On Dali and Resizing (AKA Blog 5A)

Original:

Resized:

The original image by Salvador Dali draws our attention to the “Earth Egg” at the center of the image, which appears to depict a man emerging from the center of a cracked Earth. To draw the focus of the observer, Dali uses the RULE OF THIRDS by placing the man’s hands and feet at strategic spots where the lines of thirds that divide the image intersect. Also drawing our attention to the man inside the Earth Egg is the fact that all of the LINES in the image are directed at the Man and the Egg. The woman on the right is pointing to him and the fabric floating above the Egg has its edges and corners pointing down at it. The crack through the egg also draws our attention to the man. This, in terms of camera angles, is what we could call an EXTREME WIDE SHOT because we can see all of the characters as well as their environment.    

      The resized image of the child standing behind its mother could be called a WIDE SHOT because though the other elements of the original image are not seen, the entire body of the child is in view. In the original image, our focus is on the man emerging from the Earth Egg because of the painting’s TEXT AND SUBTEXT. The text of the image is that a man is emerging from the Earth, which is shaped like an egg, while a mother and child watch. The subtext is Dali’s interpretation of the creation of humanity, born from the protective and nurturing egg that is the Earth. This creates AFFINITY as all people are aware that we are born from the Earth, so much so that we refer to it as “Mother Earth.” However, the image also creates CONTRAST in the mind of the observer because most do not necessarily think of humanity as being born from eggs. In this case, the contrasting element compliments the familiar element, creating the idea in the mind of the viewer of the Earth as an egg.

On the Death of Walter McGuinn (AKA Blog 5B)

On Brainwashing (AKA Blog 4A)

In the manifesto Brainwashed (conveniently located here, at: http://changethis.com/manifesto/show/66.01.Brainwashed) Seth Godin discusses possibly the most important issue facing the 21^st century American; how to stay relevant. We live in a time, here at the turn of the century, when the American is trying to stay important to the economy and the society of his country, and his country is trying to stay important to the economy and the society of his world. He once lived in a time when he could be master of his universe by following a set of clearly-stated rules. He went to school so he could get a job. He got a job so he could make a family. He made a family so that his children could continue this process. His country encouraged him, because it believed that as long as this process continued, as long as the country itself followed strict rules, it too would be the master. America built an economy so it could build a military. It built a military so it could protect its interests. It protected its interests so that it could build an economy. And so on. As long as the cycle continued, three things would reign supreme, America, the American, and Liberty.

But in this century things have changed, as things are known to do. American has been humbled abroad, the American has been humbled at home, and Liberty is as humble as ever to the point where it is considered either a threat, a burden, or the idealistic, wishful thinking of university students like myself. This is not the result of the brainwashing. For a long time, the society of training, the culture of machine-people was successful. The world is simply different now, and following a strict set of directions no longer gets you where you need to go. Into the gap between what we must do and what we were trained to do, America has fallen.

            Our generation bares a great burden. Whether in the end it will have been a fortunate or lamentable undertaking I cannot say. But it has been left to us, and we must carry it. Our parents were able to make wonderful lives for themselves (and for us) by following the rules. This is the culture in which they were fortunate enough to live their entire lives. Our children will live their entire lives in a culture where creativity, artistry, and original thought are encouraged and rewarded. We cannot imagine this culture for the simple reason that we have not yet invented it. This is our burden. We are the ones who must explore and settle a New World. We are pioneers on what is not the final frontier, but simply the next one. Our disadvantage is that we were taught only the rules of the world we have left behind. Our only advantages are that we are willing to be pioneers, and that we have no other choice. In this manifesto, Seth Godin provides us with seven pillars to help us along in our journey. They are not rules, for in this undiscovered country there are no rules, and following them can be deadly. The two that I will discuss here are “Acknowledging the Lizard” and “Connect”.

Acknowledging the Lizard

-          The “Lizard” is something that is inside of us all. It’s the old part of the brain that used to protect us from saber-toothed tigers and those giant bird things by telling us when we should leave the safety of the cave. Today the Lizard does the same thing, only the tigers and birds are other people, society, and the consequences are no longer so deadly. The Lizard keeps us in the cave, stops us from venturing too far out of our comfort zone because when we do so, we flip a coin, and we hope that the predators out there will like what we do when we leave the cave. In this scenario, failure is always an option. Given the choice between risk, which offers both success and failure, and safety, which offers neither, the Lizard will choose to sacrifice success to avoid failure. The Lizard will present to us its decision, and we will listen because we have always been trained to.

