Yifei Long

23/1/2022

For this assignment we chose five words from the word cloud: Evil, Egg, Fly, Vision and space. Then created a short film based on the short story we wrote in creative writing class. Due to time constraints, we reorganized the background of the story and simplify the plot.

According to the words, this is a dark little horror story. It is about a mentally disturbed housewife who cannot stand her husband’s affair and kills her son who looks more and more like him. Because the housewife is insane she sees things differently from what a normal person would see. She thinks she is collecting eggs, but in fact she is disposing of her son’s bones.

Then we wrote the script.

We then did some research, with Chuan lin in our group collecting material for this (e.g. classic American domestic interior scenes and images of housewives).

Then we each worked on our own ideas, and this is my part↓

The next step was to draw storyboards and shots based on the script and setting. We drew each part that we wanted to express, and we combined them to bring them together. We drew and edited as we went along in order to keep the film to a manageable length. I think it’s important to have a sense of editing by sketching first and then making a draft short film.

After that, it was time to divide up the work and move on to the production of the video, with Chuan lin working on the first ten seconds of the line, me on the second ten seconds and Feiya on the colouring. Finally, Qianwei joined us for post-production editing and voiceover. The animation software used here is TVP and AN, and the editing software is Pr.

For the background music, as we were asked to use our own music material, I chose to record my own piano music and did a simple arrangement of it. I suggested Qianwei to add an electronic noise and a downbeat to give the video a more contrasting feel.

After editing our work was completed, I would like to say a few words about the group work and my thoughts on it: Overall, it was a well-defined group work and I believe that each group member learned different things from this collaboration. I think I learnt a lot because I was involved from the beginning when we discussed the story, drawing the subs, adjusting the subs, creating the animation, coloring and post-voicing. And I think it was a challenge to coordinate the group to integrate our opinions. Back to the animation itself, I personally think that there is still a lot of room for improvement in the expression of our shots. Watching more good films and animation works may help us to draw assignments that can express the plot more accurately. And through talking to my teacher, I understood that the biggest problem with our group’s assignment was that we didn’t tell the whole story clearly. Firstly, because it was difficult to tell a story that needed to be set up in 20 seconds, and although we barely finished the story, the audience still had a lot of confusion. At the teacher’s suggestion we added some details to show that the main story line was that the heroine went mad and then killed her son, but the overall clarity of the story needed to be proved. All in all, my introspection are: 1. to simplify the storyline when designing the story, it would be better to write a story that can be simple and clear without the need for background padding. 2. to design the subplots more rationally and accurately, not to use too many subplots that express repetitive meanings. 3.perhaps we can explain the whole story through adding voice-cover. My gains are: 1. a clearer understanding that the styling of the characters can be a breakthrough in telling the background of the story, taking this assignment as an example, the image of a mad housewife should have a hollow and dull expression and unusual movements. 2. a better understanding of the language of the camera, what kind of shots can convey what kind of message, and what kind of shots are coherent to make the pace more comfortable. 3. Experimented with new ways of expression, such as using different colours for a long shot to express the passage of time. I think this teamwork experience is really fruitful and thought-provoking, I wish next time I can do better.

11/11/2021

This week we will be making up a story for our school area: elephant castle. The theme of the story is to imagine the origin of the name ‘elephant castle’ and to use imagination only, without access to real references. We will be working in groups to create an artist book to tell the story. The book can be in any form and can take any (non-normal) shape according to our imagination.

Our group’s story is that: long time ago, elephants were considered a symbol of luck, so a kingdom used army to capture an elephant and imprison it in the kingdom in order to bring luck back to the country. The elephant was so depressed, but the kingdom said to him, “Take me with you and run away! Eventually the elephant and the kingdom came together in the area that came to be known as Elephant Castle.

To make the artist book, our group got straws and paper bags from the cafe and made them look like a castle (as shown in the picture) and then snapped a round hole in the middle to act as a window to show the plot of the story. We then used paper cut-outs to make a cage to catch the elephant, the elephant, the mouth of the castle and so on. The whole process was great fun!

22/11/2021

At the first time I have an idea but I’m not sure if it fits the topic. I wanted to commemorate a late composer that I really liked, and then I wanted to use some of the things that appear in his different compositions and link them together in the video. But then I realized that this idea itself is another form of “connection”. I’ve just thought about it again, and maybe it’s possible to read the connection from the perspective of “composer and listener”. It means that the listener has a spiritual connection to the composer in the form of a secondary composition（like fan art）

The feedback comes from the emotions we feel, the memories we relive and the impressions we leave after hearing this composer’s work. This is the invisible communication and bond between the composer and the listener.

