Premise: OGR

Premise: More writing and some sketches

I am just rewriting and adding to what I have already done.

For this project I want to explore the way that physical pain affects my actions and mental state and how I have learned to cope with it. I will use a character who is perhaps based on me and for this pitch I will use the first person to describe what I hope to show.

I want to represent parts of my body as separate from me, the parts of my body that are most painful, such as my back and knees. I tend to treat my body as a separate entity with its own opinions about how I live my life; this way of thinking helps me to deal with being in pain all the time.

In order to explain my pain I often say things like ‘my back is angry with me’. It often feels like I am having a constant conversation with different parts of my body. My back will tell me to stand up and move around, while my knees will be telling me to do no such thing. It is like a constant and annoying soundscape. I have had to learn to listen to it but to not always let it dictate what I do. My knees may have an opinion about me dancing around but I’m still going to do it because they don’t make my decisions for me. Sometimes the noise is too loud and I do have to change my behaviour to make it quieter, sometimes it becomes unbearable. It is difficult because no one else can see the disconnect between me and my body and no one else can hear it whispering or shouting at me all the time.

I don’t want to make something that is very dark; I want to include the difficult parts of this experience but focus on the ways I have learnt to deal with it and make my life the life I want to have.

Visually I would like to represent parts of my body as disconnected, either through actual spaces between parts of me, or things attached to me or through different colours. I want to use audio as a very big part of this, with different voices for different body parts and perhaps different music. I want to show how sometimes it is one voice louder and clearer than the others, sometimes it is just whispering and sometimes it is a lot of voices at different voices and sounds at once. Perhaps it is just some abrasive sounds, rather than voices.

Moments I have in mind to show this is me getting out of bed. My feet are lazy, they don’t wake up right away and sometimes it is like every part of my body is attached to the bed my ropes or are gripping on to the bed and I have to fight against this. I have fallen over a few times and have had arguments in my head and out loud with my body over this.

Standing around, at a bus stop, at the train station, during a fire alarm is one of the situations that I have to deal with my body more than others. My back will be asking me to move and my knees will be asking me to sit the hell down. I have to explain to the part of my brain that is trying to listen to them that I can’t do both and they really I don’t want to do either so I need to get over it.

Dancing is another thing. I love to dance, I doubt I’m any good, though I used to go to dance classes when I was younger, I don’t really do it in front of other people. My body sometimes gets very frustrated with me and my dancing, because it’s sort of like I just throw myself all over the place and it’s a time when I really drown out my body and do my own thing.

The drawings I have in this post are exploring my ideas, with a particular focus on the idea of something wrapped around my joints.

Toolkit 2: Life Drawing 11

5 mins each

approx. 30 mins

>40 mins

close up of >40 mins

Toolkit 2: Digital Sculpting - Apples and Another Bowl

Branding/Logo Thumbnails

Here are some possible branding options I have played with. I think the last one is my favourite. I have used a lighter purple than my current blog, I like this colour but I will try some different colours.

Toolkit 2: Infographics - Class Task

Tookit 2: Infographics - Influences

I am going to make my titles sequence for 'American Horror Story Hotel' (2015). I like the idea of sharp lines, which fits the art deco theme of the hotel in the show. Below are some influences.

Premise: Visual Influences

I want to find a way to visually show my body, in particular my joints and most painful muscles, as separate from me and able to influence me. Below are some influences I have looked at.

Premise: Some notes about how I think about and deal with my pain.

I want to make a film that communicates something about my pain and how I deal with it. These are just some notes about that, they aren't very eloquent, this is just me getting some ideas down.

One of the main ways I deal with my pain is to compartmentalise it, to think as though my body is separate from me, and there are different parts of it. So, my pain is my joints or muscles telling me something. Like, 'my back is angry at me'. Like it is a separate entity with opinions about how I live my life. Like, my knees get distressed when I dance about but they don't make my decisions for me, so I can still do some things.

So I'm listening to music while I dance and focusing on that, but if my knees get louder than the music that makes it difficult to push through. So I would have to stop after a while, but music is useful, focusing on other things is useful. Like, I am in charge but if someone yells at me steadily louder for a while it will impact on what I do.

Like, I don't want my brain to seem like cruel dictator or anything, sometimes I have to listen to my body or it will get too loud and I won't be able to do anything. In general I have to remember that I'm in charge, but I need to just take my body's opinion into account to make a good decision. So a lot of the time I'm having to think hard about how I move, I have to decide to ignore my body or listen to it all the time, because it's always there, always having an opinion.

