Project A 'Connections'

4/11/15

Audio Exploration

This project requires me to record spoken word of other people that i can use to create an animation for. I could approach this in different ways such as recording conversations i over hear, instigating conversations or interviewing people personally to direct them to talk about certain topics etc. 

There are some legal limitations to this however and i must get the people i record to sign a consent form in order for me to use their voice in my work.

"it is not the voice that commands the story, it is the ear' - Italo Calvino

Brief:

Record 1 conversation (refer to ethical and legal limitations discussed in class)

Conduct 1 interview, based on pre constructed questions.

Select 1 section from each source that i feel would provide a rich base for visual response. 

a short presentation of my selected clips with analysis focusing on the successes and failures of the processes used and the justification of my choices.

Road:

                           

Jim Cartwrights play Road Directed by Alan Clarke for TV. The scene especially from 8:36 shows a celebration of normal common dialog between characters, the visuals put with it however make it more interesting and although the dialog is already rather out of the ordinary and humorous the visuals that go with it and the way the characters are acting make it very observable even though not a whole lot is going on. Cartwright has highlighted the average lives of the characters and made them amusing in subtle ways.

Creature Comforts:

A really good example of the kind of thing this project relates to is creature comforts. Creature Comforts is a stop motion clay animation comedy mockumentary franchise originating in a 1989 British humorous animated short film of the same name. The film describes how animals feel about living in a zoo, featuring the voices of the British public "spoken" by the animals. It was created by Nick Park and Aardman Animations.
                            

In this episode of creature comforts the public is being interviewed on what they think about where they live and an animation has been put together to create clever scenes in which it appeared as though the voices being recorded are actually animals talking about their homes and hinted jokes are made by the visuals to match with what the speakers are talking about. For example the crocodile scene the woman is talking about the area being good because there are lots of people the visuals and how the crocodile moves etc suggests that the voice is referring to eating the people.

Under The Skin:

a Science fiction art house film directed by english filmmaker Jonathan Glazer

             

Those city scenes were captured with tiny, inobtrusive cameras. Many of the people who appear on screen, including some of the men who chat up Johansson's character, aren't actors at all and don't see the cameras. "Scarlett's character was interacting with real people who were completely unaware that they were in a fictional film," said producer James Wilson in an interview released by distributor A24Films. (Permissions were secured after the fact, of course.)

This shows how Scarlet Johanson the actor is acting in a way to lead the unsuspecting characters she picks up into responding in a certain way to give a more realist feel to the film but still coming out with the desired end result (which in this case is causing these men to chat her up etc).


Suky Best Early Birds:
http://www.animateprojects.org/films/by_artist/b/s_best

Suky Best is an artist based in London. Working with print, animation and installation, she has exhibited nationally and internationally. Commissioned works include About Running, a moving image commission for The Great North Run, Stone Voices, a permanent sculptural piece for the Devils Glen in Ireland, From the Archive, an animation for the main reception area of University College Hospital London, and The Park in Winter, Arts Council England's online Christmas card 2008. She has exhibited at the Baltic, Gateshead, the Art Now Lightbox at Tate Britain, and has had solo exhibitions and publications, including The Return of the Native at the Pump House Gallery London.

This animation shows the visual depiction of the birds the people are talking about in the narration of the video. She has used various different people to make up the audio for her work which has an effective result as she shows different birds. I could think about different ways of recording people for my own work such as using multiple people in the audio i record.

BBC Knowledge video:

                     
BBC KNOWLEDGE from weareseventeen on Vimeo.

This video shows a different type of audio where the narrator is more informative for example in this video the narrator is talking about physics and an animation has been made for it to help viewers understand and to make the information being given more interesting and entertaining. I like how this animation has been created as well with each element merging into the next to follow the narrators words and keep the visuals flowing smoothly, for example when the words morphs into a clock.