Zane's Film Reviews

[zanemancer]

Hi there! Check out my video essay on ‘Lost Highway’ by David Lynch

[zanemancer]

Lost Highway - Film Review 3

Lost Highway is a neo-noir film. ‘neo-noir translates to dark movie. This film is a true masterpiece in many sectors. Starting with David Lynch’s directing style. Lynch made strong choices in this film that one can determine are stylistic choices. Lynch relies on his sound design to bring this film to life. Mysterious music is a big factor that ‘made’ this film for me and his use of sinister tones fits perfect with the film. Lynch also gives some of the scenes a old film grain that shows his directing style coming through in the film. It is a ballsy choice to make, but Lynch did not disappoint.  The cinematography was also a big highlight for me in ‘Lost Highway’. The use of POV shots really draws the viewer into the story and emphasizes the sinister tone of the film. Scenes are also framed in a way that gives the characters depth. The relationship between camera and film are well connecting. By saying this, I mean that we as the audience are taken on a wild journey through this film, from tracking shots of characters, focus pulling techniques and even slow motion reverse shots of a cabin exploding. The artistic use of the cinematography are highly complimented. The characters for this kind of story are hard to bring to life, but the acting was very relatable and indulging for the viewer. Very good choice of cast. All around, the sinister characters, tone, sound design and production were outstanding and artistic, making this film a ‘one of a kind’. One sector I did battle to relate to was the story as a whole. I was left with many questions in the end and battles to grasp the overall meaning of the story, but I guess that is the whole point of David Lynch films. With that said, this film is nothing short of an artistic masterpiece that I would speak highly about in the film world. 

[zanemancer]

Wild Strawberries - Film Review 2

Wild Strawberries by Ingmar Bergman was a film I truly battled to connect with on many levels. The editing was very questionable in my eyes. There were action scenes where the editing would throw the scene right into the viewers face with very jumpy editing. The viewer has no time to register what is going on, instead the action shots and sound design is completely overpowering. When it comes to the cinematography, there are shots and scenes I can complement. Dialogue scenes were filmed with beautiful close ups, allowing for the viewer to connect with the characters and indulge in the narrative. The acting is completely over the top in most scenes, drawing the viewer away from the characters. The acting in car scenes is complemented, but for example, Marianne’s melt down when she is kissed by another man while picking strawberries is almost eye melting to watch. This is just one example of the many few scenes that disappointed me when it comes to the acting.  The overall tone and mood were carried out well in scenes jumping from Henrik’s dreams and back into reality, although there was not as much mood and tone as I would have liked to see in this film. The mood and tone were very soothing car scenes and almost sinister when it came to Henrik’s dreams. The production design was also another questionable element for me. Some scenes did represent a good setting when it came to inside the Borg family house, but when it came to the hitchhikers singing happy birthday to Henrik, the background and setting was disappointing to say the least. The story and narrative can definitely catch different viewers in some way although I battled to find any connection to the story or narrative in the slightest way.  

[zanemancer]

Tokyo Story - Film Review 1

Tokyo Story by Yasujiro Ozu is a beautifully executed film about human life. The acting in the film for me was very restrained most of the time. Actors were constantly smiling in the film, instead of showing facial emotion towards what they were saying. This made it extremely hard for me to connect with the characters. Yasujiro knew exactly how he wanted the film to be perceived, by creating lengthy dialogue scenes amongst the characters to allow for the viewer to relate in some way with the story. I, somewhere along the story, did connect with an event that happened in the real world. Which why I praise Yasujiro’s directing. The editing matched the lengthy film. Scenes were long and static with truly little editing in the scenes. The cinemaphotography for me was a remarkably interesting topic. Almost every scene was completely static, except for two scenes in the entire film. I did question the choice of completely static camera movements at first, but then realized the cinematic impact it has on the story. It allowed for me to relax and connect with the story in my own way, without having to concentrate on all the movement in the scene. The only downside I have towards the cinemaphotography was that some close ups of the characters were delivered directly into the camera. For me, this broke the fourth wall in a way and took me completely out of the story. I noticed that the production design was built in a way to frame characters within the scene. Very smart cinematic move on Yasujiro’s side. All together the production design was set up beautifully for the time period and location in which the film took place. The film was quite a lengthy one in my opinion and extremely slow moving, which opened my eyes to the tone and mood of this film. The tone and mood of this film is soothing and impactful. The use of a lengthy dragged-out scenes allowed for the soothing and impactful tone and mood of the film to truly soak into the viewer and pull them deeper into the narrative. I think there could have been more use of music to support the scenes and narrative, but the soft mellow sound that was used did do the deed of creating an overall tranquil setting for the film.

