Let the Plant Decide

What was your biggest take-away from this piece? :

The biggest thing I learned from working on this piece was that filming was considerably harder than I had expected. In order to set up the shots, working on cuts, and takes led to considerably more time and discipline than I had initially though. We ran into issues with sound and setting as well as trying to get our takes. This came in the form of line memorization cause it was very difficult for us because we had so much dialogue. Trying to fill the time with constant vocals was probably not the best idea as it made editing considerably more difficult. So my main take-a-away would be to not be afraid of pauses, I can allow the story to speak for itself.

What were you trying to say with this piece? :

The purpose of the piece was to be a funny take on informercials, with a completely ridiculous product. The goal was to make it seem like Marco was a crazy person selling an imaginary product in his basement. The initial goal was to create a humorous project resulting in an informercial for a product, but I think we lost of this by trying to force the humor.

Overall -- How was your process? :

The process was interesting, it was very difficult working with multiple people with differing schedules. We were struggling a lot with the flow of the piece and editing. I think the idea behind the informercial was good but we lacked on execution. 

Me and Sean created an intro track to a podcast. I envisioned it as a the “next week on …” section of a show where they tease the upcoming episode.

We focused on trying to capture the different points of the story arc.

I used the following songs for the different parts of the arc(one problem I had was I couldn’t figure out how to fade in the music properly which is pretty clearly heard). :

Better Days - BenSound.com

Harbinger of Doom - Purple Planet

Trepidation - Purple Planet

Chimera - Purple Planet

Day Break - Purple Planet

The sounds we recorded include:

We felt with these sounds we would be able to capture the aspects that stuck out to us about the story. We felt that the story had a very creepy vibe to it which made me interested in taking the podcast route for the piece. If I was to take this piece and create the whole podcast, I would go about it by first reading the piece and then having a discussion between me and Sean about our thoughts.

https://soundcloud.com/sharif-hadidi-1/bloodchild-mixdown

We divided up the tracks based on where we felt they worked best. I tried to add a bit of a twilight zone vibe with Sean speaking the intro. For the next segment we covered part of the families interactions with T’Gotoi. I included me reciting the lines from the story. building up the suspense as we move towards the climax of the story, which I viewed as beginning right after Gan has the argument with his brother. That incident led to Gan deciding to confront T’Gotoi, which I saw as the climax. We achieve the resolution when Gan realizes that the relationship is something he wants to keep for himself and his true feelings come out again.

Passing Strangers

Passing Strangers by Pejk Malinovski is a walk through the historical significance of the East Village with Poets throughout the years. The walk was very enjoyable(even though some of the landmarks were either closed/under construction when I went) and gave me an insight on the significance of the East Village. 

During the walk we are introduced to the historical landmarks of the East Village starting with St. Marks Church and ending with the Bowery Poetry Club. Throughout the walk you learn about the famous poets who have lived in the East Village throughout the years, and the history of the neighborhoods and how they have changed. It was interesting to see how things have changed both in terms of the buildings and in terms of the population of the neighborhoods.

While traveling down Avenue C they described how the neighborhood had been predominately Orthodox Jewish people but had a growing Puerto Rican community growing. Now they Avenue is filled with restaurants and stores for the new white residence of the neighborhood. While walking I felt as though the East Village has been losing some of it’s culture as time has gone on. With the changes to the neighborhood taking away from the past and altering the beauty.

I really enjoyed the story of the walk with the different stories of different poets all being tied together through their shared history of the East Village. I noticed that there was a lot of change happening with new buildings being put up and the harsh contrast of old buildings standing near new modern buildings(seen at 27 Cooper Sq). While there is all this change there is also a sense that history has its place within the East Village as you can tell with places such as La Palapa who hang a plaque letting passers by know that Auden had lived there.

Overall I would say that the experience was one that I will truly cherish as I had lived in the East Village for a short time, and while I had lived there I hadn’t really enjoyed it. After doing the Passing Strangers walk though I have gained a new sense of appreciation for the history and the story as well as the culture that is the East Village.

Bloodchild

Octavia Bulter’s short story Bloodchild was an interesting read to say the least. My first reaction to the story was that of confusion as to what was going on. With the conversations revolving around the interaction of a family on an alien reservation, having conversations very casually with what I viewed as their captor. It was only when the story continued that you see that the Alien is actually part of their family having first interacting with the father who is no longer alive, and actually being the one that introduced the mother, Lein, to the father.