I can't do everything my body tells me, partly because different parts want me to do different things. So I'm standing still at a bus stop and my back is getting agitated, cagey, it wants me to fling myself about a bit, loosen up. My knees though, they want me to sit down and never move again, they're getting really distressed. So if I try to listen to everything I would get all twisted up acting like a total weirdo, while not actually satisfying either body parts request. But also I can't listen to everything because then I would never do anything I want to do and that would be a really sad and difficult way to live. I've tried living like that, it isn't very nice. I'd rather be yelled at by my whole body than sit and stare at a wall for hours on end or do something equally boring.

So, I have a weird relationship to my body, thinking of it as separate and like it is talking to me. It isn't like a dictatorship, like my brain or my body is in charge ordering the other about. Like, maybe an older sibling (my brain) has been left in charge of a really unruly child (my body). This older sibling loves and cares for the child, they care what the child has to say, but OMG is this child annoying and loud and mean, and the child has some really weird requests that make no sense and are just really exhausting. So I'm just living like that, like dragging this annoying child around with me, they are always there, I have to keep them in mind all the time, because I care about them, but also it is pretty difficult to ignore them because they are so loud.

Toolkit 2: Pipeline 1 Head Modelling 7,8,9,10

Film Review: Adam Elliot's 'Mary and Max' (2009)

Fig. 1 Poster

Adam Elliot's 'Mary and Max' (2009) follows the story of two lonely people sending letters to each other. Mary lives in Melbourne, Australia and begins the story as an 8 year old girl who is teased for her appearance and who also feels isolated from her alcoholic mother. Max is middle aged and lives in New York, he is also struggling and isolated, due to Asperger's Syndrome. Mary randomly finds his address and, desperate for some connection, sends him a letter. Max responds and they become regular pen pals. The story begins in the 70s and runs through the 80s, exploring their relationship and their growth and maturation. Writing for The Guardian, Andrew Pulver notes that the film 'manages to be sickly-cute, alarmingly grotesque, and right-on at the same time – often in the very same scene.' (Pulver, 2010). The film has both humorous and sad themes throughout, the two moods highlight and support each other, making the emotional impact of the film that much stronger.

Elliot made the film with a small team and a budget of $7.3 million over the course of five years. He had previously won an Oscar for his 2003 short film 'Harvey Krumpet'. Elliot labels his films as 'clayographies' referring to his use of claymation and his tendency to make stories out of real people and real events. The story of 'Mary and Max' draws from Elliot's experience of having his own long term pen pal. Speaking to Bill Desowitz for Animation World Network, Elliot said 'All my films are deeply personal and based on the people around me. I try to make films with depth, substance; films that deeply engage, move and make the audience think.' (Elliot, 2009).

Fig. 2 Max

The use of claymation is powerful and important in this film. Claymation allows Elliot to make the characters seem particularly unique and vivid. Luke Buckmaster, writing for The Guardian, describes the characters as 'haunted but cute.' (Buckmaster, 2014), which fits well with the way the film moves between sadness and silliness. Fig. 2 shows Max, who appears rounded and in some ways soft in shape but has exaggerated features and lines on his face, making him seem different and distorted. Also, claymation is associated with children's cartoons, which links with Noblets, the fictional cartoon that Mary and Max both enjoy. The cartoon is used to show elements of Mary and Max's friendship and also the way that they mature through the years. At one point Max is deeply hurt by Mary and doesn't write to her. Fig. 3 shows Max's shelf of Noblets figures, figures that he eventually sends to Mary to show that he forgives her and realises that people aren't perfect.

Fig. 3 Noblets

The film won many awards, including the Annecy Cristal and it opened the 2009 Sundance Festival. While the film remained only in the festival circuit it did well and received very positive reviews from critics and the public.

Bibliography

Buckmaster, L (2014). 'Mary and Max: rewatching classic Australian films'. At: https://www.theguardian.com/film/australia-culture-blog/2014/may/30/mary-and-max-rewatching-classic-australian-films (accessed on 24.01.18)

Desowitz, B (2009). ''Mary and Max': Elliot and Clayography'. At: https://www.awn.com/animationworld/mary-and-max-elliot-and-clayography (accessed on 24.01.18)

Pulver, A (2010). 'Mary and Max - Review'. At: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/oct/21/mary-and-max-review (accessed on 24.01.18)

Illustration List

Fig. 1 Poster

Elliot, A (2009). 'Mary and Max'. [Poster] At: https://vulpeslibris.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/mary-and-max.jpg

(accessed on 24.01.18)

Fig. 2 Max

Elliot, A (2009). 'Mary and Max'. [Film Still] At: https://images.moviepilot.com/image/upload/c_fill,h_470,q_auto:good,w_620/mary-and-max-2009-sometimes-perfect-strangers-make-the-best-friends-png-127982.jpg (accessed on 24.01.18)

Fig. 3 Noblets

Elliot, A (2009). 'Mary and Max'. [Film Still] At: http://pierdariomarzi.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/mary-and-max.html (accessed on 24.01.18)

Toolkit 2: Life Drawing 10

7 mins each

40 mins

30 mins

5 mins

Toolkit 2: Digital Sculpting - Glass Bowl, Painted Satsuma & Painted Pepper

Toolkit 2: Digital Sculpting - Satsuma

Orange from Eleanor Row on Vimeo.

