#1 ASSIGNMENT

‘SNOWFALL’ 

Snowfall was a very engaging, long form narrative we looked at in class. It also happened to be multimodal, the narrative was broken up with images and videos. This gave the consumer agency over the story, as you could choose to read parts and watch parts. As Henry Jenkins states in ‘Convergence Culture & Trans media storytelling 2009’ The reader/consumer ‘cease control over the media technology’. I felt that I was able to cease some form of control over what I read and watched. I also felt that I was participating with the story, as I’d click to watch a segment of something, or swipe to see a montage of photos, and thus had a level of control over what I consumed and what I chose not to consume. The elements it involved weren’t overly interactive as the story unfolded in one way through the act of scrolling downwards. There was text, images, audio and video included in the story. These elements brought value to the story as the reader/viewer could connect multiple forms of media with the one story, emphasising the impact the avalanche had on peoples lives. It was a beneficial way to tell the story as it ‘drilled’ in the narrative and used different media modes to heighten emotion, it made me feel levels of melancholy. I felt at times the amount of scrolling became overwhelming, and my attention span didn’t last for the entirety of the story. At the time it was released people would have had more time to scroll and read, but in this day and age hyper attention is a dominating factor. It did however stand out more as a story, because there were multiple things to interact with, through the different design options. You could tell it was a multimodal story from the get go, as there was a moving image at the top of the page, displaying snowfall, quite a beautiful sight. This gave the consumer some visuals to keep in mind while reading the piece. The relationship between all the elements used enhanced the story as it was backed up with auditory and visual cues. I found myself relying on my memory as I approached aspects of the story, keeping the visuals and audio pieces in mind while reading the narrative. The ‘Dowling’ article proposed ‘Snow Fall’ as a shift in the paradigm of online journalism. No one had ever seen anything like it before, it was a ‘one block’ narrative that offered different people stories presented through extensive imagery in a contemporary way, video and audio. The reading suggested the promotion of the story was very unusual at the time it was made. It was an ever changing mediascape – ‘new’ forms borrowing from older forms, similar to the notion that there are ‘no new stories to write’.In the article it suggested that Snow Fall ‘Broke the rules’ but still stuck to the journalism rule of ‘following the story’, in order to conceptualise it and get it made. I found that the reading gave me more insight into the story and raised the question whether media makers should break conventions? and are the changes actually beneficial (and for whom), or are they just for the sake of changing the dynamic in telling stories.

‘MIND MAZE’

 

Mind Maze is a nonfiction zine displaying the importance of conserving graphic art posters used to promote club events, as they usually end up on the floor of a club and forgotten about. The ring bounded book appears like a school notebook, as the consumer you flick through the quality paper pages, it feels luxurious but juxtaposed is the gritty layout, with etched graphics scanned onto pages and club event posters designed by Maryos Syawish. It is a multimodal piece that carefully combines imagery (drawings) and text. You can see the airbrushed graff style pieces behind the text which is similar to something you’d see scribbled in the bathroom of a club so it fits with the context of the story. It gives insight into the graphic art scene of Melbourne through Maryos Syawish’s stories of club cultures visual identity and the importance of celebrating it. As the reader I felt a sense of nostalgia as I recognised some of the posters from events that had happened in the past. The yellow background of the pages brings the text forward and highlights its importance.

 

 

 

 

MEDIA WORK #1

mealtime 1 final

This is a story of a meal that holds a lot of significance in my family. From as early as I can remember my family have celebrated food and coming together to share meals. I wanted it to seem naive, so I had the text handwritten as though it was coming from my younger self. I was inspired by the yellow background in a zine called ‘Mind Maze’ as it gives contrast to the text and makes it stand out to the reader. It involves itinerative making, as it isn’t a linear story. Instead it gives anecdotes from different times the meal has meant something to myself and my family. It acts as a sort of time capsule that implements photos from the past and photos from the present. The incorporation of video allows the consumer to participate in the unfolding of the story. I used epub to deliver this story as I wanted it to conform with the form of an e book with pictures, hand written text and moving image, through doing this I was able to convey the story of a meal that is significant to me. Next time I think I would incorporate more writing, but I think it’s easy to be immersed in the story when there is less text, sometimes less is more in the telling of a story. I went about it in a route similar to ‘My Grandmothers Lingo’ where I focused on the aesthetic/imagery composed with small amounts of text to lend the story.

 

 

MEDIA WORK #2

 

For this piece I scouted different friends and mutual friends, that had stories they felt comfortable sharing with me. This particular friend would prefer to keep his identity anonymous for the sake of his story, however not taking away from the story he has to share. I decided to use a mixture of audio and still images for this piece along with music I composed and recorded myself.

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *



To prove you are a person (not a spam script), type the words from the following picture or audio file.