Testing with multiple videos at once

Tried playing four exported videos at one go to see how they would look. I'm quite pleased with the result and it's great to finally get a glimpse of the aesthetic of how the final interface will be like.

Water colour + Film

Probably one of the more successful combination of moving water colour and film. The footage was looking a bit flat so thought the water colour would add a bit of texture & subtle movement. Duplicated the 3D animation to get a more full looking explosion.

On the roof

More experiments with one of the stories filmed on the roof. This one was about body image and I'm trying to create a sense of not feeling comfortable in one's own skin, getting out of one's own skin I supposed... trying to exaggerate the overlaps. Screenshots below:

I will be updating my proposal section soon since it's a bit of a mess...

Moving Watercolour black/desaturated

Another water colour piece. A few things I changed from my previous ones:
Eliminated the symmetry (as suggested by my tutor)
Added an expanding mask
A close up of the water colour rather than than the whole piece
A more subtle animation (I found the noise interesting but a bit too much perhaps)

This can be used as a standalone video in the database or superimposed on one of the films.

Interface

A few screenshots from my interface tests carried out by my developer Maria Each time you refresh, videos change size. Each video can be resized & full screened.

On a black background. Videos below are stored in the hosting rather than taken from youtube. Pros: Better layout (no borders) Cons: longer loading time.

Experiments with water colour and film

I've created some more moving water colour pieces. I still can't decide whether they should be separate from film or combine. I think I still have to find a better way to combine them; still not convinced. Below are some experiments:

Separating water colour from film.

Applying water colour effect to Kane only.

Just my argument explained in pictures from the web

During short breaks from my research paper, I was browsing some unrelated funny websites just to clear my head for a few minutes. Strangely enough I still found some posts that reminded me of my research question. Below are a few funny / thought provoking posts. Resources can be found in the captions.

from 9gag.com - repetitive story structures in traditional cinema

9gag.com - how new technologies are being given more importance than the story 

9gag.com - games taking over cinema, even in storytelling

postsecret.com - absence of meaning / chance

Back to work: Split screen digital story

Back to work! I have posted my essay on the blog. Hopefully will soon have time to update my proposal. I have resumed working on the project. The following are stills from something I have started editing today. The video features a split screen from 2 webcam conversations. The story was about someone who lost a 'digital' friend - as in someone who he never met, but spoke to online. I tried to capture this 'loss' through a disintegration process. So far I have found noise to be the most effective, but this might change later on. 

One of the videos was distorted when I exported it (left). I found this to be a happy accident and  so decided to leave it.

Happy accident (left) - gradual noise (right) - I might desaturate the noise later.

Finishing the essay and thinking about interface design

http://mariacamilleri.com/moira/

I haven't really been updating my blog so often because basically I have been immersed in the essay. I am find it so difficult to stick to 3,000 words. So many details are being left out- although perhaps this is my fault for finding a wide subject to write about. Nonetheless, I still think I have a good argument and I still think there are plenty of things I can afford to remove.

In the meantime, my developer is finding ways of how to display multiple videos at one go. A couple of things we're discussing:

• I want this to be online so loading too many videos will be slow, therefore I have to restrict the number.
• For the show, for bigger impact I will host the website on my laptop and load a greater number of videos.
• If I display this on a touch screen, the area where the user will drag to make the videos bigger or smaller, or just move them about, will have to be better suited to fingers.
• The borders look bad so we will use a black background, black / transparent borders and when the user hovers, these will be highlighted.

The project is basically "An impossible quest for closure" and it reflects what I am writing about. There will be text on the interface which will give the user the illusion that it is trying to help them find a meaning. Instead this will simply play disjointed recordings, pieces of music, or refresh the page to reveal new videos. Maria, the developer also told me to consider changing the actions of the buttons (text) every time the page is refreshed. Therefore the user might see "What does this mean?" and click on it - only to refresh the page. "What does this mean" might not be there when he/she refreshes, but if it is - this time it might trigger a recording.

I will be compiling a reading list (because I'm afraid I will lose track if I don't!) and also update my Abstract.

Reflective writing on chat with Paul Coldwell

Festen - Thomas Vinterberg, Dogme 95

So yesterday I had a half an hour audio chat session with Professor Paul Coldwell about my research paper. It started alright - midway I got distracted and confused (the screaming kitten didn't help :)), and I think it ended OK. So here is where I got stuck:

Prof. Coldwell suggested that Cinema is growing and so is the sense of escapism. I wasn't sure about this but didn't know exactly how to back it up. By Chance! yesterday I found a lecture by Professor Jesse Schell about the rise of the need for realism. Some points I observed: In the midst of all this technological breakthrough, people are feeling that they are living in a 'fake' world, therefore yearning for "real" food, "reality" tv, "reality" in games and adverts. (Yet I still think that escapism seems to still be lurking in through all of this realism. It is an interesting mix of both. The safety of going back to something genuine and natural, and the excitement of the surreal. A technological representation of the natural perhaps.)

