Class of Sept 25th

In class today, we looked at each others flipbooks and watched more excerpts from movies.

Most of the flipbooks were pretty creative and fun to flip through.  I especially liked Matt's which he made by filming his house with a video camcorder, then capturing each frame, and then printing each out.  It was the most fluid of all the flipbooks and it reminded me of one that came in a box of cereal.

The first film we viewed was Videodrome.  It reminded me of an episode of Cowboy Bebop, where a boy's consciousness gets trapped in the internet, and he manipulates people with artificial videos.  There is a similar concept of the ambiguity of whats real in videos.

We then watched three films based off the great works of Philip K. Dick: Total Recall, BladeRunner, and Minority Report.  Personally I like Minority Report the best because I like the plot the most.  All of them feature a motif that shows that nothing is what it seems.  This pops up a lot in Dick's novels.  Personally my favorite Philip K. Dick-based movie is A Scanner Darkly.  It featured amazing and beautiful rotoscoping technology.  The viewer never knows exactly what is real or what is a hallucination.  Very Interesting.

The last film we watched was Avalon and it examined how videogames are changing the way we view reality.  It was directed by the man who made Ghost In the Shell, which is one of my favorite animes.  I thought it was especially interesting when they said that people in the fictional world make a living from playing the game.  People in real life do that with games like World of Warcraft and Diablo.  I think its amazing that games have become like sports and that their virtual reality can be just as pertinent as normal reality.

Class of Sept 23

Today in class we watched a variety of classic films. Some I've seen, some I haven't, and some I would like to see later.
Alfred Hitchcock's BIRDS is a timeless classic. It draws the viewer in with a rich immersing feel. Hitchcock was the master of horror for his era, and this film shows why. He takes an ordinary thing like birds and transforms them into a horrific force of nature rivaling Mike Myers or Jason.
2001: A Space Odyssey is another acclaimed movie. Rather than a just a meaningless sci-fi film, it examines what the future may bring and how the human psyche has evolved. Have we gotten more or less savage? Are machines able to reason as well as humans and if so how long before they are controlling us? I wish to watch this film in its entirety when i have time, if only for its astounding production quality.
A Clockwork Orange is another fantastic film. The diction, plot, and acting are all topnotch. I can definitely see its influences in other movies, such as the Joker in the Dark Knight. Its reference of Singing in the Rain is great way to show the lasting effects of previous generations.
I'm not really a fan of Polyester and I have bad memories of Rocky Horror Picture Show so those didn't really inspire me. But I'm curious as to what movies we will watch next.

Class of September 18th

Today in class, we focused our studies on several classic films such as Gone with the Wind, Casablanca, Singing In the Rain, etc. We also briefly discussed the art Damien Hirst.
Damien Hirst recently had an auction where he made millions and millions of dollars. I immediatley recognized his art from the Jennifer Lopez movie "TheCell." Rather than saturate the art market with traditional paintings, Hirst creates scupltures that defy the norm. His piece, that is essentially a human skull covered in diamonds, is quite elegant, simple in design but screams volumes. Some of his other pieces feature various animals being perfectly preserved in tanks. Out of these, I prefer the shark. It appears like a frozen moment in time of a shark about to eat its prey. Normally we would have to rely on paintings or photos for such visuals, but here Hirst physically captures the image and brings it to us first hand. Most of his other animal pieces are nice but I'd probably look at them for their scientific value rather than their aesthetic value, at least initially. But all in all, I would rather study his art than someone like Goya's.
I very much enjoyed watching excerpts from the classic films. I never watched Singing In the Rain before but I really liked what I saw, so I'll have to find time to watch the whole thing. I always loved Casablanca. It has such a classy noir ambience to it that I find captivating. On the other hand, I hate Gone with Wind. Its boring, features characters that I just cant sympathize for, and is way too long. Eraserhead was pretty freaky. I'm not sure if I'll ever watch the whole thing but I researched it a little on Wikipedia.
The way things are progressing, I can't wait to see what other films we'll watch.

class of 9/16

Today in class we continued our exploration of early film. We watched excerpts from several high profile silent films; including the Golden Beetle, Nosferatu, Trip to the Moon, etc.
The Golden Beetle was made in 1907 and it was very interesting to me to see the style of special effects of that era. Throughout the entire film, the camera was stationary and the only color came from hand-painting the individual frames (which I'm sure was a tedious endeavor). Most of the effects came from stop-camera editing. Simple but exciting for that time. Its amazing to see how far the film industry has come in 100 years. In 2007, Transformers was released. The special effects in that movie would have seemed like witchcraft to 1907. In TF, cars completely shapeshift and transform into futuristic alien robots, with the camera following the intricate process the entire time. If weren't for the audience already knowing its CGI, they might think its real. 100 years makes a big difference.
Winsor Mccay's self made animationwas also pretty breathtaking for its time. He pioneered the art for making 2D images come to life. Its something that I enjoy doing and hopefully will make a career out of, so its nice to see the origins.
We also viewed a scene from Phantom of the Opera. It featured certain objects colored via the same hand painted means. I believe this was done to add a special eery and extravagant effect to the Phantom. The coloring makes the Phantom more unique and mysterious.
The powerful scenes in the Joan of Arc movie and the Battleship Potyomkin makes revisiting these classics very much worth it.

