The Rule of Thirds is a compostional rule where an image is basically divided into 9 parts by two equally spaced lines going vertically and horizontally, like this image:
I know it's meant to be a 5 second film...but I haven't quite got round to doing that yet. I definitely will though! So for now, a picture of my brother (:
The four crosses where the lines intersect show the four important parts of the image that should be considered 'placing points of interest' in the frame of an image or film.
In theory, if the points of interest are placed on the intersections, the image/frame becomes more balanced and will enable the viewer to 'interact' with the frame.
It's taken me a while to decide on a designer I could write about, although I have to admit, I think I had an idea of who I would write about straight after the first lecture.
The designer I've chosen is Jan Švankmajer, a Czech animator and film maker. If you've seen some of my (few-and-far-between) blog posts, you'll know I've mentioned him quite a few times already! The work he produced was one of the first that I started to look at during my foundation course and I found his ideas intriguing. His use of surrealism in his work has fascinated me and inspired me to try similar techniques that he had used for my own projects. This was the first animation I watched by Švankmajer:
Jan Švankmajer has primarily used stop-frame techniques for his animations, which is why I had researched so heavily into his work during my final major project for my foundation course. Although I know that the technique is quite out-of-date now compared to 3D animations, it's the technique I used to produce my first animation.
I started looking in the library to see if I could find any books that might relate to Švankmajer, but so far, I've only managed to find videos and DVDs that include his films and animations. I might take them out just to have a look anyway...but I've just bought this to help me with my research though (:
Until I get it...I'll just trawl through the internet and see what I can find.
I wouldn't be surprised if I suddenly change my mind in the next week...
I have to admit, choosing to study a Foundation Diploma in Art & Design was definitely a decision well worth making. It helped me to find out what it was that I wanted to study at degree level and allowed me to develop my skills within the Media pathway, which I had chosen to specialise in.
For my final major project during my foundation year, I started with the idea of using different animation techniques that involved stop-frame animation, such as wire-framing, claymation, paper-folding/origami and a variety of small
puzzles. For these techniques, I started looking at Jan Svankmajer's work. Throughout the year, I had come across his work several times as he primarily uses stop-frame animation to produce and present his work. Looking through his work also allowed me to see the different types of materials that could be used to produce an animation and how Svankmajer chose to move these materials in and around the screen. If you haven't come across Jan Svankmajer's work before, take a look at these - one of my favourite pieces by Svankmajer and one of my main pieces of research for my final project:
With these techniques, I tried to find a technique that would allow me to incorporate each animation style into my work. My first thought was to try and connect the techniques as if it were a chain reaction or in a series of 'consequences' - this idea was inspired by Fischli and Weiss' 'The Way Things Go':
My first test piece was made using images of work that I had produced in the exploratory and pathway stages of my foundation course blu-tacked onto children's alphabet blocks.
This gave me an idea of how much time it would take to complete the filming for my animation and the amount of time I would need to take to edit my work.
The problem I found with trying to incorporate so many techniques was that there just weren't enough ways to try and connect them together...the other issues were that I didn't have the space to be able to set up such a piece of work and it would've been far too time-consuming. I then came across a video that helped to shape my final outcome:
My next task was to find a way to present my work. I still quite liked the idea of creating a series of chain reactions to link several animations, but finding a way to create 'reactions' through post-it notes didn't seem very imaginative...they could join on from each other, or one animation could finish and then evolve into a different animation - it just wasn't the way that I wanted to present my work. One of tutors then showed me a website composed of several animated GIFs (http://www.iamnotanartist.org/index.php) - the set up of this website was the basis of the layout for my final piece.
I created 7 animations altogether for my final piece. I started my editting in Final Cut Pro, as it had been my main programme for editing previous pieces of work, but I encountered a lot of difficulties and problems such as resizing my animations and trying to make sure they played at the right time. Resizing my animations also changed the resolution and made them extremely pixelated. I then decided to try editing in After Effects.
I started with the 'balloon/falling post-it notes' animation and filled the screen, making sure that the post-it notes would be right in the centre of the screen.
I then started to add the animations on either side of the centre animation:
After making sure that the animations on the side were all the same size and aligned, I started to copy each animation so that it would continue to play at the same time for roughly a minute without stopping and without any of the frames disappearing off the screen.
During my exhibition, the video was played in Quicktime Player and kept on loop so that it was just a continuous animation.
There are definitely things that I would change to my animation now had I still been working on it, but I'm still happy with the final outcome! It was the first time I'd tried to make a multi-screen animation and worked in After Effects, and although it's not the most amazing piece of work, it's one that I'm proud of (:
I tend to babble a lot, so if you've managed to read through this whole post, thanks! :D
