Extended Image

Since the beginning of this semester, my roommate, Joey Diaz, has been working on his extended image project. Extended Image is a class, where students go through the process of setting up a show/gallery, and then creating the art to go in it. The art is supposed to be photography outside of the standard print and frame, hence the name. Thinking outside of the box, students had a lot of different projects set up.

One guy had weird looking statues in a small room, and handed out flashlights. When you aimed the flashlight at a statue, the shadow of a human figure appeared. Joey's project was a series of short videos. He brought an artist in our living room studio to paint with water, and then drop ink on the water. The effect was a really cool spread of the ink through the water to create imagery. The video was about water deficiencies in different countries, and what organization you could contact to help. (This inspired my Advertizing and Imagery final project's subject [water].)

I think that this was a really good experience for the students, because they had to set everything up, including everything about scouting and acquiring a location, setting everything up, and producing content to fill it with. It was a very practical real world experience, combined with delivering a product that forces photography majors to think outside of the box.





[Right] A picture I took of Joey's father watching his presentation. [Left] A photo that I took of Joey and his friends, who visited from VA.

Type in Motion 10

I'm a softy for things that look good, and this looks good. From the transitions, color choice, and rendering to the motion tracking, sound, and overall visual aesthetic, this video is a solid video.

Right at the beginning of the video, white paint [or something], drops, and the illusion that text drops with it is given. The type is comprised of two very different fonts that I really like together. I haven't spent much time working with multiple fonts. I've, sort of, played it safe, staying with one font family for most of my work. This, and some of the other videos, really inspire me to acquire more fonts and play with mixing them (elegantly). I really like the "the" above the "s" for spectator. This is a very small part of the video, but I like it!

We then get a different view of the dripping, which masks in more text (in the same font as "the"). This text is broken up by section (within a complete thought). If you read it, you could read it in three sections, or two; they have visually broken it up so that you could read it in three or two sections. I like.

At :04, there are two word sections with solid block backgrounds ("by deciphering" and "& interpreting"). It's weird, but I really like the way that they used the plain block backgrounds, juxtaposed. They are opposite colors, and they play off of the background.

Around :05 - :08, we see contribution coming together, which is pretty nice looking. It's very cool seeing broken text in still graphics. It's even cooler seeing it happen in motion! During this same time, we see "to the" in that "the" font at the beginning and "creative act" under it. They are referencing the style that they used at the beginning with a different large font. Even though the font is different, though, it is still a visual theme that is being repeated.

The next part is one of my favorite parts, because it is well done motion tracked text :D The same word placement that we talked about above is used again, but in a different color, and this time at an angle, within a scene. During the transition (of the red thing) there is actually some subtly placed text. If you pause the video at about :10, you can see it. "The areas of consensus shift unbelievably fast". I love subtlety in design of everything (including writing for scripts). There is a rule of three in video, that talks about repeating something three times so the audience will get it, but it really underestimates an audience that yearns for something more challenging. I would rather have subtle details that only one person sees than in your face details that everyone gets, right away.

:16 is one of my favorite parts. Little text is motion tracked, and it says "design is so simple", and it fades in in three separate shifts. Visually, the composition is very simple, but there's something very charming about it (especially with the sound). The tracking is very specific. The designer chose to track (instead of to the drops) to the horizon, so that the text moves with the waves of the overall movement of the liquid. I like.

The next scene says "that's why it's so complicated." What I found interesting about this was the tiny serifs on the font. I like it, and it works. (The word "simple" is written in a sans serif typeface and the word complicated is written in a serif typface [which also has more variation to the weight per letter form]) I think that we're over the whole "no serif for video" thing, now that we've moved to high def. After all, 1920x1080 is my entire monitor, with every pixel accounted for. That's plenty of space for a serif or two ;)

J. Edgar

My friend, Tim Brooks, and I went to Maryland to get an interview for a video project that we were working on. I've known Tim for 7 years, and a fun fact about us is that we were born on the same day in the same year! We didn't have enough time to do anything fun on our birthday, so we saw a movie, after the interview in Columbia. We looked up trailers, and this seemed to be the best one.

Unfortunately for us, the trailer didn't ruin the story, as most trailers do these days. It seemed, to us, like it may have to do with the assassination of JFK, and some other epic events in history with more insight into what created the events.

The movie started by giving a lot of information about J. Edgar Hoover, and I felt like I was actually enjoying something that was teaching me about history. The movie kind of portrayed Hoover as a hollow shell of a person, which started to get depressing after awhile. Then, about half way through, the movie's focus shifted almost entirely from the historical and event-based story to a fictional story about being lovers with his male assistant. Seeing Leonardo Dicaprio made up like an old man rubbing hands with another younger actor made up like an old man was very awkward for me. It got even more awkward during a scene where they got into a fight, were bleeding from the mouths, and one forcibly made out with the other until it was mutual. It was interesting that at the end of the movie, they had a short disclaimer letting the audience know that they basically didn't have much information to base a lot of the story on (so they took extreme creative liberties).

I tend to like stories that have a lot of believability mixed with what if scenarios. Like, what if WWI was actually started this way, and everything could have happened that way, but with this new twist. I really enjoy movies like that. I didn't really get that from this movie, though. I liked the movie more, before it focused on how shallow and empty of a person he may have been and before the focus shifted entirely to his gay relationship.

It's interesting how, as communicators, we can alter audience's view of the past. This happens all of the time with movies and books (even history books). It really shows how important first impressions are. If a person's first exposure to a story of the past is told one way, and then the person hears of another version of the story, the person will most likely stick with the first story that they heard. This reminds me of Inception. Did I just get incepted?

