Media Observation Page: Yelling and Money

The title is also what I've observed about media in general, at least news related media.

Look Out, The Saints Are Coming Through (In-class discussion/response?)

Initial thoughts on the short story:

I, personally, cannot find any sort of relation between this and the Bob Dylan song. The story itsself was somewhat grating for me to get through, though it was not a 'bad' read I suppose. The narrative was confusing and weird, the only things that I could really piece together being the addictions to certain drugs, and violence.

The various jobs that the male character went through were interesting enough I suppose, though the lack of clarification on whatever was happening was irritating. Him having no real clear, readable character was also somewhat irritating.
The female character was forgettable, and I found it hard to really understand what it was she was doing beyond just scolding the main character and getting bothered by her brothers. The only things I can manage to remember about her, as a character, is that she wore jeans under her wedding dress.

Story-narrative wise, the use of the roman symbols for each 'chapter'(?) were kind of neat, but otherwise I still had a lot of trouble trying to figure out where I even was, and again, how it was even related to the Bob Dylan song.

Questions On the Board during class:

1. What is your reaction to the text you just read?
    See above. 
2. What connections did you make with the story? Discuss the elements of the work with which you were able to connect. 
 The only connections I could make with the story is that the two characters in this story were married/in a relationship, the male character had violent tendencies, the female character had 'smart' brothers and she was somewhat witty, and that the male character occasionally mentioned wanting to be like Bob Dylan in terms of doing artsy shit when he was slightly older.
The elements I suppose are the same thing; Just being able to connect the married aspect, the violent character, the witty character, and some references to Bob Dylan.
3. What changes would you make to adapt this story into another media? What media would you use? What changes would you make?
 I would definitely try and make this into a comic, because I think the graphic novel format would work for the type of story that this is trying to tell. Likely in the style of something of Mike Mignola for that extra punchy effect that I feel like this story is trying to get. I would use the graphic novel media format, either traditionally drawn or digital, doesn't matter. As for changes, I would definitely first off give the two main characters names, and delve into what happened, and maybe make the references to Bob Dylan perhaps a tad more meaningful more instead of just off-handed mentions of liking his lifestyle or his music.

Journey (Curation/Suggestion)

The piece of media that I'm going to make a recommendation for to be watched/read about for this class is a video game called Journey.
I would not say that people have to play the game (Because not everyone can afford a playstation 3/on wards or have the money to buy the game, because you cannot rent it since it's a PSN exclusive.) but there are numerous no-commentary, silent, full play-throughs of Journey that people can watch.

Here is a link to one of the better HQ silent playthroughs of the game.

This is the general overview of Journey:

          "Journey's story is told wordlessly through gameplay and using cutscenes. The player's character begins on a sand dune in a seemingly endless desert. In the far distance looms a large, foreboding mountain with a glowing crevice that splits its peak. As the character approaches the mountain, they find remnants of a once-thriving civilization, eroded by sand over time. Scattered throughout the ruins at the end of each area are stones at which the traveler rests; these stones give the traveler the vision of meeting a larger, white-robed figure in a circular room, with art on the walls describing the rise and fall of the civilization mirroring the player's journey. The player must also contend with the ancient automatons left over from a war which ended the civilization, and which still roam the city looking for intruders."

                                 - Wikipedia description of Journey.

Here is a link to the entire game's soundtrack, composed by Austin Wintory.
Here is Austin Wintory's website.

Here is a link to the game company that developed Journey, called thatgamecompany.

I feel Journey could be an interesting topic for people to explore in the class, since it is often compared to things like a book, or a concept, and a massive art-piece, while also still being a video game.

New Yorker article on Journey.
Giantbomb article on Journey.

The book about the art of Journey.
Some of the concept art for Journey:

Games as a Medium: Journey

For me, personally, I think one of the best examples of a video games being a piece of literature is the video game called Journey. The game has no dialogue aside from the beeps and chimes that your character can play, but it has all of the elements of a really good thriller book.

There is excellent pacing, as well as choice pieces of game play that only reveal small things about the backstory and plot as you go along, as well as stunning visuals and music that really pulls you into the game.

I feel that Journey can both be a literary experience, as well as being a movie of sorts, but definitely a work of art.

