CoP 3 Proposal

Animated response

The basis for my visual response was to directly input into my essay. Since my question was hard to get solid evidence that directly answers it I needed to create a study that gave me useful data. I decided to test whether moving image could generate different emotional responses from the same piece of music. I would get data using a survey from a range of people research. I decided to create 4 videos which would try and produce 4 different emotional responses. 

One of my starting places for research was an edit of pixar colouring through different films. https://vimeo.com/105089367 was really useful to understand how I could use colour in my animations and which colours evoke which emotions. 

After researching for the written section I knew colour was going to be a very integral part of my visual responses. I started reading up on the job of the colourists:(http://www.fastcodesign.com/3048719/evidence/inside-the-manipulative-world-of-film-color-correction) This was a very useful article explaining the general basis of the job. I applied colour correction to all the finished animations to help alter emotions more. 

I started researching into the themes of all the different videos. A really good example of work I found that helped show how imagery can effect mood was the use of breathing shapes. These shape are designed to help people calm down. The slow and smooth moving shapes are very relaxing to look at.

Energy levels of the animations where also very important. Users can connect with the energy of movement so changing speeds can make people think different things. Calming should be smooth and slow compared to exciting should be quick and sporadic.

I listed all the possible imagery that could work for happy, sad, on edge and calm that could work in an animation. Then worked with all the ideas that I thought would be most effective.

putting together the questionnaire was quite difficult as I didn't want to coerce people through my wording I needed the answers as reliable as possible.
The questionnaire I used:
If you could spare 2 minuets of your time it would be really appreciated. I’m doing a case study with the question “Does moving image change how we perceive sound?” I’ve created a series of animations to a short clip of music. Please watch the video and fill in the questionnaire.
Write one or two of the emotions from the list for each question:
Happy, Sad, Calm, On edge, Angry, Excited, Nothing
-How did the music make you feel?
-How did Video 1 make you feel?
-How did Video 2 make you feel?
-How did Video 3 make you feel?
-How did Video 4 make you feel?
You can just write your answers in a list in the same order as the questions
I made sure a wide range of people answered the questionnaire. If I only asked artists at college they may have more of an affinity towards visual stimuli compared to most. I also made sure to ask both older and younger audiences.

lecture: Institutions and Institutional Power

This lecture was a very interesting one with many concepts that I had never heard of. I did unfortunately struggle to relate this to my working practice however I felt it could be related to life in general informing me as a person rather than an animator. The most interesting ideas discussed in the lecture were the the themes on panopticism. It made me think about the modern way society is run and possible implications of external society based pressures acting on us every day. Understanding the pressures created by the punishment and surveillance states that panopticism has created may help break from the turmoil that pressure can have on an individual basis. Trying to break free of the panoptic disciplinary technologies surrounding us daily especially around the issues of personal enjoyment could be very beneficial to one's mental wellbeing.

lecture: identity

Ideas on pre-modern identity although interesting seemed irrelevant to todays society though may apply still in other parts of the world. Modern day identity can be a way to humanise non human ideas and objects. The creation of characters can contain "identity" similar to that you could fabricate for yourself on a dating website, both can be argued are as real as each other. Containing an identity with my work will make it more relatable to people by humanising it. Big companies and ad campaigns have been doing this for a long time, by taking popular identity and applying to there own brand. Although often criticised it does prove effective. Whether that is done through character or through its aesthetics crafting that relatability into my work is something that happen to keep engaging audiences. This can however stem from just trying to create original work rather than mass producing something based on a series of things that already exist.

lecture: Censorship and Truth

This lecture touched on what I thought would be very general themes that would likely having little relevance to my practice. There where however things that I could apply to my work and had similar themes to some subject touched upon in my essay. A lot of the lecture was about journalistic integrity and the art of the edit. I had thought about how much you can edit footage (film or still) to create a different interpretation of the same story. It relates back to work I used in my essay which is a study from the 20's known as the "kuleshov effect". Which again is about changing the order of an edit ti change perceptions of image. Choosing to miss out certain part of data in an image can massive change its interpretation.
I need to think more deeply about how I'm editing my footage both pre and post production based on what I want to convey as the order of the shots can completely change the tone.

lecture: the flipped classroom

The flipped class room looks at the way we learn and how it can and arguably should be changed. A flipped classroom involves a change in teaching direction from tutor controlled to student.
The lecture was very interesting and made me raise some interesting thoughts regarding learning for my self. At the core of lecture where some very positive messages about personal potential and self directed learning. I am very lucky to be at an art university where personal learning is very much encouraged however the lecture seemed to indicate taking it more into my hands. The ultimate creative freedom is led by yourself and its ok to not let other take over the direction of your learning if a more personal creative touch is needed.