Eureka Visuals - CMS & Video

After looking up and down comparison charts, and looking through advice in forums, I've decided to go with Wordpress as my CMS. I decided to use Wordpress, because it is said to have excellent SEO, right out of the box, and the back end seemed the simplest. I looked through some different themes, and themes that I like actually come packaged for multiple CMS platforms, so it didn't really have anything to do with the way that it looked. I am not familiar with CMS systems, and this was a completely new experience for me. It seems to be very much like an advanced version of Blogger, with many more customization options.

Also, I've been working on some video footage for a short documentary style series. I'm extremely excited. More to come on that, soon!

Eureka Visuals

After talking with my professor, Monica, I've decided to create an umbrella brand: Eureka Visuals. This will also be the brand that all video production will fall under. For example, if I create a video for the websites, it will be a Eureka Visuals production.

I'm finishing up design for some promo stuff and logos.





The final versions of the websites will look like this:

MACBETH - The Rude Mechanicals

I have really been taking the time to look at props and costume design, recently, and I really enjoyed what they did for this play. The visual theme of this play had to do a lot with color and clothing. All of the living characters wore black. Witches wore red and white, and dead people (ghosts) wore red. This is some pretty obvious symbolism (signifiers and signifieds), but I like the use of it. I would like to incorporate these types of things into my work, in the future. I generally don't think about costume color as a means to communicate ideas.

The end of the play was actually different than the original play. When Malcolm, played by Anna Brammeier, was crowned, everyone converged on her and raised their swords to swing. Then, the lights went out. It's actually an addition to the original, which ends with the crowning of Malcolm.

Our interpretation effects the way that we tell and present stories, and adding something like this onto the end of a story really shows how much creative power people other than a writer have on a writer's work. Through history, things like plays and other works of fiction are used to communicate ideas. Taking creative liberties to create differences between our interpretation and an original CAN BE an essential part of making things relevant to an audience. This may not be the best example of this, but it is certainly an example of a small creative change to serve as a meaning or commentary about something.

The play was well done, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. (Good job Ryan Smith!)

ALEF - Leadership Conference

I belong to an organization called ALEF (Appalachian Leadership Education Foundation), and I attended an event hosted by ALEF at Concord University. The event had speakers ranging from high ranking air force generals to employees with some pretty impressive job titles at some pretty impressive companies. They came to discuss leadership, our state, our country, and where we (the United States) are headed in the future.

One of the presenters gave some extremely good advice for being involved in leadership in a work environment. While discussing business relationships, he told us that "People quit people before people quit jobs." One thing that more than one presenter really stressed was the importance of trust, honesty, integrity, and good character.

One of the other presenters gave us some very insightful information about defense and how our country and other countries operate. He couldn't, of course, divulge any information that civilians and people outside of the government are allowed to know, but what he did present was very interesting.

This was a very important lecture to attend, and I took away a lot of great lessons from it. It is very important to learn from people who have lived longer than ourselves, and to listen to the advice, stories, and mistakes of successful people. It can be an integral part of success in life, to avoid situations and gravitate towards others, based on advice from people older than ourselves, without making the same mistakes yourself.



[Above] Picture of our group with four star general, Robert Foglesong. [Below] Notes from the presentations.

Type in Motion 9

Live the Language

This is a series of videos created for study abroad programs. After I found it, my roommate, Joey, told me that he had watched the video of Paris, before he went there on his trip. Different people have created different videos, but they all have a unified visual style. What drives these videos? Type.

It has become a theme, in videos that I find that I like, that the videos I choose as well done videos create (almost) logos out of each new title or set of words. In these videos, each title is thought out and designed, and could pass as a logo. This makes a much more interesting experience, than seeing the same typeface or just different typefaces slabbed on the screen. Even kerning properly wouldn't do it. Each title is DESIGNED, and that makes a huge difference. Even though these title shave different fonts and styles, they all seem very unified. Even the different languages seem like they all belong to the same set of videos.

The style of the type is also something that I'd like to comment on. In a lot of my work, I use a drop shadow that has an increased size (from the standard) and no distance from the object with the opacity set to 5% to 25%. This allows for subtle separation and more legibility, but usually goes unnoticed, depending on how opaque it is. There is something very classy, however, with sticking to plain white with no drop shadow, even if it is hard to read. I noticed it YEARS ago in the Oceans movies, and it's a very slick look.

Movement of the type was one of two things. It was centered while the video was in motion, behind it. Or, it was motion tracked to objects in the scene. I think that this was a really clean and classy use of the text and titles that they were using. Motion Tracked text is sexy; it appears as part of the scene, while maintaining it's own visual aesthetic.

I love the way that each title design has the same style of pronunciation, below it. It gives more unity to the titles, as well as reminds the audience about the purpose of the video (relating to the title, Live The Language).

It was interesting seeing different languages, and seeing how designers used type design with their versions of words (symbols for Beijing). Beijing's text was very interesting to see, because the variation of font was cool to see, without the perspective of the alphabet that I am used to. I honestly never even thought of fonts for different languages that were symbol based, but it was interesting to see how different and interesting symbols can look with font variation.


OTHER VIDEOS

The Fall of WDIGTS

WDIGTS is no more.. I've decided that I don't want Graphic Design to be a part of this project, anymore. I will now be focusing exclusively on video and photography.

