48 Hour Shootout

Touched by Time

Cover Campus with Cover Song

Opening 2 Reflections

Where do Ideas Come From?

I really connected to this speech. It does feel as if the creative process doesn’t solely come from within us. Rather than being a mystical creature of sorts however, I see it as an idea or thought that is shaped by outside influences.

Yes I agree that it is something that just comes to you in a moment and if you don’t pay attention to it in that moment there is extreme fear that you may never get it back and for me at least it makes me feel as though I am losing a piece of myself or a bit of my creative thoughts, but upon further reflection I realize that that thought or idea wasn’t mine at all.

Sure I had a part in it by seeing it and conceptualizing it in my own terms, but to me, that idea came from things around me. Most every thought you have is in some way or another influenced by what is around you whether it be people, experiences, contrasting beliefs, shared beliefs or a psychotic lapse of sanity. It is something that isn’t inherent to you alone but rather something that when you find it, discover it, or loathingly lose your mind inside of it, is then transformed from whatever it was conceived as in another beings brain, another beings experience, or another beings emotions, tangible and intangible, it forms from your creativity, and has a way of shaping you in return.

The Power of Myth

I really connect with and agree with how George Lucas believes we are all mentors and we are all teachers and that we teach by living our lives not necessarily by lecturing. I think this is very true because all our actions have an impact on others, some of which cause learning experiences whether intentional or not.

Video Games and Storytelling

I’ve never really thought about how different it is to write for a game rather than a movie. The fact that the audience participates in the story you are writing is a complex idea and I can see how it would be challenging. It is interesting to think of it as passive versus linear storytelling, a comparison that opened my eyes to how writing a video game significantly differs from normal story writing. It is definitely unfortunate that well written games don’t typically sell. But I feel if publishers actually pick them up, there would be a large market of buyers willing to buy well-written games.

Musical Language

I find the idea of perfect pitch very fascinating. I also think it is very cool how certain languages are pitch languages. I never explicitly realized that certain languages are characterized by pitch variation. It also seems as if they are more in touch with one another through this. With English, in my opinion any way, we can recognize a change in someone’s tone and it may indicate a change in mood but this change in meaning of the words as it transforms with the change in pitch is something I don’t think is extraordinarily perceived among native English speakers.

The Power of Music

I find it very interesting that music has this sort of power. We all know it has the power to evoke emotion but I never realized how much power it had outside of that and how different tempos can completely change the song and completely change how it effects the world around it. I found it incredibly mind blowing that after 150 decibels, sound actually could become plasma in the air. The fact that sound can literally physically change matter is incredible. I think a lot can be taken away from the notion that how sound varies can really affect how the listener feels and is something worth a lot of attention in creative works which a majority of media pieces are.

Joke Video

The Greedy Lawyer

Original Story Board by Tyler Putnam

Video Adaptation by Brett Maszczak and Carly Maurer

Storyboard can be found at this link

http://www.sendspace.com/file/q8hsek

This creative project went fairly smoothly except for a few minor mishaps. I started by looking through all of the different storyboards. Most of them required many different actors, and I knew I would not be able to accurately represent them. I was pleased when I finally found "The Greedy Lawyer". One of the most difficult shots for me was creating a wheelchair. I used a normal chair and my bike, with some clever cropping it sort of appears to be accurate. The most difficult part of this project was correctly reading the lines, I believe there are a couple instances where I say a word that was not in the original script. There were no errors that had an impact on the overall story though. While shooting I did not notice that the "United Way" logo displayed on my laptop was minimized for the second half of the United Way employee's lines. Also, I did not notice that the employee's tie was showing underneath the collar. I worked with one other MDIA 1020 student Carly Maurer. She did well for what I asked of her, but the other actors I had to use for one of the scenes were not as enthusiastic as I would have liked. At one point I thought I would need to do all of the roles in this video by myself so I am grateful for being able to find people to help me.  For the most part I am happy with the outcome of the video.