iBook, commentary and self-reflection and evaluation:

Part One: Discuss your feelings about the iBook animation story task:

1.    Are you satisfied with the final result?

Yes I’m very satisfied with how my iBook has turned out. At the start of the term I wasn’t too sure if everything would work considering I had never made a book of any sort before, but I guess that I've proved to myself that I can make an iBook! 

2.    Did the iBook require more/less time than you originally thought?

I think making the iBook required more time than I originally though due to the fact that when we were told about the project, I thought making an iBook would just consist of finding pictures or taking screenshots of our animation then writing a story to go along with them. However it actually turned out that making an iBook was much different to what I thought it was, as we needed to: 

- Split up and trim our full animation so there would be QuickTime clips for each chapter

- Make voice recordings for each chapter

- Find suitable background pictures

- Find suitable fonts

- Choose a good colour scheme for the iBook

Although it took a while, it was definitely worth it in the end because I’ll always be able to open my iBook and be proud of the work I did in Grade 9.

3.    Would you like to change any aspects of your final project (layout, links, images, video and audio content, colour scheme etc)?

If I were to change certain aspects of the final project, I would probably try and modify my voice to sound more interesting in certain parts of the book. For example, if something sad was happening I would try make my voice sound sad, if something really exciting were happening, I would try and make my voice sound excited, and so on. I might have also looked for different pictures to put in the background of each chapter, even if it that only meant finding a little clipart fish or some underwater bubbles.

4.    If you could start the project again what would you do differently?

I don’t think I would do anything much differently if I were to start the project again. However, as I mentioned in the previous answer, if I were to modify any aspects of my iBook, I would probably try improving my tone and emotion in the voice recordings as well as finding some more background images for extra interest on each page. Although coming to think of it, before I imported my videos into QuickTime, I should have made sure the sound at the end of the video slowly faded off to prevent the sound from being loud and suddenly coming to a stop. This would have helped my videos to flow more when watching them.

Part Two: Respond to each of the following dot points. You should include as much detail as possible in your responses.

1.    Discuss whether your iBook has turned out the way you pictured.

I think my iBook has turned out better than the way I pictured considering I had never previously made a book, let alone an iBook. I had never used anything relating to iBooks Author so everything was really new to me, however I soon got the hang of things and was able to produce an iBook that can be kept and read in my iBooks Library for many years to come.

2.    Explain whether your iBook clearly depicts the style of your animation and describe some specific design principles that you have used to achieve this.

I think my iBook clearly depicts the style of my animation considering both are quite childish and colourful. However in order to achieve the appearance of my book being similar to my animation, I downloaded fonts from the internet that closely resemble the handwriting of a child, I then made the colour scheme closely relate to the colour scheme of my animation by using the magnification glass tool found in the colour pad. The colour played a major part in making the two look similar, as in every chapter, the main colour of the video preview was the same colour as the text box surrounding the writing, the title of the chapter and the same colour as the shadow surrounding the video. I think all of these aspects helped my animation and iBook have styles very similar to one another.

Matching colour scheme:

3.    Describe any problems or technical difficulties you encountered while creating your spoken words in GarageBand.

There weren’t too many problems while creating my iBook, however at the beginning of the project when I wasn’t too sure how to use certain tools, I continually had to ask my friends and Mr Powell for help. For example, I didn’t know how to crop an image, use the magnification glass tool or how to chose an appropriate cover image for the movie previews in each chapter. My other issue would have had to be getting all of the voice recordings done, as I kept having to delete and restart recordings due to me miss-pronouncing or missing words, stuttering, or missing a line when reading.

4.    Did you have all of the necessary resources to complete your iBook or did you have to create new materials?

Yes, thankfully I had most of the resources needed to complete my iBook such as appropriate QuickTime movie lengths that allowed me to create decent length stories for each chapter. The only resource I didn’t have were the background pictures for each chapter. For the opening page with the little introductory sentence to start the story off, I found some orange clip art fish to go in the background. For the remaining pages, I found an appropriate striped pattern off Google that I cropped down so there could be a few rows of stripes at both the top and bottom of each page.