I then also looked at other points in time when this happened, in art especially - Pre-Raphaelites, the 60's Psychedelia. I still need to see what happened exactly in the film world but essentially it was pretty much the same pendulum style activity. From one extreme to another. Stretching something to the max and returning to something else.

I suppose then that it is in this day and age that going back to the natural seems to make so much sense, since we were never so far away from reality as we are now.

The more technological and virtual/digital we become, the more we want to get back to our roots (It's natural :)).

Jesse Schell specifies that this factor is called the concept of Authenticity, and if it is true, then there was never a better time for chance and database to combine and create filmmaking structures that are more relevant to today's culture.

So... currently updating my arguments, but moreso the conclusion which I still wasn't sure about up until yesterday.

More points to think about (as discussed with Paul Coldwell)
Sophie Calle - Figure to research
Max Ernst series - A woman with a thousand heads
Early cinema - Duchamp
Surrealism
Are people still going to the cinema & escapism

Experimentation with students

Today I did what you could call a "mini case study." I am currently working with BA Fine Arts students where they are encouraged to destruct and reconstruct their own style, and in the meantime work on a unit called "Prevent, Provoke, Parade". Since a large part of my research is about Chance and one of the students is writing her dissertation on Chance, I decided to give them a brief exercise on Chance and closure.

The Class is comprised of only three students, however since today one of them was sick I decided to contribute to the exercise. This is what we did; Each one of us created an impromptu painting/collage using acrylics, found magazines, newspapers, charcoals, pens, tape etc... I told them to think about a concept concerning "Prevent, Provoke, Parade" but to keep their ideas secret, so to not influence once another.

When the pieces of work were done, I told them to exchange it with someone else's. We 'destroyed' each other's work by cutting it up or tearing it. Once we had all the pieces, we exchanged these once again and threw them randomly onto a large piece of white paper. We taped them together exactly in the way they landed:

This was the result.

We then needed to test how the montage looked so I asked two other fine art students to comment about composition, colour, texture and perhaps significance. We got very positive results and a variety of theories regarding composition, negative space and the "illusion of three dimensionality". I have to admit I was scared that the final composition would look bad aesthetically and perhaps lack in composition and colour. This was not the case however, in fact I think applying Chance let the students work without fear that their work would look bad, because they knew it would be destroyed anyway - so they knew anything that looked bad could look good later, and of course vice versa.

So from this exercise I concluded that: Chance = great freedom and less restrictions in the work + a fresh result. I think I knew this already but wanted to try it out for myself and let my students experience it as well.

Updated Structure

Man With a Movie Camera - Dziga Vertov

Now that I have started writing the essay, I have had to restructure several times, this is the one I'm working with at the moment: (based on the structure suggested by Kevin Fox during the chats)

IDEA: Chance & Database VS Traditional Narrative

Introduction

|

General Background of Traditional narratives VS General Background of Chance

Order/Regulated VS Disorder/Nature

|

Main Argument. Traditional Narratives VS Database Structures

(Various types, what database (modular/puzzle) offer that traditional don't. Are they a new species? Temporality. Examples, etc...)

|

Does the audience want meaning or chance?

|

Conclusion

Reflective writing on chat & lots of writing to do...

How I feel right now, pic source 

After the brief discussion with Ed Kelly, I think I am on the right track when it comes to the essay, although I have to admit I am very much all over the place. I have started from chaos and now the order seems so difficult to achieve. No doubt this is the worst part of the essay - trying to mash everything together into an argument.

The problem was that the reading got slightly out of hand. I kept finding more and more material and just reading and underlining, and now I'm not sure if I have enough time to log it all. I still have a couple of journals I need to log and see if they fit with the rest of the research.

Amid all the confusion however, yesterday I came up with a structure which would involve three chapters in the essay:

The first part will deal with an intro on classical Narrative which will then lead to a discussion on Modular and Database Narrative and how it is perceived by the audience. Most of the disadvantages of new narratives seem to be the lack of meaning, therefore I will link this to Chapter 2 which deals with Chance, meaning and the author. Chapter three will continue from a discussion on the open-ended nature of chance and lack of meaning, and will lead to new interactive narratives, games, and contemporary modular films.

This is likely to change, however I think it should be a good starting point. Chapter one will have to be written this week.

An inspirational quote

Came across this today....

"Cinema, which was the key method to represent the world throughout the twentieth century, is destined to be replaced by digital media: the numeric, the computable, the simulated. This was the historical role played by cinema: to prepare us to live comfortably in the world of two-dimensional moving simulations. Having played this role well, cinema exits the stage. Enters the computer."

