Dan Cody's multimedia journal

'Temperance'

2012-01-03T06:23:00.000-08:00

Recently edited, I think I'm starting to get a grip of the harmony between music and visuals, should come in handy for the next design project. I have contrasted the slower first part of the music which runs along with the falling roses reminiscent of the first version ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjdaumYbxzY ), with the upbeat section running with the strobe light visuals.

Progress montage

2011-12-17T09:08:00.000-08:00

In the spirit of the new context 2 design brief for the new year, portfolio building, I decided to produce a montage of how I feel my work has progressed and the quality has improved over the past few years.

Design project 3 -Assignment 2 : Projected Visuals

2011-12-09T11:27:00.000-08:00

So the brief for this assignment states I will be making a 6-8minute video to accompany one of 16 pieces of music. My first thoughts on this assignment are that the video I will produce will not be a 'typical' music video type video. By that I mean not an MTV lip sync job. When visualizing the task at hand my first thoughts were of the example below.

Final edit feedback session.

2011-12-02T03:33:00.000-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRbczrWH9fY

After presenting the 'final' edit of my nicotine anti smoking advert for the 'say something political' brief, my required amendments are:

• Low light
• Low sound
• Smoke shot should be last shot
• Change font
• Centre font
• Fix flash shot
• Fix sound sync
• Dubing of sound if neccessary

'Say something poltical - Nicotine' finished edit

2011-12-02T03:17:00.000-08:00

'Say something political' Set pictures

2011-11-07T09:34:00.000-08:00

The set is mostly contrasting dark and light colour, which costumes for both characters will highlight

'Say something political' storyboard

2011-11-07T09:31:00.001-08:00

Year 2 multimedia - moving image - first project 'MALac'

2011-10-16T04:51:00.000-07:00

So for the first project we are given a classic enigma script, subjects dialogue revolve around a briefcase containing a 'malac' an unspecified object that is the most terrifying object in the world. While my 'malac' would probably be the context 2 coursework, we as a group have decided to leave the object unspecified.

rough intro to visual essay (dialogue)

2011-04-11T12:16:00.001-07:00

Hi….

I’m Daniel Cody, and while that name has nothing at face value, this visual essay will show what I’d like it to mean in the future.

I am currently rotating through the first year carousel of multimedia areas, animation, moving image and interactive space, or web. This visual essay should express my passion for, and hopefully my prowess in moving image, by way of my projects, influences and inspirations. The essay will also display the reasons I have for choosing the moving image pathway, as well as my reasons for rejecting the others.

I will call upon example of work from three different practitioners in the field of moving image, to display my influences and inspirations, and to show how their work reflects my own. Two of these practitioners are the film writer/director/producer Quentin Tarantino, and the film writing/directing duo the Coen brothers. Their work is both masterful thought provoking and I will show how so in this essay.

So in short this essay combines the work of me, the works of others and the reasons combined, that all in all lead to my choice down the moving image pathway. Let’s begin.

Term 2 - animation - Haunted house ride

2011-03-22T10:22:00.001-07:00

Just recieved the brief for the term 2 animation project, we have to render a haunted house ride with a few scares in it, based around the scale of the waverly theatre.

Portfolio screencaps

2011-03-22T10:08:00.000-07:00

Wire frame design for online portfolio

2011-02-24T08:37:00.000-08:00

Basic first draft of a wire frame outline for my online portfolio.

project two - Interactive space

2011-02-17T06:57:00.000-08:00

So, interactive space comes round again this term and this time the project brief is to create a digital online portfolio. Today's seminar with Shaun covered example of sophisticated web design related to feature films official websites, artists websites etc.

Final product - short film project - 'herds'

2011-02-15T15:28:00.001-08:00

Herds from Oliver Benns on Vimeo.

Experimenting with depth of field.

2011-02-09T10:58:00.000-08:00

The Talent

2011-01-28T07:51:00.000-08:00

By looking into the NTU drama society I've managed to find two male student actors for the short. :)

moving image project progress

2011-01-28T07:49:00.001-08:00

Me and the team have been editing the short film script, with changes to dialogue and subtle plot points.