The trick to not bending to the will of the Lizard is not to ignore it. The Lizard is not something that can be ignored. If we pretend it doesn’t exist, we fail to attach a mouth to the dissenting voice, and so what the Lizard says will seem less like the opinion of half our brain and more like the opinion of the Universe. We forget that the voice that says “you will fail if you take a risk” exists only in our heads. By acknowledging the Lizard, we bring it down to size, and see that its word is not law. We may take its advice, or we may disregard it. It keeps us safe, but it also keeps us down. By ignoring the Lizard and listening to its voice, we make the Lizard a tyrant. By seeing its advice as just one option out of many, we democratize our conscience, and Liberty prevails.

Connect

-          I have a friend named Corrine. Corrine and I are very different people. She is a very nice, innocent, religious, conservative girl. I am an obnoxious, liberal young man. We probably wouldn’t be friends were it not for a certain set of circumstances. But one thing that connects us is that we’re both writers. In our writings we tell very different sorts of tales, but we are still able to help each other out. I find that one of the most important, and also the most difficult, parts of writing is coming up with names. Names for characters are infinitely important. One always wants a character to be memorable, and a memorable character is one with a memorable name. Jay Gatsby, Sherlock Holmes, Jean Valjean. Names are paramount. The same goes for place names. They can be as specific as 221b Baker Street, or as broad as Gotham City. But they can’t be random. People have to remember the characters and where they exist. So one time Corrine texted me and described a small New England town where her story would take place. I gave her the name “New Derry, named after the home county of the Irish immigrants that settled there.” Then a few weeks later I described to her a city of moderate size, located in central Ohio, and she gave me the name “Hawthorne, named for the hawthorn trees that grow around the city. A large forest was cut down to build the city.” This is a very simple example of how a connection of two or more creative minds can lead to a breakthrough. A small breakthrough, but a breakthrough nonetheless.

In this class, our blog assignments allow us to engage in both of the pillars that I have just described, as well as others. We are able to acknowledge and (hopefully) reject the Lizard who is telling us out opinions and ideas are unimportant and undeserving of broadcast. Allowing the blogs to exist as a class requirement makes it slightly easier to reject the fear of embarrassment. It also allows us to connect with other creative minds by reading what others have to say on their blogs, and what’s more, it allows us to connect with creative minds that we are in close, classroom proximity to.

Music Project

Soundscape

This is the soundscape video. It's on vimeo which means I can't post it on a video because Youtube and Google are in cahoots. But in any case, here it is;

http://vimeo.com/22487531

I Wanna Hear the Same Song Twice (AKA Blog 3A)

The song that I chose for this blog is the “Boss DJ,” originally recorded by the reggae-ska band Sublime on their 1994 album Robbin’ the Hood and covered by the ska-punk band Reel Big Fish on their 2002 album Cheer Up!. It should be noted that the original song as recorded by Sublime is itself a partial cover of two Bob Marley songs.

The LYRICS of the song haven’t changed at all between the original Sublime version and the one recorded by Reel Big Fish. The only major difference is that the chorus, “It’s so nice…” repeats at the end of the Reel Big Fish version, giving the song more of an optimistic tone than the original. The lyrics themselves are not completely pleasant, ending with the phrase “Nowadays, the songs on the radio all drive me crazy.”  By repeating the chorus again, Reel Big Fish seems to make the song a bit more hopeful, which is not really their style. Much more to their style is setting unhappy lyrics to upbeat music, and while “Boss DJ” itself isn’t so much an unhappy song, the lyrics are set to significantly more upbeat music in the Reel Big Fish version.

