When trying to decide what to do for my final project I decided that I would work in Rock Creek Park because throughout the semester I haven’t been able to take landscape pictures or work with nature at all. I decided to work with the storyline of a girl walking to the park, girl meets boy and then girl slips in mud and boy helps her, making the last shot be of them in together. In regards to the final I was more concerned with the visual aspect of the pictures versus the actual story line. I wanted to get each shot to stand out and be interesting by itself. The day that my “actors” were free it was raining so I decided to work with that. I took two very bright umbrellas and made them the center of attention in each picture, rather than the actors. This was effective until we reached the actual park because the bright blue and green of the umbrellas seemed extremely subdued in comparison to leaves and fauna at the park.
I wanted a contrast with the umbrellas and the leaves on the trees with the outfits that my “actors” were wearing. I had the girl wear a plain black and white jacket because I wanted her to look washed out in comparison to the actual trees and the greenery. The guy was wearing a light blue shirt, which I thought would was out well with the black and white jacket, when in reality it was difficult to show the contrast with it. In order to make this part of my final more effective I had to up the contrast and saturation in every picture. In this way I feel like it made the pictures stand out more than they would of originally.
There were a few visual aspects that I wanted to include in my photo story. Some worked and some didn’t but that’s expected. One was that I wanted to capture the rain coming off of the umbrellas in a few pictures but even though it was raining very hard it wouldn’t come up in the photographs. The reason that I included the picture of the sign that says ‘Trail’ is because it showed the rain dripping off of the sign(to prove that the girl and boy weren’t just walking around on a sunny day with umbrellas) and to help further the story line of where the girl was going.
Another aspect that didn’t work as well for me was when we reached the actual park. I had to make the lighting on my camera higher because the trees and forest was extremely dark but I made a mistake when we reached the clearing. I forgot to change the lighting back to the regular setting and because of that the last four photographs are a lot lighter than I would have originally wanted. Once I came back and loaded the photos on my computer I realized this mistake and did the best I could to darken them up to match the others however, to me at least, there is an obvious difference in the lighting in them.
Besides the rain not showing up and my mistake with lighting I believe that the photos came out very well. I wanted the trees and the fauna to balance out some of the photographs and believe that it did. I’m happy with this being my final project.
Vis Lit Final May 5, 2009
Commercial Review March 31, 2009
For the commercial I chose an Ad from 1978 about why breakfast is so important. Its visual effects are quite comical but I thought the different types of shots were used well. Beggining with a medium shot on a young kid getting out of bed at the sound of breakfast being made the music video soon zooms in on hands that are cracking an egg in a pot. These hands are delicate so it is safe to say they are the little boy/girl’s mother. After this action there are a series of still shots. There are multiple with the different ways you are able to cook eggs and the different ways you are able to eat them. There are also different shots of children looking excited to eat the eggs and the parents who are also overly thrilled. On the subject of color it is a little harder to make out because the quality is not very high, but as far as I can tell there is just a normal use of color and no visual apects to make something stand out more than the other. The eggs are always the bright food on the plate but besides that this is a pretty dull video. The reason I picked it was because it made me laugh with its theme “Get Crackin” and the song that coincided with it.
Music Video Review March 31, 2009
I chose to review a music video by Coldplay because I knew that an important component of their music videos are visual aspects that are more artistic. The video begins with a panning of the tunnel on Chris Martin. The colors are contrasted from inside the tunnel to the outside. Blue and orange are used as complementary colors to make each end stand out more. After this the camera follows Chris around to the outside of the tunnel, where the colors are mostly black and void of feeling. The shot starts with a high zoom in Chris’ face and then begins with zoom out where the viewer is able to see the background which consists of cold, metal refineries. After this there is a small amout of color, but the main visual aspect of this music video is when Chris breaks out into a run and the camera follows from his persective. The camera shakes and the viewer believes now that it is running with Chris. This music video gave my group the idea to film this way when we did out short one minute film in the graveyard. We used the camera as the face of the person visiting the graveyard. Before the video returns to the typical music video(where the band just plays the song and maybe some rain starts to fall) the element of a shadow is used. It is so dark outside that when looking at the back of Chris it appears that the camera is following a shadow and this creates a pretty cool visual element. Whether you like their music or not Coldplay does come up with some pretty cool music videos.
Movie Review March 17, 2009
I chose to review 12 Angry Men because I have heard about the film growing up, through family and friends, but have never had the time to watch it. The film is based on a play and tells the story of a lone juror who tries to get a man acquitted by putting up evidence of reasonable doubt. No names where used in the film, the suspect was known as the ‘boy’ and there was also ‘the old man’ and the ‘lady across the street’, and all jurors where given a number and not a name which helped emphasize what I’m guessing the point of the play and film is: innocent until proved guilty and not vise versa.
I know that when this film was made all movies were in black and white but I felt that if this would have been in color the majority of the suspense would be gone. Black and white movies need to have substance to keep the audiences attention. Frankly, color movies had a great advantage because in the lags of great screenwriting there will be some colorful object to distract the viewer, which cannot be done in a black and white movie. I was a little hesitant to watch the film because I didn’t know if my attention could be held but the great writing and acting and visual aspects had my full attention, which rarely happens. I was also surprised at how I missed a few things in the film. I realized that the day was hot but it never occurred to me that the men wouldn’t care what happened to the boy, as long as they got out before dinner. My dad had to point out a few of those little, but also large, things in the movie that could of been overlooked.
