Narrative Flow Chart

Here is the flow chart for my interactive narrative project:

I am really happy with my Flash project although there are plenty of changes that can be done to improve it even more.

Evaluation

Adventure Holiday is aimed towards poeple of diferent ages (but probably no younger than around 8 because of the text) It is of a fiction genre designed to tell the user a story that they can have a degree of control to.

The story is set in New Zealand where a group of the people (the user included) decide to go on a road trip for the weekend and do some adventure trips including caving and hiking. For most of the text slides I chose a black background, this is because I thought It tied in better with the theme of the caves, the text over that became blue to create what I think is an effective style.

I have not added much sound to the project as of yet, I have however added some sound to the buttons, this helps guide the user through the story so that as well as the buttons changing appearance as they push them they can hear that they have pushed a button too. I did attempt to add some more ambitious sound effects such as different sounds coming through on different slides but I could not quite grasp the method of doing this. I will continue to try this until I get it right and upload it to Deviantart.com when I am happy with it.

I also have not uploaded the project onto Deviantart.com as of yet. This is because some of the pictures I have used came from Waitomo.co.nz which is the website giving all the information about the Waitomo Cave trips. I do plan to remove these pictures and replace them with my own pictures therefore eliminating any copyright issues.

Throughout the production of my Flash project I asked several of my fellow students to test it for me and give me any feedback. This happened several times and was very beneficial for me as several issues were raised, such as the text being hard to read on some slides, this meant that I could go away and adjust the problem areas and make the project even better - Thank you to all who gave me such feedback!

So far...

After today's lecture I realised I have failed to keep updating my blog on the progress in this Interactive Narrative project.

I am well into my 'Holiday Adventure' narrative project now, which follows the story of a person who goes on a weekend trip with their friends to the Waitomo Caves and hopes to go hiking the next day as they return back home.

The idea came when I found myself sat down thinking of a story or a reason why someone would want to 'interact' with my narrative. This story came from my own experiences that I had a few years ago during my travels, this also made me realise that I have a lot of stories that I could re-tell. In the narrative the user can make their own decision as to which 'path' to take as they encounter various choices throughout the story. The user is actually having to face the same obstacles that I encountered in this trip so I find will it very interesting when I see what choices they will make to overcome the obstacles.

This is the first time I have used Adobe Flash so I was a bit worried about not being able to handle the software but as I have been creating my Interactive Narrative I have been given great tips from other students and my lecturers which have been a great help. Also, the online tutorials through NOW have been really beneficial to watch as I am quite comfortable with the interface of Flash, making it much easier to figure out what goes where etc.

At the moment I just need to add the sound effects to my story, which I will find out how to do by watching the online tutorials. I am still not sure wether to upload my project yet or not because of copywrite reasons. I was already well into the project when I was told this may be an issue, therefore I plan to complete it as it is for now, submit it on disk to my lecurers on thursday and in the future I will change the pictures I used from the Waitomo website to other non-copywrited pictures and upload that in time.

Interactive Narrative

Seeing as I cant sleep I decided to have a look at the lecture and seminar notes that have been posted onto the NOW. I looked at all of the different example pieces mentioned in the lecture notes and looking at those pieces i'm now quite excited to be starting this new project, it is something that i've always been interested in trying. I hope I get a good enough idea (narrative/story) for me to work with.

We shall see.

The Meeting

Here...Finally...is the final edit of my one shot movie:


Camera Angle: Out of the other takes, I thought this angle was the best one to use as both characters can be seen clearly both in front of the computer and on the actual screen. The viewer is positioned behind he characters where they have a good view of the characters interacting with the web cams.



Camera Movement: There is no camera movement in this one shot movie, the story was played out in front of the camera in its still position.

Mise-en-Scene: The viewers are made aware that they in a computer room as there is more than one computer in the shot, if there was only one computer then it could be anywhere such as in a persons home. The web cams are in clear view and the reflective images on the monitors are very clear to show that the characters are interacting with the web cams. The smiles and funny faces performed by the acters let the viewer know that they are happy at that time and can easily see when the faces change to evil and scared letting the viewer see that the mood of the scene has changed.

Lighting: The lighting in this film had to be made so that the main focus was the monitors, the room is not over lit allowing a good view of the characters in front of the monitors but an even better view of the images on the screens.

