Evaluation

I have created my first experimental video. I have planned it, created it and exhibited it to the best of my ability. A lot of things went to plan, and a lot of things didn’t. For example, the editing, I believe, was faultless. But the final outcome was a bit of failure as the idea of the video was not successfully portrayed in the way that I had hoped. The idea of my video was to show a man walking up a set of stairs over and over again, the stairs was supposed to represent a problem, job or obstacle for the man to overcome. But he would keep reappearing at the bottom; this would represent the difficulty of the problem, with the fact that he has to keep on trying again and again. And then finally after persevering for a long time he finally achieves his goal by reaching the top of the stairs.

The idea behind my video was constantly missed which would suggest that it wasn’t projected properly. However there was one response that seemed to suit the video more than mine, this was that my video was based on the monotony of life, and was also commented that it would be suitable to be shown within an art gallery.

To improve my video I think that I should have made the person who was walking in my video to appear to get a lot more tired as he keeps walking to suggest that he isn’t even going back in time. He is in fact supposed to be transported back every time so that he has to keep on trying. And with his perseverance achieves his goal, which was the intended interpretation.

One comment that was constantly appearing in the feedback questionnaires was that it was boring. One way I could have changed this is to make this slightly more intriguing, possibly by making the man run up the stairs to start with and then towards the end have the man climbing up the stairs on his hands and knees to show how much of a challenge this really is.

All in all, I still think that the video was a success even though there were some inconvenient responses to it. I still believe that the video turned out well. And people still can relate to it even though it may be a different relation than the one intended.

MY EXHIBITION PLAN

The reason why i have chosen this space is because it is very close to the stairs and people who are walking up and down can see it and hopefully it should have some relevance to them.

3RD DIARY ENTRY

I have now shown my video to some people, not quite in the space that i would have liked to have shown it but where i did was just as good. And with these questionaires i have been able to create and finish my evaluation.

2ND DIARY ENTRY

On Friday the 13th I began editing my video and on Monday the 16th I finished the editing on my video, including adding a soundtrack and beginning titles and adding special effects for the transitions. All I need to do now is plan my exhibition and show it, the I will need to write an evaluation.

1ST DIARY ENTRY

On November the 10th at 2 o’clock rather than waiting for someone to help me by acting for me I decided to do it be myself. So I went and borrowed a video camera from Nicola and went into the stairwell that isn’t very often used. And I did my filming. I had one practice shot to see if the shot looked ok, which it did so, I made the camera start recording and I walked up and down the stairs plenty of times so that I could get enough footage for my film.

CHAPTER THREE

After watching a few films i have noticed that not all films have a narrative structure. Some of them have nothing close to a narrative whereas some will deliberately follow a narrative. Videos such as Landing Lights start and end in exactly the same way, just from a different camera angle. However Doll Face has a beginning middle and end, it also appears to apply Todorov's theory of three acts. The first act is the beginning, the equilibrium. The second is the middle, the disruption. And the third is the end, the restored equilibrium. Doll Face begins with a robot in a box, the equilibrium. Then a t.v. comes along and the robot wants to imitate the image, the disruption. And then eventually the robot breaks trying to reach the television, the restored equilibrium.
Art videos often don't have any narrative structures as the artists behind them would not have necessarily needed to follow a narrative, as most of the artworks would have got straight to the point, to reveal the artists impression straight away. This is because if a piece of video art was in a gallery, those in the gallery will not be in there just to watch one video, they will be there to see much more, so to see a whole video within the gallery will absorb peoples time as they wont want to hang around one place for too long as they would like to visit the rest of the gallery.

LANDING LIGHTS

Landing Lights by Graham Young. This experimental video is computer animated. It was inspired by the tragic events of 9/11. The craetors main concept behind this film was to create a scene as if it were a dream, although some may take the interpretation that it is a nightmare. The original intention was to create an "antidote to the prevailing politics of fear." The message i got from this film is that even though the plane continuously flies through the building without causing any damage, there is a moment when it knocks over a chair. Which could mean that not everything is invincible, not everything will escape unscathed.

