The Sixth Project

Artist Statement: While I initially wanted to create a model out of 2d reference images, it proved to be too difficult with my level of Blender knowledge. So after hours of attempting to learn how to learn to do something too advanced, I gave up and tried something simpler. As you can (probably) tell, I attempted to create a sword by manipulating meshes. While I know it's not the most appealing 3d image, this project did teach me quite a bit about grid manipulation and texture modification. While I wish I could've done more with this project, I do feel like I have a better grasp of Blender, although there are still enough things that I don't know about Blender to make my head spin. One difficulty I had with this project is that, the Blender tutorials on the Digital Media blog had different window placement and overall layout so that it was difficult to replicate results without taking several minutes to explore Blender. Whether this is because of Blender version or because of the transition from Mac to Windows, I am unsure. However, I would like the opportunity to learn more about Blender. I wish we had more time in the semester to learn about it.

The Fourth Project

 Original: http://www.ubu.com/film/lenteng_5seconds.html

Artist's Statement: This project had a lot of bad luck for me. After I got back from Spring Break, I found that the pictures I originally took for this picture became corrupted. After taking several hours to find a way to fix it, I finally found a program that had a fair shot at recovering the files. Unfortunately, even though several of my files were restored, none of the ones I needed for the project were recoverable. In the end, I wound up having to take them all again, somewhat at the last minute. That's why all of these pictures were shot in the night time. However it wasn't all for naught.  I did learn quite a bit about Final Cut in this project-- it's my first time using FCP. Although my project differs from the original by using still shots, I believe it creates more interest my way. That, and the addition of music. However, I believe that my project still remains true to the original by retaining much of it's simplicity, with little edits, and with the central themes and concept.

Reading Questions 2

1) What kind of influence do you think the new art would have on you had you been there at the time of it's unveiling, and how do you think the art of that influenced the modern idea of art? Did it contextualize what could be considered art?

2) Do you believe that the different forms of video art during this time were discriminated when being critiqued? Why?

Update on project

Finished laying out the ideas of the project. Will need to shoot more footage before I think I have enough frames or length to work out around 5 minutes. Narrowed down the music that I am contemplating on using. Obtained the materials I need to do this project. Only things left to do is to shoot more footage and to edit it. After that, the project should pretty much be complete.

Video Selection

http://www.ubu.com/film/lenteng_5seconds.html

I chose this video I did, because I feel that speeding up daily activities to conclude what's been done would be interesting. Also it provides a lot of freedom on how to approach, including still frames and just regular video editing.

The Third Project

<iframe width="320" height="640" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/t6ruktE2Ocw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<iframe width="320" height="640" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/oqbId1_wZ24" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Artist Statement: I don't really think the final product came out as well as I had intended. My original idea was to sync up the music to the newly lengthened animation, however this proved very difficult using two different programs. One of the biggest issues was with the photoshop frame animation menu not showing time, but only lengths of frame. This made it very difficult to sync music. To sync music, I literally had to pause the song, look at the time to a tenth of a second, then had to guess around where it would be based on the different lengths of frames I have and how many frames there are. tl;dr The ends did not justify the means. It was too time consuming and then end product just was not worth the time. For sounds, I tried to pick things related to what image was being shown and what it was doing, without it being too cluttered confusing.

The Second Project

Artist Statement: The flow of the video works in the same manner as the way I came up with the concept of the original image: smooth blending, with reality representing the bottom part of the image, and fantasy being the upper part. One thing I really like about animating my original work is because it highlights details otherwise gone unseen. On the other hand, the animation seems a bit rough... but that's a given, considering it is frame animation.

Critical Questions I

Based on the article, would you say the author agreed with Marx's ideas?

Do you believe what Walter Benjamin said, in 1936, still applies today?

The First Project

Artist's Statement: Abiding by the class's theme of reality and fantasy, Scott and I have each created an image that is themed as such. For my montage (right), I used images that both Scott and I thought were of interest and placed them in an way that would contrast reality and fantasy as opposite halves of one. Although they are opposites, we need both-- yin and yang. Without fantasy, reality would wear us out. Some of today's inventions and achievements started out as a fantasy... but then they became reality. Long had man wanted to fly, and now in our present day, we have airplanes. This image relates to everyone, because everyone wishes to escape reality at some point of their life. Some may decide to do this through TV, some through vacations, and for people like myself and Scott-- video games and anime. To say this image expresses myself would most certainly hold true, and it was quite fun to put together.