Sound: The sound in the film is all non-diegetic, the characters do not hear this music it is for the viewer only. It starts with low tones which are quite ominous instantly letting the viewer know that this is bad or threatening. This then changes to a happy, upbeat tune which mirrors the feelings of the characters as they play. The shift back to the original music emphasises the evilness of the character being revealed on screen.

Un-edited

This is the movie in its un-edited state. I'm having a bit of difficulty with the editing (mainly as I dont really know how to use premier - too many bloody buttons!) but i'm working on it!

Keep smiling!

Location Shots on Day of the Shoot

We decided to use the student area outside of Room 207 as it was the most practcal choice as would not disrupt any classes and we could take our time on getting it right.

After a few technical hitches (the power supply mysteriously not working where we wanted our computers to be) we could begin to practise our timing with the already recorded footage and the new shoot.

We shot from several different angles to see which one works best, in some of the shots the monitor was blocked from view by the actor, some of them got too much glow from the monitors and others worked out fine. This gave the group many different angles to choose from and develope further indevidually in their editing.

Once we had finished we reviewed the film to make sure we were all happy with the footage. I feel we all worked well together as a group to make sure everyone had the angle that they were happy with to portray the story in their own way.

Pre-production

As part of the pre-production we had to shoot the footage that would be shown on the computer monitors. We took a Mid-shot of both of the characters pulling faces and laughing etc. Each shot was timed so that as one turned evil, the other became scared. Reference and timing were essential in this production, the two characters had to look the right way at the right time.

When these mid-shots were filmed and we were happy with them we could start to plan the next part of the film.

This is my basic storyboard for the final film;

One Shot Movie Planning

My group for the One Shot Movie consists of Martin, Jo, Steve and myself. As mentioned earlier Jo had showed to group a demo of an idea that he'd had, this is the concept that impressed us all:






We have decided to work with this idea.
STORY: People's evil sides revealing themselves through their reflections (web cam) Our original Idea was to have four people sat at computers playing with their web cams and then being scared off by their "evil sides" revealing themselves. The evil halves will also gesture to each other as if they were together on the "bad" side or a parallel world being shown through the monitors.

After several group meetings we polished off the idea by deciding on only two people instead of four, this was mainly due to limitations set by the camera and monitors, four monitors would be a bit of a stretch to see clearly what was going on on all the screens at once, remember our camera is remaining still throughout the shot. Our two protagonists will be playing happily with their web cams, general funny faces etc and as soon as they disappear an evil side to one of them is revealed who will then cross over screens and hurt the person in the other monitor.

SITUATION: A web cam meeting

DIALOGUE: There is no dialogue in this short film, the tension will be both visual and through the music used.

COMPOSITION: As the composition is resticted by the camera and the monitors (we know that cirtain angles will causes a flicking effect on the featured monitor) we will shoot from several different angles to find out what will work out best for the story and the audience.


The tasks that have been handed out are:
Steve - Lighting, Equiptment
Sam - Actress, Costume
Jo - Actor, Concept Artists, Equiptment
Martin - Production Technition

The group met up before the shoot on Friday 7th Nov to descuss our initial ideas, Tuesday 11th Nov to finalise the ideas and to find a suitable location and Thursday 13th Nov to decide the roles of the group members and to carry out further pre-production planning.

Complimentary Colours

I have taken a photo and changed some of the colours in it to show an example of complimentary colours. When looking at the colour wheel I noticed that Purple and Yellow are complimentary colours. I wanted this photo, taken in Nottingham's Market square to become a bit creepy, I imagine if you put this building in the right setting it could become quite foreboding. I have made this image much darker, The building itself shines golden like I imagine a castle should but there is a contrast created by the complimentary purple used to create a dark look. This is emphasised by the now dark sky.

This building can be found at the entrance to Nottingham University near Lakeside, it is part of their Eco project.


I have added the colours orange and blue as these are complimentary colours.

Colour and Light

Figuring light, Colour and The Intangible
Exhibition at Djanogly Art Gallery, Lakeside

Colour is fundamental for an artist in his or her work, it quite often sets the mood, time and ambience for an image. However this exhibition held at the Djanogly Gallery entitled Figuring light, Colour and the Intangible exhibited works concerned with exploring colour itself as an individual ingredient. Each of the four artists, Duncan Bullen, Jane Bustin, Rebecca Partridge and Richard Kenton Webb, have displayed work that investigates colour, and of course light, differently.