From Cinema and Digital Media - Lev Manovich

Tests and logging

So my developer, Maria has just put up some tests (which I will post soon hopefully) of three videos of different sizes playing, and four audio pieces playing simultaneously on command. I am in the process of editing another video however the logging of the reading material is slow, plus my reading list seems like it will never end.

I am currently logging Umberto Eco's "The Role of the Reader" as well as Lev Manovich's "Database as a symbolic form". It feels like the more I read - the more there is to know, however I cannot keep reading forever so this week or next week latest I will finally start putting my essay together. This week I will also email Antoine Beuger with some questions regarding John Cage and works of Chance.

Today a student presented an HP video where they launched some kind of touch technology back in 2007; it reminded me of my project in its database presentation, as in one could move and scale videos up and down, as well as turn music on and off at any desired time. The difference is that I want mine to be more of a whole than just an abstract representation of multimedia. and rather than having random videos, these will be based on stories since of course the whole exercise is a quest for meaning. In general, this HP project got me excited to work on my own, however made me long for a large touch screen which would made the experience so much more exciting! I still have to discuss these options with Maria to see what is possible.

Abstract is up & I found a developer!

I have just put up my Abstract. It is still under construction however the basic idea for the essay is there. Today I have also met a girl who will be my developer for the project. We have decided to use Jquery and to create the project as a web application that can be viewed on screen / mobile / tablet. She will be sending me a test of how everything will work as a whole. Even though she's taking care of the development, she will be explaining how she did everything to me so I know how the application was constructed.

This is of course great news, because it will give me plenty of time to work on the videos.

We have also discussed the idea of making the website/application open to the public, whereas anyone can upload videos etc... however I felt that this would be a completely different project (although this could be done in the future perhaps). So instead we're thinking of letting the user share their chosen combination of video/audio/music.

The missing link...

So there was one element which wasn't particularly making sense in my project (well... perhaps more than one) but this was was annoying me because it just had nothing to do with the idea of chance, and just picking bits and pieces and putting them together to form some kind of meaning (or not).

This was the music. I felt that just finding ready made pieces of music and 'throwing' them in my interface would be too easy. Too easy in the sense that music facilitates the manifestation of emotions and meaning generation; therefore asking someone to give a piece of music would just take over the whole project.

So instead I have come up with another mini project which involves sound. My idea came from this 'Secondhand Sureshots' video that I had come across around a year ago.

"This documentary film by the dublab.com creative collective is an experiment in sound recycling. Secondhand Sureshots features four amazing, LA-based beat makers: Daedelus, J-Rocc, Nobody and Ras G in a secret mission to create new musical magic from the dusty remains of thrift store vinyl. dublab.com/secondhand"


So I thought what if I did something similar, but based on Chance?

The idea is this:

Two of my friends who are both vinyl collectors, and also have a vast library of samples will be creating one looping piece for the interface.

They will be choosing a number of vinyls (not decided yet) by Chance! (the method has still not yet been decided).

They are allowed to add other layers, pads and effects however the body of the musical pieces has to be composed from samples from vinyls picked by chance, to complement the rest of the project.

The 'music' piece, (and I say 'music' because they might just be ambient sounds and effects) will be presented in separate layers where the user can turn them off and on at the same time or choose which layers to have on and which to leave off. The menu for the interface has not been decided upon as of yet, but it will have to complement the recordings menu.

I will be recording this mini sound project and presenting it as well. I'm just curious to see how this will all turn up. This is the great thing about chance; it makes you feel excited for what's about to happen; for what is unexpected.

Testing with multiple recordings

Working and studying at the same time means having little time to think about my Masters project. Most of the time I brainstorm and generate ideas on my way to and from work (30mins  + 30mins = 1 hour daily) which is not bad. So this was an idea I had today coming back from work - what would happen if I had more than one recording going on at the same time? The recordings were slashed randomly and placed in at random points in time. (I don't want to go into the psychological reasoning behind how random these actually were but let's just say they were given little to no thought). This isn't the point anyway - I wanted to figure our how confusing they would sound. As you can see I even slashed words in half, which I must say - produced a nice effect and yet of course, meaning is compromised.

This is the main difficulty here; the aural effect is much more interesting, the recordings almost form part of the minimal music at the background, however meaning is pushed back to make space for this 'effect'. I will surely need to test this to see what the viewer thinks.

The editing of this is not complete, like all other videos I have posted so far. I like exporting incomplete videos though, and often these end up being much more 'alive' than the finished work. I think it's something about the database aesthetic; it cannot be forced.

