Fireside Chat

            My fireside chat was a tribute to my parents. I had recently been inspired by the poet, Billy Collins, and his poem “The Lanyard.” This poem is about recalling in his youth that he made a lanyard for his mother as a gift. At the time he thought the gift would make them even for all the things that she had done for him and given to him. Only later in life did he realize that you can’t ever repay your mother. This struck a chord with me, since I have my own young child now, and caring for him has made me realize just all that my parents have done for me. I’ve thought of ways that I could repay them. Actually, getting a degree in Media Arts is one of the ways that I hoped to do it. I often dreamed of making it big in film and becoming wealthy. And when I’d dream of having a lot of money, I thought of few things I’d like to do for myself, but mostly I thought about the things I could do for my parents in an attempt to give thanks and repay them for all that they’ve done for me. But over the past few years I’ve come to realize that this is simply impossible. Nothing you can buy will ever repay the people who gave you your life.  I wanted to let them know that I was aware of this, so I made my project about them, and I used to poem as a jumping off point.

            I used the old photos to go along with my narration so that it would feel like a little trip down memory lane. I felt that using pictures they hadn’t seen in a long time would stir up some good memories and be very powerful. I selected photos that represented the monetary things they had given me and then the things which are beyond value. I did this for contrast and to also set up what I mentioned earlier about no dollar value could be equivalent to them giving me life. I chose to make it mostly serious because it was a serious feeling, but thought that a little bit of humor would be reflective of my personality(they did need to know it was actually me who wrote it).  I also used that poem of Billy Collins’ because I felt it said some things very well that I couldn’t say any better myself. Every time I rehearsed when I got to the end,  I knew I was going to get a little emotional. I always kept it together when I practiced, but when the real thing came, and my parents were there, I was fighting back tears. I feel that was one of the purposes of this assignment – express some very real emotion in real time.

           

Concerned Citizen

 

When we first started to throw around ideas of who we might like to get to know better as a concerned citizen, we thought maybe someone that works at an animal shelter, or doctors that were doing innovative things with patients. But then we watched the Fit for the Kingdom video that was centered around the LDS poet, Rusty, where it was in a much more intimate setting where we really got to know what kind of person he was and what his inspirations were. This led us to choosing someone like him that was doing something relatively small in the community, but still making a difference.

In Goldbard’s article, she references a few instances where policy seemed a bit behind the times, with the Muslim women and their hijabs, and the growing prison population in the US. Knowing we wouldn’t be able to tackle an issue quite as big as either of these, we decided to tackle a smaller issue, but still one in which the citizen was doing something that didn’t quite fall in line with the larger community around him. Josh Palkki is a student at BYU, residing here in Provo, but grew up in Oregon, where he was raised to recycle. We thought it would be interesting to discuss with him why he continued collecting recyclables, even though it is more difficult to recycle here. For our video we took inspiration from something we found on vimeo about an artist in LA (https://vimeo.com/79222497).

In short, we spend a lot of time listening to what the artist has to say while he’s sitting in a chair, but there are cutaways to some of the work that he’s done and things that help you further understand what he is saying and who he is as an artist. This is why we decided to include a lot of the interview, he had some really interesting things to say and we thought it would be beneficial to include things like his dirty kitchen  to sort of contrast how he is an avid recycler but is maybe more lax in other aspects of his life.

 

An interesting issue that we ran into while we were trying to find an apartment complex nearby that had recycling set up for students (so we could film some cutaways there), was that there was no such thing. We spent nearly an hour searching for one and came up short, having to go on campus and to the dorms to find any actual recycling bins. This was comical since we had just discussed with Josh how it was much more difficult to find anywhere in Provo to actually recycle. Our hope in spotlighting Josh and recycling is that hopefully others might be impacted by what he has to say, like we were, and take more steps in helping the community around them.