T’Gotoi’s relationship with the family and especially with Gan makes you wonder if there is really a love between the family or if there is hostility. Lein, seems untrusting of T’Gotoi’s relationship with Gan even going as far as to say “He’s still mine, you know”. This was our first interaction between the Alien and her family host that shows you that while they are all a family there is more to the story that we initially thought. Gan’s older brother has a distrust of all the aliens insisting that they are nothing but livestock to the Aliens, that they are only there in order to allow the aliens to continue breeding. It is with his admission to Gan, after he had witnessed the birthing of the infant aliens by ripping them from the flesh of a terran who stumbled upon their home, that Gan’s brother explains his fear and hatred towards the aliens.

This causes Gan to speculate if all he has believed his whole life has been a lie. Gan confronts T’Gotoi about his concerns, to which she informs him of the history of the relationship between the terran and the Tlic. The mutually beneficial relationship between them, while not idea at all times serves a purpose. T’Gotoi ensures Gan that she will not force him to partake in something that he doesn’t want to do and has him choose. He initially chooses not to be a host, but rather to give up his sister for the role as she has always wanted it. T’Gotoi agrees and informs him that that evening will be the act of placing the eggs. Gan reconsiders after realizing that he would want to have the bond with T’Gotoi and that he truly does love her and it wasn’t a forced relationship.

I truly enjoyed the story, while at first I was confused by the description of what was happening and the appearance of the aliens. It was only after the characters were developed and the story reached its climax with the harvesting and the fight between Gan and his brother that I was truly enveloped into the story. It created a world that I felt I was apart of with vivid descriptions and characters you felt for.

Remixes

The topic of remixes and originality is something that is very important to be as I feel that the way that we discuss music and art is in the topic of intellectual property. I feel as though this is not the case when it comes to art, and creativity. The speaker spoke about Bob Dylan and his unintentional use of another artists melody as an example of how some say that he stole some of his songs. I heavily disagree with this stance, I feel and have always felt that art is an expression of ones self, and when an artist uses a melody from another artist but changes surrounding aspects of the songs it creates something different. For example:

https://youtu.be/RKWb9MGtVmw?t=24

Chedda Da Connect’s - Flicka Da Wrist

https://youtu.be/ZB79v7D4LiE?t=107

Tory Lanez’s - To D.R.E.A.M.

Both of these artists use the line “look at the flick of da wrist”, while I view this line as something that belongs to Chedda Da Connect, Tory Lanez changed the delivery the line and the beat of the song is different enough to consider it original. I feel that art is influenced by our experiences and interactions with a particular medium. When an artist uses the work of another artist completely without changing it or giving credit to the original artist I believe that is really the only time in which art is stolen.

If an artist alters something even minimally it is still not the same as the original piece and has become something different. The question comes, where do we draw this line, and what constitutes enough change for something to become original. Another example I wanted to share is Cheif Keef’s I Don’t Like and Kanye West’s I Don’t Like. The original song was produced by Young Chop a producer from Chicago and he created the song for a young fairly unknown artist from Chicago. Kanye heard the song and decided to “remix” the song where he kept much of the beat but altered it slightly and added the vocals of his label mates. Kanye credited the beat to Young Chop, but Young Chop exposed the fact that Kanye had altered his beat adding drums and snares that had not existed in the original version. I would ask while no one would attribute the beat to Kanye West the song has a now Kanye-esque feel to it with his signature drums added. Would this be considered stealing?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6g5ZF6DUrHI

Chief Keef’s Version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSJoDuU328k

Kanye’s Version

Side Note-

The talk about the remix reminded me of a documentary about the artist girl talk and how the remix had been effectively killed by labels which hurts artists who are trying to create something new within the world.

https://vimeo.com/8040182

Briana Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. The phrases spoken in this video correlated with the images that were flashed on the screen.

What is your overall impression of the piece? It definitely gave me this feeling of defining one's self-image. It was empowering.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. One thing that could potentially make this piece better would be to use higher-quality images. Other than that I think it was quite successful.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I like that you only used 3 or 4 main phrases that were reiterated over and over.

Alicia Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video.

There was definitely an interesting "primal" feeling created by the sound and images together. (Choosing to combine human and beast.)

What is your overall impression of the piece? Very eerie, but very well done and professional-looking.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Can't think of anything.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. The title fits the piece very well and gives a better sense of the meaning behind the piece.