CHAPTER TWO

Technology has evolved over the years and is still evolving rapidly. But how has technology changed the way in which films were made? In the beginning the only way of creating films was to simply film it with a camera and just have really long and non-edited pieces of film which was the extent of their capabilities back then , however nowadays there are so much more options such as stop frame and computer animation, SFX and all sorts of things that can be done whilst editing. All this has changed the technique and style of the way films are filmed, and has also radically changed the media industry itself by opening up thousands of jobs with each and every aspect within the media now.

ASTRONAUTS

Astronauts by Matthew Walker. In this eight minute long video you see two astronauts after losing a set of keys, return to space, then one of them sees a button which says "Do Not Press" and curiously presses this button. Only to later realise it has terrible consequences. After the consequernces have taken place the other crew mate appears to have a look of regret on his face and wishes he had not punished him. The concepts that i have recieved from this film, other than humourous one, is that sometimes the punishment does not fit the crime. The craft of this film is obviously computer animation.

CHAPTER ONE

There have been many experimental videos over the past few years. I am now going to compare three of them, to contrast the differences and similarities between past and present pieces. The three pieces that i have chosen to compare are, Girl Chewing Gum by John Smith, MUTO by BLU and Doll Face by Andy Huang.
In comparison to the other two Girl Chewing Gum (GCG) was created in the 1970s, whilst the other two were created within the last ten years. For something like GCG to be done in the 70s is quite a feat as having that technology then was very fortunate, as televisions had only become mainstream a few years ago with the Queens coronation in 1953. So this video was quite advanced, for its time, making the craft as important as the concept. Whereas the computer animation seen in Doll Face is quite common today so the craft behind this video is not as important as the concept. However in MUTO you can see the technology being used and the craft thats taking place. You can see the amount of effort that has had to be put in this video make it work, picture by picture, which makes this video have equal importance to the craft and the concepts.
Doll Face and GCG would seem to have similar concepts as the could both portray the mind as being easily fooled, whereas MUTO would seem more of an expression or evolution of the mind.

DOLL FACE

Doll Face - by Andy Huang. This is an animated experiental video of what appears to be a robot or machine trying to imitate an image shown to it by a television. As the robot keeps changing its image, the television keeps getting further away, until the television gets out of range and the robot reaches too far and falls and breaks whilst the TV goes snowy and remains out of reach. The concept behind this piece, in my opinion, is that the TV represents the progression of the media's representaion of beauty and the robot represents the public and all people who aspire to be that image.

CHAPTER SIX

An audience can have very different opinions or reactions to different pieces of art, some might feel shocked, some might feel humoured and some might feel inspired. They may also have different interpretations of the artwork, and some of which may not even be the interpretation that the artist intended, the artist would have only had one meaning or interpretation to portray and yet it will do so much more. These interpretations occur uniquely to everyone, there may be similar reactions however there may ones that are completely obscure, it depends on the individual. They may feel disgusted toward a piece of work because of the manor of which they were brought up, as they may have never seen an obscene piece of artwork, whereas someone who has a very keen interest in art and who has visit many art galleries will find it intriguing. An example of this is the piece of video art by Paul McCarthy in the Tate Modern called Material Gestures, where a man was wearing a mask and jumping around, naked with his genitalia tucked in behind his legs. This video could have two particular reponses, one of disgust and shock and the other one could be quite comical.

