I hope my artefact engages the audience by combining humor with social commentary, using satire to reveal the absurdities of comical objects. By juxtaposing a 1960s protagonist with modern-day elements like TikTok and vaping, the film invites viewers to reflect on how different the culture has vastly changed, often in bizarre ways. It aligns with the studio’s key concern to embed comic events in the “non-comedy” genre like drama or documentary, allowing for more suspenseful intersections of comedy. 

If I continued working on my short spy film, I would focus on refining two key elements to enhance the overall quality and impact. Firstly, I still see the underperformance in the set design. As we do not have enough resources to create the exact look of the ’60s era, we slightly create unfavorable loopholes. Agent Whyte and the boss are from 1964, but the agency’s setup and characters’ dialogue do not belong to 1964. After re-watching the 1964 scenes multiple times, I would love to create a better interpretation – how people interpret meanings through social languages (narratives, gestures, and so on). Furthermore, we lack concentration on the side character’s storytelling. Most events revolve around Agent Whyte most of the time; thus we waste opportunities to invest in potential characters such as Agent Whollie. One technique I learned from sketching the story is to identify the goals of your comic characters to expose their stagnant characteristics, and their actions in pursuit of goals should match their traits (Toplyn 2014). We neglect the drive of Boss to hunt down Agent Wollie for the file and the schemings of Wollie against the Boss. It lacks the condensed background to build up the character’s motives, leaving the film flat with easy resolution

Secondly, improving logistics and pre-production is also important. My initial lack of experience with shot lists and storyboards was a hurdle. On the first day of shooting, I was lost in keeping up with the schedule. Staying too long at one scene held us back from keeping the progress on time. Therefore, I felt the need to have an intricate production sheet where I planned what activities I had to follow during the day and the timelines for them. I watched a helpful YouTube tutorial, “How To Storyboard Even if You Can’t Draw”, and found out that even if I can not draw, executing good direction lines beneath each scene is viable enough. Moreover, I used the Shot Design App to create a 2D model of the shots. It was a supportive document on set, especially when actors understood their characters most thoroughly and might not have the best understanding of the director’s terms. Speaking to them clearly about your shoot intention and getting feedback from them come up with spontaneous ideas that were not part of the initial plan.

Reflecting on the media works “Operation Superstar” and “Situation Tragedy” from our studio, I gained specific insights into the key idea of Benign Violation, which explores how deviations from social norms can trigger laughter (Warren and McGraw 2014). This concept also aligns with the Story Sketch idea, emphasizing that every character needs a motive, and their personalities are crafted to highlight that motive (Toplyn 2014).

In “Operation Superstar,” Paul’s actions create a sense of unease as he desperately seeks attention by violating norms. His character shows a serious motive after being overwhelmed with being unnoticed, in that he puts a condom in a cast member’s sandwich and openly admits it to everyone. Still, it fails to get the attention he craves, nevertheless the horrible things he did. His extravagant behavior is an act of norm-breaking, meant to provoke laughter through discomfort and absurdity. Similarly, in “Situation Tragedy,” the characters Kevin, Adam, and Josh embark on a wild adventure in search of Millie Bobby Brown. The drug hallucination leads to absurd and humorous actions, such as the boys neglecting Kevin when he gets lost in the water or meeting the pirate. This scenario highlights their carefree and spontaneous nature despite facing consequences, that defy the logical senses. Again, these examples underscore how the careful construction of character motives and personalities can effectively utilize the benign violation theory to elicit laughter.

In engaging the media work “Picture the Moment” from the Scene in Cinema Studio, its focus is to recreate the vibe of inspirational Ghibli films. I understand that this final project requires you to draw your personal feelings from inspirational cinematic experiences and recreate them using your vision. The producers intend to create a lo-fi nature-type look that speaks to the common aesthetic design in Ghibli films. It requires a sophisticated analysis of Ghibli’s films to conclude what makes Ghibli’s animation mesmerizing and tranquil. Ghibli’s stories speak to morally humane themes and catalyze nature to emphasize its influence on expressing the inner moods of characters. Therefore, they employ static shot composition, which captures the nature around the in-focus character, with the support of minimalist camera movements. The narrative, centered on a photographer reminiscing about a lost friend through capturing silent moments in nature, further highlights the themes of memory, connection, and solitude.

