Have Faith In Me – Final

Final Time-Based Communication Submission:

Monologue:
i gave everything i have, everything i ever had.
success comes with a price, and i won the lottery.
dreams come true…if only i slept more often.

like a son watching his father, i studied my idols
and i did the same things they once had. confidence
comes with the abandonment of fear.

success comes with a price…things you can’t buy back.
i can’t find my way out, and the sound of silence is deafening.

does this make me a man? will my father finally be proud of me?
maybe now he won’t forget.

this is what i have, all that i have left.
and i pray it won’t be fleeting away as quickly as it came.
i wish i could freeze time.

Have Faith In Me – Rough Cut

Here’s a really rough mashup of video I filmed. I told the actors that the audio would not be used in the final recording, which explains their falsetto voices and bad language. The current monologue does not overlay very well with these images, so it needs to be adjusted and refined. I have not recorded a planned guitar track for background music, nor have I edited the images very smoothly or cut them as much as I want. Things I need to do: re-write/re-record monologue with Shane, record guitar track, cut down footage to make video shorter, add more transitions.

Have Faith In Me – Process Work

Here is an anamatic for my upcoming final project. Some realllllly rough sketches combined with a rough monologue recording. I’ve given so much to get here. I’ve given everything I have, everything i’ll ever have. this is my dream come true… of all the countless hours i spent practicing the dozens of singing teachers that couldn’t handle me i uh, used to think i’d never make it and be another one of those people with hidden.. wasted talents with no one listening. my dad always said you had to stick with it and make it count. i’ve given so much to get here… now that i am. i wish i could freeze time.

10 Things I Love

I’m glad to finally be back at school. It’s time to finish the things we started and move on to new and exciting things.
It has been required of me to post 10 items of mine that I have a relationship with. So here goes:

1. Art & Lutherie Wild Cherry Acoustic Guitar
2. iPhone 2G
3. Zero Skateboards Wallet
4. Xbox 360 Controller
5. Dorian Gray – The Precurse CD
6. Curb Your Enthusiasm DVD Set
7. Michael Scott Bobble Head (from The Office)
8. Sony Headphones
9. UO Plaid Scarf
10. Gun-metal Bulls-head Belt Buckle

1. Art & Lutherie Wild Cherry Acoustic Guitar
One of the only benefits of the strike, was the increase in free time. My love affair with the guitar has been on and off since grade eight, and newly rekindled with this new acoustic I purchased earlier 2008. Since September I’ve been practicing every day and finally warded off procrastinating on the things I want to do.

2. iPhone 2G
I refused to own a cellphone my entire life until last september, when a landline phone was not an option. Since then I’ve joined the rest of the world and their constant obsession with texting, calls, and other cellphone tasks – in public, with friends…anywhere. It has become one of my favourite things because it’s my iPod, my cellphone, and my time waster – all in one.

3. Zero Skateboards Wallet
If I said I knew when I bought this wallet, I’d be lying. This is leftover from my 3 year stint of skateboarding from late elementary and into highschool. I am a huge skateboarding fan but unfortunately had to stop due to knee surgery due to it. Ever since then it was hard to continue skating and following it. This wallet is one of my last connections to something I would spend every summer day and night doing.

4. Xbox 360 Controller
I am a video game nerd…throughout highschool I ran a successful Video Game reviewing website with a few close friends. We received the majority of all new releases for free from game companies, including game systems (Gamecubes, Gameboys, DS’s, Wii’s, etc.), ad revenue brought in thousands of dollars a year, we were invited to press conferences in Toronto held by Microsoft and Nintendo, etc. It was an exciting introduction to the video game world and website building and management. Like all good things, it came to an end as our interests shifted and we separeted to go to different schools. My Xbox 360 is something I somehow usually find enough time for nearly everyday and is my last free system I haven’t sold yet.

5. Dorian Gray – The Precurse CD
Music is a huge impact on my life. I’ve toured Ontario, and 7 differernt states in America with my band and recorded 1 EP and 1 LP. In the picture is our independently released 8 song CD featuring artwork I designed. Playing on stage to kids who know every single lyric of your songs is an incredible experience and I wish every person could experience it. I still play with my band on odd-weekends and tour with them every May – which seems to be an issue this year due to the extension of classes…I need to figure something out.

