Media 1 (2016)

This week’s tutorial focused on the showcase of the classes self-portrait films, secondly a discussion was held on a ‘source’ (documentary sound) ‘Affairs of the Mind’ which focused on a women hiring a private detective. Our lecturer said to take not on five important characteristics.

• Perspective
• Social Distance
• Figure, Ground, Field
• Intimacy
• Immersion

Notes for when recording: Best signal -12, -6Db ‘gain’ *in regards to microphone levels (L & R)

(Collaborative partner; Grace Thomas) Our Informal Interview was recorded in the hub of building 8. The atmos contained a lot of conversations, movement and other central sounds which can be easily heard in the background. The gain was brought down slightly to peak around -12 so that we could cut out slightly more of the atmos although it was informal and allowed to be included. We played around with the proximity of the sound source and distance of the microphone to see which distance worked best (aka best signal to noise ratio).

Our Formal Interview was recorded in a lecture room in building 80 (level) 1, It was a challenge to  find a quiet room where we could record something formal without eliminating all atmos but we tried our best and it ended up sounding more professional than we imagined.

To mix my sound I’ll be using Adobe Audition I’ve used the program before working with the Student Youth Network (90.7fm) but haven’t mixed as much audio as I’d like to so this will be fun and definitely a task for which I can learn more about the program especially for future use. In my next ‘activity’ post which I’ll be uploading soon I’ll be writing about the trials I went through when mixing as well as uploading the mixed audio/finished product from this weeks activity. Attached to this post is the raw audio recorded from the condenser microphone.

Today I went into university only to realize It was not on, stares into a hollow classroom*sigh*. Not to worry I have a good initiate post coming up, to be continued.

Since this week’s lecture focused on aspects of ‘Sound’ I’d like to link that to a current TV series I’ve been watching that takes careful consideration into what the audience hears, that’s right Daredevil (Season 2).

If you don’t know the main character in this TV series is blind which causes his senses to evolve using sound as a tool for being able to locate and observe his surroundings. This means an increase in diegetic sound effects especially when there are closeup’s of the protagonist’s face (as this is how we know what his thinking as we don’t always see what he sees when it comes to point of view as he sees nothing at all).

This series was created by Netflix using a well known and loved marvel character, and we know that in recent history Marvel seems to do no wrong when creating projects that seem to sell (take into account their most recent flick ‘Deadpool’ which grossed $340,941,383 US) but I find compared to the blockbuster movies we see on our big screen the netflix TV series brings something different into the comic book adaptions, It’s dark, edgy and the acting is well done but not only that I feel like it isn’t afraid to step out into the deep end whilst the big screen adaptions stay in shallow water.

I really admire the colour pallet used in this series; very dark, earthy tones- mostly blues and reds to be exact- these represent the overall mood of the show. Blue representing ‘good’ and the characters morals and red accentuating the violence. The image attached to this post is a good indication of these colours and the beautiful contrast they create esepcially since Matt’s Murdock’s (Daredevil) suit is red when he fights representing again the blood he spills whilst fighting.

I’m also glad the story line isn’t completely rushed and muddled- for example if we reflect on other comic book adaptions such as ‘The Amazing Spider man’ they try to squeeze as much action into the plot as possible- aiming probably towards a Hyper attentive audience although for many it’s just a puddle of jumbled mess. Overall I look forward to watching more of this program and taking into account how they use sound to describe their character as well as the cinematography and colors to represent mood. Until next time (check out the Daredevil Season 2 trailer below for more information on the show).

The self-portrait I created demonstrates particular aspects of my personality and lifestyle that I believe represent me the most accurately. The piece starts off quite simply with opening titles, I do enjoy a simple minimalist title as it keeps the piece clean and neat and adds to the overall artistic approach.
Firstly, I chose to add a short video and selected images of tickets, memories, photographs and trinkets that I keep on my bedroom wall. They are a reflection of my travels and experiences I chose to edit this in the way of a camera ‘clicking’ as it again represents the part of me that loves media and photography.
The piece then changes pace to a sound effect of static before I’ve added in a song that I recently wrote. The overlay for this song is jump cut footage of my synthesizer and music equipment- I believe it represents another aspect people know me well for; ‘music’.
I chose to complete this artistically, changing the video to black and white to represent a focus on the song and its lyrics. Further along in the video I chose to add in footage of myself lip syncing to the lyrics to make the words stand out.