Reference List:

Toplyn, J. (2014), “Story Sketches” in Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV, New York: Twenty Lane Media, pp. 221–238.

Warren, C. & McGraw, A.P. (2015), “Benign Violation Theory” in Attardo, S. (ed), Encyclopedia of Humor Studies, Los Angeles: SAGE Reference.

Beyond a Joke, Beyond a Genre: Week 7 Reflection

Beyond a Joke, Beyond a Genre: Week 8 Reflection

Beyond a Joke, Beyond a Genre: Week 9 Reflection

Beyond a Joke, Beyond a Genre: Week 10 Reflection

Beyond a Joke, Beyond a Genre: Week 11 Reflection

#4 ASSIGNMENT – Reflecting: Final Reflective Essay

My artefact:

ROGUE from Media Factory on Vimeo.

I hope my artefact engages the audience by combining humor with social commentary, using satire to reveal the absurdities of comical objects. By juxtaposing a 1960s protagonist with modern-day elements like TikTok and vaping, the film invites viewers to reflect on how much culture has changed, often in bizarre ways. It aligns with the studio’s key concern to embed comic events in the “non-comedy” genre like drama or documentary, allowing for more suspenseful intersections of comedy. At the start of the semester, my comedy was framed in an independent genre. I opposed genre hybridization because I was not confident combining aesthetic formats that compensate for the dominant comedy vibe. However, I acknowledge that the comic frame is built on the role of context we access and constitutes variable meanings tailored to each person (Voth 2014). Therefore, I took the last major projects as an opportunity to challenge the hybridization of spy themes and comedy modes.

If I continued working on my short spy film, I would focus on refining several key elements to enhance the overall quality and impact. Firstly, I would delve deeper into the genre hybridization by balancing the comedic and satirical tones more effectively. Following Meikle’s (2012) analysis of the fake news TV series Brass Eyes, satire is more than calling out the framed subjects and justifying views. Each subject should be treated differently based on our perspectives and distances from the satirical subjects. As our format is not live TV shows, we speculate our method to communicate views of satirical subjects in a short film format that our character, Agent Whyte, exaggerates her expression when confronting the subjects. What still needs to be worked on is more research into how the typical ’60s comedy movie is portrayed contrasting to the modern look. Logically, our character is from 1964; thus, her expression and social perception differ from the contemporary generation. Spending time editing and rewatching the 1964 scenes, I realized we needed the 1964s context – how people interpret meanings through social languages (narratives, gestures, and so on). However, I am satisfied with our investing efforts in portraying a clumsy and insensible Agent Whollie and reimagining how her character would survive in 2024.

Furthermore, I suggest modifying and extending the script. Since this is our first film-making experience, we will unlikely avoid the unforeseeable plotholes. Most events spin around Agent Whyte in the large time length that we neglect to discuss the depth of other important characters. One technique I learned from sketching the story is identify the goals of your comic characters to expose their stagnant characteristics and their action in the pursuit of goals should match their traits (Toplyn 2014). We neglect the drive of Boss to hunt down Agent Wollie for the file and the schemings of Wollie against the Boss. As a result, we tend to resolve the plotholes by Wollie breaking down the situation through her few lines. It lacks the condensed background to build up the character’s motives, leaving the film a simple run-and-chase between spy and bad guy.

Improving logistics and technical execution is another priority. My initial lack of experience with shot lists and storyboards was a hurdle, but I’ve discovered valuable resources that can guide me in creating more detailed planning documents. This YouTube tutorial has given me different ways to compile visual guides for the shot, such as How To Storyboard Even if You Can’t Draw. I used specifically the Shot Design App to create a 2D model of how the shot will be played out from the director’s view. I would love to excel more in shot list organization. I realized the success of a shot list depends on good logistic execution, including but not limited to location scouting and reviews, and technical capability. One example is the scene when Whoyte is looking for clues to find Wollie and her face is a bit underexposed on camera. Our initial plan was to shoot at midday but it was pushed back to late afternoon after we finished other priority shots. However, if I were more delicate, I would plan alternate options to bring more light kits or choose proper locations.

