Creative Work

While here at Ohio University, I learned how to use some of the tools that actual media producers use.  So, I took MDIA 1300 (Digital Media Production Basics) where I basically learned how to utilize Adobe After Effects.



The video above is a project in our MDIA 1300 class where we were required to animate a word to show the meaning of the word. I chose the word Kinetic, mimicking a Newton's Cradle.

This project pleased me in its final form because everything in the project that I envisioned came out to be the final result exactly as I had pictured it, using basic animation techniques such as Squash and Stretch.  My video clip was composed in Adobe After Effects CS6.  I want to acknowledge my teacher, Tyler Ayres, our animation teacher, on helping me complete my project.  His insight allowed me to make crucial decisions in piecing my final project together.  I know this is not the greatest animation in the world, and I am always looking for critique.  However, I know that I am pleased with how it turned out. 

Weakness

This post is a reaction to The Freak Factor: Discovering Uniqueness By Flaunting Weakness by David Rendall.

In the presentation that I read, Rendall makes some good points in trying to know yourself in the world of media, and knowing that you are unique with your weaknesses. Here, I will explain two of his points and elaborate on them.


"3. Flawless: There's Nothing Wrong With You."
-Rendall explains to us that each of us have unique characteristics that are both positive and negative features. He says that instead of seeing a weakness as natural and unavoidable consequence, we see our weaknesses as problems that need to be eliminated.  His point here, I believe, is highly valid.

Has anyone in the world let a disability, condition, or addiction get in the way of their success? Absolutely not!  Van Gogh had a mental illness, yet has painted the greatest paintings the world has ever seen, in history.  Think of Stephen Hawking, sufferer of Motor Neuron disease, the smartest man in the entire world since Albert Einstein.  Helen Keller was deaf and blind, yet she pursued a hugely successful lifetime.  I can list a many things that I'm not good at, but I guarantee you that I can make a bigger list of my strengths. Every weakness has a strength. 

"5. Foundation: Build On Your Strengths"

-We are told that our strengths are what we love to do and what we get good at doing. Rendall groups the explanation of our strengths for 3 reasons, which are all very reasonable explanations for why we build on our strengths. 

Although, I must say that this suggestion to our "Freak-Factor" weakness is invalid.  It's only invalid because he has made this argument before throughout his entire article, and this 'reason' just seems like filler. Building on your strength is only countering your weakness because you need to also build on your weaknesses just as much as you build on your strengths.  For example, if you are good at taking notes but you are a bad test-taker, you shouldn't build on the strength of taking more notes in classes because this could lead to overlearning.  You can become extremely overconfident in your strengths if you work on them too much. 

Or, maybe you could learn a percussion instrument for a while instead.

-Personally speaking, what have you identified as a weaknesses (as far as “the creative process” is concerned)? 

To me, the creative process is a phenomenon that you can control.  Whatever idea you have, no matter how big or how small, can be pursued.  Any "weakness" that gets in my way can be countered with a respective strength.  Now that I think about it, I can produce video content with a team of people that have strengths where I have weaknesses.  But, specifically, I identify a 'weakness' as something in your own creative process that you simply just aren't good at. 

Seriously, it's hard to imagine someone who is the PERFECT media maker.  Sure, you can do it all in media (you can write, you can edit, you can film, you can light something, you can match audio), which is fantastic and all, but you can't do it all and be good at it.  I personally think that my weaknesses in producing media include screenwriting, storytelling and acting. 

But, my strengths lie within production and post-production.  I have an eye for detail in the camera, and Final Cut Pro flows through my hands to the computer as I piece the puzzles together.  The more I learn about media, the more I learn about editing, then the more I learn about myself as a person and what I should be focusing on.  This semester in school, I decided not to take an editing class because I already know how to do it.  Instead, I took a screenwriting class because it's something that I know I'm not good at. 

He has his weaknesses in media as well. We all do.

Personal Essay

Being a part of the technological revolution that is currently taking place has been quite a privilege.  Computers, AM/FM radio, The Internet, video cameras, TV -- you name it, we are all surrounded by these tools used to create and broadcast media.  It's almost inevitable and unavoidable.  Communication today is crucial to our daily lives, and therefore e-mail, phone calls and texts are all effective ways to establish connections between distances.  It's so easy to forget what life was like without these wonderful inventions, because it seems as if cell phones and the internet have been a part of us for much longer than they really have been.

