week 13

After the interim crit i received some constructive criticism about the stage i am at with my work i needed add more to the development side of things for example getting out there and taking some images of the environment around us.

My photography began down in the foundation studio in the university where a few friends where working ,came across some 3d art work which i found to be quite interesting, i could manipulate them and try the lighting i liked from Gregory Crewdsons work.

For some strange reason my next door neighbour has random objects within his garden I'm not to sure why he has them and don't really see him that often either, hes an elderly man who's seems very quite and non sociable, remembering this i took my chance and captured some interesting looking pictures and also manipulate them.

For my final piece to succeed it must fall under The Uncanny valley which is the graph shown below.

Long Weekend
Dir Colin Eggleston
1978

http://www.dantenet.com/er/ERchives/reviews/l_reviews/longweekend.html

The last of the Australian trilogy of films ended with Longweekend, the films start of with a scene with Marcia (Briony Behets) inside her home of a modern Sydney couple atmosphere which seems to be normal, i remember the televisions content contained 'The Birds' which was the very first film we watched, the sounds in this film is very strong a key scene i remember was when one of the main character Peter (John Hargreaves) ran down an Australian native animal the kangaroo it then went on thought out the film creating strange crying noises as if a baby was crying, the couple believe they are traveling somewhere however when they stop at a dinner on the way the locals seem very particular and odd not knowing where this location is they are trying to find, it backs up the theory of the beginnings of a strong horror genre style of film .

Once again nature is out to get the couple i believe its connects to the killing of the kangaroo and the damage of the bush as Peter through his cigarette out of the window, the angle of the shots where very good it ranged from birds eye views from grounds views it all helped making the viewer feel unease thought the film.

The hallway idea i decided to design is shown here with some colour i added in photoshop to give a better perspective of the condition i wanted to show in my design.The aim is to create a cold dam type of astmosphere enhanceing its uncanny meaning the best way i could shows this was to use dark blues and blacks with gray.

week 12

Once researching the artists and gathering information about the uncanny style of photography my findings lead to create a list of the environments I'm considering working on, for me this was essential as it will determine the type of scene I'm going to develop.

Exterior
-Alley ways
-Junk yard
-Garden at night
- Forest
-Caves
-Tunnels

Interiors
-Basement
-Bedroom
-Junk yard
-Theatre set
- abandoned house
-Shops

Its clear that some of these scenes above are not in much depth however now i have done this i can further my development in creating some concepts which i will later create in photoshop.

Walkabout
Dir.Nic Roeg
1971

This is the first of a series of Austrian films the film is a non-ambiguity film as it shows the contrast between natural and the real world i feel that the film has been completely constructed in the way the films scenes are displayed they changed for example from an interior to an exterior scene, the sense of horror in the film is not shown unlike the Birds by Alfred Hitchcock for me i received mainly strangeness, sounds in the film create the atmosphere especially at start of the film with the sounds of a didgeridoo, accompanied by close up of creatures in the desert it shows how deserted they are as the animals run free in the wild.

In the film i see hints of Gregory Crewdson artistic skill, his work is constructed as like the film is also the important scene i remembered was the one where on there journey they came across an abandoned house a strange relationships was occurring which developed the strangeness even more.

Ideas

I made my decision of wanting to design a interior scene, the fist idea came into my head i just quickly jot this down into my note pad and than developed it more as you can see from the images below this one.
the idea was to have a Victorian style doll sitting on the edge of the bed, there would be quite an intense light coming though the window casting a shadow behind the doll.

http://blog.wellsfargo.com/GuidedByHistory/images/Girls_W_Dolls_1888.jpg

the reason for my choice of included a doll is that i feel that they have played an important part of the childhood during 1950s young children normally carried around a doll everywhere they went as you can see in the picture above.

the Victorian doll in a way is a key symbol the main meaning i wanted to express in my idea was that the spirit of the dead child lives on in the doll.

1.

