Aww Dip

Last night I worked on adding a few more lines to this self-assigned kinetic type project. There is still a long way to go, but I am happy that progress is being made at a steady pace.

One of the projects I am working on this quarter is a quasi self-portrait. The fictionalized story is told through animatic still images. I was working on storyboards tonight, and I had an idea… Since I was planning on shooting/processing all of the photos to have a high contrast, Film Noir feel, why not try to recreate a silent movie feel?!

After some processing of the images and some tweaks in After Effects, this is the concept piece I will have to show to my professor:
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Timing is still getting tweaked to allow enough time for information to be understood, but not enough time to have the images get boring. Also, I am sorry for the small size. I am currently looking for a new video player, as WordTube is not giving me the features I am looking for.

During the summer quarter of my Sophomore year in DAAP, we were given a kinetic type project. This method of animation has become very popular as of late, especially on NBC and in recent Ford commercials. I was never happy with the final results of my first foray in to kinetic type, and seeing it over and over again while watching television has lit the necessary fire underneath me to take another stab at combining sound, motion, and typography.

If you have not seen my original kinetic type piece, here it is:

While it is nice, it was never something that I felt represented my vision. One of the biggest problems was that since this was a school assignment, I felt that I needed to make this something that my professors would look favorably upon. I chose to ignore my gut feelings and went in a direction that I thought my professors would like. Yes, professors… plural. There were two different professors that were both grading this project, and at times their feedback would be in direct opposition of each other. I felt stuck in the middle, and after a sting of communication breakdowns, I simply threw up my hands in frustration.

The last third of the piece is my favorite, and it was almost done completely out of spite. In stead of trying to continue working in a visual language that I did not agree with, I decided to just have fun and let them give me whatever grade they wanted. It was when I finally stopped worrying about making my teachers happy and started making myself happy that I found satisfaction.

Instead of going back and redoing the same piece, I thought it would be beneficial to move on, learn from my mistakes, and make the next piece better than the last. I chose to use the song “No Sunshine” by Rhymefest. It is a remix of Michael Jackson singing the popular Bill Withers song. (Confused? You won’t be, after this video example…)

I will post updates on the process work, and as you can see this still has a long way to go. Not only does the rest of the song need to be roughed together, but I also have to add color, finer animations, extra details, and then overall tweaking. It will take a while to get this to a finished stage, but I am looking forward to seeing where it all takes me.

This was the year where Sara and I went back to NYC to spend Thanksgiving with my side of the family. We got tickets to the Grandstands of the Thanksgiving Day Parade again (thanks dad) and I managed to get some decent pictures. I managed to keep my shutterbug self under control, but I do wish I took more pics around the city in general.

Below are a few selected photos, and the full set can be viewed at my Flickr photostream.

(Yes, that is Rick Astley. I was excited and a little scared)

I saw this license plate the other day in the parking lot of the Hyde Park Kroger. While it is kinda ballsy to be that brazen in the midwest, is it really any different than someone putting a “Jesus fish” on their car?

This is what my “happy face” looks like:

And this is why I was so happy:

I was sitting inside this Saturday, trying to watch some CSI and Sara told me before I got too in to the show I needed to move a mini-fridge out of my car. So I begrudgingly threw on a sweatshirt and some shoes. When I went outside, I saw that someone had parked a Mini Cooper in front of our house, and thought nothing of it. I mean, I have seen Minis parked around our house before. Something like that isn’t out of place in Hyde Park.

For some reason, I turned around to look at Sara, since she had come out of the house after me. She was standing there with a camera, and I realized that the Mini in front of our house wasn’t someone else’s… it was mine! Cue happy face.

I am really proud of Sara, since something usually goes wrong when she tries to surprise me. Either she slips and gives me a blatant clue or I find out by accident. This was the first time she tried to surprise me and I didn’t see it coming. I also want to thank Jay Sofranec at Cincinnati Mini. He really went above and beyond, coming to pick us up in the car so we could go and sign all the necessary paper work. If you are in the market for a Mini, make sure to give him a call. He will treat you right.

Now I need to figure out what obnoxious vanity plate I am going to put on my car…