Creative Media Analysis Task – Year9 2011

Factory from citrusink on Vimeo.

Animation – Factory

This animation, Factory was made by Miwa Matreyek around two years ago, in 2009. Some literal objects that can be seen in the animation are people, factories, buildings, smoke, tools, hands, scientists, airships, blender, machines and computers. These may be literal objects but some are displayed as something else like metaphors. For example, the large hand shown, that repetitively picks up things, can be a representation of machinery which picks up things like a hand does. Machinery is possible representation as machines are usually only given orders to do repetitive work. The first thing noticed when watching this animation was the smoke as the title, factory, lead one to think of pollution as today, being environmental and air pollution are well known to all ages. Afterwards it is recognized that the main focus is not about pollution but repetitive work and work that many have no interest of at all.

The facial expression on the people seems serious and just concentrating in getting the work done, for the sake of getting it done. In addition, the effect of it being black and white makes it even duller. All the shapes and images shown are very realistic, the straight and sharp edges suggests that it was cut out from maybe a magazine and made into something like a collage, stuck down flat but then there was the motion of the objects, which contradicts the notion. Many of the lines are straight bold and thin horizontal in motion that suggests stability and strength but also calming and peaceful as they just continue with their jobs quietly and individually.

It is difficult to tell the time of this animation as it is in black and white but since the beginning shows people entering the factory to start work it would seem like it was in the day as that is when most people start working but it is also possible that some factories start working in the dark at night. Then turning to look at the animation again, the colour of the background and sky shown is white and not black therefore, suggesting that it is in the day and not night.

The overall visual effect of the repetition gives the mood of boring work and the dullness gives the feeling that the people are not enjoying their work at all.

After surveying some people, some friends has suggested that it seemed very repetitive and they random. They are unable to come to a conclusion as to what is going on. Many family members have thought that it was really depressing in its own way and overall many were just confused as to what is going on and therefore, did not have much to say.

The black and white colours give the animation an overall effect of a peaceful, plain and repetitive life. The sounds are just as repetitive as the actions shown, its all mainly the sounds of machinery and metal sounds, tapping and anything that is shown, nothing too random. The sounds just go with what motions are shown which make it more realistic as opposed to it being just the images moving with no sound. The sound complements the motions of the images giving it more of an affect.

This animation gives one the image of how repetitive peoples everyday lives are and how many, despite disliking their job must continue with it as they have no choice, they need to earn money for a living but as children, children have a choice and should cherish it, to think over things carefully and thoroughly before making the choices that will affect their future forever. As they don’t want their lives to be black and white but filled with colours everyday, to be able to put a smile on their faces as they face a new day, to be alive and not be like a dead machine.

Assignment, Music Video - Finished

There was some problems in exporting my final project so I don't have it on the blog at the moment but I'm pretty satisfied with what I have handed in though I would have wanted to change some parts and like touch it up a bit if there was more time.

Throughout the process of the project I made many adjustments and changes to what was originally planned but it still displayed the original concept of men going to war and surviving.

The plan for a freezing heart worked out really well but it continued through to scene 2. I had some problems in making the hands look like they were shaking, so I gave up on the idea and went with another plan I had in mind of a lady reading a 'Call of Duty'kind of letter and then crying about it...Then the heart shows up on the background and starts to freeze up.

For scene 3 where the song goes 'you say that your leaving' I just have three motions of the soldier front, side, back showing him turning and leaving. Then the original plan for scene 3 is pushed forward just before the chorus starts.
So far, I beleive the changes made were better than the original plan.

The original plan for scene 4(chorus) was similar for the next scene and I think I didn't plan this scene very clearly, like it wasn't very definite. To tell the truth, after scenes 1,2 and 3 I didn't look at my story board for directions as to what I was going to be doing, so practically everything changed other than the definite plans I had in mind at the beginning of doing this assignment.

During the process of the first few scenes, I began to really want a collision scene for the chorus but was quite hesitant as I wasn't certain whether it would work out or not, like if I would be able to do it. Luckily, I was able to do it and it turned out to be really good, though I did have some problems and it took many attempts to get the movement of each foot right and have the soldier finally running.(more about this can be read in...)

After getting the soldier running I made a copy of it and flipped it so that it seemed like two soldiers colliding in a fight, at first when it was done it looked really odd as it was like two twin sodliers just like running against eachother and since the first few scenes all have a dark background, a sudden white background in the same mood didn't really fit in so I decided to switch the colours.

Unfortunately, not every part of the scene was changable but then I thought it was a pretty good idea to have it flashing black and white instead and so the unfortunate event turned out to be extremely fortunate as it turned out better than I thought.

I didn't really want to draw people suddenly falling as a whole group of soldiers run against eachother as I didn't think I had the time as I wasn't really progressing at a fast pace for all the scenes I want to be done. To show the same thing but in an easier way, it flashes just before the two soldiers collide. The flash here is not clear white like all the other flashes just before the chorus, nstead, the flash is slightly red to show blood, killing, war.