Bojack Horseman (Binge watch)

Binge watched bits and pieces of Bojack Horseman. Initial thoughts:

 - Feels a lot like Rick and Morty
 - Bojack is really dislikeable, hard to really enjoy watching a character I hate.
 - The art style is alright, just feels like standard fare mostly.
 - Interesting topics, but I mostly get invested in whatever it is Todd is doing.
 - Almost like an "adult" regular show.

Might watch the rest of it but probably not; only enjoying really one character isn't really enough to keep me interested in the show. Shows are like books to me; if it doesn't grab me within the first few pages I will not enjoy spending time with it, and will find it incredibly hard to focus on it.

Writing Assignment: Asterios Polyp

I think the strong aspects of the author's voice in Asterios Polyp is definitely the use of purple/blue, as well as the integration of various little bits of geometry and other isometric forms of art.
On top of this, David Mazzuchelli likes to use the different fonts for the different people, as well as shifting the style of the panels to really read to the viewer what is going on.

My favorite examples of this is when Sterio and Hana argue/talk and it goes into the isometric forms for Sterio, and the sketchy, form-ish figure drawing style for Hana. The use of only three or four colors per panel, with the majority of them being blue/purple/pink is very indicative of this specific voice.

The integration of various forms of Greek mythology is very strong with this artist's comic, with it melding very well with the main character and the side characters that they encounter.

Author's Voice : Maya Deren

I'm writing this assignment on Maya Deren, which is who I chose to watch three films of.
The films I watched were:

- Meshes of the Afternoon
- At Land
- Ritual in Transfigured Time 

While watching these movies the thing that was always in common for me that I noticed were:

- There was always a blank, strange sort of opening when it came to starting the film out. Some sort of bizarre act would occur.
- They were all in black and white.
- They all had very lovely soundtracks.
- Each film had a very dream-state trance-esque feel to the films.
- There was a lot of symbolism with the themes of these movies.
- They all had a woman as the star of the film.
- There was a lot of abstract symbols and characters in the films. (Character with a face for a mirror in Meshes of the Afternoon)

Her voice seems to always have a sort of dream-like quality to her movies, as well as trying to tell a story with some form of self expression or feelings about a certain way things are going in a relationship, or in life. She loves to use symbolism for these movies especially, adding to the dream-like quality that always occurs in these films.

List of things in Common with Jim Jarmusch films

- Almost a film noire-like thing in all the films
- Two are black and white for that false old-look
- Have very moody or depressing themes/tones/attitude
- Teeter on the line of being almost too real of a situation
- There's always some sort of couple relationship in the movie
- Very complicated characters that have their own thing going on
- Multiple stories going on in one film (though sometimes only two stories)
- Traveling and running away from things
- People being put out of their elements
- Significant things always happen on the corner of a street/intersection
- Characters are all developed by some sort of unfortunate circumstance
- We never really see anything from a first-person point of view, we're always looking at the characters from the outside
- There's always a character that doesn't have english as their main language.

The Goose Father (In-class writing assignment)

Copy-pasted from our Google Docs session from class today.

Order of Things to happen:

• Views of newspaper talking about goose-fathers, Gilho’s daily life, eating junk food because wife/kids were in America, but he was better off with money and planning his life/fortunes. Scene of him hugging dirty baseball mit. Next would be putting out ad for tenant, to help with his lonely feeling.
• Show meeting Wuseong and introduce goose at doorstep.
• Show balcony scene of confrontation between Gilho and goose. Gilho was checking on plants.
• Show scene with pancake and then develop into montage where they start more separate but get a lot friendlier and close with one another.
• Show night going out to drink and do stuff, close moment, show Gilho slapping Wuseong, Wuseong disappears for a day or so. Show empty apartment, then show him getting visas, calling in sick, etc.
• Passage of time, show him drinking with other guys, show him bringing other dude home.
• Show them coming back and Wuseong comes back and he’s sitting on the balcony with the goose.
• Drunk guy tries grabbing goose feathers, gets bit, Gilho has another confrontation with the goose, eventually lets goose go after Wuseong talks to him.
• Gilho wakes up, new moon, sees Wuseong standing on balcony with goose-corpse-mom scene.
• Show visual representation of Gilho coming to terms with loving Wuseong with goose wings enveloping the both of them in a hug for end. To show the end of Gilho’s internal struggle with feelings.