I have also considered changing the name. WDIGTS is clunky and it's really not an appealing acronym. This isn't the main reason for the change, however. The main reason for the change is the title's, sort of, negative nature. Telling people to stop is never as power as people to do. And, I could tell, when I presented this to teachers (an important section of my target market), that they did not respond well to bashing school. If I want this to succeed in schools, I want teachers on my side. So, the future titles will be Eureka Photo and Eureka Video. KABOOM!

Ad Campaigns & Semiotics

In class, we created political campaigns for and against gun control and for or against a candidate. Let's look at signs. A sign is made up of a signifier, which points to a signified. A signifier is some kind of thing (generally a tangible object, color, or something that a 10 year old could describe). What is signified is a little more difficult to get to. What is signified has cultural connotations, and you must keep context in mind. A signifier can point to many different things, and it is very subjective, but the goal is to be as objective and relevant to your context as possible. Now, we can take a look at some of these ads created in class, and we can distinguish what is a signifier and what it points to.



Danielle's Ad Campaign:

Signifier: Red curtains at the beginning of the movie..
Signified: There will be some sort of show or entertainment.

Signifier: The Statue of Liberty..
Signified: This generally represents freedom and America. (It is also indicative of something good.)

Signifier: Capitol of United States..
Signified: This, again, represents the United States. It can blur the line between what the candidate is saying and American standards.



Holly's Ad Campaign

Signifier: A girl in a white dress with her hair done and makeup on..
Signified: She is a bride in a wedding.

Signifier: A girl in a dress holding a gun..
Signified: Guns are harmless.

Signifier: A man sitting under a dead animal with a gun propped over the animal (the man is smiling).
Signified: He just hunted the animal, and he is proud.



Josh's Campaign Ad

Signifier: Balloons and campaign advertizements..
Signified: A celebration is taking place. (The person in the photo may have done something successfully.)

Signifier: Black and white image of news microphones held up to someone's face..
Signified: The person is being questioned about something. (Probably something that isn't so good..)

Signifier: Penny - (There is red text that says flat out that Mitt Romney is two faced, so we can't quite ignore that...)
Signified: The penny and the words two faced over the penny are pointing to two things:
When people are two faced, they say one thing to one person and say another thing (with their other face) to another person. The reference to the penny is really a reference to a coin. Some people would trick others by using a two faced coin (with the head of a president on each side) to flip, when making a deal or bet on the flip of a coin. That way, if the person always called heads, the person would always win. It has ONLY negative connotations; it is not good to be two faced.

Type in Motion 8

My man Conan O'Brien...

A unique thing about this video is that none of the text is being independently animated. It is all set where it is going to be, and the only thing being animated is the camera. The camera work and animation is actually good, and this is a major beef that I have with most kinetic typography (most kinetic type that I've found isn't actually that good - I thought it would be easy to find a lot for this blog, but it's hard to find well done projects).

I like the fact that this is in a 3d program. The light and diffused shadows make the text really give the illusion of three dimensions. Also, doing this in a 3d program allows the viewer to see different angles of the sides (extruded parts) of the text, which helps with the illusion of three dimensions in a two dimensional medium.

The designer uses boxes for separation, and within each box is a new phrase. I love that each phrase is extremely unique, and looks well kerned and tracked. Every section looks well thought out, and most sections seem like they could be a logo. (Some of them are.) The point is that this person didn't just stick to text, and that is what makes good kinetic type. Being creative with letterforms, geometric shapes, and everything else that goes into logo and type design adds so much. You can tell that the person who designed this put a lot more effort than just animating text onto a screen and timing it with the audio.

Type in Motion 7

MOSHUN


TYPOGAMI


This is the first time that I have seen anything like this. These two videos are fonts designed for After Effects.

Regardless of motion, I think that motion is a very creative typeface. It's not an average "safe" font. They got really creative with geometry, and wasn't afraid to have a LOT of variation between letterforms. For instance, the letters H, U, I, C, O, and S don't have any solid black, but V is almost entirely solid black, and K and A have tons of black in the letterform. I guess the way to tell if it's effective or not is if it looks unified, it does, and if it is legible, it is.

I don't like Typogami as much as Moshun, but it's still a very cool animated font. I like that all of the opening animations are the same rectangle, and then fold into their letterform. The beginning shows this green color that makes it look very pixelated and nasty, but the zoomed in version at the end shows it in different colors and with customizeable shadows, light position, and fold angle! Wow, I (now that I've seen the ending) like this just as much as Moshun.

I really like the idea of motion in letterforms. It would be cool to see something like this get standardized, as normal fonts have. I think that any project merging mediums is a worthy endeavor.

WDITGS - CMS

Doing some digging into other CMS solutions. It's taking so much time to write content that I no longer want to do anything twice. I want to do this the right way the first time. From what I hear, Drupal, Joomla, WordPress, and Plone are the options to go with. I like the flexibility of Joomla and Drupal, but WordPress seems so easy to use without a very steep learning curve.. I really want this to be about the content, and its organization. The only thing that I'm worried about is my ability to customize static pages with static content with WordPress. I want that, and the ability to really customize everything (Which I have less control over in WordPress, if I understand the differences correctly..). Hmmm...

Type in Motion 6

This is one of the sickest [most disgusting] animations. The thing is, it's just so fresh. I'd like to focus on the beginning and the end.

Starting with the text..

Tight kerning mixed with a good use of Bevel and Emboss creates the nice and simple black gray and white tone. When "tginho" first animates in, it doesn't just flip in place. It actually moves toward the camera at the beginning and eases into it's final position. Normally, people start out doing this, having the text totally flat (invisible). This animator actually had it tilted upside down a little bit, to start out with. This, in combination with animating towards the camera in 3d space, creates a great overall effect.