Chelsea H. Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. Interesting "sound wave" effect created with all of the different circles correlating to separate sounds.

What is your overall impression of the piece? Very interesting and well-composed. Controlled chaos.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Maybe think about adding color? (The beginning of Jamie's piece addressed this well.)

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. The small circle that moves across the bottom really helps to tie down the chaos that you create.

 Kat Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. There is a juxtaposition of beauty in the video vs. ugly in the sounds.

What is your overall impression of the piece? It almost reminds me of a propaganda piece? It's probably because of the sounds that you used but I don't really know.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Think about getting rid of the music at the beginning and end, I don't think that it's all that necessary, especially for this video since it's supposed to rely on sounds.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I enjoyed the juxtaposition that you created between the fields of flowers and the sounds of coughing and war.

 Megan Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. The sound relates to the video, although it does not sync.

What is your overall impression of the piece? It's a compilation of stereotypical breakups that happen in films.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Can't think of anything, I really enjoyed this video!

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I think that the jumbling of the dialogue and videos was successful. Even though the audio didn't match the video, your message was still incredibly clear.

Patrick  Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. The sound is generated directly from the video.

What is your overall impression of the piece? It was very random. Although there was no real "story", I think the repetition and breaking up of the audio worked well.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. The only thing that was bothering me was the pixelation on one of the clips, which is probably completely out of your control.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. As I said, I think that the repetition and looping of the clips worked well.

 Ben Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. The sound definitely related more to the clips of explosions, but the juxtaposition of the menacing video and audio with the clips of children playing at the beach was very interesting.

What is your overall impression of the piece? It was very retro, and came off as very menacing and eerie, with just a pinch of child-predator. :)

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Can't think of anything.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I really enjoyed the look of this piece, the footage that you used was great.

 Chloe Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. There were two main parts to this piece: the clip of Forrest on the bench and the clip of his mother. The first clip matches the audio but the second does not.

What is your overall impression of the piece? It was very funny!

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Perhaps altering some of the clips for better "comedic timing"?

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. It's funny, and the sound clips are very easy to recognize.

 Chelsea M. Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. A "soundtrack" is created that the video matches up with.

What is your overall impression of the piece? I really enjoyed this piece, I like that you had one continuous shot.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Perhaps reworking some aspects of the song where it gets a bit garbled?

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I think that the song you created was very well done.

 Brandon Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. The sound effects match up with what is occurring in the video.

What is your overall impression of the piece? It reminds me of old cartoons that rely mainly on sound effects as opposed to dialogue.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Maybe look at adjusting the levels on some of your sound effects so that they are all generally the same volume?

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I think that the sound effects that you chose match up with the video quite well.

 Jamie Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. Much like Chelsea H's in the video, and Chelsea M's in the audio. The sounds and the video definitely match up well.

What is your overall impression of the piece? Computer-y. The audio and video both attribute to this feeling.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Can't think of anything.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. SHAMU.

 Nana Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. Video game soundtracks with black and white kaleidoscopic images.

What is your overall impression of the piece? Retro, but modern. (Sound vs. video.)

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Some of the video clips don't match the feeling of the soundtracks as well as others.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. When the soundtracks and visual did have a similar feeling, they were very effective.

 Ryan Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. Sometimes the audio and video matched in feeling, other times they were polar opposites.

What is your overall impression of the piece? Interesting juxtapositions/similarities created.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Sometimes there were strange silences that maybe could have been filled up with a sound?

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I really like the clips that you chose to use.

 Sean Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. Much like Megan's, except this was a comedy compilation.

What is your overall impression of the piece? This really reminds me of a director's commentary that you would find on Step Brothers or Anchorman for some reason. (If you haven't seen Step Brothers with the commentary on, DO IT.)

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. I wish that some of the clips matched up better with the audio, in terms of characters matching up when audio from "them" is playing. (Sorry if that doesn't make sense haha.)

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. As a whole I think this video was very successful.

Me  Describe the relationship between the elements of sound and video. The sounds relate directly to the video, whether or not the audio is generated directly from the clips.

What is your overall impression of the piece? SPACE.

Point to one thing that could be readdressed to make the piece better. Syncing up the audio with JFK was a BITCH.

Point to one thing that is extremely successful that you enjoy. I mean I dunno, I guess the theme definitely shines through.

  And there you have it.