So I’d like to introduce my favorite composer: Siina mota.

Siina is a talented Japanese composer who has been contributing his music to online platforms since the age of fourteen. His early style is light and airy, like the dream of a simple child. In his middle and late works he created a number of pieces that would be considered avant-garde if listened to today, using a unique electronic expression. Unfortunately, he passed away at the age of 20.

Siina’s songs are a reflection of a teenager’s thoughts on growing up and life and death. The sad and inspiring lyrics, suggestive phrases and questions have created a unique Siina in my mind.

In his last piece before his death his lyrics read: The first circle, and the last circle, with the incredible answer, is a zero (in Japan the circle represents the correct answer also the number zero) but in my heart, and in the hearts of many listeners, such an independent and unique being is of course a perfect score. So at the end I think he must become an angle.

15/11/2021

Today we had a 3D modelling session, firstly the teacher asked us to build our own story world and then image the scenes. My scene depicts a secret base that I dreamed up in my head as a child.

17/11/2021

This was my first attempt at modelling. The main thing I wanted to do was a secret base of my own that I used to think about in my head as a child. So I used this duplex design because I wanted to make it feel like a castle in the eyes of a child. I used to dream of two-story houses, staircases floating in the air, balloons and buntings visible from the windows, so I added all these elements. For the color scheme I chose a fairy-tale and peaceful looking color scheme, I wanted to be able to have peace in the scene. In fact, if I had the time to do the original design, I would have liked to decorate the walls of the house with some plants, but time and skills were limited so I didn’t do it. However, as a first attempt at modelling, I learned a lot and hope to do better next time.

This is the making process

And this is my final work

8/11/2021

In character design, geometric shapes are important for the generalisation of the character. In class we therefore carry out exercises to depict a character using outer contours. The external outline can be used to bring out the character’s personality traits.(p1)

In addition to this, we have been working on the characterisation of objects: the objects placed on the table have been characterised and the characters have been designed according to the shape of the objects. A favourite figure was chosen for a more in-depth drawing.(p2,3,4)

11/11/2021

For the final character design homework, My main design concept is using the theme of winter to create an elegant maiden.I wanted to make her a fairy tale character so I added a lot of settings such as a castle hat, fog hair, mistletoe bow tie, dream tobacco pipe which carrying the dream of all hibernating animals… I also designed her dress in the shape of an upside down goblet and decorated it with Christmas tree elements.

That day I was diagnosed to internet addiction then I was sent to treatment by my parents.

16/05/2015

Unstoppable electric shocks keep stinging me, it feels like a million worms gnawing at my brain. A series of haunting voices kept forcing me to admit my mistakes. If I answered incorrectly, I would suffer a more intense electric shock.

20/05/2016

I’ll never resist…all I have to do now is confession! To confess of my addiction, my ignorance, my ungreatfulness! I will kneel and always follow your guidance… that is the oracle!

03/07/2017

When I was out from the hospital I found It’s hell on earth. Everything that was forbidden in the hospital then came to me like a tidal wave. Everyone was using the internet! What a horrible way to live, and no God to heal them! I want to escape back to your shelter but there is no place for me in the world anymore!

“O God, if there is an afterlife, I want to live in a happy world where I am a good child.”

Such a suicide note lay silently on my desk.

In fact, I want to try to express a more realistic and absurd topic, which is essentially the rejection of new things by human beings. When computers were first introduced in China, many parents looked at their children who were keen on the Internet as if they were drug addicts. Some institutions took the opportunity to set up so-called Internet rehabs to give children electroshock treatment, forcing them to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from the computer and associating them with fear, electroshock and computers together, to let children feel afraid when they see computers or mobile phones. But when the child comes out of the rehab facility and sees that society has now slowly accepted the internet, they will become fearful of society now and even want to escape back to the rehab, which I think is the darkest of all. All in all it is the use of violence to make you fear something to break your addiction, the ironical thing is that the whole society has slowly embraced these things, and finally find you are marginalized. So I wrote in diary form, over three years, about the changes in a child’s journey and what happened to him. Firstly, I wanted to portray the changes within the child, and secondly, I wanted to create a timeline to reflect the slow acceptance of internet culture by the public.

This week we started the fourth rotation class: sound. Here are the study summaries for this week.

