Evaluation

For this unit I have used the theme of super heroes and heroes in pop culture to create a sequence of images to tell a story through a still image and a stop motion film. The theme of heroes is very broad because it could involve the powers, individual characters or specific characteristics of a hero. My individual work is about showing the growth or evolution of a hero. My group task is about using powers on objects in our surroundings. 

Our ideas for the group task didn't change much because we knew that we would use powers from Star Wars and show mischievous behaviour similar to that of T-shirt Wars by Rhet & Link. However my original idea for my individual piece was to show metamorphosis from one person or animal to another. Unfortunately I was quite stuck for time and had to change my idea which was easily influenced by another piece of research I had already done.

I used my Nikon D610 to create my work. I then used a 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5 Nikkor lens to allow me to have some leniency on the distance I had to be from the models. I found this really useful when creating the stop motion. Other equipment I used includes a tripod and a wired shutter release. After the first stop motion we made I relised that this used a full frame ratio and I found this unappealing so I changed the ratio to 16:9 on the camera. After realising that it had changed back I had to use photoshop techniques to make them into the right ratio.

The main problem I had was when I started to run out of time to complete my individual piece and had to reconstruct an idea and produce it. The second problem was when two scenes for the stop motion had been photographed in a full frame ratio. Using actions and batch alteration on Photoshop I was able to fix them and produce the whole film in 16:9.

A big influence for our group task was Rhet & Link's T-shirt Wars where there was two characters playing pranks on each other and annoying each other. Another influence was the evolution on man by Thomas Huxley. It was the beginning of the drawing of the gibbon slowly evolving into a human over millions of years. I have used the shapes and the growth of man in my own work and I have extended it into hero.

I am very pleased with the stop motion film. Most of it flows smoothly, in some cases I should have spent a little more time organising which frame goes where; which might have made it even smoother. I feel that more could have been done more with my individual piece however I ran out of time to experiment with colours and props. If I could I would have used a cape with a very deep red with a high level of shadows whilst it was floating in the wind to represent superman. Or I could have used a black with a large amount of tonal contrast and I would have used bat ears. There were many props that I could have used.

Individual Piece

I am going to go into the studio and attempt to create silhouettes that resemble the evolutionary diagram and create a super hero at the end of the path similar to that of the one I found.

All these images are facing the wrong way so I can use the action and batch to make them all face the right way when I have finished the initial edit.

This screen shot shows how I used levels to make the white stand out more which increases the contrast  and make the silhouette stand out more.

I thought that the image was very warm toned. To equalise it I have used a cooling filter. It looks white now.

After adjusting the layers it also made the edges on the model have an edge so I used the brush to take away the levels in certain areas.

After flipping the canvas I placed them all of an A3 template and cropped it down. 

Using layer masks I was able to blend the light areas of each image together so that it has soft tone contrast from one image to the next.

This completed the image.

I like this image because it clearly represents the evolution of man and the last image would be seen as a hero. They are also clearly silhouettes with barely any light leak around the edges. This has given me more ideas about adding capes and ears to represent batman or superman. They could be in colour and have different tones. This will make the image more visually exciting for the viewer and contain more compositional elements.

The Stop Motion film

To make it I used the same techniques I used to make the Star Wars stop motion film. Placing individual frames and groups of them at different durations using the speed and duration after a right click. Nesting individual scenes so that I didn't get confused with an overwhelming amount of frames. Rendering the movie after every set of images placed on the timeline to keep the playback smooth.

I had to make this movie twice because it didn't save properly the first time. I feel that I slightly rushed it the second time because I was slightly annoyed and just wanted to get it done. However saying that I am still very pleased with the result because some parts are very smooth and clearly show a story.

Stop motion film - Scene 4

This was a scene that we came up with at the time. We thought that it would be funny and still link in with the rest of the film because misfortune is still coming to one or the other character.

Stop Motion film - scene 3

Scene 3 was the hardest scene to make and took 2 hours to get all the images we needed. We had to move the car in small increments and move the camera to get good angles. We also had to work with other users of the car park because we had to move several times. This created the challenge of positioning the model back in the same place.

Stop Motion film - Scene 2

We originally shot this whole scene in a different aspect ratio. I learnt how to use photoshop actions and batch editing to quickly make all the images the right crop of 16:9.

To start an action you first press the record button and it will take note of every action you make.

You make the crop and save the image so that every image saves. If you dont save during the recording then none of the images will be saved.