class of september 11th

In today's class we viewed two documentaries; one about the history of photography and the early days of the first motion pictures.
It amazes me that someone was able to invent photography almost two hundred years ago. I had a photography course at UT my freshman year, so I realize the complicated process it takes to go from taking a snapshot to getting a physical print in your hands. Its long, arduous, and full of trial and error; and that's just to get the print finished not including getting the image to a suitable standard. There are so many fragile steps that if they are not followed precisely, the photographer will achieve nothing. Digital photography is infinitely better. The photographer will instantly see how his snapshot appears on the screen, then he can manipulate whatever he wants via Photoshop (allowing for the ability to improve nature and to better captivate the eye), and finally to make a print, the photographer just simply needs to use a printer. Easy, efficient, and the way of the future.
Advancements in photography led to the invention of the moving picture. Originally these films were silent and very short. By today's standards, they are a little creepy. Displaying black and white individuals moving silently at unnatural speeds (almost like ghosts) is what some modern horror movies try to emulate.
At the time, the silent films were shown in theaters occasionally accompanied by a live piano player to add music. I believe they did this for several reasons. For one thing, the technology used to record sound along with the visuals was still experimental and it was hard to synchronize both elements. Secondly, showing soundless moving images in theaters would no doubt have gotten boring quickly. So the theater managers sought to hold the audiences' attention by livening things up with some popular upbeat music. Finally, some viewers were initially made uncomfortable from seeing the new technology as they probably thought it looked unnatural. So music was brought in to help alleviate their fears and remind them that this was entertainment and nothing to be scared of.
I can't wait until our examination of films progresses to the modern day.

class of 9/9/08

Today in class, we continued exploring vaudeville's evolution to broadway and then to musicals.
Vaudeville was the voice of the city, the most popular form of stage entertainment for the average citizen. I can't help but be reminded of the vaudeville characters on family guy. They usually show up to crack a few jokes that would have been funny in the early 20th century and then leave as quickly as they entered, albeit with old-timey piano music following them. It sticks out to me because its a rare example of vaudeville showing up in modern pop culture in this new post 2000 millennium.
Broadway was a mix of high brow and low brow art. Prohibition had forced the privileged masses to mingle with gangsters and Broadway was greatly influenced by this. Siegfield and his follies were responsible for many very popular shows. The most interesting part of the act for me were sketches that featured actors positioning themselves to match a famous painting. That intrigues me because paintings were made to represent and imitate real life, and now that they have acquired enough acclaim, real life begins to imitate paintings.
Finally musicals became the modern live opera. Music, dancing, singing, drama, comedy, and story had come together into a seamless form of entertainment. West side Story sticks out because it portrayed contemporary life and it featured dancing as an extension of the acting (dance moves became fight scenes).
All of these forms of entertainment have sex appeal in common. The truth is that sex sells and that was as true a century ago as it is today.

Class of Sept 4

Today in class, we continued our examination of opera.
We watched exerts from various famous productions including the works of Mozart and Wagner. These just added to the notion that opera is the first from of multimedia entertainment. These films seemed to have more acting and more of a storyline, bringing them closer to the look and feel of modern movies.
What really peaked my interest was when the professor provided several examples of linking opera to current pop culture. "What's Opera, Doc?" is a Bugs Bunny short that places the iconic rabbit and Elmer Fudd into a parody of Wagner's work. Here, we see the sheer talent of both Chuck Jones (director) and Mel Blanc (actor). This has been noted by some as their greatest collaboration together and one of the best animated films of all time. I found it particulary interesting because I remember the cartoon from my childhood and now that I'm older and going into the animation field, I can appreciate all the hard work that went into it.
Things are starting to move more swimmingly as we see how opera evolves into vaudeville and broadway productions. I find broadway more entertaining than opera, so I'm excited to see where this goes as we eventually make our way to modern times.

Class of Sept 2

Today was the first real day of class and we're beginning the semester by studying opera.
The idea behind it is that the opera is the initial example of a form of multimedia entertainment. This is something I never would have thought of, but after watching a video opera movies in class, I can see why. Technology was used to create elaborate scenery pieces, costumes, and special effects. Music was also integrated so that opera was differentiated from a standard play. So many forms of entertainment all merged together for the first time; art, the theater, and music.
The films we viewed were mainly used to demonstrate the hard work that went into these productions both off and on the stage. All this effort was made possible by the the gold and money that was flowing into Europe from America. This wealth helped usher in the baroque era, which featured a lot of gaudy and highly decorative ornaments. What I'm primarily interested in is following the evolution of this form of multimedia entertainment to the modern forms.