6. Curb Your Enthusiasm DVD Set
I am a huge Jerry Seinfeld fan. When I learned the co-creator of Seinfeld, Larry David, created another comedy on HBO I had to watch it. Of course it being HBO, it is quite vulgar and extremely awkward, I really enjoy the humour of Larry David. Now I can’t decide which one I like better, Seinfeld or Curb! Pictured is the Season 6 disc set…

7. Michael Scott Bobble Head (from The Office)
For my birthday a few years ago, I got a Michael Scott (Steve Carrell) bobblehead from my friends. It’s pretty sweet.

8. Sony Headphones
My brother bought me these headphones for a christmas present. Definitely the best headphones I’ve had.

9. UO Plaid Scarf
I liked this scarf so much I drove to the states to get it. I pretty much wear it everyday in the winter. Plus it adds some colour to my all black winter attire.

10. Gun-metal Bulls-head Belt Buckle
I’m not sure why I thought this was extremely cool at the time, but I was searching for a good bull-head belt buckle for the longest time. I finally found one made of Gun-metal from the USA. I bought it for $60 dollars, and wore it a few times…it’s a little big and it doesn’t really fit my style anymore – but its still awesome.

P2: Academy Leader Final

The academy leader was an interesting animation project, to say the least. With such rigid time constraints (there no stretching or condensing of the 10 seconds), its hard to carry out all your creative ideas without being on overload – which is also part of the fun.

The purpose of this project was to demonstrate an ability to come up with a suitable concept, capture images, edit them and arrange them in a rhythmic and interesting way, with a narrative sequence. The project required this to be outputted onto a DVD with process for viewing.

The house numbers demonstrate the qualities and requirements needed for this project because the numbers countdown the leader. I used a friend of mine to create a narrative, walking from house to house that all look uniformly the same, trying to find the correct house. After the leader finishes, the narrative is completely by the final scene when he finds the right house to deliver the pizza too. The immense amount of images I captured, allowed the video to be played at a full 30 frames per second, only allowing images to stay viewable longer when they were important (eg, the main house number shot). Playing the video at 30FPS allowed the viewer to experience the delivery boys feelings of being on the clock, stress to find the correct house, and frustrated with his missing luck of finding the customer. The viewer is not sure why the man is knocking on doors until the final scene…the door knocks at every second gives the leader pacing and is representative of actual sounds. The knocks also vary in volume, louder/quieter/louder/quieter, etc like the ticking of a clock. In order to combat repetitiveness, the fast-paced animation leaves no time to predict or even realize what’s happening until it’s over. I collected sounds from the FreeSoundProject.org and then edited what I needed. I used a door knocking, reduced it to one knock and added delay to give similarities to a clock ticking. Heavy breathing from the pizza boy is present to demonstrate his hurriedness. Wind is used to accompany the sense of speed in the animation, while city noises are present to give the location context. These sounds and the fast-paced imagery of the man and the house numbers, create a narrative of trying to find a place, in a sea of sameness, while on the clock.

Some challenges involved finding a suitable concept that could be told well in such a short time. Even when a concept has a strong connection to numbers (such as the hide-and-go-seek) it is necessary for there to be visual numbers as it is an academy leader. It also took some time to find a row of houses that actually went from 1-10, it is pretty rare to start at the number 1, I now know. If I were to do the project again, I believe it would be fun to experiment with some stop animation with stationary objects, as the numbers would come be clearer as the shot would be less busy as they would be the greater portions of the frame.  I am becoming more fluent with final cut, using shortcuts and different toolbars to better my workflow, something this project has required.

All images were recorded on my digital camera. The video clip was recorded on a DV camera rented from the school. All sounds were downloaded courtesy of freesoundproject.org and then edited in Audacity.

Final video:

P2: Academy Leader Process

Please click on an image to see a short description for sketched process work

Early sketches

More early sketches

Early storyboarding

Early Storyboards

Early Storyboards

Early storyboards

Storyboarding for hide-and-go-seek

Storyboarding for house numbers

Storyboarding for house numbers

Storyboarding for house numbers

Too many stills...

Video Process:

Project One: Final

For our final submission, we were required to combine all our knowledge gained in the last three exercises to demonstrate technical and conceptual lessons gained. Through the combination of still images, editing, and audio – we can create stories through abstract and conceptual means.