The biggest difference between the two songs is the MUSICAL QUALITY. The Reel Big Fish version is far more upbeat, containing many more instruments than the Sublime version, which is completely acoustic. Bradley Nowell’s acoustic guitar is replaced by Aaron Barrett on rhythm guitar hitting the traditional Jamaican ska upstrokes, with a supporting electric piano and horn section. As for pitch, the difference between the lead singers of each band is clear. Bradley’s voice is slightly higher and flows through the song’s lyrics at a leisurely pace. Aaron, on the other hand, drops in and out of lyrics rather abruptly, and his voice has always had a trademark low pitch. The speed is increased significantly in the Cheer Up! version, and the sound quality itself is dramatically different between the two versions. As an album, Robbin’ the Hood was intentionally recorded with low-budget methods in comparison with Sublime’s previous (and premier) album 40oz. to Freedom. Conversely, Cheer Up! is one of Reel Big Fish’s most well-recorded albums, so much so that even RBF front man Aaron Barrett thinks of the album as being over-produced. As a result, the Reel Big Fish version of “Boss DJ, in terms of the recording itself, is of dramatically higher quality than the Sublime version.

Personally, I prefer the Reel Big Fish version of “Boss DJ.” I have nothing against acoustic tacks, but after a while I get bored of them. I like listening to a song multiple times and focusing on a different instrument each time. With Reel Big Fish, you’ve got plenty of instruments to choose from, each doing their own thing, along with Aaron’s deep vocals backed up by DJ Gordie Johnson. Of course, there is nothing bad to be said about Bradley Nowell’s own vocal skills (may he rest in peace) and as an acoustic, jam-session anthem, Sublime’s original recording of “Boss DJ” is pretty boss.

Sublime:

 

Reel Big Fish:

On Howling (AKA Blog 2)

http://changethis.com/manifesto/show/51.01.YourHowl

The story that Johnathon Flaum tells in this “manifesto” is of a red wolf bred in captivity and released into the wild. The wolf finds life in the wild to be dangerous and deadly. He and his fellow wolves never learned how to hunt or find shelter, or even howl in order to form social groups and choose leaders. The wolf realizes that when in captivity, he stopped being a wolf. In order to survive, he finds he has to rediscover how to be a wolf, how to be himself. The final step in this process is learning how to howl.

The point of these stories is that we’re all wolves in captivity, in a way. We all act the way that we are taught to act, behave the way we’re expected to behave. We never truly act like the people we really are. We are never really ourselves. And if we continue in this fashion, then we run the risk of one day forgetting how to be ourselves.

When the creative mind “howls” it releases creative energy that has built up inside for a long time. It’s the thing we’ve put away so that we can fit into our captive lives easier. The wolves hid their howls because they are fed by humans, and humans do not howl. We humans hide our howls from the other humans because they take care of us too. We cling to the hope that whatever comes out of our heads, the other humans will appreciate. We live in fear that they won’t like what comes out of our minds. But the strange thing is, humans are very good at knowing which things in this world are manufactured and which are natural, including ideas. Sometimes, when ideas come out of our heads, we think the other humans in this world won’t understand it, or they’ll be frightened by it, but we release it anyway because there’s just nowhere else for it to go. Often though, when other humans find these ideas, they respond differently than what we would expect. They appreciate it more than we would expect. It’s because they know that it’s something real, something natural, not a manufactured idea or behavior. They hear a howl in the woods and they go to it, because they know they’re being called by one of their own.

On J.J. and Steven (AKA Blog 1A)

It was senior year in my television production class that my teacher, Mr. Ruby, showed us this video of Lost creator J.J. Abrams speaking at a Ted seminar. I have watched and re-watched it several times through since then. It is not particularly necessary to watch the entire video (though I highly recommend it) he spends a lot of time focusing on what he calls the “Mystery Box.” The Mystery Box is the term he uses to describe an element of several of his projects; a mystery that is never quite revealed, but serves to push the plot forward. In the case of Abrams, the most obvious example is the island on Lost, but I’ve never actually seen Lost, so instead I’ll focus on one of his other projects. In the Abrams-directed Mission Impossible 3, the plot revolves a team of secret agents trying to recover a stolen weapon known only as the “Rabbit’s Foot.” Throughout the movie, the nature of the “Rabbit’s Foot” is guessed at and mused upon and so the device takes on an ominous persona, and the tension is forced upwards as the heroes try to take it from the hands of the evildoers. The mystery of the “Rabbit’s Foot” is what gives it power and a sense of danger, and so when the device is finally recovered, the audience is able to release that tension, knowing that this weapon of mass destruction is back in safe hands. The function of the “Rabbit’s Foot” is never revealed, but it never has to be. If we know what the monster looks like, we aren’t afraid of it anymore. We are afraid of the “Rabbit’s Foot” precisely because we don’t know what it does.