Lastly, I would love to excel in camera proficiency, especially in focal lengths and movements. Two helpful resources will help me prosper in creating unique visual ideas: https://eyecannndy.com/search/ and Frame Set. There were a few scenes when I rewatched again during the edit, I was thinking of shooting different ways. For instance, I would love to try the wide shot (imitating the look from an anamorphic lens) to create the look of Agent Whyte when she was standing outside the Flinder Station as an outsider in this world.

I am satisfied with the experience of working with different groups throughout this semester. The drive to change the groups occasionally would help me find suitable teammates for the last project. I was in groups with people whose working styles were contradictory. I am proud of my final project group as the majority put concentrated effort into getting the best result. Moreover, I feel that my opinion can be easily transmitted and teammates validate my slight vision from my experiences of producing and editing. For instance, I suggested using a shot list and slate that helped us cut short editing time. I also learned to validate others’ contributions to the output. Before this class, I did not have experience working in a production group because I enjoyed taking charge of every element in the artifact to fulfill my visual desires. Also, scheduling conflicts and differing opinions sometimes slowed decision-making, especially during the strenuous final week before the deadline. I understand that variations of shot placement change meaning and though an individual shot has a different meaning; when it is combined with other shots, the meanings change (Dharmendra 2023). Therefore, it is substantial that everyone will have a different view of which edit cuts work. These challenges, though frustrating, taught me the importance of clear communication, flexibility, and compromise. I am proud that after all, we have a mutual vision to foster a positive teamwork environment and allow each person’s strength to thrive in the project.

Reference List

Dharmendra C (2024) ‘Image comprehension and the emotional response to film editing’, AIP Conference Proceedings, doi: 10.1063/5.0179615.

Meikle, G. (2012), “‘Find Out Exactly What to Think—Next!’: Chris Morris, Brass Eye, and Journalistic Authority”, Popular Communication, 10(1–2), pp. 14–26.

Toplyn, J. (2014), “Story Sketches” in Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV, New York: Twenty Lane Media, pp. 221–238.

Voth, B. (2014), “Comic Frame” in The Encyclopedia of Humor Studies, Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, pp. 148–150.

This week, we are at our final stage of shooting and starting editing. I am thankful that I had a detailed shot list, so we saved lots of time when we selected the right clip for editing. It was easy to compare the clips when we had the slate showing the shot details at the very beginning of the scene. At the beginning of the shot, I asked a member to hold up the slate to the front to show the shot details. It is fascinating to see that the director’s cut and the editor’s cut are slightly different. When I made the shot list, I imagined the shot from my vision as an editor. However, when you work in a group, it opens new thresholds for ideas that you might not have seen before. For example, when I was making the storyboard for the TikTok dance, I did not think about how it would look because TikTok was not my proficiency. When we came to the scene, the girls suggested trying the wobble camera movement to look exotic. In the end, the edit cut was different to what I imagined before. We expect to finalize the rough cut by the end of this week. I would like to thank these people for giving me helpful tips to fix audio problems. I saw other groups using boom mic to capture the audio. Since I was in charge of equipment loan, I wanted to use the lightest mic pack that could transfer the audio smoothly without the need for a boom mic holder. However, we had to do a lot of sound mixing because the sound from the audio channels clipped with the sound from the camera’s internal mic. Furthermore, I would also like to thank Bradley for answering questions about the the Location Safety Checklist and Report. As you mentioned, it is great to have a look at what is feasible to do in terms of our permitted capability before shooting, including the authorized guarantee of location.