Press the stop button next to the record button and it will stop the recording.

To apply this to all the images in the file go to file>automate>batch. Make sure the right action, input folder and output folder is selected and press ok. It will then go through the whole input folder and edit them all.

The cropped images are on the contact sheets.

Image 2920 has been use to make a scene cut into the next.

Group task - Stop Motion film - Scene 1

As a group we have discussed what the story would be behind the idea of telekinesis. After looking at Rhet and Link's T-Shirt War we thought that we could base it on two guys who play pranks on each other using telekinesis.

First we should use a very small amount of it and slowly increase the amount of power that the characters use. first start with one character throwing something small with their mind at the other. moving on to pulling an object out infront of the other to trip them up. I really like the idea of moving a car like they do in Chronicle so we can attempt to do that.

We first attempted to use a pen however due to the lighting condition which restricted the shutter speed we could not capture a detailed or even visible pen in the frame. So we decided to switch to a screwed up piece of paper. This was a lot more detailed because it moved slower than the pen. All the images with the paper in the frame are at the bottom.

I have numbered the frames in the order that they should appear in the movie. I have also used 3064 to make a cut screen in between the scenes. This will make it look more homemade. 

Evolution

The first true diagram to the evolution of man was shown in Charles Darwin's first book 'On The Origin Of Species'. Drawn by Darwin's friend Thomas Huxley; he over exaggerated the size of a Gibbon skeleton to resemble that of the size of a human.

This was all done to allow them to explain to creationists the scientifical resemblance humans have to apes.
Since this a lot of parodies and scientific diagrams show the stages in between the gibbon and human including neanderthal.

This is the image that resembles the movement of the shadow from Harry Potter. The growth from an animal that is small that learns to stand and walk up straight. Some parts of the body have shrunk like the arms. The legs are positioned to show walking and the arms show a natural movement.

This is a direct link to what I want to achieve. They have used the normal evolution images and then placed a silhouette of superman at the end. I feel that superman is too far away from the main images and raised to high from the base of the image. It feels like it's a separate image. I am going to do a similar thing to this except I am going to make it better by making it more flowing.

Sirius Black

Sirius Black is a fictional character from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. He is Harry's uncle and is often seen by the law as a criminal however he works for a secret organisation fighting against dark forces of the magic world. He uses a specific incarnation on himself to change himself into two different types of dog. We never see him change shape however we see shadows and clues to justify that he changes shape.

Here he is a greyhound and walks behind the clouded glass to show his shadow changing shape. It all happens in one smooth movement. As he enters the room the dogs stomach gets larger in order to match the size of a humans. Black brings his arms up as he straightens his back into a standing posture; the tail tucks in and then blends with the flow of the coat. The hair on the head grows out a little which matches the scruffy look of the dog and the snout/nose shrinks in to form the shape of the nose and mouth. Finally the details of the collar of Black's coat appears.

This is another method I could use. By hiding the actual metamorphosis it makes the whole motion smoother and has less room for error. The producers and lighting managers have also used the positioning and and direction of the light behind the glass to make it darker near the floor as he enters the room. This makes the shadow blend in a little more and allows some error in the smooth motion in the change. Looking closely at the tail it seems to disappear just before the blend but it isn't that noticeable because of the column and the shadow. The heights that are used and the forward movements also remind me of the evolution of man diagram from ape through neanderthal to homo sapien.

Actually I really like the idea of using shadows because it's very simple but very effective. Using props and specific pop culture I could show the evolution into super humans through the style of pop culture. Using different heros from different pop cultures I could end up with a lot of of different endings for evolution.

Mystique

Mystique is a character from the X-Men comic book, graphic novel, cartoon and movie series. She is shown to be a shape shifter and can change into any person. Her real appearance is of blue skin with small protrusions covering around 75% of her body. Her eyes are stained yellow in both the iris and the sclera, the pupil is still black. The hair is auburn-red, it's always kept back over the head and ears and it is only neck length. Due to her natural appearance that she cannot change; some details of her body are not visible and so she does not wear any clothes in this form.

These gifs shows how her power works in the movies. It looks as if her skin works like revolving scales with the new image of what she would like to look like on the other side. I notice that it is the front part of her face that changes first. It then moves diagonally down the body and to her back. The eyes seem to change last.

I find the idea of changing appearances very interesting because I can use my photoshop skills to show progression through the metamorphosis process over a few images. This could be the change between animal and human or human to human. I can experiment with really obvious changes and subtle ones as well.