Image / Time

Image/Time Tumblr- Sunset McCarthy

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Image/Time Reflection

Unit 3 - Reflection Post

During this class I learned the most about form, elements/principles of design, and applying them. I experimented with mediums I would not have otherwise tried, and was pushed during the creative process to push my ideas further and make them better. I feel that I’ve improved so much in this class and now really understand how much more I can do with my ideas and where it can take me if I’m willing to put in the time/effort.

Not only will I use the concepts I learned to create better compositions and to spend more time on the creative process, I will be more willing to experiment outside of just drawing. It was very interesting to explore a more fine arts world, as I’m much more accustomed to the Illustration world (which often feels more straight forward to me). 

There were definitely frustrations in trying to work with certain mediums and trying to wrap my mind around what makes a good composition. While I’m certainly not where I want to be with it, I’ve come a long way and will only improve as I continue to apply these concepts.

There were obvious connections between all the units as they focused the most heavily on form and applying it in all types of projects and ideas. This focus I believe helps keep you rounded as an artist while still keeping in mind basic principles.

I’m glad this class was required as I feel I benefited a lot from it. The work I made in this class is what I’m most proud of, and I have plans to expand on a lot of them and improve them in the future.

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Unit 3 - Final Project: Stills Movie

Purge - Sunset McCarthy

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQYRISFDZ24)

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Unit 3, Exercise 5 - In-Class Sound Exercise

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Unit 3, Exercise 4 - Final Project Brainstorm

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Unit 3, Exercise 3 - Non-Linear Movie Analysis Extra Credit

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

This movie tells the story of a couple who has broken up after their relationship progressively stagnated and the girlfriend, Clementine, gets the boyfriend, Joel, erased from her memory at a clinic. Joel finds this out and erases Clementine as well and the audience witnesses their relationship in reverse. Joel tries to hold onto pieces of memories but to no avail. After the procedure, the two feel discontented and are drawn to each other once again. Despite finding out that their relationship has failed before (due to the side story that leads to a character at the clinic sending everyone their file) they decide to be together again. There are several conflicts throughout the story, the overarching one being Clementine and Joel’s relationship having no closure, leaving Joel specifically feeling lost. This is resolved in the very end when the two come together and throughout Joel’s procedure when he realizes again how much he loves Clementine and that their relationship was worth trying again.

This film falls under Romance and Science Fiction. I have expectations of the Romance genre to be more “cheesy” or a more guilty-pleasure kind of read, but this is not the case in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The concept is unique and the characters, with very raw and conflicting emotions, are complex and recognizable in real people. I generally expect Science Fiction to be more Star Wars like, but this falls under a more based in the present, realistic type of Sci-fi.

Timeline: -Joel wakes up and sees a dent in his car. Doesn’t go to work, goes to the beach instead and meets Clem on the train. They hang out and he stops at her house so she can get her toothbrush. Joel is approached in his car by a man and questioned. -Audience finds out that Joel was broken up with and tried to approach Clem but was blown off (and she has a boyfriend). He finds out from friends that Clem had him erased from her memory. -Joel makes his own appointment at the clinic -People from the clinic start Joel’s procedure; Joel realizes this when he witnesses his memory from the outside. -The most recent memories from his relationship with Clem are erased. The audience sees the dent in the car was from Clem, which is why Joel doesn’t remember it. -Clinic people are working and talking. We see that man who approached Joel in the car works at the clinic (Patrick). -Memories continue to be erased in reverse -The woman who works at the clinic (Mary) shows up.  -Memories continue backwards -Patrick goes to see his new girlfriend, Clementine. -Memories continue -People from clinic chill while machine is on autopilot -Patrick gets to Clem who is freaking out. Patrick tries to comfort her with stuff he got from Joel. -Joel tries to hold onto memories but they slip away -Joel begins skipping through memories in attempt to hold onto Clem -Clem goes to the lake with Patrick in the present but begins to panic. -Joel brings Clem to deeper memories that aren’t related to her in an attempt to keep her -The people from the clinic need help because Joel has disappeared from the map, they call Doctor Howard for help. He comes and puts the machine back on track. -Joel and Clem keep jumping to different memories and get back off the map -The Doctor fixes this again. Mary confesses her love to Howard. She kisses him and they are caught by his wife, who drove up and saw them in the window. The wife tells Mary that they had an affair before and Howard erased her memory. -The audience sees Joel’s memory of meeting Clem. Joel decides he can’t save the memories and just enjoys reliving it. -The procedure finishes and Joel wakes up, sees dent in his car (it is the morning from the beginning).  -Mary sends the files from the clinic back to all the patients, feeling now the procedure is not morally right. -Joel is in his car waiting for Clem to get back with her toothbrush and is approached by Patrick. We see inside Clem’s house and she finds her file that was sent back to her from the clinic. She brings it to the car and they listen to the tape where she says why she wants to erase Joel. Joel gets pissed and makes her get out. -Joel finds his own file in his house, Clem shows up and they listen together. Clem begins to leave but Joel stops her. Despite all the reasons they heard as to why they didn’t work out, they decide to get together again.

The non-linearity effects the viewer’s experience of the story because the audience seeing the worst of Joel and Clem’s relationship first leaves the viewers feeling the bitterness they felt, and understanding the break up. Seeing the memories in reverse from that point, though, makes the viewer more fond of the relationship, in a way they would in remembering their own. The viewer wants them together, but if they saw the memories chronologically they may feel less fondly.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind explores memory by changing on audience’s feelings towards something by seeing memories in reverse. Allowing the audience to see memories play out and a main character interact with the memories explores a particular desire to re-experience and/or redo our past that so many people experience.

