Friday 18 November 2011

Kaleidoscope

These images are created solely on my phone with 3 apps. They allow me to apply many different effects; but at the same time it was challenging to achieve different results with the same tools.

Each of these has multiple effects applied, (I've tortured some with over 6,7 filters, hence the blurry quality) because I don't believe in good results at just one click. 


I was just taking picture of my grungy notes/notebooks/books...


Then moved onto other objects around me




And got a little carried away...


The rose/royal blue version is very dreamy, while the black and white is bolder with a solid black frame around it.

As you've probably noticed, I like to have pink-blue-purple, be them solid colours or gradients, in almost all my pictures. They are my favourite combination of colours and I think they go with everything.

That's possibly why I'm not very happy with the one below, that big orange blob in the corner totally killed it for me :|




I also played with shots of Mock The Week as it was on TV at that time. They were much more fun than still objects because you don't know what you'll actually capture!

6 finger Dara!

Not sure about the frame, but the line in the centre made it interesting
And some accidental strange results.

The one with Dara O'Brien reminds me of Constructivism posters and works of Rodchenko, especially the geometric lines and shapes.



But my favourite out of all has to be this - yes, because it's got pink and blue lights! And eye blinding turquoise! :D



Lastly it's my makeup bag, and from my point of view I think it looks like some kind of starry galaxy...no?


I may use some symmetrical designs in my projects as they are fun to look at and work with.

Friday 4 November 2011

Liverpool Trip



The Liverpool trip that took place during induction week was hectic but very interesting, as the museums we visited have a diverse range of arts in many different forms.


Our first stop was Another Place by Antony Gormley at Crosby beach, which was shown in UK for the first time. The sculptures were made from moulds of Gormley's body with cast iron. Each one was placed at different heights, so when the tides are high some figures may be drowned in the water.

It is pretty ironic (hmmm) that the figures are made of hard, solid iron while it's set to explore the relationship between man and nature - us human are so weak and unsteady when facing the nature.


We then head to the International Slavery Museum, which I found as depressing as the weather because people were treated in such awful ways. The African exhibition next to it was more colourful and upbeat.



Many of works exhibited in Tate Liverpool were intriguing, unfortunately I didn't note down their titles nor the artists...



This box of mirrors and basketballs in glass tank played with our perception of space using orinary objects, and I must say they were very effective!



I'm not always fond of Andy Warhol's colour palettes, but was very pleased to see the Campell's Soup and The Queen prints as they were so iconic and beautifully done. The vibrant pink and red were bold and catchy, which is exactly my impression of Pop Art.


Books in a glass wall sounds magical, but the actual scene is pretty violent, in my opinion.
And the lobster phone must have attracted many hungry visitor's attention...


This giant wall of text made me a little dizzy; the other wall next to it is for visitors to create their own poems with magnetic words (in a pretty script font :D).


I really like this photography piece with a man holding a paper saying I'm Desperate, while smiling to the camera. Another piece that caught my eye was pages of a passport, displayed flat in a frame, in a nice orange - purple gradient. It immediately reminds me of mine and instantly feel like I'm in the airport.



The Apple(?) sculpture with an interesting hole, and this set of absolutely huge table and chairs are the main works that inspired my postcard design. They are both blown-up versions of everyday things, and their sizes are exactly what made them surreal.


My drawing for the poastcard task was Snow White in Wonderland. It still consists of my favourite Alice in Wonderland theme and falling objects, like the giant chair and table, suspicious apple and Dali style clock.

(Surprisingly) it's not a graphics, aka CAD piece partly because I felt more comfortable to use pen and paper to put the idea down. I think I can take this idea further into more illustrations.

Wednesday 2 November 2011

Breathless, Inception, and Derren Brown

During the lecture on Wednesday 26th, we've seen a film dubbed the most important New Wave film, Breathless (À bout de souffle) by Jean-Luc Gordard. It was made in 1960 and frankly I hardly know anything about the period, therefore the whole viewing experience was based on what films are like in 2011.

The plot was: "A young car thief kills a policeman and tries to persuade a girl to hide in Italy with him." Then she betrayed him and the police killed him. After so many years of watching films, we have pretty much seen every possible storyline on-screen. A story so simple and straightforward seems a little...too simple.

Michel seemed to see women as objects ("Oh well they're dogs"); making stereotypical generalisations to countries and genders; he basically survived through stealing money from girls and robbing people, driving away someone else's car and then sell it. I don't think many people would have empaphised with him.

Being in black and white takes away a big fraction of visual interest from the start; the handheld camera shots are sometimes unsteady and most importantly, the editing - one scene jumping to another without any connection in-between.


Breathless (1960)

Later research showed these 'flaws' are in fact what made this film revolutionary - the low budget production ($50,000) shot its street scenes by placing its only cameraman in a wheelchair and pushed by Godard; the 'jump cut' technique was invented while Godard needed to cut down on the film's length; and the storyline was about modern life of that time instead of traditional tales. The film seems cliche because it was the pioneer in terms of film-making techniques and many others followed.

I haven't seen other films from this period so I can't make a comparison, but what I love the most about this film is the beautiful Patricia, her sharp and elegant dress sense and the bright streets of Paris.


Last week I watched Christopher Nolan's famous Inception for the very first time, because the more I read / heard about it, the more I feel that I need to be ready to get into the story, not just use it as a time killer.

There's enough interpretation of which is reality and which is dream; I dreamt about going through layers of dreams that night right after reading reviews. During the film I constantly remind myself which layer they are at, and was pretty sure I know which one is the real world - up until Cobb waking up on his plane seat.


Inception (2010)

Some say it's the confusion of not knowing which is reality, but what got me at this scene is the fear of
what we believe in is actually not real. And the spinning top at the end is like a question to this fear: will you choose to believe in it anyway? Similar scenario was also in Nolan's Memento (2000), where I had the same feeling toward the end of the film. Maybe in both cases the characters just carried on believing to make themselves feel a little better.

Interestingly, in Breathless Patricia also questioned her love for Michel - "I wanted to see you, to see if I'd want to see you."



After watching Derren Brown's The Experiment: The Gameshow on TV and catching up The Assasin online, aside from the argument of if they were staged or not, I was thrilled a person can be controlled to do something unconsciously to such an extend, like killing another person; as well as people's conscious, deliberate choice of behaviour.

While waiting for the next 'experiment', I started watching Trick or Treat, a 2008 series that I can remember seeing it at the time it was on, but for some reason never watched.

At the beginning of each episode, a member of the public is asked to choose one from two cards to determine the following events to be happened to them, but the ambigram on the cards means in fact they are not in control of their own fate. Whichever card they choose, it's up to Brown to decide whether it's a lovely experience or something out of their imagination.


Trick or Treat (2008)

They are all very memorable due to the surreal settings of the events; even ones who experienced tricks said they were delighted to have taken part. The one I like the most is where an old lady won second prize of a profesional poker game - has she learned Brown's observation techniques in 2 weeks? I have no idea, but it was so sweet to see her and her husband's happy smiles.

On the down side, everything is probably a big fat lie. On the plus side, we may as well just go with the flow and make the most of it.