CAPTURE

Darwin college feedback

I received feedback for my Risk video from Darwin college today. The feedback was:

‘This film is obviously about Risk- from the sign carried by the figure. But apart from that sign, it was unclear to me what else the film said about ‘risk’ - i.e. it felt like you could have chnaged the word on the sign and used the film for a whole range of other themes.’

‘It was colourful, visually ver arresting and had an engaging quality’

‘it failed to satisfyas to its message about Risk and as a result left the viewer somewhat confussed about what to take away from the video.’

The feedback was what I expected and I completely agree. My video doesn’t have a clear link to the theme of ‘Risk’ - apart from the sign. I think the suggestion of changing the text on the sign in my video is interesting and if I had, had more time this is something I would of tried to change in my video.

Darwin College did not select my video to be shown, which doesn’t surprise me, they said: ‘the connection to Risk, it was felt, was not inherent enough in the video’s story.’

Tag Clouds

After receiving feedback from peers on my final Risk video I took the most used words and created two information clouds - one for positive feedback and one for constructive criticism.

Positive:

Negative:

My tag clouds show me that colour and creative were important factors that my peers took in from my video and also that length was issue.

If I had the weekend to continue working on my project, I would of done a few things differently.

For starters, I would have taken a varity of photos of myself holding the the ‘risk’ sign, in more interesting ways then just a straight on photo. I then could of edited the photo’s in different ways so they were all different. I may of even written a letter of the word ‘risk’ on different pieces of paper and taken pictures of myself holding each one, so when it came to animating, it visually looked better.

I would of animated the images differently and possibly made the background animation more interesting.

Its hard to say what I would of done differently, as if I could I would of liked to start again.

Deadline

Today was the project deadline and i really had to work to get my video finished in time. I had created my animation files on Photoshop at home so all I had to do in today’s lesson was bring it all together using Final Cut Express. I began by placing the background animation on a loop as it only lasted roughly 10seconds. Next I used Key frame points to make my ’model’ images animate around the screen. As you can see demonstrated here:

I then searched online for a soundtrack using the links Nick had provided, but I couldn’t find anything that would fit, and the websites were a little confussing, so I went on Garage band where I found a soundtrack called ‘Catwalk’ which I thought could work, so I dropped it onto my timeline and played it throught with the animation and found that it went well with the visuals so saved it.

Overall, I think that this isn’t my strongest piece of work, and its just unfortunate that my idea fell apart, however i’d like to think that my project does show that I can use the programs Final Cut Express and Photoshop well and that I am capable of creating mixed media.

New Plan

My project sort of fell apart - the found imagery wasn’t working, so I decided not to use found imgery but to take a photo of myself holding a sign saying ‘Risk’

The plan is now to edit the photo in the style of Nikki Fraquharson to place over my animated illustrations.

Here is the image I am using in my video, I did three different colour verisons of this (Black, Green and Blue)

I created the images by taking a photo of myself holding a sign I made saying ‘risk’, then opening the photo in photoshop I used the Pen tool to create a path around each of my legs to make it look like I’m wearing knee high socks. I then created a new layer and used the pen tool again to trace round my hair,  I then filled in the path using the paint bucket tool.

I think the polka dot jumper works really well and fits in with the pattern themes, I also think the font of the text I drew is good because it also fits in with the pattern theme.

The backround illustrations I created on Photoshop CS3 also, is based on one of my practice illustrations. I used the Pen tool, the bucket tool and paint brush tool to create it, I also made two different patterns to use for it - a stripey one and a polka dot one, you can see this here in one of the frames:

The theme of risk for this would be that i’m using mixed media.

Check Point 3

What I’ve done today:

Today I used one of my practice illustrations to photoshop my found image (http://www.oliviasobsession.com/gaga_costume.jpg) on to see how I can play around with it ready for my final video. I made the image get bigger as it got closer to the front, to create the effect of walking, to add to this effect I also flipped every second image so the legs look like they are moving.

What i’m going to do:

Next I plan to animate the practice footage using colour and plan how I want to use it in my final video. I’ll probably use the same image, as I think it represents what I was going for theme wise, or I might take my own photo. I also need to make my illustrations landscape for the video so I don’t get a black border on the left and right side of the frame.

What could go wrong and how can it be fixed?

The main thing that could go wrong at the moment is that I don’t finish my final illustration in time, however if this problem does occur I can always use one of my practice illustrations.

Practice Patterns

For the project I am creating colour and pattern illustrations using felt/fine tip pens, however this may prove to be very time consuming, so Nick suggested I create the illustrations on photoshop, so here are a few practice patterns.

Using GIMP (a simiular program to photoshop) I created this pattern

I started by going File > Create > New Pattern

And then created a swirl design. I then tested it out by saving (Edit > Paste as > New Pattern) it and then using it to see if it matched up. Here is what it looked like

I’m not too keen on this pattern, however it was only my fist attempt.

Practice illustrations

I have also made some practice illustrations on Photoshop, as it is quicker and allows them to be animated later on.

Here is my first attempt at creating the illustrations on Photoshop. I took screen grabs of my work in progress..

I started by using the pen tool to create the runway and backdrop shape - a circle

I then began to add pattern inside the lines I created, still using the pen tool

Here is a screen grab of the pen tool in use

Next I added a pattern around the circle

Finally I decided to experiment with a little bit of colour. I want my illustrations to be colourful however I think this works with and without colour.

I then made another one using the same tools, here it is:

Check Point 2

It has been another full week for me, as I’ve began to focus on adapting and researching into my ideas and my final idea. My final idea being that I will create a stop motion effect video of size zero models and models wearing ‘artistic’ fashion items walking along an illustrated catwalk that I will create. The risk being that size zero models give off the wrong image to audiences as well as health issues for the models and designers take creative risks in producing their fashion collections. I shall be using the theme of found imagery and pattern and colour illustrations for this idea.

I think I have been reasonably successful during this project so far, updating my blog and sketch book as much as possible. In the next week I shall be keeping to the schedule I set myself that can be found in here a few pages back. The schedule is a daily plan of what I want to achieve.

One way in which I could improve my productivity and meet the deadline is to do more work outside of lesson, such as blog work and sketch book work so I can focus on my final video during lessons where help is available. I could also listen to suggestions made by my teachers and concentrate on my work.

Exploring Patterns

In today’s lesson I focused on my sketch book, going back to previous pages to make sure I have annotated them in as much detail as possible, as well as creating some more designs.

I took a double spread page so I could explore into patterns. To help me do this I printed off a few of Nikki Fraquharson’s mixed media girls that contain lots of pattern and colour, I stuck 2 of the images in my sketch book and began to take the patterns away from the image across the pages. Here is a photo of my page in progress

Finished page

I also helped Angelica today with her practice footage. Her project is based around slow motion, powder paint, and models and for her practice footage she was testing out the slow motion options on after effects, which meant she needed to shoot something. So myself Angelica Elliott and Jahmal went out near the Coleridge car park and I shot footage of her throwing water over Elliott and Jahmal. Originally she wasn’t going to use just water, she was going to add food dye, so visually it looked better, however I think it worked just as fine without and I’m excited to see what she produces for her final project video.