I chose to add in/ record a segment of a song that I composed because I think it portrays my mind stuck in romanticism and always writing about love, life and things that make me feel alive.
Overall I really liked the start of my self-portrait but then worried as I created it the rest of it that It would be too artist and some people wouldn’t understand how it relates back to me, I’ve a very artist person I love colour and life hence why I wanted to portray a lot of floral into my piece as I’m always out and about collecting flowers whenever I can.
I really like the flow of movement and interpretation peoples body language which is why I used shadow to create a layer of artist movement towards the end of my piece, this paired with a calming sound of  wind added an abstract element I really enjoyed editing together.
Also within my video I’ve added the last four lines to one of my favourite poems, Henry’s Sic Vita. It’s about the inevitability of death and man’s mortality I really like this poem and think it fits well with the flowers and the fading mirror/hand as to me it represents reflection something I do very often.
To make this piece better I would have loved to spend more time I think setting up shots and to add more angles in although there are still quite a few.

Media affordances; the term affordance was first used in 1977 by Psychologist JJ Gibson. “When applied in media production context it refers to the specific and unique attributes (or functions)  that a medium may have.” That’s what the first part of this week’s lecture and readings focused on, sound in relation to media affordances. I’m one of those people who like to write down the definition where ever I can so that I know I’ll be able to remember it and what it means for future reference.

Example 1: Listening vs Hearing
‘A distinctive attitude or approach that can be brought to bear on a listening experience’.
Hearing – is perceiving sound innately
Listening – is actively/consciously choosing to interpret something, it requires concentration.

So this week’s lectorial delved deep into what sound what the components that made it up as well as how we interpret and process it (to hear it to experience air pressure changing). There were new terms I learnt that I hadn’t really come across very regularly such as ‘Psychoacoustics’ (a complex interaction of psychics, physiology, sensation, perception and cognition).

John Cage (1912-1992)
“American composer, music theorist, writer, and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments.” And that’s just a starting quote to lift us off. So why Cage was mentioned in the lectorial is due to his piece 4’33”.
This is a composition that was created in 1952 and is it the absence of deliberate sound, the idea is to be present in fact musicians state it is not four minutes and thirty three seconds of silence but rather focusing in on atmos in the environment heard by the audience during the performance. The piece was seen as controversial as it challenged the boarders of art and performance.

In this weeks workshop we started talking about the personalization of our blogs and the structure/style conveyed in their presentation. I’m really trying to aim my blog to be more personal, although it is currently very structural I think that- that’s purely a reflection on my personality. I’m generally a very organised person sometimes at points to organised, always arriving early. It’s actually kind of humor to think lately I’ve been trying to be more ‘on time’ to things rather than early as I end up waiting around for quite a bit when I overcompensate for travel time. Besides that I really want to talk about aspect in this blog that generally interest me and link them in with my learning. We’re focusing a lot on our self portrait (short films) at the moment and I’m hoping to create mine in a way that will really reflect my personality. I’ve very interested in film, media of course and changing technology, art, music, spirituality and psychedelics. I take inspiration from the films Ex Machina, Into the Void, Whiplash, and many other new contemporary flicks which apart more as an art rather than a narrative (although all mentioned have complex story lines in themselves the cinematography is what I find more alluring). I’ll probably be focusing a lot on my cinematography so hopefully it goes well, I’ll check in on here later.

This weeks tutorials theme focused upon aspects involved in media making, and although the content watched as apart of the readings delved into the technical side- we as media makers need to learn both technical and practical in order to succeed in modern day society where competition is at an all time high (and probably will continue to grow as the population itself increases).

Now in this post I wanted to talk about something that coincides with increasing technology and also something that interests me, below I’ve shared with you a ‘TED Talks’ that discusses that the issues involving drug addiction are not caused by drugs alone, the main factor that causes addiction is issues such as Isolation, alienation and loneliness.
So in a society where we seem to appear always connected there is a darker side and a stronger disconnection in certain areas. This talk gives examples of how Heroin was used commonly during the Vietnam war but once soldiers returned home and were embraced by family the usage stopped, so how come people with addiction in modern society it isn’t that easy, a simple fact could be we think people are fine when there not, it is the illusion of connection due to social media.

