracing it in flash allowed me to edit the image, so i was able to create a window in the back of the camera and make buttons etc.
I am quite pleased with the final outcome of this peice however, i would've liked to create a zoom function so the viewer could zoom in and out of the images. I found using Action script quite complicated, and although i eventually got it to work it kept throwing up errors due to very simple human errors such as an odd {. this i found quite frustrating!
Interactive Narrative
iNtErAcTiVe MeDiA
www.cavemanscrib.com
I found this through facebook. it is a interative flat owned by the caveman. You are able to venture around his crib and read emails on his laptop, play music on his ipod, read his magazines etc etc.
I really enjoy this site. The graphics are of a high quality, its easy to use and extremely well thought out.
It gives the chance to be a proper nosey parker, while you nose about the caveman is still in the flat, and occassionally you bump into him and occasionally tells you off which I quite like. , there is a real sense of humour in the entire set up, especially with his personal blog. i can't critisise it.
www.scifi.com/tinman/oz
This is a very visual piece. the funtionality is easy to understand however the site is not as interactive as the Caveman's Crib is slightly limited as you can only fastforward and rewind the visual. the site does not incorporate the classical imagery of The Wizard of Oz, which for me, made me intrigued
www.stevelawler.com
this is a graphic designer's website designed to basically show his technical capabilities. i especially like the inhaler that the viewer must pump up to reveal the links to other interative pages.
he also has a number of games on his sight which stimuate the viewer, they are all just for fun with no aim, but still work well
Narrative One Shot
i found it quite difficult to come up with a good idea for this project. My group hit on the idea of using a spiral staircase as the setting, but thinking of a narrative for that setting without it being cheesy was difficult.
The videos on the single-shot website explored some very individual and experimental ideas. I especially like the Glass Gun by Julie Hill. The way the viewer has to wait for a while until anything happpens is very nice. It is remonisant of a painting at the beginning, adnd the slow motion adds an almost romantic feel.
i have tried to incorporate the same idea in the way i have edited my one shot film. Although it doesn't give it a romantic mood, more sinister i feel. this is the reason why i have chosen the audio i have. i think t compliments the visual. And although i tried hard to go against what the rest of my group have done in fear of copying, making this into a happy peice didn't quite work.
gLoW sTiCkS
This was just an experiment that I have been wanting to try out for some time but just haven't got round to, mainly because I didn't have a tripod. I have only used 8 glowstick bands in all of these pictures, but using a long exposure time I was able to mess about and make it look like there are more.
tEcHnO
The idea for these photographs came from reading the book 'The Language of New Media'. I was interested by the opening quote by Manvich commenting on how technology is embraced by the western world.
"A western artist sees the Internet as a perfect tool to break down all heirarchies and bring art to the people. in contrast...i cannot but see how the internet as a communal apartment of the Stalin era: no privacy, everybody spies on everybody else, always present are the lines for common areas such as the toilet or kitchen"
This got me thinking about how many devices are around the home, and also about the environmental debate that is in the public mind recently.
This book gives a good advice for the beginner on how to create a successful storyboard and the argues the importance of the storyboard as a visual tool in the planning process. John Hart gives reference the many greats in both animation and film and uses them and their work as examples to back-up his argument.
I found this book extremely useful for research purposes, but not so much for the hints and tips on drawing. However, some of the points he made were very creditable.
Narrative Pixilation
Ideas page
Storyboard
Evaluation
The idea for this animation came mainly from researching into George Melies. I heard about him from reading 'The Art of the Storyboard'(immediatly above) and from watching a documenatry style movie on Youtube about him (below), i got thinking about the theme of magic.
I am significantly happier with this piece, compared to my lamp animation. It took me a long time to create the set and make the woodman's clothes but i can't say i didn't enjoy it. I learned from my previous mistakes as to the pre-planning process, and made a storyboard/ideas page to help me and Laurel when we were filming.
First frame.
The woodman magician walks on stage while crowd cheer
He thanks the crowd for their cheering and explains that he will perform a card trick. He then walks over to the prop box to get the pack of cards...
...and starts to deal.
As he pans his hand over the dealt cards they disappear one by one.
He raises his hand, and a wand appears in his grip. He then taps the pack of cards three times and they vanish.
He takes off his top hat and takes out a red hankerchief.
He stuffs the hankerchief into his hand...
...and when he opens his hand the hankerchief has gone.
He has an idea!
...and takes the red hankerchief out of his hat.
Makes the hankerchief disappear again and puts his hat back on.
Raises his arms...
...and he disappears, to the crowds amazement.
This short animation of a confused lamp is in no way original, but not having done stop frame animation much before I thought i would stick to a simple idea.
I have taken direct influence from the stick-man example (further down on my page) which I found on YouTube over the summer and it also has similarities to the animated lamp for the Pixar logo.
i am reasonably pleased with the final outcome, although i think i could have taken more frames with less movement between them; as the movie is a bit jolty in places and aiso quite short. I could've tried being a bit more adventurous with the 'look' also. i didn't do a great deal of pre-planning, which, in my opinion comes through in the final product, and ideally i would re-shoot but, producing this has given me a building block inorder for me to progress if i choose to produce another pixelation animation. i see this animation as a practice run. Before i did this i was unaware and inexperienced with the software we used, and not to mention the technique, but even taking these points into consideration, i remain pleased.
this animation i find to be very crude. it was shot in 'Speak Easy' and was the first attempt with my group. we planned it as we went along and didn't finish it either.
narrative scrap book
These are examples of other peoples work that i have come across previous to starting the multimedia course, and also since. They all have relevance to my Narratives project, so i thought i would include them.
Snooker table
Flash animation
George Melies
Pixelation 1
Pixelation 2
Freshers Week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
in one word....fab!
i have been looking forward to coming to uni so much, especially in the month leading up to it, and it definatly hasn't been a dissappointment! although i think my body would say otherwise, i have been hit by the dreaded freshers flu; but it has in no way dampened my efforts to make the most of the situation. the people i have met so far are amazing and i'm looking forward to meeting many more!
big shout out to Gordon house and of course Multimedia student al of whom are the dogs b******s :D
whoop whoop!!
wHiTe BoArD AnImAtIoN
we where given the task to draw a tree and a box and make the box travel to the other side of the tree. We were given a pen a whiteboard and a camera; and in small groups we produced a short animation which was then put on YouTube.