Visual Important things:

• Bright colors for when Wuseong and Gilho are around each other
• Desaturated for when they aren’t around each other
• Normal Actors (Not an Animated Feature)
• Importance of Goose-mom scene, heavy visuals on this scene to imply importance of it.
• Lots of focus shifting for scenes
• Sharp cuts for most scenes; Fuzzy/soft cuts for passages of time.

Visuals (Locations and Theme?):

• Korean based still like original story
• More focused on the romance; less on weird goose corpse mom?
• Show even amounts of the backstory between Gilho and Wuseong since we’re learning about both of them.
• Definitely keep goose.
• Modern time (2016-17); It still keeps economic issues and also common theme of families staying apart and people staying, etc.

Writing Assignment: Costume Designer (Empire Strikes Back)

When approaching a script like this I feel that a lot of the elements of this movie could be very mysterious and strange looking, something that would invoke a sense of not really knowing what kind of creature or alien that the audience is looking at. I would approach this script with costume designs for the characters that would only be 'familiar' on the main characters, or even just the human ones, but for things like the aliens and mysterious monsters, they would have to have some truly bizarre looking designs and things to make them look almost in the realm of uncanny valley.

I would want my costumes to be really memorable, though I feel they might not age that well due to how exaggerated they would have to be to teeter on the realm of uncanny valley.

Questions - Whites

How are our characters connected to the world? 
Well, I think our characters are very connected to the world in this short story "Whites" by Julie Otsuka. They are stated as being a very real part of California's history in farming and existing in the country while having a sense of honor-bound duty to their families back in Japan. They are very real and entrenched in the underbelly of American's society during that time, and do a wonderful job of bringing us a view of that world with the ways they have to talk to Americans, do their work, and speak about their own places where they feel they can be safe. Calling the little Japantown in San Francisco 'more Japanese than the villages in Japan' was a really unique way of bringing us into this perspective of the situation these Japanese people were stuck in, specifically the Japanese women.

Short Story Questions

Are there any female characters in the work that you identify with?
• I don't really personally identify with a lot of the female characters in these stories. I've never really been in these situations that a lot of them are placed in, so I don't find a whole lot relate-able to them. Possibly the instance of being lost due to trauma, but that's about all.

How are relationships between men and women (or characters assuming male/female roles) portrayed in the story? 
• It, to me, just always looks like a very heavy one-side-has-freedom/power while the other side has little to none, and the one without power always finding some joy to getting that freedom, or the character feeling sadness or whatever when they're having that power used against them.

What are the power relationships between men and women in the text?
• The men usually have the most power, and either use it or don't outright use it in the story but it's implied due to the sorrow of the female character.

How are male and female roles defined?
• The female characters are almost always relegated to being trapped inside the house, or trapped doing things they absolutely don't want to do. The male characters are always running around doing really whatever they want.

What constitutes masculiniity and femininity in the world of the story?
• "Femininity" is usually defined by staying home, cleaning, being quiet/submissive, being pretty for the husband. "Masculinity" Is usually defined by always bringing home money/food, being aggressive and in control, always keeping a hold on the situation and not letting any threats appear.

Do characters take on traits from opposite genders in the story? How so? Does this change others reactions to them?
• I suppose in the one that I read, Where are You Going; Where Have You Been, one of the male characters that the main character originally finds interest in takes on a pushover, easily manipulated, submissive role to the aggressive, bad male character. I suppose that could be 'taking traits' from opposite genders.

What does the work reveal about the ooperations (economically, politically, socially, or psychologically) of patriarchy?
• That the men of the society are extremely entitled and believe they are owed whatever a woman has.

What does the work express or imply about the possiblities of sisterhood as a mode of resisting patriarchy?
• That women need to spend less time being pitted against each other by men, and spend more time working together to survive and have success.

What does the work say about the history of women in literature or the arts or about women's creativity?
• I think it implies that women are insanely creative in various fields, but they're often pushed aside or purposely written out of history/stories because they don't want people finding out that women can be successful.

Wonder Woman

For the question for writing this week: 
I would like to design a female character that is okay with being pretty, she's smart, she doesn't put up with the 'not like other girls' bullshit (it's a tired rhetoric, very embarrassing to read.) She's allowed to display emotion, without being put down for expression emotion, for her to be able to have friends that are men without her immediately being shackled to them as a 'love' interest. I'd like her to be able to love another woman, without being reduced to just fetish material, or the fact that she loves another woman be seen as wildly inappropriate or only ever sexual.