"Viuze" then animates in, and I love the animation used. Each letter has an anchor point at the bottom center of the letter-form. When it animates in, each letter individually scales up and then eases back down to its final size. Normally, the word as a whole would scale up and back down. The animator (maybe) took the time to create individual objects out of each letter, and animated them individually, independent of each other. The overlap of the letters looks great when they scale up, because the kerning stays the same. It's a very interesting and awesome way to work with text. [Side note: the animator then flips each letter-form independently.. so sexy.]

the Sound..

The sound is great. One thing that I notice about the animation style that I like is that it's a little late. The movement of the visuals seems really relaxed (to match the sound). Had they matched the animation perfectly to the sound, it wouldn't have the chill vibe.

Shapes and Color..

I love the accent colors used in this video. The gradient from orange to pink is awesome. The shapes move around and create positive and negative space, while adding the little accent of animation to music and color. The end (00:51 to the end) is probably my favorite part. The last three beats (with the little line that looks like a cursor) are so well done. The line goes from underlining one word to being the transitional visual to the next word. It then looks like it's interacting with the text to the right of it to the beat, and then creates the middle bar by expanding. This allows the animator to use the background grey as the text for his name. So so well done..

WDIGTS - A Little Stressed..

I haven't gotten any real feedback yet. I don't want to hound people that I am asking for free advise, so I may just start moving forward. I'm a little stressed about the fact that I haven't started on content, yet. I think that the best way to resolve this issue would be to ask a few more people for their opinions, and just start working. I feel confident enough in what I know about each of these areas that I know that what I have already WILL be in the final product. It MAY be organized differently, but I would rather be shifting things around at the last minute than writing massive amounts of content at the end. So, it is working out of order, and I may have to work backwards, in the end. But, I need to get cracking on this content. This week and weekend, I'm going to push to see if I can really get through some topics, and see how far I can get.

I just met with a teacher that I used to know in high school, and she told me that she started up a side business in the realm of photography. She isn't very experienced with editing software and had a lot of interest in the site. Just by talking with her, I gained some new insight on my target audience. BOOM!

Mountain Media Ministries - Remnant Church

Remnant Church hosted a two day event with Mountain Media Ministries to discuss how to become independent in an "unstable world." Between the inevitable fall of the dollar, oil, the situation with other major world economies, and our extreme amounts of debt, it is a very important time to be in a situation that allows you to have basic necessities, like food, water, energy, and warmth. In preparation for massive inflation, they discussed how to create a living situation that would make these basic necessities available in times of need.

They discussed gardening as well as how many acres one would need to grow trees for warmth in the winter. They also discussed how to prepare for food in the winter. They had a jarring demonstration, and went over some warmth and survival tips for winter months. Basically, we are such a soft generation that we would most likely die if we didn't have power. Even if we have well water, we still need electricity to pump it out, unless we have a manual pump installed. This event was all about advice for getting to a place that would get us off the grid, and help us be independent, and less reliant on big companies and the government. It is an important thing to be discussing, because - whether people want to believe it or not - our country is going to have some dramatic changes in the near future, and people need to be prepared.



[Top] Ad and Description. [Bottom] Notes and program.

WDIGTS Target Audience Research

I've been working on researching my target audience and getting some vital information. I wasn't thinking about some demographics that may have been missed, had I not talked, personally, with these people. I need to pay attention to non-mainstream programs, and somehow integrate them into my system. My goal isn't to cover EVERYTHING, but I would like to touch on everything that I can manage, to give people the widest perspective during their education.

My first inclination was to give the industry standard options, and then the freeware options. I think that it is the best way to go, in most cases, unless there is a notable similar program that provides either a major price cut or features that don't exist in the industry standard software. An example of this is realizing that a good portion of my audience use things like PaintShop Pro and Aperture.

My thoughts on which progrgrams to use are more like this: if I can't use an industry standard that gives me the best results, I will find a free version of the software until I can afford the better software or until I find the need to upgrade. I'd rather not spend money and then re-spend on something half better. I'd rather get what I can out of a free program until I can manage the best. [Many times, people will never need functions past the functions offered by free alternatives.] But, recognizing that everybody doesn't share this perspective is important, and I will make my best effort to cover other options that I find people using, as well.

Rosser Reeves' Political Commercials & The Persuaders

It's funny that war, taxes, skyrocketing prices, and the theme of "change" was used in Eisenhower's ad campaign, just as it is today. The creators of the campaign ads rely less on full pathos, and more on flawed logic. The political commercials seem to use a lot of fallacies of logic in their ads. They use forms of bandwagoning and irrelevant facts to sway people's decision making.

Song Airlines relied purely on pathos, giving no ethical or logical arguments in their main advertisements. Song airlines focused on specifically not making arguments. They focused on visuals, music, and symbolism. These elements were made to create feelings, rather than arguments.

One thing to make note of is the fact that these are completely different videos with completely different purposes. Yes, both sets of videos are created to persuade people. However, one set of videos is geared towards creating lasting customers and primarily persuading people to buy something. The other set was created to persuade citizens of a country to vote for a person. The creators, then, have different things to pull from. Voters' freedom, liberty, and patriotism is focused on as a responsibility. The commercials tend to create a culture out of imagery that focuses on feelings, as well as telling the audience that the audience has a problem (and the creators of the ad have the solution to that problem). Now, of course, there is plenty of overlap, but the mindsets are different for the end result, so the strategies do differ.

