#practical matters

I did this drawing from reference from @fun-o-physics again. RIP Practical Matters! 😂😂 

I hope everyone is enjoying the four fashion polls from the fashion archives. Each has 64 outfits, brilliant outfits that have gone already and unfair match-ups, but only one has a right answer.

The best thing Louis Tomlinson has worn this year is the Polari top: 

(photo from the LT fashion archive).

What is Polari?

Polari was a street language used by gay men in large cities pre 1967 (when sex between men was partially decriminalised).  It was a way of communicating hidden messages in plain site and identifying who was safe among people whose existence was criminalised.  There’s a short film in Polari and you can learn more by poking around the internet. It’s a really important example of culture created under oppression as a form of resistance.

Polari Clothing is using that history to create streetwear - calling itself ‘the language of the subversive’.  They have different Polari words on t-shirts and sweatshirts.  Their instagram is a celebration of gay culture. This year was the fiftieth anniversary of the partial decriminalisation of homosexuality - and Polari Clothing is part of the recognition and celebration of survival and resistance that that anniversary marked.

Why is it important that Louis is wearing Polari?

The peculiar history of Louis’ closet means that so many queer symbols aren’t available to him.  At this point, it’d be difficult for him to look at a rainbow flag without being outted. 

But Louis has long turned to much older gay culture to express himself.  You see it right back in 2011, when his response to Harry mentioning Eleanor was ‘How Very Dare You’.  You see it in the bears (as I have gone on about at great length). For a short while, Louis was consciously camp - describing himself as flamboyant and using the codes that previous generations of gay men had developed to communicate to each other who they were.  But soon that wasn’t open to him anymore - what had been a secret sub-culture had become too public too known. 

If you’d asked me if Louis could have worn a hoodie that said ‘Polari’ and remain closeted - I would have said no.  I would have thought that it’s the sort of thing that might trend and lead to tabloid articles.  Instead fan response was muted (so muted that it’s not even winning the fashion poll now!).  Louis knew better than I did.

Louis has done what generations of gay men before have done before him.  He has negotiated a way to be seen, despite the closet.

The Right Time to Write #amwriting #writetime

Refusing to write because we can’t do so at our favorite time of day or night is analogous to a child saying, “If I can’t have all the ice cream, I won’t have any at all.” And that is precisely what the right side of the brain will do, if we allow it. The right side of the brain never grows up, always wants instant gratification, and demands what it wants, whether it’s realistic or not. It’s…

Choosing Protagonists #solstein #writingcraft

“The novel in question had two protagonists, which is a bit like having two wives or two husbands. Can loyalty or affection be divided fairly? I strongly oppose having more than one protagonist because the reader’s emotions become diffused. If a writer has difficulty deciding who is the main character, he should ask himself which character’s experience is the stronger in this story, or which…

I am working on most of the particle effects that we will need in the project. This entails learning how the various systems work in whichever program(s) we finally chose to render out in.

Currently I've been working in Blender to create different types of smoke and fluid. This will expand to fire, sparks and other emitted particles that we may need. Another option is 3ds Max. I've had a look and it is not as simple as Blender, and so I've shied away from learning too much at the moment. Unlike Blender though, 3ds Max and Maya (though generally more used for animation) has plug-ins that are exactly what I'd like to use. However there is the issue with money. FumeFx and Krakatoa are both beautiful for what I'd need. They have been used in Avatar, Harry Potter, Thor, Green Lantern and more, to great effect.

The limitations with Blender is mostly knowledge, simulation and baking time, and rendering. This includes hardware, as the CPU or GPU can be used in calculating simulations and rendering in Cycles. The advantages to Blender (and I suppose Max) is that I can attach a render sequence to the background and then animate/create the particles to match, which is extremely important for realistic lighting for the smoke.

Mostly the concerns are to do with the simulation and rendering times, as every time you change one thing you have to re-simulate and render. This eats up a lot of time.

As for the rest of my duties, I will be using After Effects to create the HUD. As I've already done a test of this, I will be trying to finalise a look that matches with the overall design. No doubt I'll be working in Photoshop and possibly Illustrator to get it down.

As of completing this, we've discussed a switch to Unreal Engine 4. This creates a whole new set of questions in relation to effects and rendering, as well as compatibility. Which version are we going to settle on and will we update to any newer ones as they come out? A discussion for another time during our break.

References

https://www.afterworks.com/FumeFX/Overview.asp

http://www.autodesk.com/

http://www.blender.org/

This group project is one of many that I have worked on, as such I've done my best to find and keep a method of interaction and organisation that works well.

From the start we've been using Google Drive to store our work, creating different folders and keeping to a file structure that doesn't cause confusion and is easy to use. At the end of our 5th trimester, our own accounts are quite full. We are only allocated 15GB, as such I'll be creating a new account just for this project so we have a fresh amount.

Generally, as well live in separate areas, we communicate by email and Google Hangouts (an extension or app on your browser and smart phone). I like to use Skype for audio meetings, but we've used Hangouts for this as well, as it has more features. Of course I've had some issues with sound and being disconnected as my work computer only uses WiFi at the moment (cable is an issue currently). We've had a discussion and for the second half of the project will be switching to Slack, as it has a better messaging system than Hangouts.

Communication is almost every day, in person or via chat, so if we've had a problem we want to discuss or show what we're working on, there is no issue. I think that we could probably work on the schedule a bit more though.

All in all, we've managed to work well with what we currently use, though there are going to be some changes to our workflow. Hopefully they will make things easier with no detrimental impact on the final product.

References

http://drive.google.com

www.gmail.com