martes, 18 de enero de 2011
Production Schedule (spring)
Storeys Production Schedule Spring
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10554300/Ceci_velasco_prod_spring.doc
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/10554300/Ceci_velasco_prod_spring.doc
The Why's in the Work
November 29, 2010
Ever since I started studying animation, I fell in love with the idea that people could actually experience feelings for characters that never existed and stories that had never taken place. My entering the animation world was somewhat backwards than most of us taking the program at ECU. I was trained in 3D and post-production software before I really knew what to use them for. Afterwards, I worked for a short period of time in a small studio where I did title sequences and, to be quite honest, pretty boring animations showcasing products for TV and "making of" videos. In my time there, not only did I realize how little I actually knew –technically and professionally- but I also began to realize that more often than not, I never really knew the reason of the choices I was making when I worked. Whether aesthetic, compositional or thematic decisions, I made them because it ‘felt right’. I worked by instinct. This of course made it very difficult to justify my work to my boss. Perhaps even more frustrating, it made it impossible to explain to him why he was wrong when he was. I felt a gaping conceptual hole and the urgent need to become knowledgeable in whatever it is that could inform my decisions more so than mere instinct.
My mind has always been drawn to the why that motivates people to make the work they do ever since. Why a medium? Why a colour? Why a stylistic choice? The answers were always part logical and part unexplainable, sometimes there’s an evident purpose or point, while others it just works at an emotional level that you can’t quite put into words. All of these puzzles began to form in my head and feed into my work. In her essay “Encountering the Interface”, Aylish Wood also states that the interfaces of moving image technologies present a particular kind of temporal experience to a viewer (96). So I began to wonder if I had an idea for a short, for example, why would it be better in flats than in 3d? How could it add another dimension to the point I’m trying to make? How will the technology that I use mediate the message I'm trying to convey? What message am I trying to convey? How will the viewer relate to the technique? I came to the conclusion that the relationship between the viewer and the work is imperative to be considered, especially with narrative pieces in which you want to give the viewer agency to relate. Perhaps there isn’t always a specific answer for the questions I pose, but the quest itself intrigues me greatly, and thus drives me into a deeper level of thinking about my work.
I guess one of the eye openers I can remember was an animated short I constantly think back to which is “The Dimensions of Dialogue”. Although I have never worked with clay and most of the things I do look nothing like the piece itself, the first time I saw the “Passionate Encounters” section in the film I was blown away. The use of clay to tell the story of two lovers that literally ‘became one’ was, not only masterfully done, but also so much more communicative than any other medium they could have used towards the same purpose. Every aspect of its technique helped the next concept to be grasped. Then I saw pieces like Caroline Leaf’s “The Street” and Jonas Odell’s “Never Like The First Time”, and my mind started going in all different kinds of directions in terms of story telling, mediums and technologies.
Then the time came to make my film, my WHY.
Originally, I had all kinds of crazy surrealist ideas for my film. As I worked through them I realized it was hard for me to tell a story I have never really envisioned in life before. I decided that for this first film, I want to speak to my experiences and observations, to recall my own fantasies and pose my own questions. I want to make a vivid mosaic of life through different techniques and stories put together in a cohesive blend. Furthermore, I want to tell a story that goes beyond the animated medium and reaches out to varying types of people through its humour and situations.
The filmic space provides a shelter that allows us to get much closer to people and places we would usually keep a safe distance from in real life, and that fascinates me. When watching (or maybe I should say experiencing a film) we become immersed and a certain “embodiment” happens. It is this property of our engagement with the film that allows us to make it meaningful in our heads (Van Sijll 71). Also, I must confess I have always had a personal liking for films about quirky characters (Mary and Max, The Triplets of Belleville, Amelie). It’s not the black and white in people that draws my attention, but the gray scale that makes our palette just slightly different from everybody else’s. I hope my film will speak to those differences while truly addressing the shared experiences that allow us to empathize with one another. Of course I would like to do something astonishingly innovative, touching, groundbreaking and introspective, but I can settle if I can cook up something that is just good.
Bibliography
Van Sijll, Jennifer. Cinematic Storytelling. Studio City: Michael Wiese Productions, 2005.