So Dynamic Views it is

I just thought... how could I not switch? The structure of this layout is exactly what I am reading about - how culture is becoming - time and space rather than just a single continuous line. Change is good - plus I couldn't find the labels and now I did - I feel that the presented dynamic view is the perfect way of representing my whole project, whilst also allowing for categorization via dates / labels / recent.

Will soon upload a new edited video - this time I have experimented with various recordings at one go since I am thinking about having this available in the final interface: A few keywords & phrases I have been thinking about:

-Ability to enlarge / zoom / fullscreen / view multiple videos at one go
-One layered music piece rather than a variety (I want this to be sampled from different/random vinyls)
-Grid
-Multiple Voice over
-Control
-Search for meaning
-data input
-some kind of result? maybe.

This month I'm having a chat with someone who might be able to help me with all the programming and also to help me choose a platform. I will also try to post my updated Abstract soon.

Reading

I have just been looking through the new Dynamic Views in Blogger and must say most look much better than the one I am currently using... the only problem is the label / tagging system... perhaps this will be fixed in the future, but until then I'm sticking with the 'old' layout for the sake of clear organisation.

So.. at the moment I am still editing footage every once in a while but I am mostly just reading and structuring my research paper which is due next month. I have been reading Aristotle's Poetics for Screenwriters - which I found to be slightly useful but mostly just a guide to 'sell your script to Hollywood' not really what I was looking for. I will be reading the real Poetics tomorrow (well, some of them at least!)

I have read Lev Manovich's Cinema and Digital Media and
Database as a Symbolic Form.
Moving Image after computerization - extending traditional elements of cinema
Steve Anderson's Select and Combine: The Rise of Database Narratives.
Doors to the Labyrinth by Marsha Kinder

I have read Modular Narratives by Allan Cameron
Chance from Documents of Contemporary Art
Parts of Cinema of Outsiders by Emanuel Levy
Part of Silence - John Cage
David Lynch - Catching the Big Fish
Story and Discourse by Seymour Chatman

There might be others but I have left some books at my workplace so I'll add these later...

Most of the transcripts are ready.
Before I go full-on writing I wish to read parts of Semiotics, the basics by Daniel Chandler and Mass Mediauras by Samuel Weber.
I also have a couple of links to articles in my favourites which I have to go through..

Just a screenshot of the plan I have been following:

New footage, reading..

Unedited screenshots from new footage. Still reading Modular Narratives in Contemporary Cinema. I still haven't started writing yet, but the more I read the more I am seeing a clear structure of what I can write; I just need to put it down on paper (and by paper I mean Word)

Edits and reading

Cinema 4D Exploding / Randomised Sphere

I'm trying to finish a second edit on one of the stories. I spent today trying to get an interesting effect using an exploding sphere. I chopped up the animated sphere similar to how I chopped up the footage. It still needs reworking but here's a preview of what I've done so far. I've not shifted the edits from Premiere to After Effects i.e. much more flexibility, yet a slower workflow.

As for my essay... I have finished reading the book on Chance and have continued reading 'Modular Narratives in Contemporary Cinema'. This book is taking a while to read since it is extremely interesting to read, whilst also being very relevant to my paper. At the moment I'm reading about how Lev Manovich believes that database and narrative are two completely different dimensions, and yet the author thinks otherwise. Have to admit I am very much enjoying this process...

3d!

I'm trying to incorporate some 3D triangles ... essentially 2 exploding spheres.. it needs to be a longer sequence and perhaps a larger sphere. I would like to incorporate more 3D and more traditional media with the footage. 

Getting Out of One's Own Body

A few screenshots from the latest edit. This one is begging for some After Effects - but it will have to wait until I create some new traditional material and / or transfer my collages from my laptop.. So far it is simply layering in Premiere and messing around with layer transparency options. All shots were filmed using a static tripod and camera (except for the close ups of the pegs).

As for the Reading - I have 'finished' Story and Discourse - and I put it in inverted comas because I did not actually finish it, since the last two chapters were about 'character' and 'setting' - not really relevant to my paper so I skipped them after skimming through a couple of pages. I have now resumed reading 'Chance - Documents of Contemporary Art'.

An interesting thought

"Are we forever condemned to Aristotle’s moral presuppositions, no matter how poorly they fit modern characters or situations? It not, how shall we go about finding new and more adequate taxonomic features? And at the other pole, how do we guard against runaway proliferation. What is our instrument of control? How we find our way amid so many potential variables with so few persuasive diagnostic tests?" 


From Story and Discourse, Narrative Structure in Fiction and Film by Seymour Chatman - P89

Experiments - Click pictures for a larger view

 Screenshots from my latest experiment. Two videos superimposed, fireworks overlayed in the second one.

This week I will finish reading "Story and Discourse. Narrative Structure in Fiction and Film" by Seymour Chatman, where I found some very relevant material for my research paper.