Toolkit 2: Maya Tutorials - Lighting and Rendering 7

First 3 lights

jpeg saved from renderer

Final jpeg from exr file taken into Photoshop

Toolkit 2: Maya Tutorials - Lighting & Rendering 12, 13

Film Review: 'What We Do in the Shadows' (2014)

Fig. 1 Poster

'What We do in the Shadows' (2014) is a mockumentary style film directed by Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi, it received critical acclaim as an excellent comedy and did reasonably well at the box office. The film is about vampires in a house share and presents its fictional events as truthful, using documentary techniques for comedic effect. Michael O'Sullivan, writing for The Washington Post comments that that the filmmakers' 'satire is a crude but effective tool' (O'Sullivan, 2015). Documentaries aim to present a view of real life events, often to inform people about things going on in the world that they might not know about. Mockumentaries use the stylings of documentaries to display fictional events, often for satirical effect. Writing for The Chicago Reader, J.R. Jones notes that 'Clement and Waititi have got the reality-show format just right: the direct-address interviews, the confessional voice-overs, the zoom-in reaction shots.' (Jones, 2015). Fig. 2 shows the character of Deacon addressing the camera for an interview, much as one might see in many reality shows. The stylings of the set and of Deacon himself contrast well with the contemporary nature of this format.

Fig. 2 Deacon

The film's first character Viago, played by Waititi, is a 379 year old vampire from Europe. He lives with Deacon, Vladislav and Petyr, who have a ages ranging from 183 to 8,000. Clement and Waititi wanted to separate their film from other mockumentaries, which they realised tended to be about realistic things, by making the mockumentary on things that aren't realistic and cannot be documented (Bailey, 2015). There is often conflict that is common in a regular house share situation, but the film uses the differences that would arise when the housemates are vampires to inject comedy into the situation. For example, the vampires argue about dishes and have a chore wheel, all pretty normal stuff, but it turns out that Deacon hasn't done the dishes for five years. Fig. 3 shows the pile up of dishes that has occurred during this time. The extreme length of time is incongruent with the everyday nature of the argument and then the characters fly around in the air. The contrasts here, and throughout the film, between the ordinary and the extraordinary is an important part of bringing comedy to the film.

Fig. 3 Dishes

The directors use the contrast between mundane daily life and gore and the supernatural to create comedy through incongruity; the mockumentary style is useful in creating the mundane and ordinary elements of the contrast.

Bibliography

Bailey, J (2015) 'Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi on Second-Wave Vampire Movies, the Conchords Reunion, and ‘What We Do in the Shadows’'. At: http://flavorwire.com/504317/jemaine-clement-and-taika-waititi-on-second-wave-vampire-movies-the-conchords-reunion-and-what-we-do-in-the-shadows (accessed on 16.01.18)

Jones, J (2015) 'Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi want to suck your blood'. At: https://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/what-we-do-in-the-shadows-jemaine-clement-taika-waititi-horror-comedy/Content?oid=16676536 (accessed on 16.01.18)

O'Sullivan, M (2015) ''What We Do in the Shadows' lampoons the undead lifestyle'. At: https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/what-we-do-in-the-shadows-lampoons-the-undead-lifestyle/2015/02/18/09beb3d4-b2f8-11e4-854b-a38d13486ba1_story.html?tid=kp_google&utm_term=.ed672ea76372 (accessed on 16.01.18)

Illustration List

Fig. 1 Poster

Clement, J & Waititi, T (2014) 'What We Do in the Shadows' [Poster] At: https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMjAwNDA5NzEwM15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwMTA1MDUyNDE@._V1_UY1200_CR90,0,630,1200_AL_.jpg (accessed on 16.01.18)

Fig. 2 Deacon

Clement, J & Waititi, T (2014) 'What We Do in the Shadows' [Film Still] At: http://imwithgeekarchive.weebly.com/uploads/1/2/7/2/12727119/6029949_orig.jpg (accessed on 16.01.18)

Fig. 3 Dishes

Clement, J & Waititi, T (2014) 'What We Do in the Shadows' [Film Still] At: http://static1.businessinsider.com/image/54db96b6ecad04d06da75726-836-453/what-we-do-in-shadows-screen-3.jpg (accessed on 16.01.18)