5.    List the steps you used to plan and develop your project.

When we were first told about the project, the first step I took was to trim down appropriate sections from my full animation into good chapter lengths. From doing this first, I knew what each chapter would consist of so I could start off writing the stories. This took about two class lessons before I’d finished, so after this, I begun putting together my iBook. I started off with importing my QuickTime videos and pasting each chapter’s story into each chapter. After this, I discovered how you could download fonts off the Internet, so I ended up finding some really useful fonts that could be used in my iBook. I’m really glad I discovered these fonts because otherwise my iBook might not have had the same childish and fun feel to it, as I don’t really think any other usual fonts found in programs could have achieved the same appeal. Once I had figured out my fonts, imported all my videos and pasted all my stories into each chapter, it was time to start the voice recordings. Altogether, this took several hours, as I had to make sure each sounded how I wanted it to and make sure it would fit into its assigned chapter. On top of this, I also had to add in the title “Click here to play voiceover” to every voice recording and change the font to match the story’s font. Once all of this was done, I started playing around with the colour scheme. I made the background of each slide a light blue to match the underwater theme of my animation, and then made sure each chapter’s title, text box surrounding the writing and shadow surrounding the videos, each matched the main colour of the chapter’s video preview picture. I did all of this by using the ‘colour magnification tool’ that can pick out any colour it’s hovering above. When all this was done, I had just about finished and had a last couple of read through to make sure everything was in place and looked appropriate. Finally a term's work was finished! And I couldn't be happier with the final result.

6.    Talk about any time-management issues you encountered during the project and describe the steps you took to improve in this area;

I don’t think I encountered any time-management issues during this project. I managed to stay on track with my work so at the end I wasn’t rushing to have everything finished for the due date.

7.    Discuss whether you undertook adequate and detailed reflection throughout your project. i.e. Have you provided enough evidence to support your work?

I think I have undertaken adequate and detailed reflection throughout the project as I’ve kept recent blog updates explaining what I did in each lesson and what I learnt. I have also included screenshots and pictures in some of my post to support what I was talking about or trying to explain.  

Just About Finished!!

All weekend I’ve been working on having my iBook fully completed and finished so it’ll be ready to submit on Friday. This took several hours due to the fact I not only had to make each page look well presented, but I also had to make voice recordings and import them onto every page. But in the end it was worth all the work because now I think my iBook looks similar to something that could be downloaded from the iBooks store. I think that all the fonts and colours have worked together really nicely, creating a good theme for my story and interest for the reader.

However the voice recordings were probably the overall most challenging and time-consuming aspect of this whole project. This was mainly due to the fact I had to:

- Take multiple attempts of recording a page if I accidentally stuffed up a word or stuttered

- Had to trim down each clipping so there were no gaps between the start and finishes of when I spoke

-  Make sure there was no ‘click sound' at the end of each recording from my finger pressing down on the track pad to stop the recording 

However after finialising the voice recordings, I’m really happy with how they’ve turned out because I think they sound really good! 

I also managed to find some suitable background images for each chapter. Instead of having an image behind the writing, I thought it would look more effective if at the top and bottom of each page there was a stripy pattern to add interest. These are some screenshots from chapter 2. The stripes at the bottom and top of the page are what every other page has as well.

The reason I couldn’t get a full page screenshot was because the page didn’t enable me to zoom out so I could see the entire page. 

Progress and Colour Schemes

So I’ve finally made good progress with my iBook as I’ve modified and finished writing the stories for every chapter,  added in writing fonts, and have figured out my main colour scheme for the story. These effects can be observed in this screenshot from chapter 1:

Today Mr Powell taught me a handy trick to use when trying to find a suitable writing colour. All you have to do is go to the box you would click if you were selecting a colour, but instead of clicking a colour, you click the little magnifying glass that enables you to hover over and click any colour on your desktop screen that you want your writing colour to be. For me, I hovered over and clicked the main colour that appeared in my video of the chapter. More often that not, this happened to be a certain shade of blue considering my story is set underwater. 