(Edit: I do not have the original footage since they are in Zoe’s hard drive. But I am happy to share with you our final results of audio mixing when we finish. Best regards)

This week, we started the shooting process of the short film. As the main supervisor of location scouting, equipment, and shot list making, it is my first time handling multiple jobs at the same time. Therefore, it is unavoidable to encounter logistics problems. When I was organizing the shot list, I did not consider the timing of the scenes. Mainly, when we had a group discussion of the script, we did not mention the scene timing. Therefore, the shooting order did not suit our intention. For example, last Sunday, we managed to shoot the scenes when Agent Whyte was teleported to 2024 in daylight: the city montage. After that, we finished those scenes when Whyte was looking for Wollie’s clues. All scenes happened to be done by 5 p.m., and we expected to shoot the fighting scenes between them. However, the winter afternoon soon got to dawn and the sky turned black quickly. I was running into camera issues so the shot has to be delayed to next Monday. Therefore, either we wait until late Monday to get the fighting shot or try to find a way around to shoot it regardless of the condition. Nevertheless, I was able to grow professionally by managing these roles in our project. After our first shooting on Wednesday, I learned that it is more useful to have a good direction visual and a more organized shot list. My first shot list was not that great for delivering instructions to actors. However, I still managed to include other useful information: scene order, location, camera, lens width, and shot types. Therefore, it helped cut down time on the set. For the second shooting on Sunday, I tried to break down each scene into smaller parts. That way, it will not get the actors confused by too many directions. I used the Shot Design app to convey my idealistic shot visual in 2D. Especially during our working on set, I realized that it’s better not to be too adamant about the shots you want to make. My teammates are natural performers and they know how to take advantage of the shooting location to express their characters. That’s why I added a comments section next to each shot to ensure that I kept track of any visual changes. It helps me communicate with my actors more easily since they understand my expectations and give immediate feedback on whether the shot might be good or not.

Link to my shot list: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1JaB4bkNaVk-isVFPDZSGO6bPif5TqNSoiyQBWOwB64w/edit?usp=sharing

This week, we aim to accelerate our writing process to finish the script before Friday. We appreciate Brendan for the helpful tips and sincere insight into our writing drafts. He advises us on which idea might be off the hook and not standing out at the punchline. He also emphasizes the importance of setting up the premise before the jokes so as not to get the jokes slightly off. Moreover, he also suggests revising the satirical elements. We also ask if our attempt is a parody of spy movies as we poke fun at the spy figures with Agent Wyte’s character. Once again, thanks for your clarification, Brendan. As long as we do not imitate the look of any specific movie totally, we can get away with inspiration. We solve the satirical problems by inserting Whyte’s appearance on the street and how she gets dozed off with the satirical problems in modernity: the tram, the vape, the protest, and TikTok. Once again, it presents a challenge: Does all the scenes make sense when they are grouped? Each one of us had written separate establishing scenes for the modern world. Yet, once we finished them, we would correct them one more time to make sure they matched the bigger events in the story. Moreover, we are confronted with the timeline challenge of dividing the scenes’ length appropriately into 10 minutes. One relevant problem with the script is that sometimes we dedicate more lines to unnecessary scenes but leave the important scenes unresolved. In the script briefing, we spend time skimming through the skip once again and looking at lines we need to discard.

This week, we settled on the main storyline that we aim to do for the project. We aspire to remake the look of agent intelligence films that focus on the chase between the cop and the criminal. Classic examples we took reference to were the Kingsman and Men in Black. However, we aim not to focus only on the comedy genre. Rather, we visualize it to be a hybridization of satire and comedy. Even though we have not decided on the main satirical objects, we want to bring the daily life momentum to the scene. What we feel about social activities will be transformed into satirical material. We also talk about the character’s profiles. Based on Brendan’s advice, we agree that getting established with the description of characters advances us faster in crafting the vomit draft. Therefore, it can avoid illogical sensibility which conflicts with events in the story.  For example, we looked back at the main events that we wanted to use for the storyline, for example: time-traveling to different eras, and started asking equivalent 5W questions (Who, What, Where, Why, How). ‘What is the motive of our boss for time-traveling? Why was the agency in 1964?’ is such an example. After that, we have a direction in our minds in which we want our characters to fit into the scenarios. For the main character, Agent Whyte, we imagined her to be a little quirky and childish, with a strong desire to prove her capability to the boss. After we jotted down the points, we started developing the secondary scenes and tried to match them with personalities to speak of the characters. 

