Introduction
The visual narrative unit has been one of the most challenging and fun units we have done so far. The unit challenges us to visually tell a story in many different mediums. We had to create presentations, audio productions, films, original writing, illustrations and music productions for this unit. For me this has been one of the most interesting and fun units.
Something I valued from the Visual Narrative project was how much my skills increased. I felt at the end of this unit my understanding of how a story is structured and how to tell an effective story that keeps an audience interested increased greatly. I also learned many new applications in digital media and increased my skills in Pro Tools, Adobe Audition and illustrator.
Story
For the story project we learned a lot about world building and creating characters in a flash fiction. A flash fiction is a very short narrative that still builds a plot and characters. For my flash fiction I spent a lot of time working on a story that I ultimately didn’t like and I pivoted and created a story I liked better. My inspiration for the story I ended up actually finishing was based on a scrapped idea I had for my narrative in film. This idea was the original idea I had pitched for my narrative but after long discussions we decided it wouldn’t work in a film medium.
For my audio version of my project I used Pro Tools. Pro Tools is the industry standard digital audio workstation. It allows you to create music and produce sound. I recorded audio into Pro Tools and mixed it in Pro Tools. I also added some sound effects at different points to make the audio more immersive. I valued creating the audio version because it allowed me to create more of a tangible world through sound effects and my tone of voice. I also created a small music composition for the intro and outro.
Illustrations
In the illustrations unit we learned how to use the Adobe application Illustrator. Illustrator is a powerful tool for digital illustrations and is very complicated. We spent a long time getting familiar with the many tools that illustrator provides. We then made a few projects using illustrator which were fun and pushed our creativity. The first major project we worked on was the exquisite corpse.
The exquisite corpse challenged us to work on a art piece collaboratively without communication. We each made a 3rd of a artwork and we were only allowed to share where our drawings were going to connect and nothing else. I ended up creating the middle and when for an industrial theme with pipes and wires. I really enjoyed how this project turned out and everyones different ideas made it really random.
The final illustrator project we were allowed to design anything with illustrator and have it put on something in real life. It took me a long time to decide what I wanted to do but eventually I decided on a nature themed mousepad. I decided on a sort of cartoony childlike style for my nature scene but I still wanted to put a lot of detail. I spent a long time drawing out the trees. When I finally made it into a mousepad I liked how it turned out.
Music
The Parody project challenged us through creating new lyrics to a song and also learning audio production and audio recording. For this project I chose Bad Habits by Steve Lacy as my song and changed the lyrics to fit a food theme. It was a fun experience making ridiculous lyrics for this project. Then we used the recording studio and learned how to record audio in a recording studio with Adobe Audition. After we recorded we mixed the audio with adobe audition.
Food Habits
I wish you knew I wanted food
Wanted Food
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
What food, ou what kind of food
Ate that food, coulda ate that food
If I knew id have no food
Is it too late to consume
I need more food, gotta go to habit
Kinda mad that that i didn’t take a sauce packet
Thought you to gross for me my dear
Never gave me spice or sweet my dear
It’s so good I can’t ignore
Reasons that I can get bored
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
Say to me
If you still wanna eat
I wiiiiish you would eat with me
I wanna eatttt
Can i eat your food like were at habit
Would you mind if i wanna take a bite at it
thought you were too gross for me my dear
Funny you come back to eat my dear
Its ok Ill eat my food
Don’t worry its not your food
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
I wish you knew, I wish you knew I wanted food
Film
My film visual narrative project was the most difficult school project I have undertaken. The amount of planning and work necessary for my group to be able to create what we did was immense. I had never spent that much time or effort on a project ever in school and while I am not necessarily proud of the result, I am proud of what my group learned and overcame. It was the first time I ever used a location far away. We had to drive a ways to get to our location and we didn’t have much time there because it was an active office building. This made filming really difficult and we learned a lot about time management and organization.
For the Griffiths pattern exercise we made an argument scene that ends in a small chase. To do this project we had to learn about Griffith pattern and film language. Griffiths pattern is a pattern of shots that is used in almost every film to set up scenes. Griffiths pattern starts with a wide shot which sets up the exterior of where the scene and the general location. In our groups case it was the exterior of freestyle. The next part of the pattern is the medium shot which the interior of the scene and where the scene will actually happen. For us it was the courtyard of freestyle. The final part of Griffiths pattern is the close up where you introduce your characters and their motivations and for ours we showed the two characters and their anger at each other. This project taught us basic film language like Griffith pattern which has been helpful for all of our films moving forward.
The Tension Scene was a project where we studied Alfred Hitchcocks method of creating Suspense in film. We created tension through the audience knowing something the characters do not. In our case it was knowing that the creepy horse mask person was lurking around the house. We built this tension throughout the film to make the film more engaging and keep the audience hooked for longer. Another part of how Alfred Hitchcock built suspense is that the bad thing can never happen to the character. We achieved this by having the characters run away and escape before they got caught.