[zanemancer]

Final Project - 05/11/19

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1weu8GpvbQm_pNJh0d6vSodCgPQ8ysqUg/view?usp=sharing

The Final Creative Development Song Project - Zane Mancer (190057)

Rationale:

This is a song produced by Zane T Mancer. The song aims to breach a new genre in the music world, containing elements from many other different genres (Trap, EDM, Groove House, Future House, Big Room). The song took 7 weeks to make and contains no vocals as yet another new genre element. The new genre is called DEM (Drum Electronic Music). This tracks main source of difference is live drumming over the track itself. The drumming was recorded in a studio and processed onto the track. I loved producing this song and it made me a better musician and music producer as a whole. I can definitely say that I have taken the journey of a creative hero and come a long way as a producer. I am extremely proud of myself recording live drums in a studio which is nothing I have ever done before and now I can say, I CAN. 

I hope you enjoy that final project! 

[zanemancer]

Finishing Touches - 04/11/19

Greetings viewers, 

Today I would like to discuss my finishing touches of my song. This includes sound effects and little sounds that just make the song sound better. This also includes the mixing and mastering of the song (Reverb, Volumes, EQ’s). Since the song contains many different elements from other song genres, the final mixing and master did prove to be very tricky. NOTHING THIS CREATIVE HERO CAN’T HANDLE! 

To insure a song with variety and difference, I took FX and samples from different genre sample packs I have. Sample packs are sounds one buys to create music. Different samples are for different genres of music. Obviously I took samples, stems, melodies, sound FX from many different sample packs. I included different bassdrops, sweep ups, sweep downs, crash’a etc. from other music sample packs. This allows for my song to have elements to create a new genre. The challenges I faced was getting the correct sound effects to be in the right key and BPM (Beats per Minute) of my song. This was a challenge because a genre that has never been made before contains many different BPM’s and keys. With a little help of Reverb and EQ work, I was able to get the Sound FX to be in the correct key.

Below are some images of sound effects one will find in my DEM song:

Here is an example of my Reverb work on my Sweep Ups:

[zanemancer]

Song Progress - 03/11/19

Greeting everyone,

Today’s post will be on my overall progress of the final sing I will be producing to become a creative hero.

The past 7 weeks of production has shown many challenges and obstacles to over come but I am very happy with the direction in which my song has gone. My song is looking full of different stems and sounds and is proving itself to be a new break into a brand new genre of music. In the previous post I decided to call this genre of music DEM. This post is purely to show what my song is looking like. I cannot wait to release the final version.

[zanemancer]

Comparing Song To Other Songs - 02/11/19

Good Evening viewers,

Today I decided to make sure my song has different elements from other song genres to make sure the song I am producing is unique and different. 

The first genre of music I compared my song to was the EDM genre. The song I chose to compare my project to was “Lions in the Wild” by Martin Garrix. My song has very similar melody stems to this EDM track. I then looked at the future house genre song “No Money” by Galantis. My song contains the synth sounds from this genre of music. The third genre I compared my song to was Big Room. I insured my song included elements from this genre, mainly the drum beats, and one can hear the similarity in the final project to “BOOM” by Tujamo. 

My reasoning for researching certain elements from other famous songs is to ensure that my final projects contains all sorts of sounds to make it a new genre song. I’ve decided to call my new genre of music DEM, which stands for Drum Electronic Music 

[zanemancer]

Challenges Faced - 01/11/19

Greetings viewers, 

I am nearing the end of my song journey as well as my creative hero journey. In today’s blog, I would like to discuss the challenge's faced this far into the project and how I over came them. 

Surprisingly, one main challenge I am facing this far into the project is finding a singer with the correct vocals to suit the song style and genre. To record a singer with vocals now seems very unlikely. This made me realize that the song might be better without vocals, thus the listen can easily hear the different sounds. Another advantage of not having a singer is it helps justify my new genre song as most songs in the world contain vocals, especially songs of the genres I've combined (Future house, Groove House, EDM, Big Room) which makes my song even more different. 

Not finding vocals as first seemed like a challenge and made me think I had failed at my creative hero quest, meanwhile it showed me how I could improve my case of coming out with a new genre. 

[zanemancer]

Finding Different Sounds - 30/10/19

Greetings everyone.

Today I decided to scout for new and different sounds to use in my song to make sure the process of coming out with a new genre of music was successful.

I looked at many different sound effect websites and sample pack websites. Sample pack websites are websites that allow music producers to choose different sounds for their music. I found many different sounds that are used across genres of Groove House, EDM, Future house and Trap. I took different sounds from each genre and combines them into my song. From drum beats from the trap genre to up sweeps from the EDM genre sample packs. I will include links to some of the websites I used to scout for all these different sound effects. By the end of this creative project, the listener will be able to hear different sounds across different genres. The biggest difference in this project is the live drumming over the track itself. 

The step I took to become a creative hero in this project was combining different sounds from other genres to come out with something new. I will also include Youtube Links to give examples of what up sweeps trap drums are. 

https://www.beatport.com/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGLLYLzt3yA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oL7gF1R_KdY

[zanemancer]

Drum Recording - 29/10/19

Back with another Exciting post! Today I managed to record the drums over my song.