1 EXT. DOORSTEP. NIGHT 1

TITLE: Herds

Knocking on the door MONTY skips from foot to foot - What am thinking of is a loud and booming bang , to really show that yes , we know somewhere is there , but the tone of the bang would portray to the audience that he is not just your regular visitor .

As AGNEW opens the door Monty slips past him, entering
Maybe this should happen really quickly and make Agnew seem so confused that he just goes along with it
What am thinking here is some abietant background noise , so if we are filming in halls , we could have some playing some music from thier room , so its more of a - for a lack of a better word- "booming" sound.

MONTY
Bloody hell you took your time. It's a bit
quiet though better be early than be late,
never got into the fashionably late bullshit
did you?
Camera following them to the kitchen
With Monty clearly just walking quickly past. Agnew stood at the door for a second before following acting shocked.

AGNEW
Who are you here for?

MONTY
No reason we can't crack these open though is
there?

Monty holds the bag up and clinks the bottles together - bottles of wine , maybe? , easiser to distingush on film then cans of beer.

2 INT. KITCHEN. NIGHT 2

Monty and Agnew sit at the table. They are drinking beer
Agnew taking small sips, clearly not at ease with the situation. Frowns at Monty regularly.
Perhaps a moment of awkward slience with only the out of range background "booming" music can be heard.

MONTY
Not a lot in the way of snacks at this party
Searching the cupboards, possibly on tiptoes, not the fridge yet. Don't really want repeating actions/shots.
Banging of shutting cupboards
AGNEW
Is there a party? Lads don't tell me anything. Had work after lectures so...

MONTY
Where's everybody else?
Turns around on his heel before asking, clearly not listening to Agnew with his back to him beforehand.

AGNEW
I'll text them now. Are you a mate of Johnny Johnny's mate then?
Agnew rummages around in his pocket and pulls out his phone. Then looks up to ask the question.
Sounds of keys in the pocket maybe , rustling of crunched up paper.
MONTY
Don't know Johnny
Agnew looks down at his phone again. Then up again to say...

AGNEW
Billy's mate?

AGNEW MONTY
Never been friends with anyone called Billy.
On principle

AGNEW
Prior? "Uhmmm....right."

MONTY
Would love a sandwich. Love it. You got any ham?

Monty crosses to the fridge/cupboard and spends the new few moments
making a sandwich
Camera behind Monty while he is going through the fridge
As an audience, we feel more on Agnew's side. So make sure it isn't an over-shoulder of Monty as we do not see his perspective of things naturally.

AGNEW
Do we know each other?

Monty crosses [exaggerated] and shakes hands

MONTY
Nah, me' names Monty

AGNEW
Agnew
Baffled by Monty shaking his head at his question.

Monty sits and eats his sandwich
The crunch of lettuce.

AGNEW
Well I think someone's having you on Monty

MONTY
Having me on?
Not perfect English, so instead: 'avin me on?'
AGNEW
Told you there's a party and sent you this
address
"You know....telling you a party's being held here."

MONTY
You got any salad cream? I couldn't find any

AGNEW
But there isn't a party
Clearly getting slightly fed up

MONTY
Or mustard?

AGNEW
And I don't know who you are

Monty sits and chews, and chews, and chews
I think there should be a bit of a pause here with the camera switching between the two characters and showing their expressions, then the next shot is Monty being kicked out
Agreed, will make it very funny. Also add sounds of Monty loudly eating his sandwich.
Again that awkward slience comes into play.

3 EXT. DOORSTEP. NIGHT 3
Agnew holds the door open and Monty exits
Kicked/pushed forcefully instead?

4 EXT. STREET. NIGHT 4
Monty stares down the street. He is looking at houses

5 EXT. DOORSTEP. NIGHT 5
Monty knocks on the door. SHARPY opens it. Monty holds up his carrier
bag of beer

MONTY
Bloody hell you took your time

The END

New term moving image project

2011-01-15T09:23:00.001-08:00

Got handed a script that we have to produce into a short over the next five weeks, I was given role of producer, and I'm quite excited to get locations set up and hire out actors, the script is a case of social awkwardness involving uninvited guests, should be an interesting one.

