afgan woman

vilans and evil film characters

 

 

Personal:
Growing up the scariest character that I can remember was the JOKER! The joker is the ultimate villain. I think that the fact that he’s a masked villain and his mask is a clown makes him absolutely frightening to me. Clowns have always freaked me out a little bit. This depiction of a clown is jaded a clown is supposed to be happy and blow up balloons not steal and kill people. I find it very interesting that the writer decided to make the ultimate villain a clown because earlier in history they have been depicted as nice funny guys that wouldn’t hurt a fly.

History:
Historically the Joker is batman’s archenemy. He’s a suicidal criminal, who has stolen and murdered many. With a long career of depression and murder he’s no longer enticed by simple crimes so he decided to take on batman. The joker is produced when batman hands him over to the mob and they use chemicals to try and kill him and instead they create his joker like appearance. The jokers weapons of choice are usually comedic they consist of razor sharp cards and acid spewing flowers the least suspecting sort of weapons.
”The Joker has been referred to as the Clown Prince of Crime, the Harlequin of Hate, and the Ace of Knaves.”

Technical:
Technically I will analyze the you tube videos. The joker is presented in a dark grungy light. He is grungy and dirty not like a cheery bright normal clown. Both videos start of with the narration of where it is that the Joker actually came from.

middle eastern women

film as visual communication

Personal: In the movie “The Notebook” there are two characters that fall in love and become separated by their parents, distance, and class rank. The young lovers don’t care about anything but being in love with each other.

Historical: At this time it was view extremely word to have sex before marriage and she sleeps with Noah when she’s already engaged to another. The two have been separated for years but still think of each other as their soul mate. Now they are alone in a boat vulnerable to each other and their love. They now have to express to each other the truth with no escape.

Technical: The lighting is natural light and the key light comes from above the trees. The cast shadows are everywhere they are the trees reflecting off the water. The key light is the actual sun. The music is calming and peaceful they are now together at last and at peace with one another. The lighting is natural and inviting a perfect afternoon then it changes to rainy dark and miserable when the characters discuss why they ever left each other to begin with. Ali asks why Noah never wrote and realizes the he wrote for a year and that her mother had hidden the letters from her so that they would not be together. The rain or truth of the situation is finally pouring down on them. The rain is a flood of there pent up unresolved emotions. They never left the love and joy they share rose to the surface again. They are isolated from the outside world and have to finally deal with each other face to face where they can decipher for themselves whether their love is true and real or just a summer fling from so many years ago. You can see the sexual tension boiling and the love for one another shooting off of them when they row into the romantic setting with all the birds then as is begins to rain its almost as if its raining their tears and finally the lightening and thunder is their argument coming to life.
The shots from above show the beauty of the “dream” sequence that is actually really happening. The two lovers are finally together at last. The impossible and forbidden is coming true. While they’re discussing how they’re both different but the same the camera jumps from one character to the other they are both at eye level meaning that they are each other’s equals. When it rains and the water becomes choppy the music picks up and they begin to laugh this is where I think that they realize they are meant for each other. Ali throws her head back and laughs she’s letting go and she needed the rain at that moment to help her to release. Finally they dock and she pops the question why did they ever end or why had he not written her if he had loved her all these years. The weather is the emotional Rolla coaster coming to life. The scene ends when they kiss and he tells her that its not too late and that its not over.

Ethical, Cultural, Critical: The birds symbolize the idea there may be many birds in the pond or fish in the sea but maybe they are each other true loves and there is no one else. The birds are supposed to fly south for the winter but for some odd reason they haven’t yet there where they’re not supposed to be just like Ali comes to Noah’s house even though she’s engaged. The signifier is the ducks all around when they aren’t supposed to be and the signified is that there may be all the birds in the pond but they are right for each other. Or the birds are where they’re not supposed to be like Ali but yet they seem at home.

thats questionable

In our last class you spoke about the history of dance. Dance in America is an interesting thing, with the separation of church and state brought a ban on dance it was considered demonic. Dance is religion based you disagreed with me in class. In america dance was brough over with the slave trade and was used by the pagan religion as means of praise.

Dance was considered a ritual. A ritual is a enactment of myth, religion in action a form of magic which religious acts are preformed. Religion is a ritual which is rationalized by mythology. This is where trance comes into play, trance an altered state of consciousness or a loss of voluntary movement this scared church authority. So the idea of spiritual possession and trance being inhumanly and uncontrollable seemed demonic and was banned from the church. During the slave trade African’s who practiced vodoo brought with them trance dance. Pagan religion used dance as means to celebrate god this was also a reason for the church to ban dance they no longer wanted their followers to continue with their previous rituals thinking they would go back to their old beliefs. Modern dances like hip hop and brake dancing comes from trance dance and is a huge part of “thug culture” the idea of being tough or “hard” goes back way further than just jail life. In this “questionable” I figured I’d enlighten the class with a little history.

thats questionable

I find it very questionable that we are now a purely web based class. When we signed up for this class it wasn’t registered to be an on line class, I don’t mind because the class agreed to this but its really difficult for me to remember to submit things on time I hope after break to be more sufficient with my posts. For me I don’t take web based classes because it’s difficult for me to learn and remember to submit things. In a way I’m happy because we’re now being more green not wasting paper but the word-press website is frustrating to me because I have yet to fully grasp how to function it properly. I guess my real question is do any other students relate to my frustrations with using word-press.

thats questionable

zeitgeist

1. Personal: I didn’t know what my zeitgeist would be, the first thing that came to mind was September 11^th but I wanted to capture something other than just an American tragedy. The ipod is the perfect high school memory, I remember the Christmas that I and every-other student at my school got one.

