Reviewing Concepts of the Overall Class: Interaction

Interaction adds another layer to a project. Not only are color, composition, form, etc. an issue, but now there is also an aspect of chance and of the unknown.  Will the viewer interact with the piece? If not, is the whole piece lost or are some aspects of the design conveyed from the static piece that exists before the button is pushed? How many times will/should the viewer interact the with piece? Does the piece need to be viewed more than once? Of course, interactive pieces are created with the idea that they will be interacted with, but what if they are not?

Interactivity has the ability to halt narrative and time, the scene starts static and stays static until something sets it off, or visa versa--the viewer has the ability to start/stop/change what is happening.  However, even tho it is the viewer that will ultimately start/stop/etc the piece, the designer needs to take all of this into account when creating the work and allow for the piece to work at all times, before, after, and during when the viewer has pushed or rolled over the button.

Motion, Sound, and Interactivity

Assignment two culminated in drawing and animating the symbol we came up with for ourselves in Flash and then adding sound to the project as well.  While Flash was (and is) extremely difficult for me to use at first, the adding aspect of controlled motion ultimately helped explain all of the ideas I wished to convey in my symbol.  As a narrative over time I was able to present an original symbol on its own (in this case the 5 circles of the solar eclipse), as well as present the symbol again in conjunction with the other original adjective symbols in the new combine symbol.  The motion I chose to use was simple, allowing the viewer to focus on words, which more dramatic motion would have taken away from.  I also chose to center the narrative and leave the objects on the page (never exiting or entering, except in the form of a fade) in order to allow the viewer to focus better.  After several revisions, I concluded with a sequence that begins with a very graphic simple symbol, and then fades to a more sketch-like symbol, and ends bringing the original symbol back, combining the graphic symbol with the sketched symbol and with text.  

In terms of sound, I wanted to approach the sound in this piece in a very different way than I approached sound with assignment one.  Instead of creating the sounds myself, or going out into the world and finding them (on the street, etc.) I wanted to use a sound that already existed, more in the realm of music than in the realm of sound effects.  After various tries with very different types of music, I still wasn't satisfied and finally got a piece that I liked, by altering and editing a piece that was largely based on sounds rather than music, even though it came from a piece of music.  By selecting sections of the sound and repeating them, and taking out chunks in order to get a start and stop feel, rather than a connected string of notes, I created a piece that has a circus-like fun quality and also a sense of building that I feel reflects the ideas of traveling, wandering, searching, and taking in everything you see.

Lengthening the piece by just a few seconds allowed me to extend the time the view sees the original symbol, so that they can fully take it in, and recall it when the eclipses come back at the end. It also allowed me to prolong the time the words appear on the fortune cookie long enough to have them be read.  Since I chose this concocted sound made up of repetitive pieces of music it was easy for me to extend the sound when I extended the piece simply by adding in a few more repetitions.  The simple motion at the end leaves the cookie static, but keeps a subtle movement going so that it is clear that the piece is not yet over, my take on the idea of a "pulsing movement" at the end.

If I can figure out how to post the flash animation as a swf file or convert it to a quicktime movie and play it that I will.

Abstract Combinations Maybe Not the Answer

I combined by symbols abstractly, using tiny details and extreme zoom. I wanted my combined symbol to have both hard and soft lines (curves and sharp angles) as well as to have both line and solid shape. While combining the elements, I did not think about movement, although, looking back, I should have--I suppose I didn't learn my lesson with my stop-motion movie as well as I thought....






After looking over the images and getting some feedback, I realized that the images in and of themselves are so drastically different that having them present in a non-abstract manner together would be just as, if not more, intriguing. I picked the most detailed and illustrative image--the fortune cookie--and the most symbol like/least detailed--the eclipse--and combined them. The eclipse, while originally symbolizing the adjective "Contrasting" also represents math and science, so can be used to show two different symbols, and, when combined with the cookie, my mark will still incorporate three adjectives. In fact, the mere act of combining the cookie and the eclipse can symbolize contrasting as well.


I believe that the combined symbols, before I resulted to the Non-Abstract version incorporated enough visual elements of the individual symbols to still convey the adjectives and so they remained "self portraits." Now, with my final non-abstract symbol, they convey their original meaning completely and so the combine symbol is unarguably still a self portrait.