The other part of this lecture that I love is when Abrams discusses writing, and how a blank sheet of paper is itself a Mystery Box. There’s no telling what ideas can pour onto it and what story will end up being told, which is what makes the writing process frightening, frustrating, and exciting all at the same time.

 

This is a long clip, especially because I’m just going to focus on a small part of it. This is a scene from the movie Minority Report, directed by my other favorite director, Steven Spielberg. It was reading a biography of Spielberg that first inspired me to seek out a career in film and television. This is one of my favorite Spielberg films, which depicts a future in which police officers are able to observe murders before they occur and arrest criminals before they commit crimes, thereby completely ridding Washington D.C. of murder. The shot I want to focus on here starts at the seven minute mark and depicts a police hovercraft flying over the Jefferson Memorial as the “precops” rush to stop a murder from taking place across the Potomac River. This is a great example of contrast and affinity. Spielberg shows us something familiar in the skyline of Washington D.C. which has barely changed over the last century, and is likely not going to change by the year 2054 when the film takes place. But by placing a hovercraft in the shot, flying above those monuments, he contrasts the familiar with the unfamiliar, the present with the future. This shot makes the future world of Minority Report seem more believable to the audience, and also highlights how unfamiliar technologies, as represented by the hovercraft, are being used in the future to enforce the familiar and never-changing laws and principles that we have in the present, as represented by the D.C. skyline.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avQ9yPQNb3M

One of the things I love about Spielberg is how versatile he is with his storytelling. Minority Report, for example, is an action movie, but it also has a very complex message about fate vs. free will and how much privacy of the people can be taken away in order to protect those same people from harm. These are very active themes which require the audience to come up with their own answers to the questions posed by the film. Conversely, in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, which is also an action film directed by Spielberg, the theme is much more didactic. In this last scene of the movie, at about the 2:19 mark, after Indy watches the aliens leave with artifacts from various ancient cultures, he says that “knowledge was they’re [the aliens] treasure.” He realizes that this treasure he spent the movie searching for was actually knowledge of human history, art, and religion. By saying this to himself, he’s really saying it to the audience. The theme of this movie, and all of the Indiana Jones movies, is that knowledge is the most important treasure, and greed is not the proper motivator for the search for knowledge. This is evident in the fact that all of Indy’s adversaries meet terrible ends, and Indy himself never actually acquires the artifacts that he searches for.

On Breakthrough Ideas (AKA Blog 1B)

In his article “14 Ways to get Breakthrough Ideas” (http://changethis.com/manifesto/show/49.06.14Ways) Mitch Ditkoff makes several well-constructed suggestions (14 of them, in fact) for people in any field who want to be innovative, or rather, to spark the innovation to conjure something quite fantastic where previously there was nothing of any significance. The imaginative mind could easily convince itself that in this piece, Mr. Ditkoff is teaching us how to perform magic, for in all honesty, what is innovation if not truly magic? I can easily see how these suggestions would be helpful to the creative mind, but as with most things I read, there are points with which I agree, and points with which I take issue.

The suggestion of Ditkoff’s which I like the most is his first point; “Follow Your Fascination.” This I think is a piece of advice that every creative mind to take to heart. Or take to brain. In any case, the thing we call fascination is itself not something that can be conjured or created. Fascination simply occurs. What Ditkoff suggests is not to create fascination, but simply to obey it. This is something that we often have trouble doing, not because we are not fascinated by things, for all of us are fascinated by something. The trouble is, it is often difficult to fully see how fascination can be refined into something productive; how an idea can become invention. Ideas are like raw materials, like lumps of coal dug from the ground, and it’s often the case that our brains can’t perceive how these nuggets of coal could ever be reformed into diamonds. What Ditkoff is saying is that just because we cannot perceive the evolution of idea to invention, of coal to diamond, does not mean we can ignore the ideas completely. For one thing, it’s impossible. Fascination ensures that such ideas cannot be ignored. For another thing, in doing so we miss opportunities to create something beautiful out of what previously was nothing more glamorous or significant than a lump of coal.