2. Historical:

The World Trade Center we’re a piece of our history. World Trade Center was the world’s tallest building from 1972 to 1973.

“To solve the problem of wind sway or vibration in the construction of the towers, chief engineer Leslie Robertson took a then unusual approach — instead of bracing the buildings corner-to-corner or using internal walls, the towers were essentially hollow steel tubes surrounding a central core and perimeter columns sharing the loads. The 208 feet (63.4 m) wide facade was, in effect, a prefabricated steel lattice, with columns on 39 inch (100 cm) centers acting as wind bracing to resist all overturning forces; the central core took the majority of the gravity loads of the building. A very light, economical structure was built by keeping the wind bracing in the most efficient area, the outside surface of the building, thus not transferring the forces through the floor membrane to the core, as in most curtain-wall structures. The core supported the weight of the entire building and the outer shell containing 240 vertical steel columns called around the outside of the building, which were bound to each other using ordinary steel trusses. In addition, 10,000 dampers were included in the structure. With the large core and high load-bearing perimeter for structural integrity, Robertson created a tower that was extremely light for its size.” Wikapedia. 3. Technical:

The image of the ipod add portrays is a signifier itself in relation to the inage of the trade centers imploding. The signified to me is america by this I mean everyone owns an ipod and if you don’t you know someone who does it’s a mp3 player loved by americans and was made by americans. There are other signifiers like the cloud of pictures in relation to the smoke of the trade centers, the marketers might have though all the things lost could be restored in the ipod. Ipods are considered to some as a major part of there electronic life along with there phone and computer an electronic necessity. The iconic signs are that both have to do with america, apple is an american company and is prided by some to be the best of computer technology to date. The pictures are symbolic they speak to americans historically and culturally. Metonymy in the picture is the connection that people make between the photo they are similar but totally different the ipod is an exciting photograph where the trade center picture is a dreaded memory.

Lighting: the lighting of the trade centers is natural light and the ipod is unnatural light. The color is important because it seems to be a nice day in New York until you look up and see that the biulding is exploding.  

4. Ethical, Cultural, and Critical: Culturally this was a sliencing moment in our countries history no one knew what to say, our nation was left speachless. This is a moment in history that will never be forgotten. The design though highly questioable at the time was an enginering mavel they we’re said to be indertructable. After 911 we found otherwise, the terrible attack has proven this statement wrong and shocked the nation. Ethically this is very interesting because it proves nothing is indestructable and brings to light the idea of buildings taking on a human like person. The biuldings we the heart of New York city and the heart was destroyed that faitful day. Across the world the hearts of people when out to the familes invovled with the tragedy when one heart suffers the pain is felt by others, this is the perfect example. Whether you love or hate American and what the American dream stands for hearts from all over the world we’re pained by this horrendous act, everyone knew the aftermath would change the world forever. The picture may or maynot be ethical because its touching on a place in every american mind that brings unhappy rememberance of the terrorist attacks but the apple company had a good marketing poly. By depicting a familiar image everyone can relate. Instead of the ipod blowing up and out everything inside like the trade centers its showing that you can capture all your emotins inside of this small electronic. The ipod is stating that everything can be capture in it, data, movies, memories via photos, and everyones favorite music. This combination of two pictures that I found on line sums up my high school experience. People may look at this and be angered by the comarison of images but I find it intriguing.

movie poster

Light: The key light is shinning on her face from the left and the fill light is on the right. It also appears that there is a top light. The lighting is diffused because there are no hard shadows that appear in the image. The image contains slow fall off becasuse its a gradual change from light to dark with a normal amount of shadow. The diffused or scoop light is on the right making the lighting on her face not so harsh. The fill light makes the intensity of the fall of not as drastic. This picture could possibly have a triangular lighting set up but the picture is take to close to tell of there is a back light involved.  

Composition:

The framing of the photo is a very upclose shot. The picture is very in your face they even cut out parts of her hair and her face, i think the reason is so they would be able to use the reflection of her glases to place the concert scene.

Vectors: There’s a vector created with the glasses that the words “almost famous” run across.

Symbolism: The movie poster symbolised the idea of fame and the star struck teen. Its interesting the way that they used the sunglasses reflection as a mirror so that they viewer is able to see what she is seeing without actually showing it. The image gives the idea and yearning for a young person to be a star or famous. You can tell by the facial expression that she’s intrigued with the concert and band. The way they placed the movie title in the sunglasses was an interesting way to portray that it’s what shes seeking but is just outside looking in she’s “almost famous”. It’s possible that there is ideology presented because its obvious she looks up to the rock star mentality and lifestyle basically the poster is showing the she idolises them. The Signifier is the writing “almost famous” and the Signified  is the idea of being almost famous, the movie poster has a great portrayal of a young girl wishing to be famous. The glasses are another signifier and the signified is actually depicted in the glasses themselves.