Wood, Aylish. “Encountering the Interface”. Digital Encounters. London: Routledge, 2007.
Ever since I started studying animation, I fell in love with the idea that people could actually experience feelings for characters that never existed and stories that had never taken place. My entering the animation world was somewhat backwards than most of us taking the program at ECU. I was trained in 3D and post-production software before I really knew what to use them for. Afterwards, I worked for a short period of time in a small studio where I did title sequences and, to be quite honest, pretty boring animations showcasing products for TV and "making of" videos. In my time there, not only did I realize how little I actually knew –technically and professionally- but I also began to realize that more often than not, I never really knew the reason of the choices I was making when I worked. Whether aesthetic, compositional or thematic decisions, I made them because it ‘felt right’. I worked by instinct. This of course made it very difficult to justify my work to my boss. Perhaps even more frustrating, it made it impossible to explain to him why he was wrong when he was. I felt a gaping conceptual hole and the urgent need to become knowledgeable in whatever it is that could inform my decisions more so than mere instinct.
My mind has always been drawn to the why that motivates people to make the work they do ever since. Why a medium? Why a colour? Why a stylistic choice? The answers were always part logical and part unexplainable, sometimes there’s an evident purpose or point, while others it just works at an emotional level that you can’t quite put into words. All of these puzzles began to form in my head and feed into my work. In her essay “Encountering the Interface”, Aylish Wood also states that the interfaces of moving image technologies present a particular kind of temporal experience to a viewer (96). So I began to wonder if I had an idea for a short, for example, why would it be better in flats than in 3d? How could it add another dimension to the point I’m trying to make? How will the technology that I use mediate the message I'm trying to convey? What message am I trying to convey? How will the viewer relate to the technique? I came to the conclusion that the relationship between the viewer and the work is imperative to be considered, especially with narrative pieces in which you want to give the viewer agency to relate. Perhaps there isn’t always a specific answer for the questions I pose, but the quest itself intrigues me greatly, and thus drives me into a deeper level of thinking about my work.
I guess one of the eye openers I can remember was an animated short I constantly think back to which is “The Dimensions of Dialogue”. Although I have never worked with clay and most of the things I do look nothing like the piece itself, the first time I saw the “Passionate Encounters” section in the film I was blown away. The use of clay to tell the story of two lovers that literally ‘became one’ was, not only masterfully done, but also so much more communicative than any other medium they could have used towards the same purpose. Every aspect of its technique helped the next concept to be grasped. Then I saw pieces like Caroline Leaf’s “The Street” and Jonas Odell’s “Never Like The First Time”, and my mind started going in all different kinds of directions in terms of story telling, mediums and technologies.
Then the time came to make my film, my WHY.
Originally, I had all kinds of crazy surrealist ideas for my film. As I worked through them I realized it was hard for me to tell a story I have never really envisioned in life before. I decided that for this first film, I want to speak to my experiences and observations, to recall my own fantasies and pose my own questions. I want to make a vivid mosaic of life through different techniques and stories put together in a cohesive blend. Furthermore, I want to tell a story that goes beyond the animated medium and reaches out to varying types of people through its humour and situations.
The filmic space provides a shelter that allows us to get much closer to people and places we would usually keep a safe distance from in real life, and that fascinates me. When watching (or maybe I should say experiencing a film) we become immersed and a certain “embodiment” happens. It is this property of our engagement with the film that allows us to make it meaningful in our heads (Van Sijll 71). Also, I must confess I have always had a personal liking for films about quirky characters (Mary and Max, The Triplets of Belleville, Amelie). It’s not the black and white in people that draws my attention, but the gray scale that makes our palette just slightly different from everybody else’s. I hope my film will speak to those differences while truly addressing the shared experiences that allow us to empathize with one another. Of course I would like to do something astonishingly innovative, touching, groundbreaking and introspective, but I can settle if I can cook up something that is just good.
Bibliography
Van Sijll, Jennifer. Cinematic Storytelling. Studio City: Michael Wiese Productions, 2005.
Wood, Aylish. “Encountering the Interface”. Digital Encounters. London: Routledge, 2007.
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