Iesha Postmodern

Monday, 20 May 2013

creativity

How has your ability to construct the new from the old developed from AS to A2

Creativity is the making of the new and rearranging of the old. In As I created a physiological thriller film, homage to the films photo booth and obsessed. In A2 I created a music video, using an unsigned indi rock band, as well as a campaign (digi pack and website). With both assignments I created prelim tasks and evaluations.

In the pre-production (research and planning) stages of my As project, I undertook different amount of basic research using YouTube. I researched into different iconic thrillers, to understand the conventions of a thriller. I then researched into different types of genres this at first was confusing and I chose many types but in the end boiled it down to one and started researching more into physiological thriller openings, so I could gather a wide range of different ideas to create my thriller opening. I also looked into the type of locations, costume and lighting thrillers, so I was able to choose these correctly when creating my thriller.

I developed my research skills in A2 as I used YouTube to its advantage and looking at other media texts and not just other music videos. I was able to research in depth as I had done it before so I had more confidence and knew the places to look allowing me to gather a variety of ideas of intertexuality. I was able to choose the type of narrative, genre and audience I wanted my band to appeal to. I looked in to a variety of bands such as the weekends, websites and campaigns to understand my genera and make my champagne appealing and sell my band. As my music video had a narrative of cowboys I focused on watching a lot of cowboy films and clips such as good bad and ugly, allowing me to gain inspiration and steal these ideas to create something new.

Planning in As I feel was minimal as it was the first time I had done this and research took up a lot of time, I had to plan rather quickly. Planning involved a prilim task, so I could get the hand of creating the correct atmosphere and using the right shots for my final thriller opening, this also involved creating a timeline and shot for shots animistic on paper, I feel my planning was detailed but very basic as I could have done more. However in A2 my planning was very thurror, with a prilim task, then a paper storyboard, timeline and a very detailed animistic with shot types and angles, this was uploaded to YouTube, so I was able to refer back to this when shooting, so I was clear on my narrative.

Research and planning became second nature as I moved into A2, my skills developed and I was able to plan and time myself so that I did not take up so much time planning. I found out in A2 that a thurror detailed research and planning is important as it effects how the final work comes out.

I feel that my production skills from AS to A2 have greatly improved. Using the HD cameras in A2 was my first time, so my main focus was following the rules of 360* and experimenting with different shot types to make my thriller look professional. However in A2 my skills advanced as I gained experience giving me more confidence with the cameras, I was able to experiment more and focus on what would make my music video look professional and sell my band. I was more creating using shallow focus, tilts and pans. I did not create a campaign for my thriller in As however in A2 for my band I create a full campaign, a website and digi pack to sell my band and their image.

My creativity skills advanced in A2 from AS. Post production stages in As was of course my first time using final cut, this software at first looked so scary and confusing, so I had to look into tutorials and play around with the different types of tools available, for example cropping, cutting, adding credits and effects such as bad tv. In A2 I was confident and able to use final cut to its full potential, I was able to beat edit, use slow-motion effects, manipulate sepia effects and colour grade my music video. In As I added a soundtrack that I created in garage band, as well as exploring with Foley. In A2 I added my bands song and synced it up with the video. In As I did not use this stage well enough as in A2. I only uploaded a final cut to YouTube and gained feedback using survey monkey however in A2 I uploaded a rough cut to YouTube to gain feedback on social network sites and used survey monkey, allowing me to gain many different types of feedback from other media students and my target audience. I was able to improve on my work and create a final cut, which was also uploaded to YouTube. I did not use Sur cameras at all in As however in A2 I was able to use these for my photo-shoot, so I could edit the pictures on Photoshop, my editing skills advanced much more as I got more creative and was able to edit my location shots to create my digi pack and website background. Also for my As and A2 I created evaluation for my work that I uploaded on YouTube, my evaluating skills because more detailed and thurror I was able to give detailed description of why I chose to do what I done and how I done it. I was more confident evaluating and used a variety of different creative techniques for example prezzies, voice overs to present my evaluation on my blog.

Overall I would say the transition over from As to A2 I was more confident in what I was going to do as past experience I learned a lot, my organistion skills grew, I was able to plan clearer and understand what I was actually going to make as well as time myself , so I had more time in making corrections, this all shined out on my final works.

Audience theories

How do post-modern media texts challenge traditional text-reader relations and the concept of representation?

Modernism an era before Postmodern, when people had faith and believe in structures as well as progress. As time went on people stated to go against and disbelieved in modernism. Social networking and gaming are very postmodern as they challenge modern texts as the audiences can now take control of these texts rather than having no control over a text. They react and rebel against modern times and boundaries are being broken between the audience and test.

Social networking such as Facebook needs to be controlled and used by members so it can exist, whereas a modern text will continue on no matter what. This breaks boundaries between audience and text as there is no belief in progress, so no new media texts can be made and no belief in structures, so the audience can now take over and have control to create and do what they wish, going against the Modern form of text and reader, users are able to create fluid identities and create a world that they are accepted in relating to Folcorts theory of fluid identities.

Gaming is now more advanced than in modern times, it is said that gaming is now created from ideas and intertexuality of films/shows, whereas modern text ideas came from books. It is said that people nowadays do not read as much as before, so therefore to create an interesting and exciting for game, creators bluer the boundaries between film/shows and gaming, so gamers feel they are in a movie/show that they can control. For example grand theft auto, call of duty, all have story lines and short films that allow the game to move on. This also relates to the theory of Inter textual references from the old as nothing is new, even games need references from the old to create something new.

This also breaks boundaries between user and text. Games however denies content from a user if they are playing it wrong, so they have to start again, this challenges traditional text as a book or a film would not deny content if the audience did not understand. This also relates to 15mm as the people need to play the games to suvive however if a game is not played it will not affect the persons life and their real life will continue. Players get so involved in the game that they lose control of real society and care for the game

Postmodern media text challenges representation as social networking has now become a way of life and the users ‘world’ as they are able to create a hyper real version of themselves a creation of how they want to be seen. This breaks boundaries between real and hyper real relating to Baudrillards theory of simulated and hype real of self.

Gaming allows the user to create multiple identities, relating to Folcorts theory of fluid identities, people can create different versions of themselves that they can controller and emirs themselves in the game as the avatar is a representation of them. This collapse the structure between real and hype, real lack of belief in progress and grand narratives. For example the Sims game players have full control of their avatars in their virtual world. Users get so involved in their world it becomes their life and a representation of themselves. As Jamason would say this is a representation of self as users base themselves on how they represent themselves in media text. This again comes back to the lack of belief in progress that people now emirs themselves in a simulated world they can control and progress in.

Gaming however has been around for years since the 1960's but they all have been platform games they have a structure that the player has to follow for example pac man has a plane structure that needs to be followed. So postmodern games go completely against these games as audeince now have control breaking the structures and boundaries.
In the future i predict that gaming will become more advance, where they start to interact with the senses.

These text both differ from Wreck it Ralph and 15mm as these are both modern texts, they have structure and boundaries however the audience can relate to them both and they have postmodern traits.