As the video The Persuaders talked about, success in advertizing and persuading goes beyond logic. This is why advertizing companies study cults and apply theories of that sociology to exploit peoples' need to belong. In both advertizing to sell and advertizing to vote, the goal seems to be to create loyalty beyond reason. Even if this is not the goal, it is definitely the end result. People have loyalty without thought, and it's scary on any side of the spectrum. We are a society conditioned to avoid the use of our most precious gift: the freedom to think.

WDIGTS Waiting on Formal Crits & Developing Motion Graphics

I've been talking to the people reviewing my materials, and, so far, they are telling me that I should look through books' table of contents and that it looks pretty comprehensive. I HAVE looked through books, which has, hopefully, helped with covering bases. I think that graphic design will be where most criticism comes. I'm looking forward to getting input from Kristin and Melissa.

I'm pretty excited about the motion graphics for this project. I think that I am leaning towards a drawing effect. I want to stay away from studio looking visuals, because I don't have access to the 100s of 1,000s of dollars worth of equipment to record looking nice, and recording specific equipment will date my materials much more than staying with generic visuals like camera and lens, rather than specific models.



There is an example when the video separates into quarters of the drawing effect that I may go for. [1:14] I used this in a class project for a class taught by Kevin Williams. I've grown a lot since my first semester of college, and I think that I could do a much better job, especially now that I'm not working on a cheap laptop that would make me wait fifteen minutes per preview.

I'm also very excited for the sub videos for the categories. I will be creating these, bearing in mind that I will be using these videos on a loop as one of my primary displays at our showing. I want them to flow well, but I want them to be individual videos, as they will be viewed independently through the actual website.

WDIGTS Words to Describe

10 words [in no specific order] that describe the feelings/reactions I want it to inspire in the viewer..

1. Fresh
2. Lively
3. Bold
4. Eloquent
5. Legitimate
6. Intelligent
7. Stylish
8. Organized
9. Educational
10. Humorous

If I had 5 more..
11. Developed
12. Dynamic
13. Energetic
14. Reliable
15. Methodical


I will use these words to guide me in forming the look and feel of my project.

Then, I can use these graphics to convey something specific to the reader.

[In response to Monica's comment on a previous post.]

Class Discussion - Changing Content Style

"Travis was reading articles on cracked.com, feeling happy and laughing. After all, the site describes itself as 'America's Only Humor Site since 1958.' He read an article called 5 Bad Ideas for Dealing With Bullies You Learned in Movies, and it was a bummer. Read the article and some of the other Cracked content. Do you think the blog site was right in presenting material that was outside of the type of content normally featured? Do you think there would be a better way to manage it? In your opinion, what is the responsibility of a site editorial team?"

Okay, let's start by establishing that there is no good or bad, right or wrong, move in this situation. This means that there is no better or worse thing to do in this situation. We can only bring ideas like good or bad into a situation when we define the parameters and limit the context.

We are all just a bunch of organisms living, and communicating with each other. In the grand scheme of life, this is not that big of a deal, to me. Somebody giving a depressing story and opinion on a comedy based blog just doesn't matter.

If we limit the context to the site getting viewers, I can only talk from my perspective and what I would want. If I go to a website for a person's writing, I would probably like this insight into the person's life and beliefs. If I go to a website for the intended purpose of the site, maybe to learn about video techniques, I would absolutely not want to read something like this.

If we broaden the context and perspective of this, a little, to include the intent of the creator of the website and their satisfaction with the site, it could be a successful move. The creator wanted to talk about a situation that happened to him, and have people listen. From his perspective, it was a success.

It comes down to whose perspective we are looking from, the creator, the audience, or the website/company. In my opinion, the responsibility of a site editorial team would be to define what the goal of the site is, and help each other follow that definition of those guidelines. A better way to manage it would really depend on the creators' intent for what the website should be and what it should function as. This includes personal satisfaction, if they want revenue, how revenue is attained and how it is divided, if they have a target audience that they make content for or if they make content to express themselves and an audience finds them, etc.

WDIGTS Review

Why Did I Go To School .com is a project that I have wanted to work on since I was sixteen. Having no access to education in fields of my interest, I found other ways to learn: books, training DVDs, and online resources. One site in particular, VideoCopilot, was of such high quality and had so much free education that it singlehandedly decided part of my career path, and took me from knowing nothing to knowing what I know now in the world of motion graphics, today. This inspired me to take what I know and give back to younger versions of me, and even people my age, who want to learn something, but don't know where to start.

Why Did I Go To School .com is meant to organize learning sources for people into cohesive logical groups, in an order that makes sense for people to learn the best. It will be a lot of written content, as the mold to hold all of the resources that I want to bring together and organize into different subjects. The idea is to come up with a very organized structure (list of topics and subjects) before I start organizing and writing content. This is where you come in..

I would like to ask for your input, because -- for one reason or another -- you have gained my respect, and I consider you to be awesome. I need help with organization and subjects.

I have three main areas to learn about: video, photography, and graphic design.
Within these areas of learning are three Microsoft Word documents with headings like this..

Photography (Main Subject - Title of Page)

What is it? (Page - Link to page with info)

THE CAMERA (Main Topic - Not a page)

Cameras (Page - Link to page with info that is tabbed below)
Film Cameras (Info for page above)

(I have a few links that can be disregarded. Just found some links while writing and wanted to have them for later.)


