Visual Stimuli- Responding to Music as opposed to Text

In the new semester our first task for Visual Studies was 'Visual Stimuli- Responding to Music as opposed to Text'. We were given the choice of 4 songs from various artists. And the purpose was to illustrate our interpretation of the song. the song i chose was 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds' by the Beatles. When listening to this song i felt like it belongs to a transcendence into the sky.                 I used Photoshop to create a page of blue sky and cloud splodges. i used the blur and smudge tool to create the effect of the clouds fading out. i added a bunch of colors into the clouds, and blurred them out into the clouds too. We also had to have our own face in the image, but it had to be subtle. to do this i imported an image, live traced it and lowered the opacity. it was all really basic, and incredibly quick. I spent around 45 Minutes playing around with this. I also saved a copy of the image, with inverted colors to see the effect it had visually.

Working on Allo Allo

Working on 'Allo Allo' as a Lighting apprentice involved the tasks of setting the lights up, making sure the gels were fitted correctly, installation of minor lighting and making sure they worked via the light board and that all the lights were patched up properly. i found it quite challenging in some aspects but their was a helping hand all along the way.their was seven areas of lighting that were needed;- the main cafe, outside of the cafe, the bedroom/pantry area, the cinema, the kitchen, the stairway, and the Generals office. the challenge with this was that some areas need light to flood through into other areas, such as the kitchen lights, and the outside lights.  Others however needed to be restricted and this was achieved through the use of barn doors. The large majority of the lights used were Minuets. Below are some photo's of the show during its performance as examples of the lighting. I also helped out with things like painting etc. I am currently working on the next show called 'Death Trap' and will be working on 'On the Tin' afterwards; which i was offered the position of Set Director, but declined due to University Deadlines for the current module and feel it will be a lot to juggle.

Its A Wonderful Life

I attended a performance of 'Its a wonderful Life' during the first week of December, last year. I was introduced to this through one of my tutors Norman Austick as he was directing this performance. I enjoyed the show but what really stood out to me was the minimalist scene settings, the use of no scene changes so to speak but more importantly i was fascinated by the way it was lit. Once the performance was over i spoke to the lighting technician about how it was done. This ultimately lead to asking if i could volunteer to come to the next performance to learn the lighting of the shows as i thought it would be a vital part of my work. I was invited to be a Lighting Assistent for the forthcoming show of 'Allo Allo'

Visit to Darlington Civic Theater

At the back end of February as bunch of us students went along to the Darlington Civic Theater with Tony Shaw. The purpose of this visit was to have a visual experience in relation to the space the stage has to use. This was to help us with the brief we had received - which was our production was to be shown here - so a scaled model would be needed. During this visit i discovered what lighting equipment they have available, stage space, seating and general functions, such as a first hand look at the curtain lowering etc. This visit was a real eye opener and also the first time i have set foot into a professional theater; this experience was amazing and has greatly helped with my designing and process in this new brief. I plan on going to see the performance of West Side Story here in 16th April.

First Time using Fast Casting Resin

 I started by creating a base and a thin wall around the kit pieces i was to cast with plasticine. This was however too dry and hard to work with; so i used it as a foundation to add clay too giving it more support. Once they had enough support they were filled with a two part silicone mix; these were left to settle and harden over night.

When i returned to the workshop the following morning the silicone had hardened and i peeled it out of the clay to reveal the moulds i will be using to cast in. i gave them a clean over as best as possible before hand so their was as little clay as possible interfering with the casting.

I mixed two-part Biresin (fast cast resin), in equal amounts and then poured it into the moulds i had previously created. these were left for around half an hour to harden. once hardened i removed them form the mould and this was the result; as you can see they retained a lot of detail and came out quite clearly. The mould are still ready for use, and the castings are nice and strong.

Introductory White Card Model Making

One of our first taught lessons was about Floor Plans, Elevation Plans and Scale Models.  We had to take the measurements of an area of our choice from the University's Foyer between the front doors and the main reception area. I chose to do a larger area of the foyer in order to understand the process as a whole rather than in individual elements.   I started off getting a basic floor plan of the Foyer space. I used a scale of 1:50 as it is the standard scale to be used for model making for screen. (1:25 for theatre).

From this i went to a digital format using AutoCAD to create a neater Floor plan and a Elevation plan of the Foyer. 

This was saved in a 'legacy' format so it could be opened up in Adobe Illustrator to finalize it for use on the laser cutter.

The laser cutter cut out all the walls with a clean precise cut; how ever it did leave burn marks around the outskirts of the walls. From these pieces i put together the white card model in which i could then use to portray 3D concepts within the space more easily.

For a first attempt at Scaled Plans and Scale models; i was pleased with the outcome and will keep hold of this model incase it develops a use in the future of this unit.

BAFTA Crew Production Design Masterclass

BAFTA presented a masterclass with the BAFTA-winning team of Production Designer Sarah Greenwood and Set Decorator Katie Spencer. Sarah and Katie joined this programme to discuss their technical and creative techniques behind the work on they have created on big, well known films such as, Pride and Prejudice, Sherlock Holmes and Atonement. They spoke about how their process working together has helped create and produce designs that have won a series and multitude of awards. They also spoke of their longstanding work partnership with director Joe Wright (Pride and Prejudice).

The talk started off with a brief overview of their work in theatre and their awareness of the freedom Film and TV could offer them at the time. This in turn led them to both meet while working for the BBC. After both working on the series Nature Boy, they started to work in partnership on some of Joe Wrights earlier films; forming a tight circle of ideas, concepts and skills. 

The first big film they collaborated on was Pride and Prejudice in which they explained about fun of locating the building they used. However the inside had been modernized and they were not able to remove any fittings in the house, they discussed that they had to create worktops on top of worktops, which restricted the space in the house, but they loved the flow of the building that much they shot the film there.

They then discussed the bonding that started while making this film, creating a small group of experienced and professional minds under one roof; which is maintained still through their designs. They mentioned that period can be difficult when it comes to dating the scene correctly when having to avoid modern items such as satellite dishes, aerials, street lights etc. but are done mainly by being removed via CGI.

One of their favorite scenes was the creation of Dunkirk at Redcar Beach for the film 'Atonement', where the boat was transported in 4 chunks due to its sheer size, jeeps were made from old Landrover chassis, and the extras were from the factory which can be seen pumping smoke in the background. It helped create the atmosphere along with the extras creating a hazy feel to the scene.     

With Sherlock Holmes however, they had an increased amount of freedom as Director, Guy Ritchie just asked them to do what they wanted. Creating Holmes’ Living room proved to be a difficult but fun task as Robert Downey Jr. kept asking for more props in the room, and that each prop should have a meaning to the character himself. They used an old set from the Harry Potter films (Diagon Ally)  to recreate a realistic 1890’s Baker Street for the film, which was used repeatedly throughout filming.

I concluded from this that it does help to start from the bottom and work your way up through the ranks and that skills aren't everything; "its not what you know, but who you know".  Although they did look negatively about courses that are available to help get into industry they then were contradictory of their own words and encouraged people to build up a portfolio and attempt to get into the industry