25/10/2021

We are exposed to the concept of sound and acoustics. Sound is vibrations , all sound has all of these properties: Pitch-frequency, Timbre-tone color, Intensity-volume or loudness, Duration-length of the sound. Sound is materially invisible but very visceral and emotive. it can define a space at the same time as it triggers a memory. The embodiment of sound is widely used in artistic creation. For example, in comic dialogues there are often blasting dialogues and exaggerated fonts to show that the voice is loud, or trembling fonts to show that the character speaks with a trembling voice; in abstract art, for example, artists often use the first sensation of music or sound as inspiration for their work, either by visualising the sound as a geometric figure or by using rich colours to interpret it. The soundtrack also plays a considerable role in the film. A large part of the soundtrack is used to highlight the psychological state of the characters and to set the mood. For example, when the characters are tense, they are accompanied by fast-paced music with a sharp tone.

For our first assignment, we were asked to capture sounds in our surroundings by ear outdoors and indoors and draw them. I painted like this. I went outside to the main road, where many roads intersected in the busiest part of the road. The continuous sound of sirens and the wind passed by my ears, so I fleshed out the sirens into little geometric shapes that were a bit broken, and also used random lines to represent the sound of the wind. At the very central of the whole painting is a circle representing the most chaotic of sounds, made up of many elements. I did the indoors painting in the canteen and I want to show people’s whispering. So I draw some abstract heads and add straight lines as their talking text.For the homework, we need to make a micro film of a journey between outdoor to indoor.

26/10/2021

For today’s ‘indoor-outdoor’ sound cover assignment, I chose to walk from the pavement to a flower shop. My idea was that a stranger had entered the world of plants and the plants were talking in their own language. So I gave the plants different human voices to show what they were discussing. I felt it was a lovely story so I also gave it a cheerful soundtrack.

29/10/2021

Here is my presentation for 3x10sec ‘ONOMATOPOEIA CLUB’ style film homework’s presentation. The idea for this short film came from a melody composed by one of my favourite musicians. The melody makes you feel like you’re falling into a dream, and its name is “Follow the Dream”, so I decided that I wanted to make a video where “three chapters are about dreams”. In the first chapter I wanted to paint the sleeping universe, I wanted to visualise the universe as a little girl sleeping, her breathing is causing the universe to change so there are undulating bubbles. Unfortunately I didn’t have enough time to finish the colouring. In the second chapter I painted the girl who fell into a dream. I didn’t think too much about the details when I did it but just wanted to challenge the animation of the fall. In the third chapter I draw some of the images that will appear in the dream world. Seeing fish flying through the sky, using a jacket as a parachute and so on. I think the original track actually works well enough as a soundtrack to tie the three chapters together, but I added some other sound effects anyway. It seems to work pretty well together.

22/10/2021

‘Objects’ Homework–David Kracov

What his work communicates: Butterflies, music notes and graffiti symbols are common elements in his work. I think the artist was trying to create a three-dimensional and layered ”visualization of emotions”. For example, the butterflies in the gift represent the intention of the person who wrapped it; and the overflowing notes of the piano score symbolize the fullness of the composer’s feelings. The hanging picture with this kind of artistic form may symbolize the collection and preservation of emotions. As in the case of specimen of butterflies, this is a specimen of emotions. The artist collect the “living” elements and keeping them in place in a vibrant manner, thus preserving and sustaining this vitality. In this way it will resonate with visitors. For the specimen, its value lies in the pact that the life remains bright and colorful even after it has passed away. For David’s works, then, the value lies in they record “the power and freshness of a momentary explosion of things.(the power in this case have multiple senses, including the composer’s inspired notes,etc)”. And more dynamic than a specimen. Based on this artistic expression, maybe we can find more complex and richer feelings.

Why I choose the artist: His work is colorful, complex but well shaped. And has an overall sense of fairytale. There is something about that it makes you want to tell a story, and it instantly inspired me a lot too. The first feeling it gave me was like open a picture book for the first time as a child. So I wrote that feeling down and it became the inspiration for our group film. If we are talking about how people’s response to objects, I think that this kind of work, which is “impactful at first sight” would be a good subject for this assignment.

Our response:

21/10/2021

This story is about a little girl and a ghost that take place in another city. The setting is a young girl who has just arrived in a new city and a ghost who will disappear from the world in just one day. The little girl is just starting her life alone, the ghost has been wandering alone and both are very lonely. But the little girl is the only one who can see the ghost, so on this night, the ghost shows the girl the whole city and they dance under the tall buildings. When the dawn came, the little girl and the ghost clung to each other in the rising sunlight, and the ghost gradually became transparent and slowly disappeared. This story is actually based on my own feelings. It was my first time in London to start a new study life, so I wanted to find an anchor. I made up the story of the ghost to encourage myself, and I believe that I can meet people here who can give each other warmth.