Why Did I Go To School .com is kind of a cheeky title, and I'd like to address the attitude that the site will have. School is definitely a valuable source of learning. I obviously believe in its worth, because I am in school. I believe that the purpose of school is not just to educate, but to teach people how to learn and educate themselves. I am surrounded with so many students that expect school to teach them everything that they will need in life, and it is sad to watch. This site is for people who do not have access to school as well as people who are in school, who want to find more information on things in the main subjects that the site covers. I have spent many years fumbling through my own education, and I feel like all of the time that I spent searching around for information could have been massively shortened, if I had the questions of what information and where to find that information laid out for me.

I don't think that I am a master of knowledge or better than everyone. But, I do feel that I have a keen ability to communicate. If I truly understand something, I can generally find a way to present that concept to others that do not. If the first method doesn't work, I try a different approach, until we find a metaphor or visual representation that works for the person learning. This is the approach that I take in my classroom, and this is the approach that I want to take for this site. I want to have a few different ways to learn the same material, so that, if one source doesn't work for some people, there will be alternatives.

If you do decide that you will help, there are three different sections. It might help to glance over the different sections, as well, just to get an idea of what I'm going for. This should be something that you can use if you are teaching a class; I want this to be used as a resource for students by teachers in classrooms. So, think about this in terms of, "If I had a class of students, what would make this a good resource for them to use?"

If you decide not to help, it is no big deal. :) Life is busy, and helping someone work on a capstone project isn't always the most fun thing to do with your spare time!

Type in Motion 5

The very unique thing about this video, especially when compared to kinetic typography, is that the artist didn't just use different fonts, styles, and color for different parts of the video; the artist created different brands for each section of the video.

The mix of color, graphics, lighting, and font selection creates a different look and feel about every three to eight seconds. This is a very noteworthy accomplishment to have done something based around text with such variation at such a fast rate. The type isn't just thrown around, either. It is carefully thought out, kerned, tracked, and leaded with a purpose, and it really shows in the end result.

The video does a great job of referencing things by the use of recognizable fonts. [1:04 Sega Genesis reference] [1:55 Fox reference] It's fun to look at how much a font can remind us of a brand is by its typeface. This shows how important and valuable a good typeface is to represent a brand and stick out in the minds of people that see it.

The retro feel of this video is great. The designer created classic old school effects. These effects look old and primitive, but they are actually very complex graphics and effects. The transitions between type/branding is great, the best of which is at 2:33. This transition from DVNO to the keys on a piano is awesome.

Type in Motion 4

I was actually surprised to find such a cool video that I haven't seen before! My personal taste conflicts with a lot of the video, but it is such a well done video that I will talk about it positively.

This video , as I talked about in another video, did a great job of staying true to, for what I can see, sticking with only text in this video. Everything that was made was created out of text. From the building to the streets to the street lights to the cars and people, everything is expressed by showing text. The very cool and interesting thing about this video is that they didn't just stick to forming figures out of text. They actually had legible words creating the objects, labeling what the objects were, such as "pregnant woman" with words describing what she is wearing.

To complement the typography, the creators used the music and sound bites to help describe the different things happening. I loved the car crash. Using color and variation of type size, they created something that really represents a cop car, without being in the shape of an actual car, at all. I think that the reason that I enjoy this so much is really because they chose not to create visual representations of the physical world with type. They did something different, and they were very successful.

The camera movement and lighting was great. It added so much to this video. The creators really did a great job creating a 3D world out of all text, lighting, and movement. They were really able to convey a story in a unique way.

WDIGTS Updates

Well, my Gantt chart really put things into perspective.. I was planning on taking a lot more time to do research, but -- as it turns out -- I don't have that much time to do research lol! My original Gantt chart was, I thought, pretty reasonable. But, I was mortified to see when I would end this process. I had to cut a lot of time periods in half. I'm currently working ahead to try to be on top of this schedule. It was a really helpful tool, to be able to visually see everything by when it's due, rather than a classic calendar look.

I'm having a hard time with logo design. I want at least 3 comps done by this Sunday, so I can get feedback from my graphic design teachers, fellow designers, and one or two professionals. WDIGTS wind up being the acronym of Why Did I Go to School. It's not very memorable, but the title is pretty memorable. [I'm not worried about the website being remembered so much. I think it's good.] The problem that I'm having is deciding what the logo should be, and if it should include the title of the website, or if I should try WDIGTS. I prefer typographic logos to symbols, because letters give another level of remembering something. [One doesn't just remember the look, they remember letters that correspond with the name of the company.] My title is too long to have as a logo, though. I'm trying different things out. We'll see what happens.

I realized that a sitemap cannot happen until my content lists for Video, Photo, and Graphic Design are complete. So, I'm working ahead on getting those done.

I realized that I need video content for this site to be successful. I'm planning on creating an animation for the main page explaining what the site is and how to use it. I don't want to be in the video, but I may need to do the voice. I really want to be able to stay consistent for the rest of the life of this site, so I think the only way to ensure that is for me to be able to produce it [unless I find someone that is close to me, who I won't lose contact with, who has a cool voice.] I hate my voice.

Until next time..

WDIGTS Research

My current research consists of a lot of books, websites, and videos. I'm comparing and contrasting how other people organize learning these subjects from the ground up, and seeing what I like and don't like (based on my own learning experience). I'd like to give a list of recommended books, as well as the website, video, and picture links that I will be providing. I still enjoy getting information through books, and I usually have no trustworthy source for recommending them. I've purchased a lot of video resources, throuhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifghout my learning experience. One ofhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif them was a video seminar by Vincent Laforet. This was very extensive, especially for video. Another video seminar was released, similar to his, by Philip Bloom.
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I'm almost done with Vincent Laforet, and then I willhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif move on to Philip Bloom. I have a few more videos to consult, and then I should have a final list for my video section.