The way media has evolved in the past century has allowed ample amounts of information to be readily accessible by our fingertips.  When wireless communications began with the telegraph, messages were received quickly through Morse code.  From the telegraph, to the telephone and through television, media has evolved a great deal and is still evolving.  Virtually every piece of existence has been recorded on the internet, and thanks to the invention of the search engine (Google, Yahoo) anyone can randomly access this information from any computer, and nowadays, anyone with a smartphone with 3G or 4G internet connections can find an answer.  The internet is probably the best and most useful invention of the past 2 decades.  Without it, conducting research and making references would be a much longer process to undergo, as Google has allowed us to search for virtually hundreds of billions of answers in fractions of a second.  This doesn't mean we aren't allowed to go to the library and crack open a book like used to be able to do.  However, the choice is yours.  Would you rather make a trip to the library to find what you're looking for?  Or, would you search online for the exact same answer virtually 1000x faster than you would going to a library?

When I complete my education in Media Arts & Studies, I feel that it is my duty to expand and acquire creative control over media.  I really want to be an editor; I feel like it is my greatest strength. According to the documentary "Rip! A Remix Manifesto," our culture in media is becoming less free.  I feel that it is my duty to change modern media so anyone who aspires to become musicians, filmmakers, game designers, etc. can get feedback from their work without worrying about the overbearing consequence of copyright laws.  It's up to me to pursue the media and take on the challenge of forwarding the world of entertainment and culture into the future.  I have been inspired to create great things by famous media artists before me.

Soon, it will be my turn.

Media Critique

This post is about critiquing a piece of media that interests me, and today, I am very pleased to critique one of my favorite video games using the tools I have learned in class.

Portal is a video game made by developer Valve, released in 2007.  The basic premise of Portal is you are trapped in a science laboratory with a fictional device that can create a pair of portals that you can travel through.  As great as that sounds, there are some strings attached:

• Your gun only can shoot one blue portal and one orange portal. 
• You cannot place a portal on top of a previously existing portal. 
• Momentum and other laws of physics are conserved between portals. 

The greatest aspect of Portal is not just the concept that it is built around; Portal is a first-person puzzle game.  Interestingly enough, the unusual combination of the first-person point of view and the puzzle game genre work extremely well.  The player is thrown into a crazy fictional world where experimenting and testing is the sole purpose of the science facility you are trapped in. The game has its rules and limitations, and the portals are used as the main game mechanic (along with other puzzle elements.)  And ultimately, each level in Portal has a primary objective to get from the entrance of the puzzle, conquer the obstacles, and ultimately get to the exit point (to get to point A to point B, using portals.)

Check out some gameplay footage -

Your character in the game is guided by a feminine, robotic being that is named GLaDOS (Genetic Life and Disk Operating System) whose character is defined by her subtextual dialogue.  GLaDOS is the main antagonist of the game.  She is very passive-aggressive, witty, and sinister.  She is considered to be somewhat insane.  The game begins with her voice over an intercom, telling you where to go & what to do.  This gives the player a sense of misdirection, where the player trusts the voice that is speaking over the intercom throughout the game.  It isn't until the plot twist in the game where (spoilers!) the conveyor belt you are stuck on is slowly moving in a dead end into a furnace where GLaDOS wants you to die. 

Portal is one of the most artistically advanced video games in existence.  There is so many contextual, subconscious hints that urge the player to hypothetically question the advances of the human race.  Why is the player trapped in a science testing chamber?  Is artificial intelligence going to experience emotions like GLaDOS does?  The plot of Portal creates tension and release throughout the game; when the player jumps through their own pair of portals for the very first time, it builds tension as you fall closer and closer to your portal.  Then, as you exit through it, the tension is released when the player makes it through their portals safely.  

Endearing, entertaining, and inciting, Portal is truly a remarkable form of art and media. 

Storytelling

Storytelling, in all views and aspects, is arguably the most important aspect of media.  Journalism revolves around making stories out of recent events.  Movies and TV shows are built out of visual storytelling.  Books, magazines, and music all tell stories.  It is the backbone of media and its structure.