This week when we read the book talking about Wonder Woman and her history, I was actually very surprised to find out so many things connected to her creation, as well as her 'lore' in the comic series.

I had no idea that wonder woman was even remotely connected to the creation of the lie detector, or that murders and other scandals were connected to her history and the people who created her. I will admit, reading the book was somewhat hard for me, because the format of it was very hard for me to follow.
Stuff and chapters felt very fractured to me, making it hard to connect the chapters together as I was reading. It was a good book, but was hard for me to follow and read.

The film that we watched in class was pretty good, but I'm pretty, personally, tired of people immediately attacking women who like to use makeup, and who immediately assume they are vapid and are only doing it to impress people.

Most of the content in the film I agree with, especially with the perspective of people being called bitchy because they are a woman in power. This attitude has gotten especially worse, with the rise of people immediately attacking a woman (or anybody that challenges the normal) when they point out something wrong, calling them 'triggered', annoying, 'sjw', etc.

The attitude is even worse towards women who don't fit the 'norm' either, including fat women, disabled women, women of color, trans women, are always put down and made fun of.

True Grit

When reading True Grit, I feel like it really encompasses some of the aspects of that 'Wild West' culture that is often really romanticized into something that wasn't too terribly common, or may not have even existed at all. I think it also points out how a lot of American 'mythology' is violent, or has a huge sense of 'justice' and revenge in it.

I feel as though True Grit really highlights a more 'real' look into the issues of the west, with outlaws, with a sense of justice and revenge that can be pretty understandable when you look into the reasons the characters do what they do.

True Grit really highlights the more violent nature of humans, I think. It also really shows more aspects of that 'dastardly bad guy' and 'paragon good guy' (Mattie's Dad being the 'paragon' who gets killed.) that is pretty common in a lot of stories. I certainly enjoyed this book, which shows the aspects of violent and real human nature, much more than another book that tries to show the same thing, Lord of the Flies.

Mattie is a really interesting character herself, what with sticking it to the 'rules' that were set around at the time. I also really appreciate Rooster, since he's an overweight character that's missing an eye ( sort of.. ) and he's overall a good guy that doesn't have to look like some slick fancy hero. LaBoeuf is an alright character, though I'm not a fan of how much of an asshole he is, in general.

When it comes to things like the mythology aspect of the american west, I think they kind of combine some of the bits of myth together? Mattie is kind of a combination of both the American Hero/American Adam, but she's also the child hero. They combine these two things very well, but they also put bits of the elements

A pretty fun read, overall.

Prologue: Cam.

I would say that my story begins in California, near Sacramento on the northern half of the monster of a state. I grew up in a small house, with a family that was relatively happy. From a young age, I had a knack for drawing and computer programs. (Since, when I was very young, the first thing I touched on the computer was the original Diablo..) That love of computers and video games only grew as time went on, being introduced to things like the PlayStation systems, as well as the Nintendo handhelds and their home consoles, which solidified my desire to pursue Game Art as my major.

Originally, because I also loved animals so much, I wanted to become a marine biologist, or even a botanist because I love plant-life, but unfortunately math is not my forté, so I quickly gave up on that dream. I plan to, instead, work this love of marine creatures, as well as land ones and plants, into my works of art and entertainment.

So, how did I find this school? It's interesting.. I left home two years ago because of coming out to my parents with personal things-- and while they didn't kick me out of the house, it's very difficult for them to understand as they come from a heavily religious background. I ended up moving to Florida with two of my friends, one of which I'd known since high school, and he recommended this school to me. I checked it out, applied, got accepted, and started my incredible journey into the world of art college.

I don't regret coming out at all, because as a result I've found not only a great college, but I've met and made so many friends who are great and understanding here, and that I wouldn't trade anything to undo me ever meeting them! I also discovered that fishing is another hobby I enjoy, as it provides me an opportunity to get a much closer look at marine creatures, which I love.  Hooray good sequences of events!

When it comes to how I view the world, I try my best to stay positive about various circumstances, though a bit of cynical-ness and doubts, as well as anger, tend to bubble up sometimes. It's something that I've been working on for a few yers.

That's my prologue!