In the realm of Photography, I have a lot of videos that I've been going through, including those by Joey L., Zack Arias, and Dean Collins.

For both video and photography, I have many more resources that I am looking through, but right now I am focusing on resources that are not free, to see how I can cover all of the bases that they cover through the free materials online.

I have over 35 books in the realm of video and photography that I'm consulting. I find that looking through table of contents sections of these books is helping with the organization of information. [Again, there's no reason to re invent the wheel.]

Graphic design is a little bit different. As far as http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.giffree resources on the internet go, graphic design has had so many that I haven't ever needed to pay for any video training. Video and photography training were pretty exclusive, when compared to graphic design. But, since the rise of things like YouTube and cheap hosting, photography and video have been catching up. So, I have only Lynda and a few other paid graphic design resources to look at. I feel comfortable with this, though, because of the extensive options that we have in the realm of free resources for graphic design. I have plenty of graphic design books to supplement this section of the website.

I'm excited to get through more information! It's nice, being able to do research about things that I thoroughly enjoy!

Type in Motion 3

One thing that I really like to see in still typography design is creating a scene and or things, creatively, out of only type. It is something that takes time and a lot of detail work. I was surprised to find a well done animation using this visual technique. As much work as it takes to create a still frame of typography like this, adding motion adds a new level of complexity.

There are three elements of animation going on in this video: animation of the camera, animation of elements (groups and separate within and outside of the groups), and masking (creating a drawn on affect).

I love that each element used is a letterform of some sort. The beginning really caught my eye, where the commas are falling as rain. One of the most brilliant parts of this entire video is when the commas hit a surface, bounce up into an exclamation point, and a ripple is made out of parenthesis.

Even without lines defining a ground, this video demonstrates some really intuitive techniques for showing space and perspective, including linear and areal perspective minus elements that we're used to seeing as signs of perspectives (defining lines).

The sprouting growth of the "Y" trees was also something that I liked. Some of this video, however, I didn't like. Some of the camera movement wasn't very well done, and a lot of the letterforms looked very bitmap/non-vector. Also, it doesn't look like the project was rendered at a very high quality. This, however, was a fun project to observe, and the person responsible did a great job.

WDIGTS - Site Design

I'm thinking a lot about the design of the website [not the development]. I'm the type of person who loves a design for a month, and then wants a new one. It's really hard for me to settle on a design. I want something that will come across as a neutral design, but I know that even a "neutral" design will have to conform to styles and colors. I would love to define an age group, but I know that my audience is not age specific. I can estimate that most of the viewers will be male, based on career statistics and purchases of equipment, but I do not want to appeal to males, only. I want this to be open and welcoming to everyone.

The thought of having a few designs and customizing it when you enter the site crossed my mind, but I don't actually feel like coordinating that. Plus, I want brand recognition, and - because my product is a website - I want to have a standard.

I'm really attracted to so many different styles that I'm not sure what to go with. I definitely want a clean look. Part of the reasoning behind the website is organization of information on the internet, so I do want something that isn't distracting: I don't want grunge, particles, or small detail stuff.

I'm thinking of a very clean 3D look with some soft shadows and high key lighting, only using slight shadows to define and separate text or simple shapes.
















Copyright Videocopilot [Andrew Kramer]

I'm potentially looking for something like this, but with more diffused and feathered shadow, brighter light, and the light source would be closer to the camera, making the shadow closer to the text, itself [not so dramatic].

I probably won't go the 3d route, just to make things easier in the design process and workflow with consistency. But, it may be an option for the logo.

I'm currently tabbing pages in a book that I ordered with a lot of visual inspiration. I'll have some updates [hopefully something to show] soon. I'm going to have to start working on the logo, as a part of the design. I have a little cartoon school stuck in my head, but that really goes against the look and feel that I'm going for. WDIGTS is too long and hard to remember to use as a good logo, probably. We'll see. I've got to put a pencil to paper to get some ideas.

Waka Flocka - A Serious Lyricologist

For my video, I chose the contemporary literary genius Waka Flocka, the most lyrically gifted artist on the market. The video does highlight some women. Some Questions that we will look at are those presented by Sut Jhally: How are women shown?, What is their role? Whose desires are being fulfilled?, What is their attitude?, Are they a part of the story, members of the band, dancers, or the audience?

Some of the women highlighted in this video are shown in quick cuts back and forth between the girl and the artist. [This implies that, somehow, Waka FLocka is responsible for or has some connection to hardly clothed women who dance and want you (the audience).] The women are hardly clothed, and what IS covering their bodies is skin tight. Wind is blowing in their hair as they dance and have gangster looks on their faces. The gangster looks are interchanged with confident “I know I’m hot” looks, involving eye contact with the camera, and looking off camera, still with the sense that they know they are being viewed.

Another woman highlighted in this video is a woman in the car with the great Waka Flocka. She is seen doing her makeup in the car, and holding the phallic stick shift with Waka Flocka. This girl is shown looking at Waka Flocka in a very admiring and flirtatious way.

There is one shot showing only the hands, phones, and breasts of women. The women all have their phones out texting people, as if that is a gender role. [Ex: stereotype of women always texting on their phones..]

