I Wish I Would Have.... [Blog 9A]

Well, I was excited to present our game design project.  For the first time all quarter, I got to work with some GIRLS for a change, who wanted a good grade as much as I did.  We met in the library one evening and discussed our game concepts; what we wanted it to look like, the music behind it, the characters, etc.  Leaving the library (after someone else had offered to do the powerpoint so I wouldn't have to for a 5th time, another plus!), I was feeling good.  It was Monday and this project was already done.  What a great end to the quarter this was turning out to be!

We presented in class on Friday, along with everybody else, but as I watched other groups present, I noticed some things in their powerpoints that we didn't have.  Pictures, music, sound effects.  None of these were required, but nonetheless, it made their presentation, you know, prettier.  We did the best presentation we could; I was feeling good and confident.  After all, I've maintained about a 100 all quarter in this class (my TA is pretty frickin' awesome with grading).  Well, grades on Blackboard had a different story.  My first B+.  Ouch, even though I shouldn't really be saying ouch.  An 88 is not bad!  But you know, compared to the rest of the quarter...let's just say I was kind of wishing I had done the powerpoint myself like every other week.

Thankfully, I can make up for it in this blog by reflecting on a couple of my mistakes with the presentation.  Nothing I like doing more than blatantly pointing out my own flaws as a creative person.  Just kidding, I'm over it.

The first thing we could've done was add some pictures to spice up the visual attraction of our presentation.  We left our audience kind of in the dark when explaining what our game would look like.  We wanted it to be a side scrolling game and very colorful and cartoony, kind of like this picture:

Side-scrolling view, colorful, cute

We also wanted to convey to the audience of how our character was going to look (you could pick boy or girl, kind of like Wii style) and how he would advance to the next level: by collecting balloons!  Sorry he looks like Harry Potter, but there's nothing really wrong with that, right?

We could've also added in some music as an example of what we wanted to be coming out of the speakers when our little kid demographic would play this game.  The second part of my soundscape I did early in the quarter would have definitely sufficed for this.  It was upbeat and jazzy and even had kids laughing in the background.

In my elementary years, I was actually required to create a board game for an accelerated program I was in (yea, I was one of those kids).  I came up with a great idea, but when it came time to formulate and explain the rules to other people, I got stuck.  I think the same kind of thing might have happened here.  Although we explained the rules and delimiters pretty well to our audience, I definitely feel like it was the most difficult concept to present; we had an excellent idea of how the rules would work in the game because, well, we created it and spent an hour sorting it out.  If you explain a game to someone, usually it takes a little application on their part to fully grasp it, right?  You wouldn't just try to explain to someone how to play Euchre.  You first explain it, then play two or three open hands, then re-explain what trump means before actually diving into a game.  Same thing goes for this I think.  We knew that rules are things that the player has to do in order to advance, so we tried to tell our audience about the criteria needed to be met during a level for the player to advance (i.e. they have to give an answer).  We tried to make it clear through our delimiters what things would be holding a player back (i.e. the answer the player gives needs to be correct; the player cannot advance until the required amount of balloons collected per level matches the quota set by the game).

Overall, game design is pretty fun.  You're the boss: you make the rules; you make the delimiters; you add in your own sound effects.  It's neat, just not something I see myself spending my life on.  Editing still sits in #1.

Critique Critique Critique [Blog 8B]

http://mdia203kardos.blogspot.com/

I first looked at Chelsea's animation.  She and Josh did theirs as a whole minute long production.  The first thing I noticed about their animation was all the intense color!  Whereas most students did the average stick figure on a white background (including me), Chelsea and Josh decided to spice it up with a full out city scape scene.  Their first 30 seconds introduces the villain with greys and greens contrasted against a purplish background.  Everything is very saturated to give the audience a very heavy feel.  The villain is also dressed in very dark colors, and the hue of his red fire adds to the intensity.  The hero, on the other hand, is very contrasted right from the beginning, as her scene is very bright, unlike the villain scene.  Her landscape is of bright grey buildings and a blue sky and SUN!  The hue of her blue water and bright pink uniform contrasts well with the villain too.  Each time the hero gets shot at, the audience should feel the tension build as they try to guess if the hero will meet her fate or not.  The release comes when she puts out all the fire bullets coming toward her with her water.

http://mdia203marchetti.blogspot.com/

For Gabe and Brandon's animations, I want to look at the movement within the characters.  There is a lot of weight to the hero as he kneels on the ground and prepares for takeoff.  I also loved the parallel lines that follows his movement as he flies into the air, as well as his head coming at the audience before he makes a quick turn and continues flying to the right.  In a very simple animation like this, it is a hard thing to make characters or objects overlap.  However, the hero takes the lightning bolt and pulls it in front of his face before throwing it down, creating the concept of overlapping completely.  I LOVE the way the villain moves in his animation.  His head is larger than his whole body and he is constantly walking with his head past his feet, which I find hilariously devilish.  The movement of the villain's eye back and forth as well as the blowing of his hair also appeals to the sneaky side of the animation.  There is obvious contrast in characters and the way that they move (flying vs. walking) but the affinity comes in how they were drawn, each with a little added touch of color (cape vs. eyes).

http://mgmulig.blogspot.com/

Mike's hero and villain animations both made me laugh.  They were really good!  The lighting is shown in both animations easily.  The mood conveyed in the hero animation is very uplifting because of the bright colors chosen for the hero's body as well as the action of saving the ice cream cone.  The mood is also humorous as the hero chucks the rock into the air (although it looks more like it floats into the air).  While the hero animation was very simplistic, the villain animation added a lot more detail and conveyed more to the mood of the piece.  Because nothing happens within the first 4 seconds of the animation, there comes a heavy tension as the audience has no idea what's about to happen.  The release comes as she finally swoops into the frame from the top.  The villain's main "power" seems to be spewing this black venom-like substance to kill her victims and get what she wants.  The blackness is symbolized to look like a large looming shadow, which adds to the darkness and evil of the character.

