introduction
In our second unit at Freestyle, we were asked how we can tell a story visually well. I was able to answer it in my own way through Film, Digital Media and English. In film, Jordan and I made a narrative film of our choosing. In Digital Media – which was connected with English – we had to create a short story, audio production of that story, and cover art. For all theses projects, we used professional equipment like Adobe Premiere Pro, Pro tools, tripods with cameras, and Adobe Illustrator. We also had to use CSS to help us code and customize our websites!
This unit taught me about how to manage my time since I am such a bad time manager. It really kept me on my toes. I had to stay organized so I could get everything done within the right time frame, especially in my elective class, Film. I also had to learn how to not be offended when getting constructive criticism. This unit also allowed me to open my eyes to more unique ways of storytelling and working together as a group to write something. Overall, I really enjoyed the Narrative unit and I’ll use these new skills in future projects for whatever I choose to create.
Story
In our English class, our assignment was to write a 1000 words or less flash fiction piece of our choice. At first, we just started by reading short stories by various authors. The most memorable one was “Metamorphosis” by Franz Kafka. Together as a class, we pulled apart the story to find hidden and/or deeper meaning of the stories and messages the author was trying to convey. Once we had done that, we started on our own stories by doing character building and thinking about the different sections of a story, like the rising action, climax, and falling action.
My inspiration for my flash fiction was my own characters, Alcides and Elaricus. Both of these characters are from my own world, in Ancient Greece. The two characters’ story is about Alcides’ arranged marriage and his struggle to come to terms with the fact that he might not always be able to stand by his emperor’s side forever. Of course, there is more to the story, but I couldn’t go past the word limit or else I would have made a whole short story that was more than a few pages. This project also showed me to explore more in depth about my own characters, since when I usually write characters, they aren’t really written with deep stories embedded into their lives. But with Alcides, I was able to deep-dive into his thought process and emotions.
After drafting and finalizing the written story, our Digital Media class assigned us to create an audio production using a program called Pro Tools. The requirement was to read the story and add six different sound effects to allow the listener to feel like they are really deep into reenacting the story where it takes place. By using Pro Tools, I was able to experience what it was like to edit audio and put in sound like a professional editor on a real life project.
The declaration was made two days ago. The joining of two cities in Great Greece was now official. It was a bitter feeling in Alcides’ chest. He wore an ugly and twisted scowl on his scarred face, His one milky white eye narrowing. He stomped through the city grounds, with heavy footfalls kicking up dust as he shouldered his way past groups of people who shot glares ranging from irritation to pure hostility as he passed. The city was vast, the marble temples and stone buildings towering as the sun’s rays reflected off fountain water.
Alcides brooded in his miserable thoughts, bronze armor wrapped snugly around bulky body as he haphazardly tugged at the gold rings in his long graying dreadlocks. Now, only in a few hours, the marriage was going to commence and he was completely unwilling to go with it. He was a bodyguard for Hades’ sake. not just some lowly man who is willing to molded into a husband.
With the wind whistling through the air around him, he was finally calm enough to look back at the looming palace in the distance, the walls tall enough to block out the sun, creating a large shadow that swallowed most of the area. After a few more moments of silence as he stood in the middle of the streets surrounded by hundreds of citizens, he finally turned on his heel and marched back, his jaw clenched as his remaining hand rubbed against the small amount of stubble on his chin.
It didn’t take Alcides long to return to the palace, where servants scrambled to prepare the special day and the aroma of honey tarts and fruit cakes permeated the air. The thought alone made Alcides’ blood boil, his calm demeanor once again replaced with sour expression.
Why couldn’t things just go his way?
He never agreed to such an arrangement, practically had no knowledge of what he was meant to do. He reached the large double doors of the emperor’s quarters, pushing them open. He was met with the tall figure of a man, a deep purple toga wrapped around his large frame. Alcides stood there stiffly, his jaw clenching slightly as he felt his heart rate increase by a few beats. After a few more moments of silence, he finally spoke, his voice taking on a bitter tone.