Originally i wanted to add the ventriloquist doll sitting at the edge of the bed but thought it would be to hard to create in Maya and found that the Victorian doll would even more challenging however would show more meaning.

2.

mannequinI feel that with human models there is a huge sense of strangeness as the are a replica of our self the 'human body' in it shape and form ,mannequins are now getting to that stage where they are becoming more realistic to give people a better view of the items of clothing they are wearing, you can find actual real life size mannequins all over the world such as models of celebrities, even though you know that they are lifeless, you have that bizarre sense of feeling for example you wouldn't want to be left in the dark with them.

http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2008/07/03/

mannequin

the next idea involves mannequins it isn't my strongest idea however could be effective if created correctly as i wasn't that keen on this idea i deiced not to carry out too much research on it.

this is the basic design of my 3rd idea, its a large store room area with many containers holding mannequin body parts such as the arms legs etc.
3.

Picnic At Hanging Rock

Dir.Peter Weir

1975

The 2ND film of the Australian trilogy was Picnic at Hanging Rock, i noticed it had some relations to the previous film we watched 'Walkabout' again around the natural nature genre it makes it feel very spiritual, you see more close ups of animals but in this case its more enclosed because of the forest atmosphere,whilst watching the film i asked myself 'what is the meaning of the film?' and could not find one as the film had so my unanswered questions.

The use of flute is what seemed to stand out and is what i remember as being quite symbolic giving a sense of freedom, during the film the class of students had been on a picnic and strangely fall asleep when they arrive at there destination at this point in the film the uncanny element started to take place maybe the clocks stopping at 12 has perhaps a connection to them falling asleep.

Another key scene i remember was the head mistress siting in her office, here you see the change in state because her hair was very nicely groomed and positioned at the beginning and now set as being the opposite.Ends as the girls where never found the film has no answers to the questions you have which becomes an unsolved as a mystery.

This is my car park scene if i was to carry this one out i would like to show the coldness and darkness in the scene i think

4.

After my experiences of creating my designs i really needed something simple on the other hand successful, this is were they idea of claustrophobia came into my head, this scene i a took small element from each of my previous designs and put them into one.

The hallway scene is to make you feel unsafe as if as event has occurred there's much more detail which is needed to be added to make it more easier to understand.

5.

week 11 Digital Enviroment

Digital Environment

Tableaux vivants

The next project is evolved around the tableaux vivants-style 'photography' the whole project will be Incorporated around this topic and will include various types of development such as designs and idea sketches from my own different environments interiors, exteriors and so on, another aspect i will be looking are artists work around this genre throughout this week using them as references to create some interesting work.

ta⋅bleau vi⋅vant
[French : tableau, picture + vivant, living.]

noun
a group of people attractively arranged (as if in a painting)

French saying meaning living picture can relate to many art forms such as theatre painting and photography.

I found an interesting photograph whilst researching tableaux vivants and examined it for myself, you can clearly see that in this image there is something quite distressing and wrong going on an event has occurred perhaps a murder hence why the women in the image is holding an axe, this is the biggest question that arises in the image the fact that it is black and white really enhances the image also i think if it was in colour it would loose its definition and would become more complex to understand the image shows large amounts of meaning and dept with its use of light.

'Chronicles of Crime is Wong Hoy Cheong's photographic recreation of famous Malaysian crime scenes.'

WONG HOY CHEONG
Malaysian, b.1960

http://www.teppertakayamafinearts.com/wong_hoy_cheong/0005.htm

Mise-en-scene

Another French term meaning literally ‘put in the scene’ its almost everything that goes into the composition of the shot which includes composition itself the framing and movement of the camera, lights, set design and the general visual environment.