Here is the attachment of the vomit draft that we prepared:

Link to our brainstorm:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1y0NnMkirLmtHHr-7WOivLypRsy-Iz5CU3rQoVeeiO3s/edit?usp=sharing

Link to our vomit draft:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iLxB55NTcyW4NO35FrW3QIaEPhvd6edcFEKgsobiFyo/edit?usp=sharing

Here is the link to our group agreement document:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ucnxGGarOvfoQYnYCucXUVxiS4CybhDQrI4luwMJ5gQ/edit?usp=sharing

Here is my individual comedy mood board:

We propose creating a genre hybridization sketch that centers around a main comedic character and his/her different behaviors toward the surroundings. We take inspiration from similar themes as Mr.Bean and Johny Englishman (one protagonist) and the time-traveling of Stranger Things. We discuss whether we want to assemble two contrasting look eras – black and white from the 50s and the modern time of the 21st century. In my research for the same aesthetic media, I came across Wanda Vision’s Marvel series. It has a lot to discuss – how they set up the black-and-white theme and acted similarly to conventional media of that timeline. Some occurrences of crisp switch to the modern setting make me question if we can handle such a complex project in terms of logistics and planning, not including the essential research into media of different timelines yet. That’s why I suggested some questions that illustrate the conflict of the time-traveling theme to ask my members the following week. Therefore, it is open for discussion within the group to keep the idea or not. In the meantime, we will focus on identifying the character profile, and lock down on what period, main storyline, and characters we want to focus on. In the first week, we decided to let each member brainstorm random ideas that they might like and we will link the favorable ideas later – that’s how our ideation method works currently.

Apples – Hybridisation Experiment #1: Parody

House Tour – Hybridisation Experiment #2: Satire

Crime Show – Hybridisation Experiment #3: Genre Hybridisation

This week introduces the concept of genre hybridization. The topic is intriguing because it is different from any idea previously presented in the class. Considering the previous weeks, we talked about how inner and outer influences can input the comedy work as modes. On the contrary, genre hybridization re-examines comedy as a supplement to the non-comedic genre. It means that a non-comedic genre will be the core structure; meanwhile, the comic frame is used discretely to support the main theme. For example, we present a comparison between mockumentary and hybrid documentaries. The slight difference that I was able to spot from the viewing examples was a magnifying editing technique called ‘cutting on significance’. While the mockumentary is called the parody version of the documentary, the hybrid version implies subtle comic devices – not through making fun of the conventional documentary’s aesthetics. The abrupt end, cutting in the middle of scenes, invokes a sense of anomalies, but it is so subtle that even though you spot something slightly off, it is still not reaching ‘that level’ of parody. However, the boundary is so obscure that we could hardly reason why this one is hybrid and not comedy. Branden clarifies that the subject of comedy will determine whether the text has comic elements, as long as we do not change the genre convention. Nevertheless, it will be a challenge to set up comic devices in a non-comedy genre without a slight mocking of that genre. Because laughter comes out of the incongruity effect, it is equivalent that we laugh when something is off. Therefore, our solution is to make a pure crime script that takes place in the interrogation room between detectives and suspects. We try our best to reach the laughter effect while still maintaining the aesthetic of the crime genre. We write a crime/mystery script and envision how some interrogation scenes take place (I imagine the famous Joker vs. Batman interrogation in the Dark Knight series). Then, to make it funny, we visualize what kind of behaviors of suspects are unacceptable during the questioning – as we conclude, a man answers by singing, a girl falls in love with a policewoman, and a man thinks he is the interrogator. Over the past three weeks, I have felt that I am more comfortable proposing ideas and turning them from the proposal into actual records – scripts, visual boards, and shotlists. I have learned by heart how it is to get organized and disciplined with the deadline so that I can still get a hold of my idea flow and become more responsible with groups. I would love to work with people who want to create comedy genre hybridization – maybe web dramas like Stranger Things – but in a hilarious scope.

Reference List:

Middleton, J. (2002) Documentary Comedy in Media International Australia, 104(1), pp. 55–66.

Sketch Link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HV9uU26v6q0