Monday, May 2, 2016

Blog 4



On my trip to museum of moving image there where two exhibits that caught my eye.
One exhibit was for the props of the stop motion animated film, Anomalisa. It gave me a better
understanding of the hard work that came from making this movie. For one I saw the
craftsmanship that was put into the sets used in the movie and the attention to detail they had
such as the street and bedroom scenery. Also it displayed the figures used for the
characters in the movie. Seeing them so stiff as opposed to how they moved in the clip presented
in the exhibit made me impressed as to how many times the creators had to keep re-positioning
the figures for each frame of movement used in the movie.
            The next exhibit that impressed me was the feral fount which is basically a cylinder with
several objects connected to it that spins at a great speed. This one had missiles, hands, melted
plastic, letters, and papers planes all in different positions of the feral fount. But when the light
around the feral fount starts to flicker at a certain speeds, the blur gets canceled out and the feral
found gives off an illusion of stop-motion animation with the hands grabbing the missiles, which
turns into melted plastic that turns into a letter which turns into a paper plane. I was amazed at
how you could use such a trick to create animation. I didn’t even think you could do something
like that. It gave me better insight on all the different tricks you can used to create animation.

Monday, April 18, 2016

Blog 3



For my blog post I have decided to analyze the shots in the video half life 2 escape from

city 17 part 1 which is based off the video game half life 2. For the editing of the video the

camera shakes every time an action scene starts up adding to the chaotic feel the video is trying

to bring to the audience. The beginning of the video shows an overhead view of the ruined city

so the viewer can get a better understanding of what the setting of the city is and show what’s

going on. The sounds of the video range from explosions to gun fire which match up with the

armed soldiers and assault helicopters chasing down the two protagonists in the train yard. The

shots are organized starting from the montage of city destruction, the protagonists devising their

escape plan, and the gun fight they have with the enemy soldiers. What determines how long a

shot is depends on what type of action is going on. Calmer scenes stay on the same shot longer

while scenes involving action are shortened with the camera angle constantly shifting showing

each action being performed. Such as when the camera does a close up of a character firing their

weapon and then it cuts to another angle of their target getting hit. The shots flows seamlessly

because the action is so quick that the instant switch in camera angles matches up with the action

performed by the characters in the movie. The video can be watched here(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1UPMEmCqZo).

Monday, April 11, 2016

My audio portrait https://soundcloud.com/user-142824912/david-gantz-audio-potrait

Monday, March 28, 2016

Blog 2



            The texture of the city sound for me usually ranges from shoes walking on the hard

pavement to the loud beeping of cars. Early in the morning you can hear these sounds very

clearly since barley any other activity is going on. The sound of shoes stomping on the pavement

is very prevalent since most people go jogging early in the day. Later in the day you can hear

more people having conversations with other people. Usually when go further into the upper

parts of the city you can hear more people talking at once. It becomes a big cluster of sound

when you enter these large gatherings of people in places such as time square. At night the sound 

becomes louder as more people usually get together with each other at night than in the say.

Areas that don’t have many people talking would include residential neighborhoods that

are mostly parks and apartment buildings. You can usually hear the sound of small children

yelling and playing along with the sounds of rusty playground equipment such as see-saws and

swings. At night these areas are completely quite aside from the sound of some of the local

wildlife like the chirping of crickets and cicadas. Special sound marks that can be found in the

neighborhood I live in would be the local ice cream trucks. The special melody the trucks play

don’t play anywhere else so you know when one is coming. It gives off a soothing and catchy

rhythm that would make most people want to check out where that sound is coming from.