Protest Poster

The poster that I made is a protest against the CDC(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) and their handling of Lyme disease. Lyme disease is contracted from Ticks and enters the blood stream. It is a terrible, debilitating disease that thousands and thousands of people suffer from because they often are undiagnosed or misdiagnosed with something completely different. This reason for this is the fact that the CDC does not even acknowledge Lyme disease as chronic. They claim it is something acute that can easily be treated with antibiotics – no matter when it is discovered. This is simply not true. If detected early and treated, then it certainly can be cured quickly as well. However, for those individuals who go years without a diagnosis, the suffering can be tremendous. Treatment is extremely difficult and the road to recovery is long and frustrating.  Because the CDC doesn’t acknowledge it as a chronic disease, most physicians are not familiar with it at all and would have no idea what to look for to diagnose it, and what’s worse is that insurance companies do not cover treatment for Lyme beyond simple antibiotics, and not even those sometimes.

So I took found a picture of Lyme disease at the microscopic level in the blood cells(the little guy shaped like a corkscrew is the actual Lyme spirochete). Next, I found a picture of the official seal of the CDC, cropped it and placed on to each of the blood cells in the photo. Next, I changed the opacity level so that the two would blend together, giving the appearance that the seal was actually inside the cell. This gives the appearance that the true infection – the real reason behind chronic Lyme disease – is the CDC and their refusal to recognize it for what it really is and help people. The only reason Lyme becomes chronic is because the CDC doesn’t help spread awareness.

Next, I placed black borders on the top and bottom of the picture because I wanted to make it look like a meme. Memes are very commonplace and viewed frequently. I think most memes are designed to be humorous so seeing a serious one might catch people’s attention. On the borders I placed the words, “Chronic Lyme Disease. Take a closer look.”  I was doing two things here: referencing the fact that my photo is at the microscopic level of someone with this disease and the second is that if they look and see that seal, they’re realize is that that is out of place and then my hope is that they will do some research on the matter and looking closer will help to reveal the truth to them.

I put my poster up on my Facebook page and it was well received, even in a short time. It seemed to be easily understood and a few people even looked up Lyme and the CDC. Seemed to work.

For this project I took inspiration from our viewing of “The danger of a single story.” I think that’s what the CDC does. They only see Lyme as one way – simple and not dangerous. In reality, it a chameleon amongst diseases, often referred to as “The great pretender” due to its ability to mimic the symptoms of other diseases. In reality it extremely complex and highly dangerous. That’s what ultimately made me choose do this – their inability to look at it in any other way.

As far as the design of my poster I was inspired by some microscopic pictures in the documentary Under Our Skin, which focuses on the fight against the CDC and the stories of several who have suffered from Lyme for years. If you want to watch it you can do so for free right at the bottom of the page.

I would highly recommend it. Educate yourself and you could help save someone or, who knows, maybe even yourself from this horrible disease.  

 

Webspinna Battle!

Opening Theme

Help me Obi Wan Kenobi

Darth Doody





The ways of the force

Religions and Ancient Weapons




Imperial March

I am Your Father

Seen His Face




Red October Standing By

All clear kid

Explosion




Final Theme

Chewbacca Roar

Perfectly Alright

When I chose to build my Webspinna around Star Wars I did so simply because I thought it would be the most fun to create. I think I was right. My objective with the audio clips I chose to use was simply to recreate the plot of Star Wars through sound. I picked very significant parts of the film and found sounds that would be easily recognized by anyone. For the most part I followed the general plot in its chronological order, with a few twists for humor or purely for fun. An example would be the clip from The Empire Strikes Back when Vader proclaims, “I am your father.” This line is not a part of the original film, but was too iconic for me to exclude. I also chose a line from Han Solo that occurs in the middle of the film but I placed it at the end simply because it’s my favorite line and I thought it would be a great way to conclude my mix. This attempt to be mostly chronological was in response to our reading. When reading DJ Spooky’s page, I honestly went a little crazy. I felt the disorder could work for him, but if I wanted to successful navigate my page, I needed a little bit of order.

The majority of my clips came directly from the film, but a few were borrowed from other sources such as Family Guy. I thought this would be a good way to mix the clips because Star Wars is so iconic that there have been countless copies of it or references to it. I decided to combine the two in order to point out the fact that it’s not just a movie that was extremely popular, but it is something that is engrained into our culture – it’s a fixture that will never be removed. It’s actually a piece of us as though we have all been to that far away galaxy a long time ago. And most of us are so familiar with the lines that when we hear one with even a single word changed, we can tell the difference. So I threw in a few to make it fun.