Fonts

I’m actually really addicted to finding fonts off the Internet now because I never even knew you could download so many different fonts you can’t get on Microsoft Word or other applications.

After finding many fonts and having to narrow down my favourite options to use for my iBook, here are the fonts I was left with:

I really like them and think they have a good ‘kiddish’ theme, which will fit in well with my story because it’ll be aimed for children to enjoy and read. 

Different Fonts!

      In today’s lesson, I was able to finish importing the script and snippet of my animation into each chapter yay! Each page is slowly starting to look like an actual iBook you can find in iTunes. Next lesson I’m hoping to start adding in background images and playing round with all the fonts. I’ve found this really good website, http://www.dafont.com, which has heaps of different downloadable fonts that you can’t find on word or pages. Some of them are really relevant to my story so I’ll have a proper look at them then!

Quicktime

     Today I started chopping up my film into sections so each could fit into chapters. This didn’t take too long, so afterwards I pasted the scripts into a few beginning chapters and was also taught how to import QuickTime movies of our animation into iBook Author. It’s really cool because once the movie has been imported, you can just click on the little play button and the scene will play in front of you. 

Background Pictures

      At the beginning of Today’s lesson, Mr Powell went through the steps of how to give each chapter of our iBook stories faint background pictures, as this is a popular technique used by many authors and illustrators for picture books. By doing this, the page can give more interest to the reader as instead of the pages being one colour; they actually have faint background pictures that can be related back to the particular section of the animation. 

Story Writing

      Today I started writing the first few chapters of my story in class. It didn’t take too long because pretty much one scene = one chapter. So for nearly every good length scene in my animation, there’s one chapter dedicated to it. With the help of Tilly and Google Fish Names, I was able to find a really suitable name for my fish! He will be called.....Skittles, because at the end of the book he has scales with every colour of the rainbow. I'm hoping that next lesson I’m hoping to start copying and pasting my scripts for each chapter into iBooks. 

iBooks

      Following our animation assessment, we’re now making our animations into iBooks! I think this is a really good idea because it means that other people can enjoy our animations, and we can carry on with our animation project instead of moving on. Today Mr Powell just went through how to make an iBook on the app iBook Author, and told us how to cut our animation into sections so we can dedicate one chapter to a certain section of film. I’m really excited to start writing the story!

DAIJ - Describe, Analise, Interpretation, Judgement

‘Glorious Visions’ is an animation that was performed by Miwa Matreyek at TEDglobal in 2010. Using projections and her own silhouette, Miwa casts shadows to create a relaxing and meditational piece that can take us away from the distractions around us that keep us from making our own discoveries in life.

Describe:

Write what you see (the visual facts).

•                List the literal objects in the animation (trees, people, animals, mountains, rivers, etc.).

•                What do you notice first when you watch the animation? Why?

•                What kinds of colours do you see? How would you describe them?

•                What shapes can you see? What kind of edges do the shapes have?

•                What is the overall visual effect or mood of the work?

When I first watched this film, I thought it was one of the most clever things I had ever seen. Previously I would have never imagined that by using projectors, film could be created behind and in front of moving silhouettes. The whole effect was so calming and from the several times I’ve watched the film now, it never fails to impress me. Every time I watch it, I still seem to notice something new that I had not seen before.