Ambiguity
From these topics i found ambiguity was the hardest to research as it contains many different types of definitions i located this site which shows the deference's and the meaning for them also A word, phrase, or sentence is ambiguous if it has more than one meaning. The word 'light', for example, can mean not very heavy or not very dark. Words like 'light', 'note', 'bear' and 'over' are lexically ambiguous.

http://online.sfsu.edu/~kbach/ambguity.html

Artist research

From the briefing we received at the start of the week i noted down some key artists that i think i can benefit from as they vary in styles, the reason for my choice is that they appeal to me in the way that artist have constructed the senses as is show me significant use of lighting.

Edward Hooper

http://www.edwardhopper.info/night-hawks.html

I remember researching Edward hopper for my Alevels and was inspired by his work, i like the styles he uses in his work such as the bold layout of colour improving its meaning which is very mysterious, the people are sitting in dinner talking to each other which makes you curious wanting to know what is going to happen next and what they are talking about also.i will take the sense of curiosity from his artwork and try to bring it into my own work.

‘carefully constructed composition and lack of narrative, has a timeless quality that transcends any particular location.’

Sandy Skoglund

http://www.enquirer.com/editions/1998/06/28/skoglund28.html

All the images that Sandy Skoglund create have excellent composition especially the use of colour, she brings the images to life by adding animals such as the foxes shown above it really adds to the balance between reality and society in the way, if you was to imagine the image above without the red foxes it would show a plan average old fashion image but when you include the foxes your view is completely transformed, from her work i take lighting and its composition to help.

Fox games
‘The photographs look as though there were stills from a movie due to the suggestion of movement by the sculptures. Splashes of vibrant colour scattered about the photograph add a lot of interest to this weird, impossible “still”.’

Gregory Crewdson



http://coromandal.wordpress.com/2008/05/03/annunciation/

My favorite of the 3 artist i have researched is Gregory Crewdson , he uses a intense light describing a very anti terrestrial scene, for instances this image shown above the women has brought her own garden into her home which you would not see in normal society, i see a huge element of the uncanny in his work and will perhaps try bring it into my own work.The affect Gregory Crewdsons artwork gives the viewer is the type of affect i want to create with my designs as i feel this is the strongest style, which will bring my work to life it will also fit in with the time scale of the unit.


‘Here are three works by the photographer Gregory Crewdson, all untitled, set in the generic suburb, landscapes and portraits, each with strong beams of light.’

The birds
Dir Alfred Hitchcock
1963

Beginning the week with The Birds, the title gives away the subject of the film straight away, its obviously something to do with birds that perhaps attack as show in the image above, at the opening of the film it seemed very strange as the 'Rod Taylor' playing as Mitch Brenner entered the scene he gave a alien like vibe that was very suspicious i felt he was going to play a big part in his films meaning, the cameras movement was very good and useful when 'Tippi Hedren' playing Melanie Daniels arrived at the house where Mitch lived to deliver his sisters present which was significantly birds, when Melanie comes to the small town she mentions the word birds in a local cafe/dinner and the locals stare at her, this is a fact showing something is not right, the particular scene was the main one i remember but there are also many more.

The birds targeted her because the birds are free migrating and she is possibly in a way invading there space and freedom, the longer she stayed at the small town the more frequent the birds attacks got leading to many deaths there is some kind of war against the birds every time these mysterious crows appeared there was something about to happen.

Throughout the film there was never a given answer to why the birds attacked however i have my own suspicions that it was very nature based as you can see from what I've wrote above more evidence from the films, it begins in a pet shop which contain birds and so its appears that the birds are trying to get there own back on humans.

The Uncanny Valley
Dead of the night
1945

We was unable to watch the clip however the images that Phil showed from the PowerPoint where very useful and this is where the idea of using (fake humans) such as ventriloquist dolls come into my work, I'm not very keen on dolls and find them quite freaky there are numerous films display my view such as the chucky films, dead silence and so on.