Afterwards there were colour flashes of red, white and black to show collision. White and black, opposites, so the two countries and red was the colour of bloodshed and war. After looking at the colour flashes, it kind of looked too simple and at the same time I wasn't sure if the audience would get the meaning of the flashes. To answer my questions, I went and got some opinions from friends and see if they understood what I was trying to portray and sadly as I feared it didn't really occur to them that it was blood.

After giving it some thought as to what shapes and forms blood can be represented in, I could only think of blotches of blood or just blood streaming down the screen. Blotches of blood was a bit like slow death and didn't really fit in, like it was more of an individuals slow death not really a whole heap of people. I went with the blood streaming down the screen and have the screen slowly be covered in red but I still kept the flashes of red, black and white to show the impact of collision and at the same time kind of make it that from the black background the flashes are mixing the colours around so it turning into a white background didn't seem too out of place.

In scene 5, it was meant to be a soldier lying on the floor and is struggling to stay alive/awake and then we zoom in on the face and he slowly closes his eyes. In the corner a pocket watch/locket appears, time ticks then fades and photos of family and friends show up one after another and during that time the soldier fades into background and the pocket watch/locket enlarges. when thats done the pocket watch/locket fades and the soldier appears again, close up on face and he slowly opens his eyes again. I would have been reallly REALLY happy if I could have done this but I wasnt able to find a reference or image of a side view from the floor of someones face or even better a soldiers face, so it was really difficult to imagine let alone draw it.

So sadly, I had to give up on the idea but the pocket watch/locket idea was kept, instead of a half dead/ nearly dieing soldier I had one that was tired from war and wants to go home and everything, takes out the pocket watch/locket and because he is tired and out of energy he drops it. As it is falling, it keeps turning and each time it comes around it shows a photo, it was meant to show family and friends but it kind of ended up as all being the soldiers so then it became kind of wierd.

Depending on how you interpret it, it could be soldiers brothers or like instead of reflecting what the soldier sees is 'reflects' what the family is looking at back at home ( lady at the beginning)as it is saying,'your face, i see, in every reflection'.
Inserting the photos and keeping the background the same and having the timing right took ages in this one as when the pocket watch turns to the back I have to colour it in but there are gaps everywhere so it took a while, in the end it took too long and I kind of just rushed it so there's some white bits in the whole thing. The photos was originally insterted only in the circle but then it was kind of hard to colour in the other parts to white and the corner of the photos would show up in some points so i ended up covering the whole pocket watch/lockets with the photo which didn't up so bad. Overall I think this scene was a bit rushed as up to this point I only had a few more days left till it was due.

Due to the fact that I was running out of time and luckily, was able to pick out a spot to cut and join it onto another part in the song so that it flowed well, scene 7 was cut off. The chorus after scene 6 was joined to the ending of the last chorus after scene 7. For this chorus instead of flashes of images of soldiers leaving, there are images of soldiers and people surviving the battle then on the last flash the images are repeated quickly one after another as a build up to the flash of the image of a hand reaching towards the light.

Finally, you see traced photos of soldiers coming home, as each tracing shows up it turns from a black background and white tracing to a white background and black tracing to show that they got out of the darkness and are now in the light. On the very last tracing the real photo slowly fades in over the tracing and finishes!

Though there are some parts that I'm not so happy about, I'm just glad that I was able to finish it up to this point as I would've been really disappointed if I wasn't able to make it in time and had to go with the plan of just cutting it off after the blood covereed the screen. Throughout this project, there were times of panic and times when it was annoying that the computer won't do as you want and times when you are sick of doing the same thing over and over again for each little slide/ section/ part, despite all this I had fun, I was able to explore it and experiment with it and I enjoyed this assignment very much as Jo and I shared opinions, tricks and helped eachother out at different points.

For this project, I did use quite a bit of holiday and weekend time to finish it but I didn't really mind since I enjoyed it and always looked forward to watching the whole thing when it's done. This project took longer than I expected but I think if I had like all the details clear as to what I was doing and stopped changing everyting it might've taken less time than it had but usually I'm a person that plans as I go, I can't have every single little thing planned all at once before I start as I wouldn't be able to think of all the ideas and know what I clearly need to do for every little part. Usually, I just have to do it. During the process of this project I aslo found that if you press 's' on animation ish it goes to the next slide and 'a' to go back. I also found that when you insert images into animation-ish you have to do it one at a time you can't just select it all and go 'insert' and I would suggest the person who made animation-ish to change that.

You can't select the same colour that you used last time as it resets everytime you open it again, so if you were in the middle of changing the colour of the object on every slide it's better to have it all done before you save and close it as the next time you open it you would need to find the colour again.

If I were to start the project again, I might have more of it planned but then that would take up a lot of time as I would keep changing my mind. I would probably try and do different scenes at different times though I think that how I just followed the scenes through and added them to the song as I go was a pretty good idea as I would know how long it would have to be and make adjustments before going onto the next scene and knowing what I need to do to the next scene for it to fit with the rest before I started was good.

Maybe try and have a partner next time? That might've taken off some time on my side and we would be able to do more. I wouldn't change my current ideas though, if I were to do this one again as I like it the way it is though for the second half I would change quite a bit of it.

Final Finished Project!