My final ident

2010-12-30T09:44:00.000-08:00

Final Ident - Cody TV from daniel cody on Vimeo.

My ident commentary

2010-12-09T04:47:00.001-08:00

My brief was to create an ident for a fictional television station, that would reflect something about yourself as well. This was to be done using Autodesk 3ds max 2011, a software used for software prototyping, as well as 3D animation. While this software took a while for me to get the hang of, I read up on the subject (Autodesk: foundation for games) and the workshops also helped me get to grips with it. Eventually I got the hang of the basics of the software, and managed to create some simple projects such as a jumping jelly, and jumping text. My idea for my project was bringing my name (Cody) to life, by animating 3D text. I tried the text in different situations, jumping, as we were taught in the workshops running through the module, wobbling, and finally I decided that I would have the text rolling down the hill, along the ground, and hitting a wall, before bouncing off, rolling back and jumping to its original place perched on the hill. This animation has several different challenges, the first challenge for me was what videogame developers call ‘clipping’, a model seeping through a plane or solid object, and therefore I had to be careful to keep the edges in line while animating the text. It is difficult to make objects come to life, and make it seem natural when they do, and a lot of the time the text seemed rigid, but I got it right in the end. I made the text roll by rotating it ever so slightly every frame, and made it jump by first compressing it into a ball like figure, and then opening it out as it went higher. I think the project went very well considering my limited knowledge (little to none) in the field of 3D computer animation.

Pictures for interactive space

2010-12-08T06:04:00.000-08:00

These are my photos before being pasted into the interactive space. The general idea is that you choose either the bedroom or the kitchen, and look around by throwing a ping pong ball where you want to go.

The 'vertigo shot'

2010-11-23T07:45:00.000-08:00

The dutch camera angle

2010-11-23T07:31:00.000-08:00

For pictures of my interactive space I would like to focus on interesting camera angles. From research I have came across the dutch angle, used to give the idea of something begin not quite right, the feeling of uneasiness in a scene.

First stab at essay intro

2010-11-23T06:20:00.000-08:00

When making a product, most go through several processes to gain an effective product. There are several design processes that can be involved in making a product, four of these are prototyping, market research, open source and reverse engineering.

This essay will focus on both market research and prototying, and look at examples of good applications of these, and not so suitable applications.

Firstly, market research involves gathering information about a product market or customers within that product market. It is an essential part of many companies business strategy, as the process finds out what people want to buy, and furthermore how they feel about what they buy, through methods such as surveys and questionnaires.

Prototyping in the design process of a product involves creating several 'drafts', unfinished versions of a product, a prototype is a basic model which envisions the final target appearance and operation of a finished product. It is used widely across businesses, for both general products and also in software production.

Insipration

2010-11-22T13:15:00.001-08:00

One shot

2010-11-22T13:09:00.000-08:00

Finished one shot film moving image project: 'Reverse' A man walks forward through time while evrybody else acts backwards.

One Shot Group Edit from Mark Boam on Vimeo.

Market research

2010-11-16T09:31:00.000-08:00

While I thought Apple and the ipod would be perfect examples of market research, I was wrong. Apple doesn't feel like it is neccesary, as they make the products that they want, and as Jonathan Ive explains in the latter part of the article, "Apple’s goal isn’t to make money. Our goal is to design and develop and bring to market good products."

http://bokardo.com/archives/steve-jobs-on-why-apple-doesnt-do-market-research/

Some past moving image work

2010-11-09T08:23:00.000-08:00

Untitled from daniel cody on Vimeo.

Past media project from last year, assignment was an opening for a fictional tv product, I chose to film an opening for a teenage drama. My idea was to make it more realistic, rather than skins esque. I only had to shoot around 5 minutes of footage to cut down to 2.30.

Some Moving image past work

2010-11-09T08:15:00.000-08:00

Better late...

2010-10-23T06:14:00.000-07:00

So this happened a few weeks ago now, but the induction lectures and seminars were very interesting, looking forward to the rest of them :) the workshop in which we did some whiteboard animation was brilliant, finished project was very LOL. Should be a creative year.