This post will demonstrate a story that would theoretically be told to a group of 3rd grade children.  The center theme to my story is "Tomorrow is a New Day."


-Once upon a time, there was a little red bird named Charlie who lived in a little red birdhouse with his Mom and Dad.  It was a sunny day, and all the other birds were flying and singing outside.  Charlie wanted to sing too, but that day, Charlie forgot how to sing.  Then, he began to panic.  He did everything he could to learn how to sing but poor Charlie never could.  "Why can't I sing?" he asked with a raspy voice.
Charlie would ask his friends how they sang so well, but they didn't want to help him.  "We can't be friends with birds who can't sing," they would say.
Charlie went to the doctor, but the doctor couldn't fix his voice.  Charlie became very upset.  As he was flying home, it began to rain very hard.  The raindrops were bigger than acorns, and Charlie could barely see anything in front of him.  Then, suddenly, a big branch from a tree above came crashing down.  Crash!  The branch hit him on the wing and he spiraled towards the ground.  Charlie hit the ground very hard.  He opened his eyes.  "How can things get worse?" he asked.
Charlie walked all the way back home with his head looking at his feet.  "This is hopeless," he thought to himself.  "I'll never be able to sing again."
Once he got home, Charlie sat down and cried.  He sobbed and thought that he would never be able to sing again.  What bird doesn't know how to sing?
Then, Charlie's dad sat beside him and comforted him.  "Charlie, son, I want you to know something," he said.
"What is it?" Charlie sobbed.
Charlie's dad took a deep breath and smiled, then looked at his son.  "Tomorrow is a new day," he said.
Charlie looked up, nodded, and then hugged his dad.
That next morning, it was bright and sunny; it stopped raining.  Charlie jumped straight out of bed, opened up the windows, and breathed in the biggest breath he could breathe.  Suddenly, he began to sing in the most beautiful voice anyone has ever heard.
Charlie cheered and danced around the room.  He could barely believe it.  "Today is a new day.  Today is MY day," he said as he started to fly outside, singing as he flew.

Storytelling is one of the most important aspects of media.

Finding Your Howl

"To find our howl we have to pay a price..."

Jonathon Flaum says the price of finding our own howl is as unsettling as death.  Flaum is the author of a story called 'How the Paper Fish Learned to Swim: A Fable about Inspiring Creativity and Bringing New Ideas to Life'.  The premise to this story is that an origami master named Daishini makes an astounding origami fish from one sheet of paper.  He sees that the fish is lonely, so in turn, Daishini creates an entire origami world for him.  The paper fish begs to be released in the ocean.  Daishini doesn't like the idea, but she reluctantly sets her creation free into the ocean despite how she believes the paper fish will be consumed or destroyed in the wild.  To the creator's surprise, the origami fish becomes real and much bigger.  The metaphor for this is that great ideas can become something greater and can outgrow their creators.  The paper fish becoming real and learning how to swim also represents how we can release creativity, inspiration, and innovation in the real world.

The world we live in is full of potential and is a fruitful ground for the basis of strong and innovative ideas.  Why do scientists aim to cure cancer?  Why do college students want to create and inspire?  What was the drive that famous authors had to write their stories to share the world with?  I believe the problem isn't within the potential and the drive; the problem is within the quantity.  See, almost everybody at some point wants to be the next J.K. Rowling, or George Lucas.

Occasionally, this guy. (Quentin Tarantino)

There is a lyric that I think captures the spirit of envisioning an idea and embracing it, then releasing it;
"They heard me singing and they told me to stop; Quit these pretentious things and just punch the clock,"

The song is called 'Sprawl II: Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Arcade Fire.
(the rest of the lyrics can be found here. - http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/arcadefire/sprawliimountainsbeyondmountains.html )

The rest of the song is about dreaming and running away from where you grew up, and creating something that you envision, or something that speaks in YOUR voice.  It's truly a wonderful song and I highly recommend it.

But, the song also communicates to you so that you take action.  What are YOU going to do?  In my case, it's putting myself out there so that I can identify my voice with the world of media.  Sure, we all want to be creative, and we all have the internet as a creative output (YouTube, Tumblr, etc.)  However, since we all have the same shot, I am going to let my voice be heard.  The song whispers to me that the world we live in is one big opportunity for you to speak on what you believe in.

Nobody should take that opportunity for granted.