Some of the feed back and suggestions I got during class was to not record five drummer and instead, record one to three drummers. This definitely did help my time management and it would have taken me much longer to record five drummers. The recording took a few hours in the studio but overall it didn’t take as long as I thought it would. Its amazing how just cutting down on some drummers could make the whole process so much faster.

This has helped my journey to becoming a creative hero by showing me that it the small issues right in front of your face that can make the biggest differences. The next step is to start finishing off the song as a whole. 

Below is the video link to the studio recording. 

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1bn6Cx2694ytPhWrtUQBsxNYM1TaB52Bv

[zanemancer]

Week 5 - Problem Questions (15/10/19)

Morning Everyone!

This week in class we played a trading card game to help identify any problem questions we had regarding our project and received some answers. 

One of the main problem questions I had was, “How can I make the recording process of a song, five drummers and a vocalist quicker?”. The most common answer I received was to record one drummer instead of five. I would should get that one drummer to play all the five drummers parts. This will shorten the time I need to record and also won’t be so time consuming. 

Below are images of the questions and answers I received from other players as well as some playing cards I had. The point of the game was to give advice to the other players by incorporating the two cards you have in front of you. 

Here are some suggestions that I received during class:

[zanemancer]

Week 4 - Creative Hero Journey (08/10/19)

Greetings Everyone!

This week, I’m not going to be elaborating on the progress of my song, but rather on how this song and creative journey is going to make me a creative hero.

The question I got in a class exercise is , “have I produced music before?”. The answer is yes I have. This raises the question, what am I going to do to insure that this creative project push’s my creativity. I am going to record my drum groups drums over the song I produce and vocals of a female singer. To record five drummers and a vocalist is going to be a very tricky task and will require many creative skills to still make the song good quality. I have never done anything like this before and to be honest, I am excited to get out of my comfort zone and push my creativity. 

My concept is the next topic I would like to elaborate further on. My concept is to bring a new genre of music into the music industry. This genre will be EDM music mixed with five live drums which is something that is not very common in the world. I cant wait to go through with this project and I hope that my concept is clear to my viewers.

[zanemancer]

Week 3 - Song Progress (04/10/19)

Evening Everyone!

Today I began the next step in song writing which I enjoy the most. This stage is where I create the groovy drums of the song. 

Before I just dive in, I also looked at other songs for inspiration for drums and also looked at South African Pop music. This helped me get in the creative mind to produce a song with African drums that are both fit with the melody and are groovy. At first it was hard to come up with a drum groove that fitted the melody with the song, thus I dug deeper into popular cinematic drums and found the perfect beat in my mind. 

This process I found harder then coming up with a melody. The question is, why? Well, I think mainly why this process was harder is because South African drums have a very specific sound. To find the right drums to sound South African was the challenge. After a few days of coming up with drum loops over and over, I finally found the right drum loop. The moral of the creative process for this week was to keep trying over and over until you are satisfied with your work.

This weeks work was challenging and now its off to week 4!

[zanemancer]

The Main Lead - Week 3 Progress (2/10/19)

Greetings once again everyone,

For this week, I began the main lead of my song and the nutshell that is going to allow me to build up the song from a synth lead. After looking at all my inspiration songs, I realized one thing, and that is a songs main lead does not have to be complicated to be catchy. 

It took me one whole day of trying over and over again to come up with the perfect main lead that I was happy with. This just shows the creative process of having to fail numerous times to succeed. After completing the main melody lead, I began to add in some claps and hi-hats to give the melody a more creative and interesting tune. I also looked at creative African drum rhythms to give my song a more “African” vibe to it. 

I’m very excited for the next creative step which will be beginning the drop of my song!

Here is an image to show the main melody of my song procress:

 Till next time.

[zanemancer]

Week 1 - 25/09/19 (Song Beginning)

Greetings everyone and welcome to my 8 week blog!

The point of this blog is to document my progress on my song that I am going to produce through out a creative process to become a creative hero. 

The first step would be to brainstorm the idea of track genre and emotions I want my listeners to feel. I begin my creative process of producing a song by listening to other songs that I enjoy and vocals that will make someone feel happy and ready to have fun. I want my song to be bubbly and have vocals that are catchy. I am definitely going to go with a female vocal because a females voice is easier to sing along with and is easier on the ear. This will help push the track to be more catchy and melodic. 

The genre I have chosen to go with is EDM radio type vibes. The reason I chose EDM is because some of the most beautiful vocals come from some EDM songs that I found in the beginning stages of my creative process.  In this post, you can find some links below to some of the tracks I sourced to give me ideas for my song. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95D6zmJreQU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tt3F2x0RuZI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHncD0yt71c

Till next time....