Something very interesting is the exclusion of women in shots of people having fun, dancing, and being a part of the group. There ARE group shots including women, but that is when the shots are of the whole neighborhood. When it is just a select group of 25 or less, the shot usually only contains males. This shows a distinct separateness of women and men. Regardless of the intercutting and the shots of women with men in shots of the whole neighborhood, there is a distinct separation of women and men in most of the shots in this video.

In conclusion, women are shown as a part of a young male fantasy in this video. They are shown dancing in similar settings as the main singer. The highlighted women of the video all seem to want sex from the great Waka Flocka or the audience (when the dancer makes eye contact with the camera, as if piercing an arrow of true love right through audience members’ souls). The role of the women is to be a sexual figure that is unrelated to the video, other than the deeper implied meanings and connotations. The only thing that seems close to a story, including a woman, is when Waka Flocka is in a car with a girl who is all over him.

WDIGTS

I'm still in the beginning phases of this concept, but I have a very clear and organized vision. Everything seems extremely straightforward; this, however, will be a very tedious endeavor. I am currently still working out details for topics in my three main areas of education [Video, Photography, Graphic Design]. It's hard to cover everything that I think someone would need to know, without getting too strung up on details. I want this to be organized in a way that is simply organized, but gets into heavy details for those who want them. A lot of this learning can go out of order, and I am keeping that in mind, when coming up with the final order of how these topics should be listed.

The hardest part seems to be some technical aspects of the site. I really want to combine a blog style site with a normal website, but I'm really not sure how to organize it. The main content isn't what I'm worried about. I'm most challenged by the overall layout.

I renewed the domain that I will be using.

I've got a few ideas for some things to drive traffic to the site. One has to do with keeping content free. The other has to do with giving valuable things away for free. More on that later..

Type in Motion 2

Well, I was actually going to choose another video. But, I stumbled upon this video afterward, and it can't be ignored. One of my favorite things to do is animate to music and sound. This music had some very interesting effects, and it's an animator's job to express different sounds, visually.

Some things could be better, but I really admire the way this animator stuck to good composition. There was good positive and negative balance, and the letterforms were interestingly played with. The motion had a good vibe; it had a good combination of fluid and jarring motion, to go with the music. Everything looked very controlled. One important aspect, that I always look at in video, is that if I were to take a still frame at any point where the text held for a second [not in the middle of a transition], it would make a good static design. It is easy, in video, to forget good composition [in animation AND cinematography]. Keeping the quality of a photographer or graphic designer -- even when in motion -- is what separates the best from everyone else.

Type in Motion 1

The reason I chose the opening sequence for Panic Room is because of its simplicity [of the idea]. Technically, this is an extremely complex feat: motion tracking, reflections, texturing, lighting, etc.. The idea, however, is to make text look like it's a part of a scene. Now, this is not a new idea. We've seen practical effects, where people actually create type in a scene out of food or written in a newspaper or license plate. This is unique because the text is not made to look like it is a part of an object in a scene. The text is an entity of its own. The scale is also something that I like. Generally, with this sort of typography in movies, there is a sense of believability. [I could believe that a license plate could have that on it. Or, I could believe that the tag on the shirt said that.] But, the scale of the text, when combined with the wide establishing shots, makes for something that we could never see in real life: suspended massive typography that perfectly melts into the scene as if it is there. Generally, in video, we stay away from serif fonts that have little baby serifs. They used a font with little serifs, but it seems to work because the text is so big. [And, because it is intended for a huge screen.] From the reflections on windows to panning perfectly with the shot this text really sells the idea of it being a part of the scene, and has made its mark on opening film sequences, forever.

Photo from Che Men's Magazine - Complements of adverbox

I chose a men's magazine ad for analysis.

Surface Meaning:

Most of the image is filled by a woman. The woman is wearing a green top, carrying a purse, wearing a white skirt with tabs that have numbers on them with red text that says "My number". The woman seems Caucasian, and has brown hair. It seems that she is walking toward some sort of train station. At the bottom of the image is a logo in red and white with "Men's Magazine" written under it. To the left of the logo, white text reads: "Let us keep dreaming of a better world." A gradient darkens the top of the image.

Advertiser's Intended Meaning

"Let us keep dreaming of a better world" implies that if women were more like objects and their numbers were more easily accessible, the world would be better. The gradient, darkening the top of the image, is not a polarizer (which is commonly used to darken bright skies). The gradient also darkens the top of the girl, leading the viewer's eye to the bottom of the image. The brightest part is where the audience's eye automatically is drawn. The brightest part of this image is the girl's butt, and the red text, on her butt, emphasizes that it is the focal point of the image. This ad is clearly not being serious. They are playing on a stereotype of men. Part of what makes it successful is the fact that the ad is not attempting to be taken seriously. It is an ad for men, making fun of men.

Cultural / Ideological Meaning

The image's focus is on the girl's butt. The camera isn't just focused or angled toward the girl's butt, it was taken at the level of the girl's butt, rather than her face. Also, the girl's face is not even shown, implying that she -- as a person -- is not as important as her assets. Showing bits of her butt and a lot of leg further objectifies women. The girl is wearing a small purse and a bracelet, as if she is going out. [Middle class and upper class men usually pick up girls that are going out, rather than the girl with the big purse who has a life.] This image is full of hair, skin, and butt and asks the audience to keep dreaming of a better world. It's obviously intended for men. Arguably, the only people who would understand this ad are a class of people who would see an ad with tabs like the one that the girl's skirt is made out of. So, this might be a middle and lower class ad. (Maybe the higher class wouldn't know so much about these tabs?)