Chucky

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6116291/

Dead Silence

http://bluebomber.wordpress.com/2007/01/24/movie-watch-dead-silence/

Technical Workshop Maya
Light & Rendering 1: Intro to Software Lighting

during this lesson we watched and learnt techniques which we must consider when creating our scenes , began thinking bout what type of scenes I'm going to try create, is the environment going to be exterior scene or interior scene? the research has covered this question and so next week i will make a choice of my design and create some thumbnail sketch's , i have to remember as my knowledge within Maya is very limited i don't want to create anything to complicated otherwise it my be to time consuming.

My scenes aim:
scene which is effective but not to complicated.

week 9

Edward Scissorhands
Dir. Tim Burton

1990

as like the alien film i have seen this film before , i quite enjoyed watching it again. the film starts off with a classic 1950s feel to it as it shows a scene of all the houses ranging from in different colours which are very light giving the impression of happiness the colours consists of baby blue, light green, pink yellow and so forth along with the old fashioned cars. from the clean neighborhood to the darkness of where Edward lives here is where some good contrast was shown an excellent scene looking up at the castle this is were the lighting was at its best.

The anti American Gothic 'perfect world' combination proved to be good as the director Tim Burton had giving the film meaning and so during the end of the film it give you a scene of sadness as Edward returned back to the castle and machinery.

The Cook The Thief ,His Wife & Her Love

Dir Peter Greenway
1989

The the last of our films was 'The Cook The Thief ,His Wife & Her Lover', i found the beginning of the film extremely confusing but soon realised what was actually going on, this film contains some very violence scene and so a get a scene of violence throughout the film an example of this would be when the thief(Albert) stabs a fork into a women's cheek.

The film had almost everything within it there was violence, love, hate, murder , cannibalism etc however i feel there was something missing the whole film seemed theatrical stage like (play) with all the vivid lighting and colours, there were some key features of the film i took note of, such as the kitchen scene, when close examining the film you notice the camera move from side to side capturing the details.

Workshop

Concept Art

Digital painting final touch ups ..

A print screen of the first scene the 'hatchery' is shown here they are images of the development stages of the scenes as you can see it is coming along nicely.I've blocked out the main areas of shadow which applies to all the concept designs sticking to my cold colour scheme of the factory you can find the description for the scenes in my key words.

The next scene is the view from the elevator on the roof looking down onto the city, i didn't spend much time on this image as you will see compared to the other two scenes ,i found it mush more harder to get the colours and angle of the scene i wanted it also lacked in detail however this is only on the beginning of the scene.

My most time consuming scene out the three which is the view from the helicopter ,i wanted to capture the city's atmosphere as well as the right idea of the scene itself , meaning i didn't want to add too much to ruin the scene and didn't want 2 have too much either i had to find the right balance.

In the interim cirt i will view all of my final concept designs.

week 8

I'm now at the stage of thinking about my essay, from the films we have watched the ones that appeal most are the earlier one such as edward sciccorhands and alien I'm going to stick to a more earlier films idea and so i have chosen equilibrium to be my film to analyses as i have a better undertanding if it from watching it previously the film relates to my projects as well as minorty report however i felt equilbrium would be better becaue of its scence and colours, the film and my book are both set in the futuritc tence which is also an advantage.

Alien

Dir.Ridley Scott
1979

This film has a connection to my book through the futuristic structure of the film ,I'm not sure if there are any other connection although watching the film has shown me some key scenes to look at for example the alien landscape when the humans leave the ship onto the planet coming across living eggs to the alien. Again helping me with different camera shots this was the thing i began thinking about after watching the entire film,rearranging my scenes to make them that little bit better.

i think i can take some pieces of inspiration from the film such as the lights, they range in colour which i can take in consideration when developing my first scene of the hatchery the ship has lots of machinery which can be used also.

i noticed with some of my out door city landscape scences i'm going to need a type of surrounding to give the background some depth so these buildings from the 1930s art deco period became qutie usefull, below are some exmaples i collected.

week 7

Rolling onto the next week i have already come up with some ideas i quickly drew into my book they are really detailed describing the main details picked up from the Brave new world books paragraphs however eventually I'll pick out of 3 of these thumbnail drawings and will develop them more further on Photoshop, all these drawing are ideas that appeared in my mind whilst reading through what i have gathered so far basing the designs on the paragraphs i read through.