I was most impressed with the work of Rebecca Partridge as her vibrant paintings really caught my eye. I agree with curator Richard Davey when he describes them to echo the Kaleidoscope’s symmetrical patterns.
Partridge manages to capture the viewer in an abyss of geometrical colour that follows the principles of light as discovered by Isaac Newton. Looking at her painting Evolver my eyes are drawn through the recession created by the spiralling vortex of coloured blocks, each block has a different colour on each side no two boxes seeming to be the same colour code and both size and shape of the boxes vary creating an organised mess of form. As your eye comes out from the centre of the painting you notice that the box forms get slightly larger and the colour begins to wash creating a less intense environment when compared to the middle of the painting.

‘I’m attempting to express something fundamental expanding from a
source. It makes sense that the colour fragments from the primaries –
that it illustrates a division of light a moment of creative energy'.

Rebecca Partridge

This piece is a direct contrast to The Dazzling Darkness. In the white paintings where the colours overlap they get darker as in the subtractive colour wheel. In this painting the colours get lighter when they overlap which is the normal behaviour of light. These two paintings demonstrate the way in which colour and light interact with one another.

One shot movie Ideas

I've had a couple of ideas for interesting one shot movies.

The first idea is inspired by today's date 11/11 (remembrance day) A day dedicated to the remembrance of the soldiers who represented our country in times of war. A lot of people do not pay any tribute to these people which I find rather sad and a lot of army veterans are often forgotten. Thinking about this I remembered attending my local church when I was a young girl, we gave thanks for the people who served for us. I remember looking around at the people in the church and seeing a few elderly men with their badges pinned proudly on their suits, one mans chest was full of them. I also remembered how shocked he was when I stopped and asked him to tell me about each badge and what they stood for. He delightfully went through each badge one after the other, his chest held high and proud. Afterwards he shook my hand and thanked me for showing such a keen interest.

I think people do not thank these people enough for what they do (or did in years past) which led me to think about a one shot film that will make poeple think about those that risked their lives to protect us and are perhaps now forgotten.

It sees an elderly man sat in his armchair after drinking himself into a sound sleep. The camera pans slowly past his old photos on the fireplace allowing the audience to learn about the man's past as a soldier. After moving down the camera follows the leg of the man as he sleeps in his chair, passing empty beer bottles and taking in all the small details such as tatoos on his arms, the scruffyness of his clothes, the bristles on his cheeks and the badges he has pinned on his vest, still shining as if new. Finally the camera slowly zooms out to show the whole scene, a warm fireplace, an old nameless solider, a tall lamp behind the armchair giving off a soft yellow light.

Another Idea reflects the current financial crisis that is gripping this country's economy. Some families are struggling to make ends meet.

A table is littered with bills and eviction notices, the letter on top has 'Final Notice' stamped on top of it in large red letters. As the camera slowley glides over these letters it reaches the edge of the table where a woman comes into view who is destressed. as she comes into focus she starts to pour a clear liquid aver the kitchen and herself, stopping occationally in thought. She throws the bottle away and sits with her back against the kitchen cabinets, poised with a match box in the hand. As tears stream down her cheeks she pulls out a match, tries several times to light it and just as she is about to strike the match she hears her baby crying upstairs. She drops the matches and falls apart sobbing, the camera slowly zooms out and black out.

The idea that my group has come up with involves the idea of people meeting their evil other halves. This is done through a computer screen. What starts off as a webcam becomes a way for the evil side of people to show themselves.

Both water and hills are aligned in my photo of Milford Sound.

This images frames the peak of the distant hills fantastically.

more images...

This image aligns myself with the left vertical line and the sheep's heads with bottom horizontal line.

The Rule of Thirds

The rule of thirds is a rough guide used by photographers to successfully align the subject in an image. Four lines make up the grid, two vertical and two horizontal, the main focus areas being where the lines intersect.

This guide is an effective way of placing your horizon line.

Mr Blob Man

I have been working on this piece all day and I am really pleased with it. I had the Idea of a blob man changing his shape by pushing himself through a pipe in the induction week when we used a whiteboard to make a stopmotion project. I finally had the chance to do it!

Enjoy!

Final Crazy Shoes Animation

This is the final edition of this piece of animation, I love the music. The colours are much more dramatic than in the original photos used and yes! I got the sparkle for the siver shoes!

Enjoy

Final Group Animation Piece

For this piece of work I wanted it to look a bit cartoony, I was thinking wacky races, I added a poster effect to all the images and word effects similar to those used in the old batman series "POW" etc. This gives the audience a focus at particular points in the animation.

Over all, I am very pleased with this light hearted piece of animation.

