Blog 3: Reflections on Sound Design

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The movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail uses a lot of sound techniques to create a sound design. 

The first technique involved includes listening modes. For example, a causal sound is used when the bells jingle as the two men are galloping across the field. The sound is a literal sound, and is not one that represents a sound. It actually sounds like that in real life when bells jingle. Oppositely, a semantic sound is used when the coconuts are used to represent horse hooves hitting the ground. They are not actual horse sounds, but the hooves are used to represent actually being that sound.

The second technique involved includes using space techniques. From where the camera is angled, more towards the castle, the men galloping out of the field is very faint. As they come closer towards the camera, the sound gets louder. This gives the perception of distance, because as the size of the men increases, the sound gets louder. As the movement goes away from the camera towards the end of the scene, the sound gets farther away and not as loud. The camera also lends to the directionality in the scene because as the men go towards the castle, the camera pans right and the sound follows the camera.

Blog 2: Finding Your Howl

Jonathan Flaum's "Finding Your Howl" can be found here:

http://changethis.com/manifesto/show/51.01.YourHowl

Flaum talks about a time he was in the fifth grade and was assigned to write a five page story. He hated the assignment and got a bad grade, but his friend wrote ten pages about a tiger who tried to escape from his cage and always woke up in a new cage. Flaum is trying to say that we can't escape our lives – we are the reason we are in certain situations and we can't blame anyone about it. We have to embrace our lives and push through it to find our passion.

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Lyrics to The Classic Crime's "The Way That You Are" can be found here:

http://www.metrolyrics.com/the-way-that-you-are-lyrics-the-classic-crime.html

To me, creativity is being completely original. It's finding your passion and going with it, whatever it may be. Flaum's message portrayed in "Finding Your Howl" shows that sometimes life can suck, but we have to push through it to find our "howl," or our passion and creativity. While it may seem like a simple task to pick my favorite song or poem or whatever that speaks to me as a creative person, I found it very difficult. I have issues with determining favorites in general because I feel like I cannot define myself based on one song or poem or whatever I might be defining. But, after a bit of searching, I found a song I like that fits the criteria of creativity and I feel goes along well with our readings for the blog.

"The Way That You Are" by The Classic Crime is an inspirational song about being who you are despite what other people think of you (to me, at least). A line in the chorus is, "Don't let them say this is the way that you are." To me, that says to be yourself and to be original. Don't do anything based on what other people want. And this has a lot to do with Flaum's article. The wolf had to go through his own prison to find his passion and feeling of life once again. That combined with the tiger who could never escape his prison shows that we have to accept ourselves and go through the difficult times to find our drive or enthusiasm for something.

You can still be creative even in difficult times if you push through it. "The Way That You Are" speaks to me as far as this because it completely embodies "Finding Your Howl." The song is saying that if you accept yourself, yourself being your perception of you, based on no one else's opinion, you can do great things with your life. You can be creative. And this is exactly what Flaum was talking about. If life hands you an issue, you have to work through it, and in the end you can still find your authentic self. When the song says "Don't let them say..." it's saying to completely disregard others, and I find that to be important in being creative. You have to base yourself on things that you like and enjoy.

In conclusion, while this was somewhat a difficult blog for me in the beginning, I found that it sort of pushed me to be a little bit creative. I had to find a song that made me feel creative, and in doing that I had to define what creative is to me, which was.... creative. Ha. The bottom line is, being yourself is the best way to find your originality, passion, and creativity. In the grand scheme, other people can help, but your creative sessions needs to be based on you and you alone; other people don't have a right to influence who you are by putting you down or forcing you to be something you aren't.

Blog 1: Deconstructing Characters

My protagonist, Water Man has a monochromatic color scheme, wearing only shades of blue. Blue is calming and cool. People tend to have a lot of trust in blue because it makes you feel safe. Blue also has an affinity with nature, particularly water, which is also a characteristic of my superhero. Not only can blue be calming, but it can also be turbulent. My character is typically calm and friendly, but when needed, he can come to life with the force of a hurricane, transforming into a water being as needed. On any given day he will blend in, but he is not afraid to show his true powers when necessary.

Water Man is naturally always shown in bright lights because he is a good guy who protects people. When sunlight shows through his water form, he can become as bright as white when needed and uses this to blind his enemies. So while the innocent can see his lighting as approachable and safe, enemies fear this terrifying light due to how it basically renders them incapable of fighting back. Also, when lighting is dim he can blend into the darkness, allowing him to be even more of a threat because he can use light or no light to have an advantage over his enemies.

My character tends to be more circular in shape. He is not sharp, because he is generally nice, innocent, and friendly. When he transforms into his element of nature, water, he can manipulate himself really into anything, with the basic shape being more rounded rather than jagged. The circular shape also lends to the idea of a circle of trust, because as a protagonist he protects people and instills faith in them and in general works to protect the good in society. His round figure makes him more approachable, and people tend to want to be around him more as a result.

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My antagonist, Fire Boy is the opposite of Water Man. He is pure evil and uses the element of fire to do his bidding. Fire Boy's color scheme has multiple shades of red with a monochromatic color scheme opposite of Water Man. Dark shades of red give the feeling of being angry and hot temperature wise. Considering Fire Boy is made of fire, this makes sense. He is vicious and uncaring to those in need. He will do anything he wants and does not care who is in his way. His red hue is a terrifying sight for anyone to see.

Fire Boy prefers to be in darkness over the light. It makes him that much more scary when his flames appear. Dark lighting is a fear of many people because there is no way of telling what is there. It is the fear of the unknown that makes dark to no lighting so frightening, and Fire Boy loves this. As he bursts into flames in the dark, he can see the fear in his victims eyes and he goes in for the kill. The only way for Water Man to combat this is to blend into the darkness as well.

Fire Boy, unlike Water Man, is jagged as well as triangular. This makes him look sharp, unapproachable and undesirable. Also, when he goes into his fire form, his flames are also pointed and ugly triangles. There is nothing soft about him because he is such an evil and power hungry villain. In public, people are scared of his abnormally triangular shape because it is just so different from anything they have ever seen. Water Man is the only element that can combat this triangular inferno of death, which is not an easy task for any hero to attempt to defeat.