“Why can’t you call it off?”
Alcides watched as Emperor Elaricus finally turned, his graying blond hair resting on his shoulders as his sunken eyes met the restless bodyguard.
“It would be unwise, Alcides,” The tired Emperor shook his head. “Do you not know the consequences of refusal?”
Alcides frowned, jaw tight, feeling his muscles grow taut with tension. “But I want to stay-”
Before he could finish his sentence, Elaricus suddenly cut him off, waving his bony hand with an exhausted sigh. “Enough! You will marry the princess. I cannot argue with you. Not now. Not ever. Stop being a child, Alcides.” Elaricus’ gaze hardened. “Flying too close to the sun will be your downfall. What you want is irrelevant. It’s your duty.” And as if to sear this message deep, the emperor’s voice dropped to a whisper. “For my sake, and yours.” With that, the older man turned back to the window, a clear cue for Alcides to leave.
Acides’ jaw set and his fists clenched. Being compared to the foolish Icarus stung more than he would admit. His dark eyes fix on the back of Elaricus’ head before spinning on his heel, his usual heavy footsteps were much more resounding, his armor feeling uncomfortably hot and heavy on his body.
The sun was high in the sky by now, almost ready to descend once more.The wedding was underway, visitors from different cities piling in for such an auspicious occasion.
It was teeming with people, some wearing expensive silk tunics while others wore common togas, signifying their wealth or lack thereof. Alcides stood in the middle of the crowds, his usual heavy armor replaced by a silk tunic, his dark dreadlocks tied back off his face. His eyes wandered to the open window as if lost in thought. His gaze unconsciously drifted up to watch the sun. Its rays were almost blinding, burning. Alcides felt an uncomfortable tightness in his chest when he turned away, the sun burning into his back, between his shoulder blades.
Crowds parted as the princess entered the room, her dark curls falling down her back, her blue stola and palla wrapped around her lithe body. Her expression was stoic, her footfalls quiet as she approached Alcides. She smiled.
Alcides could only manage to grimace.
He glanced at the Emperor, who stood on a dais, watching the groups of people mingle. The wedding proceeded smoothly, laughter ringing out. Alcides, even as mind wandered, took the princess’ hand, guiding her as they preformed gamos, offering sacrifices to the goddesses for blessings and protection. They feasted, communicating with the princess’ father then showered with gifts from the guests.
The sun began to set, seeming to burn into Alcides more by the minutes that passed by. As the sun set over the horizon of mountains, it was time to take his bride to bed.
Alcides still held the princess’ hand as he noted what seemed to be a spark of apprehension and…guilt in the princess’ eyes. He gave her an unreadable look before shooting a vexed expression to the young woman’s father, who, in turn, just smiled crookedly. That old snake.
Alcides narrowed his eyes. The air seemed to burn with heat the more Alcides glared at the older man. In the coner of his eye, he glanced at the princess, who had involuntarily tightened her grip on his hand.
Alcides remained silent for a long moment, his senses tingling with unease.
And before he could even process anything, there was a shrill scream and flames suddenly roared to life, licking against decor, the food, the people.
Alcides let himself be pulled away, his face still frozen in shock the world suddenly faded away.
During this project, I improved technically because I learned a valuable new skill. I had never edited something like this before. I learned how to create an audio book with sound effects and some music. With these new skills, I will be able to create and edit live audio for future projects.
Some struggles I encountered during production was reading the flash fiction out loud. I kept messing up on sentences and having to restart, but I still managed to finish despite the struggles. I also struggled with some of the sound effects because I was unsure how to lower the sound for the longest time, but then I with my friend’s help, I figured it out.
Something I would change would be to have someone else read the dialogue of the people in the story. That way, I wouldn’t have to make my voice sound different and lower than usual since I’m not that talented at switching my vocal tone. Another thing I would possibly change would be adding more music throughout the story and not just at the beginning.
Something I’m most proud of is the whole story in general, because I love writing about the two characters, Alcides and Elaricus. My strength is writing about my own characters.