Journal Task

People want their products to do more for them than just function well because there are so many versions of one product. Manufacturers are all supplying for the same target market, the products are primarily the same, function is the same, the only way that they may truly differ is by aesthetics which makes purchase down to the individuals taste.
For example I bought my Olympus digital camera about 4 years ago, it is still in a good working order as if it were brand new.




However, it is now dated in technology and aesthetics which led me to replace it for another.

When Looking at all the new models I noticed that the specifications were very similar on most of the different makes with the prices ranging from £69 - £200+ some of the more expensive models were priced because of brand, others because of a slightly higher spec. But predominantly they all had the same function.



I chose the Fujifilm Z100 because if had a very decent spec at a decent price. What led me to choose it over other cheaper models was its looks.

To me this camera was the best looking one there, brown being my favourite colour, the LCD screen on the back is much larger than my original camera and the size is more pleasing making use much easier.

It is Aesthetics and Ergonomics of an object that make them appealing to people. This is why there are so many of one object to choose from because everybody has different tastes and it is down to the designers to make a product that suites each individual.

Stopmotion Animation

Here is an animation piece that I am working on, this is the video before editing the photos. I want to bring out the colours more and maybe even add a sparkle to the silver shoes when they twirl.

I have added an effect that dramatises the colour a lot more which I think gives it an interesting look. (still working on the sparkle!)

Situation Multimedia - Mobile Broadband

The Internet used to be something that I could only access at school, we got our first PC for Christmas in 1999 after being ordered by my school teachers to word process my work before handing it in as complete, meaning a lot of late hours sat in the school library. Using the internet at home didn’t come for nearly another two years when my dad ordered a dial up package from Wanadoo (who later became Orange)

Speed and convenience of the internet at home was greatly improved by the introduction of broadband, which for my mum meant she could talk on the phone to my nana whilst I did my homework – magic!
Then only a few years on access to the internet became more readily available with wireless internet, abolishing the need of cables running the entire length of your home a wireless receiver would pick up the signal sent from your modem router. Wireless technology has been so successful all laptops on the market today have this feature built in ready for use. Indeed my dad can get a look in on the old faithful home PC, mum and I are in our own comfy rooms taking full advantage of the wireless capabilities of our laptops.
You don’t even need to facilitate this at home, just stroll on down to your local McDonalds, or Starbucks if you were me, buy yourself a huge hot chocolate whilst connected to their Wi-Fi for free –Thank you very much!
Now the big guys are pushing internet access even further with Mobile Broadband on the up rise. Most mobile broadband devices are USB dongles which are plug and play into any windows based PC (as of yet these do not work with Linux based machines – but they’re working on that)
Mobile Broadband works on similar bases as a SIM card in your mobile phone, you can either set up a contract with a phone company or set up a Pay as You Go system. As long as you have a mobile signal you can access the web. Now many business men start work as they leave the house. This is causing laptops to reduce in size to accommodate people who like to work whilst on the move. The technology is also working in conjunction with Mobile Phone technology where more and more phones are being manufactured with built in mobile broadband.
This technology is becoming very successful and people are benefitting from the competitive rates and quality from the leading internet providers. It is pushing the meaning of convergent products to a whole other level with an extremely high level of technology literally at your fingertips wherever you are.

My Pinhole Pics!

My first attempt isnt really worth mentioning ( i covered up the little hole..Doh!)

My Second go, however was a little bit better...kinda

I did'nt give up! I persevered!

My third go was a winner! I had a picture woop woop!

And here is the final, inverted picture!!!

Go Me!

Pinhole Camera

Today I made a pinhole camera and it worked!!!

This is my 'makeshift' camera, a beer can...

...the top is removed with a can opener...

...a hole is punched into the side with a pin

and then covered up with some black tape.

simple pimple!

Hopefully I'll still be smiling like this at the end of this course (I have a feeling I will!)

Good Morning!!

Its the first week of my time here at NTU and all is good.

Poeple ask me 'What do I want to get out of this Multimedia course'. I spend a few seconds thinking about it and reply with 'I not sure... yet'.

I want to take my work to another level and I need to learn how to use the tools that will enable me to do that. I will dive into the digital wold with a smile on my face and soak it all up.

I come from a Fine Art background so my knowledge of design is mostly with pen and paper! Although I fast came to realise that that is always a good start and I can build on those skills. I want to veer towards advertising and promotions with this course, at least those are my thoughts at this early stage.