Number 12 on Ditkoff’s list is another one of my favorites; “Look for Happy Accidents.” If one has any interest in creating anything, then one must be willing to allow chance to make its own suggestions. It’s likely that fate, or God, or the universe, or what have you, is constantly making suggestions for creative minds to pluck out of the air, but the majority of us are too busy to notice. I remember when I was in high school, the theater department would put on three student-run one act plays in the spring, and I resolve to myself that I would write one. I spent a majority of the preceding summer trying to think of ideas of what on Earth I could possibly want to write a one-act show about, and by July, I had only the vague idea that I wanted to see people just working, but in such a fashion that they would be constantly interacting with whoever came into their establishment. I was thinking “wouldn’t that be interesting, to work in a place where you aren’t quite sure what sort of people were going to walk in, or what sort of things they would want to purchase.” But again, this was an entirely vague idea, and so my creative process came to a halt. Later that month, however, I went on a family visit to San Francisco, and the first afternoon I was there, I had lunch in a sandwich deli called “Working Girls.” I began imaging what kind of characters the people working behind the counter would interact with, day in and day out, and in San Francisco of all places. Hippies, hipsters, businessmen, policemen, lawyers, writers, poets and workers, all walking along a street in the Financial District and suddenly deciding they wanted a sandwich. What sort of things would these characters say? What sort of things would these characters eat? It was while I was there that I realized where in fact my play took place. Not where it should take place, but where it did take place. Where it had always taken place, and where it would continue to take place. When I finally started writing, I had CNN on in the background, blasting reports about the Russian invasion of Georgia, and so the invasion became a subplot. I was eating popsicles at the time, the sort of popsicles with jokes printed on the wooden sticks, and so these popsicles became a running joke within the context of the play. I realized that writing, like any form of creation, didn’t necessarily have to be spontaneous, but could also be a reaction to the environment in which the creation occurs. In an environment where fate and chance are very active players, the creator must be willing to let accidents and happenstance influence his or her creation.

The suggestion that Ditkoff makes that I disagree with the most would be Number 8; “Take a Break.” While relaxation is important in any endeavor, creative or otherwise, I don’t think that walking away from a problem can truly lead to a solution. Now, I see how this may seem to contradict what I just wrote, about how my trip to San Francisco ended up helping me when I was stuck. I can see how this seems like I was walking away from my problem, only to find it solved for me, but in truth I never stopped thinking of how to continue writing. If I had put the play out my mind, it’s possible I never would have recognized that the accidental stop at Working Girls was a breakthrough in my creative process. In my opinion, creative minds can never really “take a break.” Their minds, like that of Sherlock Holmes, rebel at stagnation. When inventors come to a wall that they can’t break down, they do not walk away from it. They find a way around, over, or underneath it. No problems truly solve themselves, and no inventions truly invent themselves. Solutions and inventions come about because not because their creators turned away and let “elves” take over, but rather because they came at the issue from a different direction. Now, perhaps this sideways approach comes about easier when creators engage in some other activity for a time, but in that case I would amend Number 8 to suggest “Take a Break, but Don’t Stop Thinking.”

This is a Test

Hello. Welcome to the blog. This is the first post of the blog. You are the first viewers of the blog.

This is the Washington Monument, manipulated in iPhoto to make it look like an older photograph. This sort of aged look seems to work better with structures in Washington D.C. because things like the Washington Monument haven't really been changed since they were built.




This is my friend Madison, enjoying a snowstorm just before Christmas a few years ago. I like the black and white better than color, because there really wasn't any color to begin with. I also thought it would make sense to blur everything surrounding Madison, because Madison tends to live more in her own mind than in reality. You'd know that, if you knew Madison.



This is a photo from the day after prom. These are my friends Ben and Juls. Juls is the one in the hat. I wanted this to look like a photo that you would find in one of your dad's albums in the attic and be like "Wow, dad liked to party." The title of this could easily have been "Ben's Wedding."