My noun was environment and my two verbs were growth and decay. For my listening exercise, my outdoor sitting was just outside my front door. I decided to recreate for the most part, what I heard for my soundscape as I was interested in creating a more literal interpretation of sounds in a real environment – my environment. To add images to this, I used a gradual range of photos from nature, to nature with people, to nature with construction, to finally, just urbanization. It was the decay of nature at the expense of the growth of urbanization and noise pollution.

I tried to demonstrate this through the gradual increase in noise and loudness in audio, finally tapering off with plain static, as these urban sounds are not pleasant – they are just noise pollution. As far as images, I used a number of still succession frame captures to demonstrate the graceful movement in nature. The flowing grass is mocked later when the flowing yellow caution line, deterring people from entering construction zones, has replaced it. My images gradually turned from nature into urbanization which I believe was effective in conveying my idea. As the timeline progressed, transitions became quicker and less smooth as the sound got louder.

I learned quite a bit from this project. I had never experimented with final cut, or still image motion and it was valuable to gain some technical knowledge as well as fun to try and convey them through a motion medium that is new to me.

Sound Essay: Exercise 3

I had something clever to say about my exercise, and it bothers me that I can’t remember, for the life of me, what it was. So without further ado, here is my audio only file for exercise three.

My noun was environment, which I chose to interpret as my front door step in the Village, housing mainly for students just south of the York University – Keele Campus. My two verbs were grow and decay, which is an oxymoron but in a way, makes sense. In order for something to grow, it is at the sacrifice of another. My idea was branched off of my professor’s mention that the Village as we know it, used to be a parking lot and empty fields. It has gone from a quiet stretch of land to a calm residential area. But as construction and noise pollution continue to expand, the calm serenity of open fields are destroyed.

Audio files courtesy of www.freesound.org

Everyday Sounds

In our class, we were asked to sit quietly for 10 minutes with our eyes closed inside and outside and record the sounds we hear, the quality of them, and if we had noticed new sounds we normally are not aware of. Sound is a medium that has to be utilized well particularly in motion media where great sound has become the norm to create pacing, excitement, fear, suspense, etc.

Inside my bedroom basement apartment:
It’s 1:36 am, Wednesday night. And I am lying on my bed.
Sounds I noticed:
- The fan on in my bathroom
- Music from my roommate down the hall
- Walking around upstairs
- Drawers opening upstairs
- My iMac silently humming away
- Another roommate is typing
- Water running in the house

Normally I hear different hums from machinery running from the furnace room, but my bathroom fan was on and was fairly loud so it drowned out a lot of other quieter humming sounds. Some patterns were that I hear these sounds constantly, no matter what time…8 people live upstairs and there are constantly people walking and a kitchen is above my room, which can be extremely distracting – especially when I’m paying attention to them. I didn’t hear any sounds I haven’t already heard. The quality of the sounds was mostly bassy and muffled, besides my roommate typing, which was still had a fairly intelligible clacking sound. Some sounds were more prominent because they were louder and were repeated more consistently (or never stopping like fans). I realize that even a quiet room, has numerous constant sounds. And if you were to remove these sounds, it almost becomes distracting. I have slept with earplugs before due to noise and the near removal of all sounds besides your breathing is very odd.

Outside my front door in the Village, just south of TEL and the parking lot.
It is 9:52am today. I am sitting on my front door steps.
Sounds I noticed:
- A person walking fast
- Car horn in the distance
- Airplane
- Cars driving
- Echoed cars driving through the garage lanes
- Walking slower…
- Constant airplane noise?
- Car driving by me
- Quick yell
- Hammer
- Beep beep beep from construction trucks backing up
- Clacking? Some kind of construction, sounds like moving a ladder as well
- Random clanks and such from the York direction
- Front door opening, then closing

I noticed an ongoing hum of cars in the distance, or driving by me. I seemed to always hear that airplane hum in the way distance very consistently. I never noticed the airplanes were always going. And I never cared to notice when people opened their front doors or not. Sounds that were more prominent and clear were people walking, front doors opening and closing and cars driving by me. Sounds that were less prominent were usually echoed from a far way away and were a lot less loud and distorted (muffled or echoed).

There are a lot more sounds I did not notice before outside. I don’t normally spend time sitting out there reflecting and just listening. Where it is the opposite in my room, every night before bed I can hear all the things I heard, as I try to find a way to sleep. So it seems normal that a place you normally don’t spend much time at, would have a series of sounds you normally would not notice…

3009: Exercise Two

Version One:

Version Two:

Experimentation with circles, transitions, overlayed effects, and a narrative through 30 seconds.