Star Wars vs. Harry Potter was something we really enjoyed because they’re both very iconic and actually incredibly similar to each other when compared closely. So when pairing sounds we took parts that were similar to each other to compare them, to point out the similarities. I actually received a little inspiration on that section from a joke by Aaron Woodall, a fellow Humor U comedian of mine. Watch it

here if you like.

As far as the actual performance goes, I feel that Libby and I did well. We rehearsed a few times, and it never went well, but when we stepped in front of everyone, we only had one little goof so I think that we did very well. I certainly gained a whole new respect for DJs who can go out and make things happen on the spot in front of people. It’s pretty incredible. When it came to costume selection I went with greatest character to come out of the franchise: Han Solo. It's was a pretty simple choice - just be as cool as possible. 

World Building

When it comes to building worlds, the film industry has to do a lot more than most other mediums. Learning this skill will become very valuable over the course of our careers. The one advantage that we had to create the world with real Pokémon, was that there already is a world established. However our goal was to create a world that would have realistic possibilities.

One of the key things we learned from the readings was about “thoughtful exploration.” When examining the possibilities of a world where Pokémon actually exist, we did not simply insert ourselves into the world that had already been created to enjoy the fun we would have as kids, but rather, we considered what would be the real issues. We thought about politics and education, pop culture etc. and  which of those would involve or revolve around Pokémon. We decided on what we thought would be  the key issues, created a few ideas of our own, and then considered how they would be represented or advertised in that world. Here’s what we came up with:

Recreation

For recreation we decided to show how in a world where Pokémon exist they play cards with animals from our world. I used the animal’s real name and changed a lot on the card. I chose to do this because I felt that a lot of people have fun playing Pokémon and I think they would have fun playing cards with animals.

Animal Rights

Or should I say Pokémon Rights. I thought of this because the idea of Pokémon battles is kind of barbaric. No doubt, in a world where Pokémon exist would be a Pokémon rights group. Pairing the two: Pokémon clips and Sarah McLachlan’s commercial was the perfect way of trying to show what I meant. When people just hear the music they think of that commercial right away.

Along that same vein I created a billboard ad that I modeled after some that I’ve seen from a very popular company called Domo. Although, this ad is geared towards the protection of Pokémon against poaching. With so many different species of Pokémon there is plethora of opportunity for poaching. This ad would be intended to generate awareness of Pokémon poaching and contains a website address that would allow people to help protect innocent Pokémon. Not only does it generate awareness, but it makes protecting Pokémon cool. At least, it’s supposed to.  

Magazine

When I was coming up with the concept of this world I thought about how I would show multiple things going on in a small space. There was no better place for that than a magazine. Complete with articles and advertisements that would expand the world. For the first advertisement I wanted to show a release for a new Poké Ball. I used Photoshop to create everything by first creating the outline of a pokeball then layering a galaxy and keeping only what fit inside, then did the same with the silver bottom. When that was set I tried to make it look a bit more three dimensional by adding a bit of a gradient shade. Then I just created a tag line and copy for the advertisement the same way apple would have. This was largely inspired by Apple advertisements because I pictured the eSiplh. Company to be a leading innovator in technology.

The second portion of the magazine was merely a news report about rising stars. I kind of treated this like a typical kids magazine because most Pokémon trainers are young. So I made sure the type was larger than normal and it was merely about simple stuff and their achievements. However I wanted to also make it informative and have a call back to Aralie’s video. This was all created in Adobe InDesign, I largely didn’t know what I was doing but had some good drive about how I wanted it to look. The Pictures I just took from the internet from some great Cosplayers That I felt had a good look about them for the world and Ideally if I were to create this world for a film I would have made a photoshoot with actual people.

The last part was to show how Pokémon influenced the fashion world. This doesn’t quite fit into a teen magazine but I feel that it would help influence the kids to learn better fashion but more so If this were to be a real world there would be more street worthy clothes and not so bright or flamboyant as we see in the anime. However that goes without saying that some cultures might adopt that type of style. Yet from my perspective I felt that high fashion would drive the industry. This photo was made by merely inserting a Pokémon into the already taken photo from fashion magazines and with a selected Pokémon to show a possible influence of style.

