Monthly Archives: May 2014

Week 10 Class

We’ve done more work on our Korsakow. We have around half the clips we need, but still have to take more.

From here we need to design an interface and have a strategy behind it, it can’t just be random. There needs to be thought behind it, and I don’t know where that thought can come from.

The clips are of interview questions by members of couples, each person is in four clips answering different questions in each one. The pattern will probably have to do with each question, so one question leads to others that have something to do with that question.

The interface on the other hand we have no ideas about currently.

Brainstorming:

  • Lots of little clips to choose from, symbolising how ubiquitous love is
  • Divide the categories by male and female

Week 9 Class and Organisation

Organisation of our Korsakow project.

We’re really on track with our Korsakow project. We each have given tasks, so this week outside of class we will each conduct 5 different interviews, each consisting of 4 questions. That gives up 60 clips in total. We decided to shoot on our phones, horizontally, and all will be framed the same way.

Then by next week’s class we will have a draft put together to show in class. Then we will work more on the interface design and key words of the Korsakow during that week.

The week after that we will work on the essay. We have already decided that we will each write 600 words on a different topic. I will be covering the content of the piece.

We have all this information tracked in a Gant chart.DSC_4813

33 Objects

DSC_4794 DSC_4796This week I went to visit the NGV, and check out the new works there. Something I noticed was there is now a lot of media art on exhibition, whereas a few years ago it was mainly paintings and stills.

One artwork that seemed relevant to our media class in particular was Charlie Sofo’s video piece, 33 Objects That Can Fit Through the Hole in my Pocket.

This arwork showed the artist’s feet and random objects fell out the bottom of his trousers after shaking his feet. It was list-like, in that the objects were random and were connected by their ability to fall through his pocket. It also reminded me of our Korsakow projects because it was extremely abstract.

When watching these random objects fall out of the artist’s pocket, I had no idea what it meant or what the artist was trying to do. The description of the artwork states that it “raises questions about perceived and actual and resourcefulness or artists, humorously critiquing criteria that claim to separate treasure from trash.”

This is an interpretation that I would never have guessed at, and I think it is an example of how ambiguous media list-like works can be, and how this does not devalue them.

Martin Scorsese on Cinematography

I love what he said about deciding what goes into the frame. It’s like he’s treating film as an animation, whereby everything that exists within the frame is created and intentional, it doesn’t just happen to be there.

I also love the point that he said about the limitations of the frame. There’s a lot that you can do with film and a lot that you can’t, and I think limitations aid creativity rather than extinguish it. By understanding your limitations you can try to push the boundaries on what can and can’t be done. For example, you can’t physically touch someone through film, but by putting the right thing in the frame you can elicit the feeling of intimacy and being touched.

I was also excited to read that Scorsese and who he calls the greats all prefer long takes. This is because I do too, and I thought that perhaps it was a naive thing because in film and in particular in TV, directors seem to prefer quick, fancy cuts. This is more technically difficult but easier to cut together, whereas in one take it is easier to set up but harder to execute well. I prefer the latter. As he said “it seems like an older style of filmmaking” which makes me feel that it is old fashioned and unstylish, but it may be classic according to Scorsese. However he is right when it comes to editing in the best shot.

I love his style so it was awesome to read how he goes about constructing a frame, using a normal lens and avoiding zooms and long lens shots. Then he uses an effect, something fancy, something noticeable, whether it be lighting or the aesthetic or a prop etc. It has to be interesting for him and I think that’s a rule I’d like to apply to my own filmmaking, where if the shot doesn’t interest me it isn’t right.

Lighting Class

We noted key light and off key lighting, soft light, diffusion, reflection and hard lighting. We learned to set up lights and dismantle them. How to adjust them and which colour temperatures would work in which scenarios and how to adjust for this, eg blue tones lights or blue gels when working outside in the daylight.

Our project will be difficult to light as we are shooting outside, however half our shoot will be at night so we will definitely need lighting. We’ll be using the handheld LED lights, that have no wires, for safety reasons and convenience.

We will have to use a yellow gel to make the lighting look like artificial street lighting and add warmth. We will also use a C-stand and reflectors, so it is fantastic that through the lectures we learned how to use and dismantle these. As many of our shots will be wide shots the lighting will be diffused as we don’t want it to appear like a spotlight, it must be soft and dreamy.

 

Blow Up

This scene was very intricately put together. Most of the shots are moving shots, incorporating panning, tilting and zooming in unison. The entire shots were in focus which would have made things easier but it would have taken a lot of rehearsing to be able to follow the actors’ choreography as fluently as the cameraman did.

The room was also full of props and set design was very interesting. The placement of the reflective surface and the beams which the actors used would have been carefully through through. The camera was placed at odd angles at times to get the characters in frame, although at times they were only shown partially, in an artistic way. The actors would not have moved at random, their paths and body language toward the camera would have been planned meticulously by the director.

Then the director would have instructed the camera man to follow and pan with the actors, filming before, during and after the actors had walked in and out of frame.