Scene 1 – chapter 1 – ‘central London Hatchery And Conditioning Centre’

The enormous room on the ground floor faced towards the north. Cold for all the summer beyond the panes, for all the tropical heat of the room itself, a harsh thin light glared through the windows, hungrily seeking some draped lay figure, some pallid shape of academic goose-flesh, but finding only the glass and nickel and bleakly shining porcelain of a laboratory.

keys words :
-Enormous
-faintly purred
-Harsh Shining porcelain
-Frozen
-Dead
-Ghost
-Machinery thin glare

Scene 2 – chapter IV – ‘The view from the helicopter’

The liftman was a small simian creature, dressed in the black tunic of an Epsilon-Minus Semi-Moron.
"Roof!"
He flung open the gates. The warm glory of afternoon sunlight made him start and blink his eyes. "Oh, roof!" he repeated in a voice of rapture. He was as though suddenly and joyfully awakened from a dark annihilating stupor. "Roof!"

keys words :
-Warm
-roof
-Afternoon sun light
-Hastening rocket planes
-Hum of passing helicopters
-Dark lift

Scene 3 – chapter V – ‘The view from the helicopter 2’

An incessant buzzing of helicopters filled the twilight. Every two and a half minutes a bell and the screech of whistles announced the departure of one of the light monorail trains which carried the lower caste golfers back from their separate course to the metropolis.

keys words :
-Light was falling
-Incessant buzzing
-Bright sun of western sky
-Crimson horizon
-Sunset faded
-Thought orange into yellow
-Pale watery green

The Night Of The Hunter
Dir. Charles Laughton
1955

My experience and knowledge watching black and white films are very limited i have mainly disliked them and this classic bring back my memory's of the whole black and white film genre, this film was the least interesting film so far for me , i found it quite strange when the priest comes into the picture becoming a father to the children, my favorite part of the film in terms of the lighting and the scenes was the escape of the children as the traveled down river the light had changed with the day as it become dark during the night.

The Haunting

Dir. Robert Wise
1963

I found The Haunting to be much more helpful and useful contrasted to the content of the other films in terms of what we have watched so far, the lighting and scene are much better there were moments in the film for example the angle of the camera from the top of the spiral stair case looking down onto the actors with there shadow casted behind them really stood out the reason why i remember this and chose to write about this scene is because it gives me an idea of the type of angles i could base my concept art on perspective wise.

I feel that the film finished too quick, there was something missing as if the story wasn't told fully in my opinion, although there are some more element missing I'm not quite sure what they are from the top of my head, however I'm keen to see the remake.

I'm now beginning to see the aspect to look out for in the films that we watch and will remember this for the future and for the next couple of film that will be viewed.

This list below shows some of the conceptual art designs i looked at from more inspiration for my designs i have also added some picture references taken from the Internet.

http://features.conceptcar.co.uk/rca-vehicle-design-2007/seidl.php
http://features.cgsociety.org/story_custom.php?story_id=3780
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXpALt_m9P1Vz5VA-xzZMH67TCgQ5gvdXbeJvVY0Rju0jPInLUkTCg0UipCU033xtZBCsAznRzescVri-BZfrqsIxjbXRTV4F1MVnibrJPB9Poi4H9kgn4-1_uYv7N_nSOElCOzFxfwwU/s1600-h/Star+Child.jpg

week 6 Space Project

Space

Missing the first vital day of the new project was a shame this day included the briefing into the new project which was very important ,understanding what needs to be done also i didn't really know what was except from the new tasks ahead all i knew was is was something to do with digital environments and sets ,just by looking at the timetable for the next couple of week i notice there are a lot of films that we will be watching thought out the project i knew then theses will give use the understating we need for our scenes.