The movie takes place in the deliberation room for the jurors. There is about five minutes at the beginning of the film where the jurors are in the court room hearing the final statements of the defendant and prosecutor but besides that scene and a brief one in a wash room the jurors room is the sole point of interest for the film. The shots that the director takes, zooming in on someones face, going back and forth from a large room to a single subject reminded me how difficult shot composition is. There was also heavy emphasis on the sweat that was coming from all of the jurors, showing that emotions were especially high in an atmosphere where the conditions were not at all comfortable. My favorite was the close up of the different faces. When a film is not well acted the close ups can get old quickly but in 12 Angry Men the close ups seemed to show the viewer a piece of that characters soul. This was a great film and even though I had heard good things about it I really couldn’t praise it enough.
City of God Poster Review February 25, 2009
I picked this movie poster because I liked the contrast in colors and the contrast in themes this poster and movie are portraying. In the top photograph there is a contrast in the color of the skin of the woman, orange, along with the sand and the color of the water, blue. These colors are complementary colors and they bring out the vibrance in each other. The top elements are showing off a theme of love and happyness, while the bottom is a deep contrast. The color blue is gone and is instead replaced with black. I think that replacing it with black shows the seriousness of what these young men and boys are trying to show. They want to been seen as a gang, as men to fear, and the way the poster portrays it, in a mob style, perfectly show that point. Also, all the boys hands are in motion, like they are throwing up a gang symbol or some type of gun. This different from the top photograph since the couple is still on the beach and all seems calm. There is repetition prevalent in the bottom photograph with the number of boys and also perspective occurs due to the crowd like group.
Title Sequence Review February 22, 2009
I saw this title sequence last week and was glad to see that it contained many of the visual design aspects that we mentioned in class. What I noticed while watching it the first time, not as meticulously was that there was a lot of negative space and a huge distinction between what is the forground and what is the background. Objects in the foreground are black and more like silhouettes while the objects in the background tend to be sand(which is the negative space). After watching it more meticulously I saw that the only colors used were blue and orange, which are completementary colors. This means that the viewers’ eye is caught on the contrast. Also, the rule of thirds is prevalent because when there are objects in the foreground they are never in the middle, but rather on the sides. There is repetition used toward the middle of the song with the women and the different lines. Rhythm is also seem in the texture used to show the sand. The bodies in the sand, mostly legs, are also part of the above mentioned rhythm. Overall this title sequence, to me, was creative, sexy and most important it had my full attention for over three minutes.
Ansel Adams Photography February 17, 2009
http://www.anseladams.com/
The photographer I chose to look at this week was Ansel Adams. I chose to review his work because I have been to a lot of the places that he chose to photograph and the way he is able to manipulate the camera fascinates me. In the lower photograph the Snake river is shown in Yellowstone National Park. I visited the park at the turn of the seasons in early October and what I saw is nothing compared to the photograph. Using a black and white color scheme Adams is able to focus on the landscape without the normal distractions in a colored photograph. For instance, the viewer does not notice that there is a gap in the trees or that the majority of the greenery is brown. All of this potential negative space is taken out of the picture. Another reason this black and white color scheme works in Adams’s favor is that the tree in the top photo seems to look timeless, like it has lived forever. The discoloration in the tree is not evident and the intertwined branches give it an ago old feel. He is also able to manipulate the light in his photography. He is able to show how beams of light shine through the sky and through some of the objects in his work, changing the saturation of the objects. This is present in the majority of Ansel Adams’ work.
Photo Review February 10, 2009
This is a picture that my friend Ceci took at the inauguration. I think it would work perfectly with the word “Patriotic”. The flags waving in front of the photo just reminds me of how exciting the inauguration was. There are only three colors in the photo: red, white and blackish/blue. I think this adds to the emphasis of what the inauguration stands for. The contrast in the photo is what makes this stand out the way it does. The macro is not present so the flag in the front is blurry, which adds to the photo.
A Day in the Life of a Stalker-Photo Story February 10, 2009
The order of the pictures goes from left to right. I decided to do the theme of ‘A Day in the Life of a Stalker’. I thought that it would be a good way to work with the flower or micro part on my camera because I hadden’t gotten experiment with it. In all of the pictures I tried to make it look as though I was hiding behind some sort of barrier whether that be a tree or a bathroom stall. I tried to not use my flash to have the colors of the library and the colors in the elevator pop out more. I tried putting the photos in black and white but they didn’t have to stalker effect that I wanted. My favorite picture is the one of the ceiling at TDR. At night the reflections on the ceiling make it almost look like a mirror and that is where my idea came for the stalker theme. I thought it was a little creepy how you could see everyone and they couldn’t see you looking.
Negative Space Photograph February 3, 2009
My word to take a photograph of this week was negative space. I had a lot of different ideas of how to portray it and finally I decided this picture was the best way. I couldn’t decide if I wanted to take a literal photograph or a visual one, and in this picture I came up with both. The no dogs allowed sign is rude(incorporating the negative into the photo) and then I have the sky and the wall as the actual negative space. In this photograph the sign is in the foreground and the trees are in the background, however both are considered the positive space in the photograph. The amount of sky was supposed to feel overwhelming so that it would be obvious that the photo was of the word ‘negative space’. To take the photo I had to get on the ground to make it look like the sign was looming over me. In the final product the sky was a little too dark and looked more of a black color, so I changed the hue by making it brighter and add light so it became a lighter tint of the former sky. I think this helped infasize the contrast in color between the sky and wall and green trees.
