Reflection 31/10/12

In today's lesson we went over all the things in photoshop again so we could all remember how to use it. I am starting to work on my poster in photo shop for my film :)

Poster

This was an activity that we did last week, we had to make a poster :)
We got given a website onto wikipedia that gave off random articles which we had to choose one that sounded intriguing. I chose the article called 'Boy From School', once this was chosen we had to go to the website where there were alot of quotes throughout the page. We had to choose the last 4 or 5 words from the end of the quote, my quote said 'Don't screw around and don't smoke'. When i had both of these things, i went onto google to find pictures that would relate to my title and quote so i got a picture of a school, and emblem of a random school and a picture of boys. i took all of these photos and my title + my quote and edited them on Photoshop to make them blend together.

Essay

Factory 

The film, 'Factory' was created by an animation artist called Miwa Matreyek in 2004. This film deals with a lot of different textures and lines to draw attention to various objects. The meaning behind this film is still indescribable, but stills draw a lot of the attention from the viewer.

This film, Factory, is a very dull film. Throughout the whole animation, there the only colours that were used were black and white. There was little emotion in this film but was still very intriguing and interesting. The animation started off with a lot of men piling into the factory in the morning to start work, this then led onto the showing of the outside and eventually the inside of the factory. What was so different and intriguing about the factory was that instead of big machines moving things around, they were abnormally large hands that would do the job of what a normal machine would usually do.  I realized that it was daytime in the film because of all the men walking into the factory, meaning they were just starting their days work. There are some objects that do stand out in the animation and draw my attention straight away. Some objects were the big factory pipes blowing smoke out, blimps flying in the sky, the massive hand being used instead of a person, machines and of course, the factory itself. The massive hand confused me a lot at the start and I didn’t know what to think or feel.

The animation shows a lot of different texture, shapes and lines. In one part of the film inside the factory, it has lines on the roof which are concaved downwards. Those lines being concaved downwards draws the attention downwards to what is happening on the floor, which shows all the machines and what they are all doing. There is a lot of different texture throughout this film also, showing lots of shades of darkness or lightness in the parts where it is necessary. I found that it showed more shades of darkness throughout the animation meaning that the creator of the film is trying to give off a dull and weary vibe. I thought that the animation throughout the film was very well done and did draw my attention to the screen with the use of the factory in its creativeness.

This film really confused me at the start and I didn’t get any of it, but after a while I realized the bigger picture to it. The film is saying that technology is taking over our world we live in today, its replacing lots of things we had in our lives. It’s also showing that people are forced to do work they don’t want to do or are not comfortable in doing and are bored but have no other choice. This is a world we live in today, Miwa Matreyek has shown that very well through creative animation.

Creative Media Evaluation

Montana Leskiw

Creative Media Evaluation

1.    I am quite satisfied with the end result. I think the animation turned out really well in the end after we put all the parts of grace and mine together.

2.    My project took up more time than I intended on having. This was because I had a few technically difficulties with some of the laptops I had and also with saving my animations.

3.    If I could change any aspects of my animation I would put a more appropriate song along the lines of the animation. We didn't have enough time so we just put a song in there, but if we did have enough time we would of made sounds to go with the animation and different things not just one huge song.

4.    If I could start the project again I would defiantly not put that much time into the opening of the book. The opening of the book took me so much time that I didn't have and took up so much more time than I would of liked. I would spread out my time spam evenly so I know how much time I have to put into each scene.

I imagined the final animation much differently to what it came out as. I pictured it to be much different on the lines of the actual animation and all of it put together. I’m happy with our final animation but I did picture it a lot differently.

We had to change a lot of things with our original plan because it was going to take up to much time or was going to be to difficult to do in the time frame that we had. I had to make a bit of a scene different to what we first imagined because it was going to be to difficult and the scene itself already took up a lot of time.

I think during my project that my animation skills did improve. I think the start and the finish of my animation are different in their way that they improved more on the technique and the structure of how I did the animation and what I chose to do about things.

I had a few technical difficulties along the way of my project, which didn't help speed up things but slow me down a lot. I made one of my scenes at least three times before it actually saved onto a USB. This took up so much time that could have gone into other animations and scenes for my project instead of redoing a scene over and over again. I didn't really have many difficulties with the actual animation part but mostly the saving part.

I think the storyboards could have been used more regularly to see if we were on the right track. I did check in every once in a while to see if I was doing the same thing the storyboard said to do but not as much as I would of liked to do.

I think the planning ahead really did help speed things along in the animation project. F I didn't plan ahead I think I would have been lost at some parts of the project and not knowing what to do with myself. The planning was good because I always knew what to do and if I forgot my USB one day or my scene deleted on me, then I knew other scenes because I planned so I just did them instead of just sitting there doing nothing.

I do think our project was a little rushed near the end of it. I think it was difficult for Grace and I because we were in different classes and it was hard for us to see each other’s work and to discuss what we did in class that day. I think near the end of the project we were stressing over putting it all together into one whole movie and then we stressing over a song hen it was nearly due so we just put a random song in there. I think if we had more time it would have been cleaner and smoother.

I think I am very lazy when it comes to blogs and I need to put more reflections up and the parts of my scenes up that I get done in class. I did do some along the way of this animation project but not enough to fully show what I’ve been doing. I need to use my blog more and should be putting up reflections and blog entries after every lesson.

I did learn a few new things along the way of my animation project. I never knew how to copy, paste and undo on the animation application so I was also using my mouse to go over it and do it, which took up an annoying amount of time. I soon figured out that you only had to click command + C, command + V and comma