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, is the main source of my project the book consists of scenes that i will have to create using my imagination combined with the information given in the book ,i have read through my brief and have read the paragraphs allocated and finding it hard to understand as i have not read the book before, i cant really create a clear image of the scenes yet as i have a lack of knowledge of Brave New World however I'm going to research into it more and find out some of the themes that relate to the book, i feel that is a good place to start.

Scanning the Internet i came across some themes, to be more precise there are actually 12 different themes to the book in totally they vary discussing a totally new topic for example (the denial of death) this shows me the complexity of the books content and so Ive narrowed it down to 3 themes that relate to the designs I'm going to create, the themes are:

1.COMMUNITY, IDENTITY, STABILITY- VERSUS INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM

2.SCIENCE AS A MEANS OF CONTROL

3.THE THREAT OF GENETIC ENGINEERING

Anthony Astrachan
http://www.huxley.net/studyaid/bnwbarron.html#theme

After looking into the themes of the book it lead me to another source of information, book reviews i found a few interesting view about the Brave New World the reason why i have been checking out these reviews is so it gives me a more clear image and understanding of other peoples personal view of the book so i know i am doing the right thing also gained a clearer understanding of the books story.

'Brave New World begins with a tour of the Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre. Society has finally organized itself according to rational schema's: the birth process has been mechanized.'

Book review by James Schellenberg 1998
http://www.challengingdestiny.com/reviews/bravenew.htm

'Brave New World is set in 632 A.F. (After Ford – after the first successful mass-produced car built by Henry Ford). After several wars and advanced technology Huxley’s Utopian state rejects the past, is controlled by ‘happy’ propaganda and promiscuity is the accepted moral. People are not born; they are hatched from bottles. People are genetically engineered to carry out tasks that relate to their IQ level. Everyone takes Soma (Fordian dope) to heighten their happiness. A utopia, you could only dream about.'

Book review by Nicky 2001
http://www.ciao.co.uk/Brave_New_World_Aldous_Huxley__Review_5142974

The current status of my project at this stage is gathering information to greater my understanding of my book.

whilst looking around the Internet the words utopia and Dystipian appeared allot around the subject of my book here are the definitions for them just so i remember what they are for future reference.

Utopian:
An ideal place or state. Any vision of a socially and politically perfect society. From Greek roots, it derives its meaning from the words outopia, meaning "no place" and eutopia, meaning " a place where everything is right." In a sense, a Utopian land in fiction becomes both a place that never quite existed as it is portrayed and a place where everything seems perfect. It is an imagined world.

Dystopian:
Dystopia is the vision of a society that is the opposite of utopia. A Dystopian society is one in which the conditions of life are miserable, characterized by human misery, poverty, oppression, violence, disease, and/or pollution.

Film Metropolis

Dir.Fritz Lang

1927

Now this film was very interesting when you think about it the film isn't that great(acting wise)however during that period in time it was excellent famously known for its futuristic elements such as the huge building structures ,machinery and so on, whilst watching the film i noticed the contrast of black and white int the scenes and the use of lighting in the scenes, the one that stood out in my mind was the part where Maria/Robot was being chased around the cave with the spot light coming from Rotwang, this film was the beginning to all the fantastic films we watch today ,I'm not a huge fan of black and white films to be honest especially if they don't contain verbal language in them but i could easily capture the clear message the film is trying to give to the viewer.

Overall the films view of the 1930 future is the main interest I'm going to look into and help me.

Workshop

Concept Art

Intro to Digital Painting

Experiencing the new conceptual art class i found very useful and interesting as i have never used Photoshop in this ways before Ive picked up lots of new skill and techniques for this one class alone and is it probably the most enjoyable particular work i have done so far at the university.I'm hoping this excitement will carry on thought out the duration of this unit and that I succeed with what I'm planning on doing with my ideas.

My first sample concept design playing around with the new tools i have learnt.