Assignment 3 Reflection, Reference List and After Effects Techniques

ASSIGNMENT 3 REFLECTION

Music Track Choice

I chose Kraftwerk’s ‘Das Model’ for this assignment because it sounded more unique than the other tracks. It was quirky in a way and I liked that. The music created a world in my mind – a digital world, an imaginary place where Moebius, the legendary sci-fi artist, would live in. Hence, the other reason why I chose it was because ideas started pouring out of my head from the get-go.

Visual Identity, Style and Symbols

To find an appropriate visual identity for the video, I researched Kraftwerk’s existing visual landscape. I found that Kraftwerk’s electronica informs the design of all aspects of its brand identity: it is minimalistic, repetitive, futuristic and slightly bizzare. I also discovered that Kraftwerk is known as a forerunner of contemporary electronic music. Its fans grew up in the seventies and eighties.

Taking all the above into consideration, I decided that my video’s visual look will borrow from the iconography of 8-bit video games. The classic video game look would be familiar to Kraftwerk’s early fans; it would let me design a world that was digital, futuristic and, at the same time, offbeat.

Plenty of 8-bit visual devices and symbols are available today thanks to decades of 8-bit gaming. I found a few samples and plonked them onto my moodboard. My main character follows the grid-designed, angular and two-dimensional avatar look symbolic of games of that era. The bright, saturated, complementary hues of the character and different settings and props, as well as their design, reflects the classic video game look – albeit more contemporary. The typefaces used supports the digital, eighties, 8-bit tone and manner.

Composition and Motion

I composed the elements or forms in my scenes with asymmetrical balance in mind. Composition of key frames was done in Photoshop and then transferred to After Effects. I tried to make as little use of three-dimensional perspective as possible in keeping with the two-dimensional 8-bit world. In line with the linear movement of 8-bit video game icons, animated elements including my central character weren’t eased in or out. I made certain scenes to look like actual retro video gameplay: especially the one where he ‘flies’ through the city avoiding the concrete towers.

What I Would Do Differently

I had to tweak the ending of my video because I did not time my sequences well enough; I got to the end of the track too soon. In my original ending as per storyboard, the protagonist will happy with just the way he looks upon leaving the booth, wake up the next day and feel dissatisfied again. I would also use fewer props/elements in the scene where he finds the booth. I find it too cluttered.

REFERENCE LIST FOR ASSIGNMENT 3

All images used to create the graphics and backgrounds in this video clip had Creative Commons Share-Alike licenses and were sourced from Flickr.com

• flickr.com/photos/mnadi/34012604
• flickr.com/photos/scrapstothefuture/134266194
• flickr.com/photos/mightymightymatze/268758544
• flickr.com/photos/seier/2263988203
• flickr.com/photos/vernhart/1283676797
• flickr.com/photos/yewenyi/2144911926
• flickr.com/photos/flyingturtle/1641610496
• flickr.com/photos/jamesjordan/2448899898
• flickr.com/photos/kaleidosopicpsyche/2174781610
• flickr.com/photos/monkeygirl76/2414924504
• flickr.com/photos/polandeze/493818086
• flickr.com/photos/rileyroxx/224651031
• flickr.com-photos-darwinbell-2459821251
• flickr.com/photos/dacotahsgirl/512831513
• flickr.com/photos/ekosystem/2427517016
• flickr.com/photos/lnx/6783900
• flickr.com/photos/satosugar/56278966
• flickr.com/photos/splorp/42799621
• flickr.com/photos/striatic/6925134
• flickr.com/photos/zhent/574472488

AFTER EFFECTS TECHNIQUES

• Additional layers of graphics and text were added to the Photoshop-composed layers.
• Colours of layers and elements therein were corrected using Colour Correction.
• Glow was added to the protagonist’s 8-bit body as well as other 8-bit objects.
• Layers were positioned close to each other to give the video a “flat” or 2D look.
• Camera was employed in scenes where the protagonist moved in 3D space.
• Masking technique proved useful when I wanted to animate objects through layers (like the sun rising outside the window in the opening scene).
• To synchronise the ‘Das Modeller’ text’s radial blur effect with the music beat, I converted the track’s waveform into keyframes and then linked the effect’s expression to the keyframes.
• The exclamation mark that flew in and circled over the character’s head was an instance of kinetic type created by manipulating its x,y, and z properties.
• A video transition effect tiled the final scene into place where I credited the track to Kraftwerk.

Week 10 > Moodboard and Stylised Video Clip

Mood Board

As you can see below, my mood board comprises stuff from the 1950’s. American 50’s, particularly. It was a very optimistic time, World War II was over and done with, the baby boomers were making babies. Elvis was rocking, Marilyn and Marlon Brando were stars. The first satellite, the Russian Sputnik, was launched successfully. The women of the decade wore stiletto heels, gloves that reached their elbows, and fancy hats like berets. The men wore denim jeans — which became fashionable at that time, had their hair done a la Elvis, and drove huge cars.

Stylised Video Clip

After my mood board was done, I watched the Duck and Cover movie clip. Then I realised my mood board’s style was similar to the clip’s — which was shot in the 50’s. I didn’t want to augment the clip with visual components from my mood board because it was pointless fusing it with graphics from the same decade. It wouldn’t stand out.

So I decided to make my Week 10 pastiche clip a dark parody of U.S. military confidence. I found the Duck and Cover section of video I wanted, clipped it, and deleted the sound. Then, I scoured the Web for special effects and audio clips. I found a nice short recording of Eleanor Roosevelt (you hear her at the beginning of the video) and some Rambo and Alien movie voice samples. In addition, I found sound effects of ‘aoogah horns’, explosions, jet planes flying past, and air-to-ground missiles blasting targets. Perfect.

After mixing the elements into my Duck and Cover redux, I altered the hue and saturation of the video clip to make it greenish, added an old TV effect, as well as sped up the overall clip by some 25%. I also sped up Eleanor and Rambo’s audio to get them sounding Chipmunk-like. For good measure, I added light flashes a split second before the bombs went off in the video.

To watch ‘An Unconquerable People’, click here: http://vimeo.com/1864818