MUTO

MUTO by BLU. This is a wall painted animation that would have taken weeks or months to create with a very skilled artist who paints over paintings over and over again and then have a man with a camera who will take a picture of each one to make the image seem like its moving. The can be many concepts received from this experimental video, the particular one that i got was that it seemed to be one long idea showing evolution. This isn't the well known kind of human evolution fro apes to humans but this is all mainly human its just the evolution of intelligence, for example towards the end of the film there is an image of an intellectual head with mechanical legs like a spider. This could represent the evolution of technology or intellect throughout mankind. It would seem to begin with inhuman shapes and then eventually turns into a more humanoid figure, so this could very well be significant. Or not this is just my opinion there are many ways to read this piece, it could be to do with life and death and regeneration, this can be shown by the amount of times that one of the drawings of men would die and one would walk out of its stomach and then the same would happen to that one, so it would seem to be constantly regenerating. Unless it would mean never-ending life, but this would be cancelled out by the very last scene of a head being eaten by loads of ants leaving a skull for the final image kbefore fading out. So this could mean that human life can only keep reviving itself before it would eventually kill itself.

CHAPTER FIVE

My experimental video idea has changed very much since i was given this task, and i have mostly come up with difficult yet interesting ideas, however my latest idea is relatively simple. My idea is to keep the camera on a tripod, fixed at a set of stairs, preferably out side, in public to see one person keep walking up stairs and reappearing at the bottom and keep going up but to gradually slow down with tiredness, and then just as he appears to stop, he reaches the top. The concept behind this is to see someone struggling to progress until with great perseverance he can achieve his goal.

KOYAANISQATSI

Koyaanisqatsi - Directed by Godfrey Reggio. This is another experimental video, but this one is a one hour and twenty-three minute film which was created in 1982. This film does seem to have a few conceptual ideas. There are many representations of binary opposites, such as old and new, represented by the cave drawings at the beginning and the rocketship at the end. And there was some kind of emptiness represented by the Grand Canyon and the deserted buildings in contrast to the busy airport and cityscape. But as a storyline this may represent the evolution of mankind, and how we started off so peaceful and how we are now starting to over populate the planet. And it may also show what affect this is having on us as a species. As we desire and lust for further technology and intellect we may also be taking a step too far too quickly, this is portrayed through the scene of the rocket launch and the explosion which could represent the forces of nature holding the human species back.
The audio is all non-diegetic which unexpectedly sends completely different messages than diagetic messages would. The tempo and volume change to help emphasize what is on screen,for example the tempo increases when you see the buildings being demolished, which would help the audience realize the importance of that scene.

CHAPTER FOUR

How The Use Of Exhibition Space Creates Meaning.

When you walk into an art gallery you would automatically assume that all of the artworks are important and relevant to the world of art. But, if you were to remove those artworks and put them, for example, into a library or on the ceiling on top of a dentists chair, their relevance would instantly change. As people will go to a gallery just to view art whereas those who go to the library will just overlook such artworks as their primary intention is to look for and read books. So the beauty of the artwork is wasted.

Upon entering the Tate Modern, you are expecting everything you see will be delightful and fulfilling, in terms of art. Yet some of the artworks within the building is as amazing as you would expect, but there are some artworks that you feel that they don't deserve to be in such a gallery. These are the pieces the that could be done by anyone, and with no apparent meaning behind it, altough they all have a specific meaning behind them it just takes the right person in the right frame of mind to realise these. No matter what kind of lighting or space that these artworks are in, these will all seem very important because they are all in a major art gallery. Individually they will all have their own specific lighting and space requirements, one piece in particular relies on the lighting for the piece to make sense, this is Ishi's Light by Anish Kapoor (above) needs the light so that there is that column of light through the middle and wherever you stand the column of light will always be reflected with you in the middle. So this is how the exhibition space creates meaning.

GIRL CHEWING GUM

Girl Chewing Gum - Directed by John Smith. This experimental video was created in 1976. The video shows real life down a street for about ten minutes, however there is a voice over of what appears to be a director which turns out to be a man which is watching this video and voicing over in the style of a director. The voice over does not seem to be completely true, as some of the comments seem to be to farfetched to be real. For example he was able to predict the movement of two pidgeons, and every now and then adds a humourous comment. As he does not seem to be directing for real. he is able to change the context of some people's story's for example, a man was "going home" and another man had "robbed a post office". This video is also very conceptual as it can chage the idea of what the watcher is thinking as they will believe mostly whatever the 'Director' says until they realise that what is being said may not be all true.