My Rough Theatre and Project Rankings

I just realized that there were two blog responses on the syllabus that I completely forgot about. So I figured I would answer them anyway even though our class is over now/grades are due pretty soon.


My understanding of "Rough Theatre" is that it is extremely raw theatre. Taking all the bumps in the road and using them to your advantage. For me, my rough theatre is just going out and filming things. Not spending too much time planning and instead letting everything just play out on the camera. It's running into problems and just rolling with it.

I think filming this way, although not as professional in some people eyes, produces a very organic product. The viewer experiences a since of trust with the filmmaker and this trust allows for a more genuine film experience. The trust a viewer has with the filmmaker also allows for a deeper connection to the film as a whole, and to the filmmaker.



As far as the projects go my favorite project was definitely the crowdsourcing project. How many times do you get to tell somebody that in college you were coloring for class? This was certainly a first for me. On top of that I really like how all the frames turned out. I had never really done anything that involved creative crowdsourcing and I think the experience with creative crowdsourcing from this class was amazing and incredibly fun.

Project rankings from favorite to least favorite:
1. Crowdsourcing
2. Cameraless
3. Rhythmic Editing
4. Bolex Long Take
5. Animation
6. Live Performance, dance thing

Theory of Animation

The Wells reading on the “Theory of Animation” was an interesting read comparing both traditional animation and experimental animation. What I found most interesting about the article was Wells’ thoughts on the absence/presence of the artist. Prior to reading the article I had never really given much thought to the idea that the presence of the artist in traditional animation was gone. I assumed that of course the artist was involved. However, after reading the article I definitely agree with Wells. The animation, as Wells explains, touches so many hands that it loses the connection with its creator. Wells expands on this loss of connection through his responses to each step of the process of development for orthodox animation.

Wells goes on to explain that for experimental animation “sometimes these ‘visions’ are impenetrable and resist easy interpretation, being merely the absolutely individual expression of the artist” (Pg. 45). In thinking about what this quote, and what Wells said about experimental animation, I have a new found respect for experimental animation. All that, sometimes craziness, which appears on screen, is the artist directly communicating their vision with me. This connection between the artist and the viewer is lost through traditional animation.

I think Wells presents a insightful argument on orthodox vs. experimental animation, and one that has made me think differently about animation in general.

Bolex Long Take

For the Saturday shoot my group only had a lose idea of what we wanted to do so I wasn’t sure if our final product would be good or not. I also wasn’t super excited about having to go in on Saturday. However, I was pleasantly surprised with how everything turned out. My group’s video turned out pretty good (as good as a 1 long take can be), and I had some fun doing it. The weather being as nice as it was probably helped a little too. Also, I think not having the professor around was actually a really good idea. I think, in the end, I learned more than if I would have been guided through every step of the process.

What I enjoyed most about the project was using the Bolex camera and having to develop the film ourselves. I had never used anything like the Bolex before and as such it was a cool learning experience to step away from the digital world. Likewise, I had never had to develop film before and I was always curious as to how developing film worked.

The project was a lot more fun than I expected, and helped me to get to know my classmates better. I would definitely repeat the process again, without hesitation, if I had to.

Bridgman/Packer workshop and performance.

The Bridgman/Packer assignment for class was definitely not what I expected. When I showed up to class on Monday I expected that we would be watching a bit of their performance. I definitely didn’t expect to have to dance. I’m not really a huge dancer, as probably much of the class, but after getting over my initial shock of being forced to dance, I rather enjoyed myself (for the most part). The good thing about the workshop with Bridgman/Packer was that we could dance however we pleased. There weren’t any rules and we didn’t have to learn any choreography. This definitely helped me enjoy myself more.

The coolest thing about Monday’s workshop was trying to learn how to interact with the video projections. I have never really associated dance with live video. As such it was a new experience learning how to interact with live projections. I think the hardest thing about interacting with the live video was figuring out your orientation to the live projections. I often times found myself facing the wrong way or moving in the wrong direction. Overall I had a pretty good time.

After the workshop on Monday I had no idea what to expect with the actual Bridgman/Packer performance. The only thing I knew definitely was that they would be using video projection as part of their performance. Just like the workshop on Monday I was a little bit surprised when I saw the performance. Bridgman/Packer took what we were doing in the workshop to the next level. The end result was something even greater than what I had anticipated.

The performance was broken up into two parts. My favorite part was the first section of the performance. I thought it was really cool how they used their bodies and clothing to blend in with the projections. The second part of the performance was a little too much for me. It didn’t really make sense, and it seemed like there was a bit of a sexual undertone to the performance that I didn’t really think was necessary. Overall I thought the performance was really interesting, and shed light on how I might think about film in a more abstract and interactive way.

Reflections on Crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing is the process of taking a project and outsourcing it to a bunch of different people (http://dailycrowdsource.com/training/crowdsourcing/what-is-crowdsourcing). Crowdsourcing is a great tool for getting work done fast. You could have a really big project, but with a bunch of different people working on it at the same time, then you only end up doing a fraction of the work required. The beauty of crowdsourcing is that on top of getting the work done faster there are more people contributing to the project, thus more creative minds at work. The result is a unique compilation of different creative styles compiled into one body of work.

In my opinion crowdsourcing is an awesome way to get work done faster and to bring new ideas to a project. Working on the crowdsourcing project for class further cemented my opinion that crowdsourcing is a great way to get projects done. I think that because our project was crowdsourced the end result will be amazing. Based on some of my frames and the some of the other frames I have seen from other classmates I think that everyone’s creative style will work wonderfully together.

I really enjoyed this crowdsourcing project. It was something I had never done before and it gave me a better idea of what crowdsourcing a project could ultimately accomplish. Also, it’s not very often (in college at least) that I get to color for class. Coloring for the project was a lot of fun and provided me with something different other the normal paper or test to study for. Overall I really enjoyed working on the crowdsourcing project.

St. Louise Response

After watching St. Louise, my initial thoughts are that making the almost 6 minute film probably took forever, and the amount of film the Film Junkies used, compared to our 1 minute film, must have been immensely greater.

The film itself looked really detailed for working with film. The Film Junkies clearly used a variety of artistic methods in playing with the film. Some of the methods I noticed were that they used magazine transfers, scratched, painted, bleached, and optically printed on the film. What made everything flow together was that each of these different methods were layered on top of one another to create a completely different effect that was visually more pleasing than just each effect individually.

Although, I couldn't really make out any overall theme to the film I think that music gives the film more of a sense of purpose. Without the music I think the film would give off a completely different vibe and would seem more chaotic. I think that the music helps transition the viewer through the film without getting caught up with all the different visual elements happening at the same time.

I really liked that the Film Junkies seemed to use a similar color palette throughout the film, and the optical printing they used was really cool.

After working on film for our project it definitely helps me put into perspective the effort and time that probably was spent creating this film.

Im including the Blog/Vlog for last weeks stuff about Acoustic Ecology and the Crowdsouricing stuff this week. I forgot that we had to do a blog on top of the media fast stuff.

Here is the link to my Vlog: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMBKYoFDvGk&feature=youtu.be


Also, here is a link to the trailer for Life in a Day