It’s so easy to create a facade, a false front that sometimes we forget what people are exactly like in real life especially if we don’t see them as often as we should. There’s a saying I know that kind of relates to this image representation, “The saddest people smile the brightest.’-Anonymous.
Basically if you want to know if someones okay see them in person and ask them don’t send them a facebook message, It makes me really angry that this has become the social norm, especially around people in my age group. I once had a friend who wasn’t able to ring me up on the phone because she said she wasn’t use to it and it gave her anxiety. I didn’t understand this, go back a decade ago and it would have been one of the only ways to communicate. So social media has literally created a platform of disconnection and ‘depersonalization’ (I can’t stress the latter enough). A facebook profile isn’t necessarily personal in fact it can be the opposite a shop front for what you want people to see you as.
So as you think about why people feel so isolated in a world where we are meant to be so connected make sure you think about what connection means.

Everything You Think You Know About Addiction Is Wrong | Johann Hari | TED Talks

Hold up, hold up, what? Lets talk about religion and media mingling together to forum this new modern contemporary age where even conservative and traditional icons are getting into the funkiness of social media.
So this might not be a major surprise considering Pope Francis has a way of linking the catholic church with younger generations as well as modern society by being not only more charismatic but also more understanding of what people now want and need. It’s interesting to see how the broader communities observe changes in the media and know what’s trendy, It’s kind of humorous to think that the Pope probably now has someone hired  to help him create, edit and publish posts. Can’t wait to see what comes up next on his account.

Pope Francis gets an Instagram Account

As there was no lectorial this week due to labour day the first post of this week is dedicated purely to  this week’s reading and video, both are discussions by David Gauntlett as he talks about aspects around ‘Making Media Studies’ (also the name of his published book).

In the video ‘Remaking how we think about the Media’ David really talks about “learning with media rather than learning about media”. His views state that generally we move forward rather than looking backward, to make media and move forward rather than describe when looking backward. He wants to refresh people’s views and values on the media by adding a creative aspect. It highlights how things work and knowing how to make a difference and you need to know how things work in order to make a difference in the first place, tying in with the learning with media rather than about it.

The blog post focused on very similar themes but also and focused on Gauntlett answering What kinds of knowledge do we need now? (A question asked by Graham Meikle who is also his colleague).

There were three main points he displayed into dot points that reflected the main areas of knowledge.

• How things work (technical and economic knowledge)
  “You need to know what technological and/or economic systems make possible, what you can and can’t potentially do with them, if you’re going to develop any kind of really informed critique of how things are currently done and the ways in which they should be done.”

•  How things feel and fit (emotional and embodied knowledge)
  “The need to build knowledge about the relationship between physical and material things, and digital items (content and software), and human ideas and feelings.”

• How to make a difference (creative and political knowledge)
  “Come up with brilliant ideas and implement them effectively in the actual world that we live in.”

Reflecting on Daivd’s words we would prefer immerse ourselves in new things compared to learning about them, to go out and do something compared to studying about how it is done. He really talks about the creative homage to media and again the idea of moving forward and not reflecting back to papers in an ever-growing industry.

This weeks Tutorial focused on Haiku making and editing together as a whole, so in this post I wanted to talk about a music video that I not only love the editing to but the whole feel that the video represents including the song itself the music and lyrics.

Oh Wonder – Without You

There is something about this song that makes it easily play on my emotions, It’s interesting how each individual person has a mechanically wired taste in music and cinematography weather it be influenced by upbringing, diversity, or maybe it’s something that is even innate. Regardless I love the de-saturated fluro colors that linger in this video and the imagery of the duo ‘starcrossed’ sitting so close yet so far apart, this is imagery that matches the lyrics so tenderly “Without You” and although it is almost generically cliche the retro aspect that the director and duo have chosen to take creates and individual style that makes them so fascinating in society that is so ridden by sexualization and saturation as well as anything that sustains to the current hyper attentive audience. I would prefer a laid back placid video to an action fest any day.