Education

When Pokémon are the animals that inhabit your world, you’re going to have to study them. Considering that there are so many types, I started at the beginning. I created a page out of textbook that shows the anatomy of the Pokémon, Bulbasaur. It includes a picture of its exterior and also the interior anatomy of how it functions. The page also includes a physical description, some interesting parts of its personality, and its evolution forms.

Remix

In the fourth grade I took art from Mr. Watson. He showed us all kinds of famous paintings, most of which I thought were very cool. But one day she showed us a painting that changed it all for me.  It was made up of millions of tiny little dots that when combined made a picture of people in a park. The painting is A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat. I had never seen something so incredible. Learning that it took over two years to complete made it all that much more amazing to me. Ever since that day, it has been my favorite painting.

Later that same year, I sat down on a Saturday morning and turned on the T.V.  Ferris Bueller’s Day Off came on. I was blown away – definitely a life-changer. Additionally, I was shocked at the scene in the film where Ferris, Sloane, and Cameron go to the Art Institute of Chicago and they look at a lot of the paintings Mr. Watson had introduced me to, including A Sunday Afternoon. That to me, was a very incredible moment. And I didn’t even actually realize it at the time, but it would be a huge influence on my decision to pursue filmmaking as a career.

That realization came later when I had decided that I wanted to make films and I began researching the film’s director, John Hughes. He too, was a huge fan of that painting and put it in the film simply for his own pleasure. He said, “...I always thought this painting was sort of like making a movie. A pointillist style, which at very very close to it, you don't have any idea what you've made until you step back from it.”[1] I literally screamed when I heard him say that because I had once thought it.

I framed this photo so that the painting and the film were the only thing inside it – no outside objects. Except, of course, for me. But the way I lined it up it could appear that I’m a part of it. It’s all one. Either way, the point was to see the layers of creativity and inspirations. Seurat inspired Hughes, Hughes inspired me. What will I create and will that inspire someone to create something of their own? I derived this idea from out discussion of the Star Wars family tree. Another element to it is that it’s two works that I love occupying the same space, simultaneously inspiring me. It’s like the painting itself: there are millions of little pieces that make up the whole picture. For me, there are so many influences that have shaped who I am and who I want to be as an artist and this moment was monumental for me.

 

 

1.      Ferris Bueller's Day Off-(Commentary by John Hughes) (DVD). Paramount Pictures. 1999-10-19.

Medium Specificity

 

For my medium I selected stand-up comedy – something I have a few years of experience in performing. In my time performing I have written a lot of different jokes, helped a lot of other people fine tune their own, and I’ve watched a lot of different comedians perform – in person and on T.V. or the internet. In all the thousands of jokes I’ve been involved with, there are several topics that seem to be covered in depth by just about every comedian. Topics include, but are not limited to: dating, marriage, differences between men and women, pregnancy, food, childhood, the difference between kids today and us, technology, social media, celebrities, politics, and current events. The reason for this is the fact that these topics are very relatable, easily understood by most members of any audience. Each comedian has a different spin on each topic, due to his or her experiences and perceptions. But as the root of it all, are those same exact topics.
In response to this I wrote a set of jokes that simply explore the most basic joke topics, and the general sentiment that most comedians have towards those topics. The difference is my jokes can simply be described as premises – ideas about those topics. Rather than explore the specifics, which are what distinguish comedians from one another, I chose instead to explore what makes them the same. Comedy at its root is simply observation about every-day things. So my set of jokes is simply observation about those observations. Although these comedians say very different things on the microscopic level, on the macro, it’s all very much the same.
I drew inspiration from both the reading and the Daffy Duck video that we watched in class. I really love the idea of a medium of art talking about itself, observing itself, identifying its origins and the different elements that make it what it is like in “Show and Tell”. Another piece that inspired me was the comedy of Demitri Martin. In one particular set, he explores the origins of his own material. He calls it the “the place where his jokes come from.” I attempted to do the same with my piece. I wanted to explore what all stand-up comedy is really saying and use stand-up comedy to say it. I really enjoyed this part of the assignment, looking deeper in to something that I’ve done for a long time now, but figuring out what makes it unique from other mediums of art. I tried to pretend that I was stand-up comedy and then I had my Zoolander moment, looking into the water and staring into my own reflection and I ask, “Who am I?”