JP Hertel – Art 250

[youtube:www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mg8CzQ7uA5M]

Pre-Production

When I started to figure out how I was going to do my first project, I just began thinking of the three definitions of art, literacy, and communication. After some thought, I narrowed my subject down to relating literacy and communication, while focusing on literacy. I decided that I wanted to contemplate what literacy meant in today’s world, and how technology shapes the way we communicate. I wanted to ponder what role literacy really has today. I felt that using a narrative voice-over with images would be an effective way to examine this subject, rather than an interview-style film. I also knew that to create an effective argument, I needed to thoughtfully plan out what was going to be said in this narrative.

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My narrative has four main components that I hope will flow into another in a logical progression. First, I am going to talk about communication pre-writing (speech). This shows that while speech is an incredible human tool, it still has limitations. Next, I talk about how humans began writing as a way to preserve their ideas and get past some of those limitations. After that, I describe how humans used writing as a tool to create applications on computers, and how that has changed the way we communicate, (breaking all limitations). To bring my ideas to a conclusion, I lastly discuss taking a step back to using the form of writing that has been used the most, in terms of years anyway. I do this to express my own viewpoint in this reflection. It is certainly important to communicate with others today, and technology is a great way to do that; however, I also feel it is important to communicate with those from the past, and the best way to do that is through books. I express a somewhat urgent, perhaps paranoid, call to do this, asserting that literacy can mean more than simply the ability to read and write — it can mean the responsibility to read and write.

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Now that I had an outline in words, I needed to figure out what types of images to tie in with the words. I had several visual ideas I knew I wanted to execute, such as a book sequence and images of the statues outside Foellinger Auditorium. I began to write out images I wanted above the words. (See the PDF here if you want — script.pdf ). I had never shot film before or edited, so I was a bit nervous about the challenges that would get in the way, so I watched the tutorials about iMovie. I needed to think a bit about how I was going to take these ideas and actually carry them out.

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Production Process

I started out by bringing my list of shots I wanted and then going to those locations:

• Stacks- I traveled to the main library and entered the stacks, one of my favorite places on campus. It is really a labyrinth of knowledge and, while sometimes overwhelming, is an awe-inspiring sight. I traveled to sections where there were many old books and got close ups of those with a straight-on angle. One thing I learned was how important lighting was. Originally, I shot without overhead lights, but then I found out that I could turn the lights on! It was sort of a “duh” moment, but important nonetheless. An important element I wanted to take from the stacks was the sheer size of the place. I tried to get this by trucking right past many bookshelves. I think i could have done this better by going to a different section with more depth, turning all the overhead lights on being a little more steady with the camera. While at the library, I took a small detour and decided to do a time-lapse of Wright Street. I also found other interesting images, such as a tangled pile of book ends, which I decided to use after all. I also checked out books in different languages; I knew I wanted to take the text from them.

• Foellinger- I wanted to get a straight-on shot of the two statues, but also a closer side-angle shot of both.

• Siebel Center- This building is visually impressive, and I really love its architectural value on this campus. I think I did okay in getting a shot of the glass facade. However, seeing as I was comparing the shot of this building to the exterior shot of the library, maybe I should have focused the frame on the glass itself, instead of having the sky take up some of it.

• Krannert- I had always wanted to film those pesky birds that always fly around the science building that faces Krannert. To do this, I walked up to the roof of Krannert by the amphitheater and set up my tripod. I think the lighting worked pretty well, being in the afternoon. I was careful about setting up the frame so that the birds would take up most of the screen, while the three tubes on the exterior of the building would enter.

• Book Shots- I set up book shots by placing a black cloth over my desk and then placing a book in the middle of the shot. This was because it pushed the book into the foreground of the shot. The sequence I set up would have been too distracting if I had the actual desk wood showing. To create contrast, I decided to film some of the opening titles of books in thirds. I also wanted to grab text from the books, so I did an extreme close-up of those to show the text.

• Computer shots- I knew I would have a lot of shots of the computer here, and I chose specific programs and activities within those programs to relate directly to the narrative. I really liked the idea of having the “Hubblecast” podcast as an introduction to the whole sequence, simply because it looked really cool. I wanted to create a contrast with an earlier statement of speech being bound by location of the speaker by showing a video chat session. I also wanted to show the accessibility of writing by showing a wikipedia article being edited; other shots of email programs, and Audacity were needed.

• Other shots- As I imagined my opening sequence, I thought that having a black screen popping to an extreme close up of someone’s eyes would be effective in showing the conception of an idea. I also did an extreme close-up of my mouth forming words, but to me that was a bit scary, so I decided to use other footage. I also wanted an overhead shot of me reading a book, so I placed the tripod in front of my desk and I turned the pages while, essentially, awkwardly hugging the tripod.

The filming process was fun and new, because I had never tried it before. The whole process took place over about four days, in various locations. In addition to filming the actual video, I needed to capture my narrative. I was originally going to read the narrative myself, but I was sick (and I hate hearing myself on film). I considered having another friend read it, but then thought of how interesting it would be if I had my computer speak it. I feel this brought up many implications about speech, technology, and communication, and would add another dimension to the film. I originally was going to do the Mac voices, but decided that clearer voices were possible with ATT’s text-to-speech technology. I decided that I could use the voices as a way to distinguish different segments of the narrative. Seeing that there were four parts of the narrative, I decided to use four different voices to help the progression of my ideas.

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Post-Production + Editing

Oh boy! Now that I had the images and sound files, I somehow have to synthesize this to make sense. For pacing, I decided to start out with an acceleration, starting from a black screen with a simple statement “All communication… begins with…. an idea.” This involves working with timing and entrances of voices/volumes to have it make sense. It was basically a bunch of fiddling around with audio levels and entrances so that the main one made through at the end. I went into Garageband to make a bit of reverb and a crescendo at the end. After that acceleration, I wanted to plateau a bit. The next big acceleration takes place at the library. Again it involves layering of voices, but now also an acceleration of images accompanies this.

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This being my first edit, I was a bit unsure of how long to keep certain shots. Rhythmically, I hoped to keep the shots about the same size, but sometimes I accelerated the entrance of new shots. Editing is very different from shooting, but at the same time the two work hand in hand; to edit the images and sounds in, I had to think of how it all fit in with the overall idea. As long as I thought about how the overall project was going to look, the editing fell into place. The editing process took a long time, but I think it was worth it, because it is perhaps the most essential part of the process.
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Distribution + Reflection
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I was happy with how well my ideas were communicated; it seemed the class understood what I was trying to do and someone commented on how the structure helped that happen. I think overall it was successful in doing this, although at first I thought the first image (understandably) seemed a bit comical to the audience. Overall, there were many positive reactions and I was glad to see that they understood it. One thing I will do differently next time is take better consideration into framing, and also into rhythm of the images; sometimes I felt it was a bit askew.

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One thing that really surprised me was that after simply viewing this for the first time, I received a lot of feedback touching on many different subjects. Something very unique to this medium (video) is that while watching something unfold onscreen, many different ideas pop into the audiences’ minds all at once. Ideas I did not even ever consider thinking about were brought up in response to the viewing the film, and this was very intriguing. Also, connections within the broader range of video were brought up, and that was different from what I expected.

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Another important aspect I found important in the presentation of your ideas is the tone you set as the author of your ideas. I did not think I was setting so much of a sense of urgency in this, but after hearing different perspectives and viewing it again, I can see how that was communicated. This means I will need to take care and responsibility for how my voice is heard as the speaker. Overall it was a difficult but rewarding process, and I look forward to doing it again.