While doing this project, I developed an appreciation for audio book readers, as well as voice overs in other medias. Editing and making sure everything actually sounds good enough for an audience is hard. I really applaud people who do things like this for a living.
Illustrations
This was our one collaborative art pieces called an Exquisite Corpse. We had to use Adobe Illustrator for this project. For my part (the third drawing), I really wasn’t sure what I wanted to draw since I was a bit anxious about whether the drawing would look okay with the other people’s art. But in the end, I think it worked pretty well. As for the whole unit, our goal was mostly to understand how to correctly use Adobe Illustrator and apply the skills that we learned from our exercises on other graphics. I think my skills improved a lot with this exercise.
Our last project in this unit was of our own choosing. We had many options, but I chose to do stickers. The stickers were of my own characters, as well as a friend’s, since we enjoy collaborating and creating stories and original characters together. Each sticker was made on Adobe Illustrator and painstakingly drawn with the mouse since at the time, I wasn’t sure how to use the pen. When it was finished, Mr. Flo put the drawings on sticker paper and each one was cut out precisely by the outline – which was made separately in the process.
For this project, it took me a while to decide which sketches I liked and if I had the time to do it. Each one of these characters had a specific color palette and personality. While coloring each sticker, it was hard for me to tell if the colors were correct. But in the end, I was satisfied enough with the colors.
Each drawing of the character was created to ensure that their personality shone in the best way possible. The green haired one is called Rui (short for Ruilin) and they are a sassy and a needy type of person. The other character personalities are quite obvious: one is irritated and the other seems kind and gentle.
Music
Music was another part of this unit where we used the program Pro Tools as well, but specifically the MIDI which allowed us to use instruments without having any experience playing. We used a keyboard to experiment with the music and all the different instruments.
For my process, I was not entirely sure what kind of song I wanted, so it was basically trial and error for me. I did want it to be simple, so I just added in random notes as the song went on. We had a choice between one full song or five interstitial. I chose to do a song because it seemed like the most enjoyable one to do. And I thought I could just keep trying at it since I’d never made music until now!
You can hear it below.
Title: Surge
In this project, my first inspiration was to create some sort of lullaby, but struggled a bit to find the right beat and the tune and whether I wanted it to be major or minor. So, instead, I ditched that idea and just focused on basic things like trying to match each beat with the new note or chord. Then I added a few more instruments, some drums, and strings more towards the end of the song.
I am proud of is the final result. It was my first time making music with Pro Tool and it was quite a difficult experience. But, I’d also really enjoyed making the bass rhythm, even If I wasn’t always satisfied with the results.
Something I valued learning with these virtual instruments was that I really got to test my music skills and how well I could keep the beat of the song constant (which I was unable to do a some points), but I was still able to have lots of fun in letting my imagination run wild since it was only an experiment.
Film
This was our first activity during this unit and it was called Griffiths Pattern. A pattern that is common in almost every movie that exists. It’s a technique to show different emotions towards different scenes.
This was our second assignment, the Suspense Scene. Though it wasn’t really that good since our team was still inexperienced and I was a bit embarrassed to be the MC in that scene. And when we showed it to the class, it was a bit awkward at first because I knew that our technique was not the greatest. But I knew we could always improve with the next one.
This was our third assignment, the Chase Scene. Personally, when I first edited it, I thought it looked pretty cool, but once I got feedback I was able to see my work in a different light and I was able to think of ways I could improve on the next one.
This was the beginning of our Narrative film and shows our plan for the narrative. During the process of creating and finalizing it, we went through many different drafts. The film started off as two sisters and their struggles, but the final film ended up being about a new cat owner who doesn’t know how to take care of a cat.
I think our final result was really well made. I enjoyed working with Jordan on this project and he was a really good partner. Although the star of the shoot, Fergus (the cat) was a bit difficult, we were able to bribe him with food and lots of pats. Working with Jordan really made it easier since he was so organized and on top of it all. There was always a plan and we got things done fast.