I see the flash animation moving by first either cracking open or having the paper fortune slip out the side. Perhaps, as the eclipse comes out of the cookie, the cookie itself fades, in a blackout-like manner, so, in the end, the viewer is left seeing online the eclipse--just five circles of varying patterns. This light-to-dark effect could again emphasize contrast, and leave the viewer focusing on the mathematical nature of the eclipse symbol. If that is the case, then the "final" mark is really just the five circles, and the Lucky fortune cookie, is only seen an the beginning and through the animation.

For sound, I am unsure. Depending on the motion, the animation could start with a cracking noise or not. Throughout the clip, there could either be stereotypical Chinese music emphasizing the cookie, or else something the complete opposite to emphasize, yet again, a contrast. I would like to work with the light-to-dark idea, not only with motion and a fade, but also with sound, choosing a track that either gets louder or softer with the fade in light, and by loud and soft that could relate to volume, pitch, or tempo.

Happy go Lucky Mathematician

I listed many different adjectives to describe myself. Some were easier to develop symbols for than others. In the end, I came up with 6 adjective/symbol combinations:

Self Portrait Revisited

This assignment--to come up with 3+ adjectives, created symbol-like drawings representing the adjectives, and then combine the 3 separate drawings into a new symbol--was difficult for me because I had completed a similar task before. When creating the symbol for my tattoo, I listed words to describe myself, sketched symbols to represent the words/ideas and then combined the symbols together to create a new symbol.

Individual Symbols:

Combined:

Reflections on Sound

Working with sound was something entirely new for me. Not only was it simply new, it was also very different from other mediums I have worked with. Sound is harder for me to have complete control of because it is a new concept to to me, because I'm not as adept with the software needed to create and modify the sounds, but, most importantly, because it is a harder medium to control in general--it isn't just creating sound myself, by singing, talking, etc, it is piecing together sounds/bits of sounds someone or something else created. It's finding the interesting bit in a string of sounds. There are edits/controls to change the sound, but they depend on the original recording.

Sound can be positive or negative, it can add to or subtract from a piece. Silence or the absence of sound can be just as (or more) effective than the presence of sound. Like motion, sound requires sequence and pacing, but not necessarily the same sequence or pacing as the visual narrative.

I found hard to focus on the sound and the visual together and yet not have them compete. On the other hand, it was also hard to focus on the sound and image totally separately and have them result in a good partnership, both telling the same "story."

In my piece I used both diegatic sound (sound created by a source that is in the environment of the scene--the striking of the match) and non-diegetic sound (sound created by a source not in the environment--the laughing and talking). I chose to let simpler/more easily understood sounds (diegetic sounds) go with simpler/more understandable images (action/denotative images) and visa versa. The ticking when the match comes out of the box is used as a background tempo, and also a quite break from the louder sounds that fall before and after. It is meant to have the viewer focus on the concrete action that is taking place, as opposed to the allusion sounds that happen throughout the abstract scenes, which are meant to further the idea in the viewers mind that multiple/opposite things are happening here. The match strike can also be classified as a selective sync, and it is used to isolate the moment of ignition, the climatic moment where the fire can either do good or evil. The voices and even the laughter can be characterized as a narration/voice over as the speaker(s) are never scene but just heard.

Happy Accidents in the World of Sound

Since working with sound is new to me, it's hard to separate the sound and visual completely, and work on each independently. The sound I created for my piece, was definitely created with the visual in mind every step of the way. However, the exercise of taking my visual piece and playing it with a sound piece created by someone else (intended to go with their visual) showed that great things can come out of the pairing of two unassociated works. When my visual was played along with another's sound, "happy accidents" were created--areas where the image and sound went beautifully together, either because at times the sound and visual synced perfectly, making it seem as if the sound was created for the visual, or because the sound amplified an aspect in a unique/unusual way, or even because of a strong contradiction. The sound worked really well with my visual, and the surprise in that made it even more special.


I believe that my original [and final] piece of sound better expresses the ideas of fire I wanted to convey--it's dualities--the ability to light/reveal or dark/conceal, to purify/create or destroy, the associations people have with it from happy times reading by the fire, or the smell of a birthday party when the candles are blown out, to the sound of sirens and destruction and loss. The second piece with my partner's sound also works for me--it has a completely different feel, and not the feel that i was intending, but when played along side with the original video it creates an entire other duality piece. The same video played twice with different sound expresses that duality even further.

Stop Motion with partner's sound