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Unit 3, Exercise 2 - La Jetee Analysis

The film La Jetee is about a post-apocalyptic world where the survivors live underground. The main character is a prisoner to scientists performing experiments to try to place people’s consciousness in another time period to escape their current reality. The main character is used for these experiments and meets in his past a woman whom he saw just before the world fell to pieces, and the two fall in love. Eventually, the scientists put him into the future but he asks that the people he meets there to send him to his past so he can live out his days with his lover. An ironic conclusion is reached when the main character meets his lover in the place his past self first saw her, and is shot by the scientists, allowing the main character and the audience to realize that our main character was the man who the younger main character sees shot in the beginning.

I loved the movie. My favorite elements were the romance between the main character and his lover and the still-frame style the movie was shot in. Light and lovely moods were conveyed in the scenes with the lovers through lighter colors and scenes framed like photos from an album or through first person point of view. Darker moods, such as scenes with the scientists, are conveyed with heavy contrast, a lot of dim lighting, and unsettling sounds (ie. whispers). 

My favorite shot was the one where the main character was put in the future. The photos of the future people were set up so oddly, with an empty background, deep contrast, and the people just oddly sitting all together. I felt it got across a confusing-future feeling very well.

I enjoy this particular still from the film because it has such a light, mystical feel to it- which feels like such a beautiful way to introduce the mysterious love interest. The lighting is soft, falling on one side of her face while the other side is in shadow (though not too dark). She leans to one side of the frame with the landscape behind her and the scene feels balanced and light.

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Reflection

So far in this class I have learned more about the formal elements of design and how to apply those to my projects. Most satisfyingly, I’ve learned to push the artistic journey in each of my works, such as in this final project for Unit 2 where I had gone through several different ideas for a final piece and each one was pushed to be better before I settled on the final one.

I feel that this has taught me not to settle as an artist or be completely satisfied with any of my ideas. I should keep pushing and thinking of how I can better communicate what I am trying to do or better accomplish the goal. 

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Unit 2 - Project 3: Final Project

Artist Statement:

My goal for this project was to show the journey that is an unhealthy relationship, caught in a cycle. The idea was that this journey doesn’t end, so the best way to show it would be to create a piece that connects, without even a distinguishable end or beginning. 

This shows the nature of a destructive relationship going round and round- a journey that will go on forever until someone will finally call it off. The inspiration came from my personal life, and the lives of others I care about who have felt trapped at one time or another in this type of love.

I used the negative space of the figures cut into the boards to not only communicate with the figures, but speak to the emptiness this cycle leaves you with through the missing spaces. 

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Unit 3 - Exercise 1: Framing & Storyboarding

Option 1: Reverse Storyboard

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Unit 2 - Project 2 - Part 3: Draft (accidentally deleted- reposted)

Surreal Image: This image is surreal because even though it has unrealistic elements, these objects sit in the space the way they would if they existed.

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Unit 2 - Project 3 [Final Project]: Part 1- Brainstorm

The idea I will most likely go with is number 2- creating a book. I’m thinking of using an existing, cheap book and putting my objects and illustrations over top of those pages, or attempting to bind/create my own book.

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Unit 2 - Project 2 - Part 4: Final Draft

Surreal Image: This image is surreal because even though it has unrealistic elements, these objects sit in the space the way they would if they existed.

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Unit 2 - Project 2 - Part 1: Blog Post- Abstract and Surreal Imagery

The first image is abstract. The viewer can make out the representational form of the chair, but the space behind it is abstracted- not pictoral or a recognizable/believable space. I feel that this contributes to communicating the idea of the piece by pushing the feeling of disarray the knocked over chair shows. The paint style is somewhat blurry and an unrecognizable space adds to the confused, dazed feeling of the painting.

The second image is surreal. Though the image includes fantastical elements, they are placed believably in the pictoral space, one that could reasonably exist. I feel that the surrealism communicates the idea of the piece better because it seems to be addressing some real world environmental issues (this is my interpretation of the painting). Putting these abstract elements into a believable space places it in a real world context for the audience.

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Unit 2- Project 2- Extra Credit

The first image is an example of a surreal space. The space is surreal because it has elements that don’t exist (flying clams and a giant toy truck) but they are placed in the space the way they would look if they existed. The space remains pictoral and believable.

The second image is an example of an abstract space. The space is abstract because it is no longer pictoral and is not a space that could conceivably exist, making it abstract rather than surreal.

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Unit 2 - Project 1: Text Project

This piece was supposed to represent the cyclical, extreme nature of unhealthy, long-term relationships. I had to cut out parts of the project due to issues translating in Illustrator. I would like to redo this project by hand as I feel Illustrator was the wrong medium and my meaning got lost within technical issues.

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Unit 2: Project 1: Form and Content: Visual Poem

Rough draft

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Unit 1 Reflection

Unit 1 made me feel more comfortable with the elements of the design, both in being able to say what they are and identify them accurately around me. While sometimes frustrating, because there are some that overlap in my mind that I will mix up, I am more successfully able to identify and make arguments for whether or not something is good design.

I think I would spend more time identifying each of these elements, rather than the big picture project we had right in the beginning where we had to take three example pictures of each. This project was so big it was a bit difficult to manage, and didn’t allow us to focus on each element enough.