Superpowers [Blog 8A]

To listen to the first 20 minutes of "This American Life" radio show, click on the link below!
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/178/superpowers

Dash

Hero/Villain Animations

Procrastinate Now, Don't Wait 'til Later

(P.S. This isn't a blog post for school, yay!)

Procrastination WILL be the death of me.  Today is Thursday.  Tomorrow, I have a 5 page critical essay due for English 151 that I haven't even STARTED yet.  Also due tomorrow is a full blown 30 second animation and character drawing for my Media 203 class (the one I write the blogs for) that I also have not even begun to think about.  From talking to other people in these classes, it sounds as though these two things averaged together will take a total of about 7 or 8 hours.  And what am I doing right now?  It's 10:30am and I'm blogging.  I'm procrastinating while writing about my procrastination.  If my mother is reading this, she might be having a heart attack.

I've never been a procrastinator.  When I was younger (like elementary and middle school), I would come home from school and sit at the counter in the kitchen and do all of my homework.  Seriously, I was that kid.  All of my homework was done by 4pm (when it only took an hour to do homework), and I had the rest of the night to myself.  Now, homework takes me about 4-6 hours a day.  Sometimes I have my boyfriend change my facebook password so I can't log on, and when that happens, the amount of time it takes me to complete homework will get cut maybe in half.  Sometimes he'll just take the initiative and I won't even have to ask him to change it.  Is my procrastination problem that obvious?  Maybe so.

Even with facebook gone, though, I'll turn to other things.  IMDB, YouTube, StumbleUpon (that's my big weakness); sometimes I'll even check my email 5 times in 15 minutes just so I won't have to do what I need to.  When did this become such an issue?  I don't like staying up into the early hours in the morning to accomplish what I could've accomplished 3 days ago.  I'm not really sure where I was going with this post, but I think I figured it out.  I'm making a pledge to myself (and my mom) that procrastination will no longer be the death of me.  I cannot and I will not be tempted with stupid websites or redecorating or cleaning or anything that will keep me from my work anymore.  Take that, Satan.  This past week I think I've been the most stressed than I have been all quarter.  You know why?  Because I've been thinking about these two things I have to do, I have to do, I have to do.  I spent all this time worrying and thinking and stressing instead of just, eh hem, DOING them.  It seems so simple, doesn't it?  Maybe it is that simple.  This is definitely one of those times where I wish Dory was actually here.  I'll give my 6th grade self a try again.  However, positive thoughts and prayers my way are still very much appreciated.

Also, if you've actually been taking the time to read my blogs for school, thank you.  They might not be the most fun to read, but I think I actually learn something, whether it be about the class or about myself, every time I do them.  Pretty cool.

Analyze Analyze [Blog 7]

To watch the video that I compared ours to, click here.

Both of these videos used very different approaches.  Ours (I'll call our video Joke 4) was a silent film, with just music and text, while the other group (I'll call their video Joke 5) used dialogue and no music.

The first thing to look at is the line in both videos.  They're pretty similar in interior spaces.  Joke 4 begins with an interior scene in a living room.  The afghan, picture, and pillow all points directly to our characters head.  Likewise, in the office space of Joke 5, everything is angled toward the character.  And I mean everything.  The laptop, papers, and even scissors are all pointing to him to accentuate his character.  Joke 5 also uses line very well throughout the entirety of the video.  I assume this is because they shot it all inside.  It's a little harder to create line for eye-direction purposes when shooting outdoors, like we did for Joke 4.  However, in the jail cell, our main characters head is framed by the lines of the cell blocks.

The second thing that adds to the subconsciousness of an audiences' depiction of a story is shape.  In Joke 4, our main character's head is very round, giving him an innocence and a jolly quality.  Our antagonist, on the other hand, has a very triangle face, making her devious character match up perfectly with the devious action she ends up doing.  In Joke 5, the main character has a very square shape to his head, fitting perfectly with the aggravation he displays throughout the entire video.  His wife and all 3 coworkers, on the other hand, have the round faces, which gives them innocent qualities.  Poor Todd.  Also round are the balloons displayed on the mantel and the cake set in front of the protagonist.  All this adds to the contrast of his aggravation and the nice gesture his wife tried to make.

There was contrast between how the producers wanted the audience to take in the characters of the videos.  Joke 4 was very active; because there was no dialogue, the audience is put in the position to assume how each character feels and the way they speak the text on the screen.  However, Joke 5 was didactic; the producer wanted the audience to know exactly what kinds of qualities the characters possessed and did this through providing the dialogue.

Contrast and affinity played an important role in both videos.  Joke 4 had the contrast of interior and exterior scenes, while Joke 5 was strictly interior (with the exception of establishing shots).  Both videos had a male and female character, and I guess you could even go so far to say that in both videos the females were the antagonists (always causing problems, those women).  And, of course, the contrast between not only dialogue/no dialogue but color/black and white adds a specific feel to each video.  Joke 5 is warm so the audience can feel a little more connected than Joke 4.  Kinda cold and gray.

The Silent Movie

This was based off of joke #4.  Enjoy!

Finding Nemo is So Pretty [Blog 6B]

How To Be Creative [Blog 6A]

 Before you watch anything, check out this website.  Click 'download' to read what I read.  http://changethis.com/manifesto/show/6.HowToBeCreative 

The Italian Job [Blog 5B]

No, I don't like this movie just because I'm italian, and yes, that is Charlize Theron.  When I finish watching this movie I always have a craving for some Mighty Joe Young.  Enjoy. :)