The literal objects in the animation included:

-       Fruits/vegetables (apple, lemon, lettuce)

-       People/different body parts (eg, hands)

-       Animals (fish, birds, fish, bear, whale, dears, cat)

-       Butterflies

-       Fire

-       Plant life

-       Night and daytime sky (stars, comets, moon, clouds, sun)

-       Ocean (including ocean life like fish and a whale)

-       Rain

-       Bird’s nest with egg inside

-       Rainbow

All of these objects had similar shapes and colours. First of all, because they are all natural objects, instead of the shape being abstract and jerky, it was more smooth and organic. The colours were also natural. So mainly reds, blues, greens, yellows, blacks, browns were used. The natural and organic effect of the objects, shapes and colours of the animation help to give the film a very relaxing, meditational and reflective mood that leaves you in a peaceful state.

Analyse:

Mentally separate the parts or elements, thinking in terms of textures, shapes/forms, light/dark or bright/dull colours, types of lines, and sensory qualities. In this step consider the most significant art principles that were used in the animation. Describe how the artist used them to organize the elements.

•                How has the artist used colours in the work?

•                What sort of effect do the colours have on the animation?

•                How has the artist used shapes within the work of animation?

•                How has the artist used light in the work? Is there the illusion of a scene with lights and shadows, or does the artist use light and dark values in a more abstract way?

•                How has the overall visual effect or mood of the work been achieved by the use of elements of art and principles of design.

The artist has used many elements, shapes, colours and sensory qualities to create the film ‘Glorious Visions.’ The name pretty much speaks for itself because as you watch, the visions of the film really are glorious!

The artist has used many colours in this piece of work such as whites, reds, oranges, yellows, greens, blues, purples, browns and blacks, all quite organic colours. Even in the city scene, due to the fact it’s nighttime, there are no bright ‘in your face’ types of colours. Mainly deep blues and blacks are portrayed, with scattered yellow/white colours in the windows and on lights of buildings as well as for the stars in the sky. The more bold and natural colours used in the film have a very profound effect on the film. When the viewers see the calming colours, their brain also reacts and becomes calm as well, adding to the overall relaxing mood the film portrays. Similar to the colours, the shapes are also quite organic as most of the scenes involve natural objects like plants, animal life, the night sky and of course Miwa’s silhouette. Once again, the natural shapes of these objects have a profound effect on the calming mood of the film.

The artist has very cleverly put their illusion skills into action, using lights and shadows to blur the line between real and unreal. Having Miwa position herself in between projectors for the foreground and background film, she was able to cast silhouettes of her own body onto the screens, making it appear to the viewers that she was actually in and controlling the film. What we usually see on television and movies is contradicted; as instead of filming a person act out a role, Miwa performed live using silhouettes of her body creating an abstract film. All these elements of art and principles of design have a large overall impact on the visual effect and mood of the work, being achieved by using natural colour schemes, organic shapes, and illusions of lights and shadows. The film has a very calming effect on viewers due to these aspects. It removes the distractions, stressful and anxious emotions day-to-day life may bring us.

  

Interpretation:

An interpretation seeks to explain the meaning of the work based on what you have learned so far about the animation, what do you think the artist was trying to say?

•                Was the artist making a statement in this work? What was the Statement?

•                What do you think it means?

•                What does it mean to you? How does this relate to you and your life?

•                What feelings do you have when looking at this animation?

•                Do elements within the animation represent other things/symbols?

•                Why do you think that the artist chose to use this style of animation and make these kinds of artistic decisions?

I think the artist was trying to make a statement about just how beautiful earth and nature is, and how everything in the universe works together to make things happen. For example, in the scene where Miwa’s body silhouette acted as an island for a little person, so many animals and natural forces were working together just like they would in everyday life to keep this planet sustainable.

Examples of this:

-       The island (Miwa’s body) was a little home for the person, with shelter from trees and a barrier against the ocean’s forces.

-       A comet fell from the sky and onto the island, creating a fire for the person to keep them  warm and safe.

-       The person on the island made a small shelter out of the trees that grew. 

-       The fish provided Miwa (the island) and the passing birds with food.

To me, the statements that I think are being portrayed in this film help me to reflect on how we shouldn’t be destroying our Earth with fossil fuels. Instead we should all work together to create alternatives so our planet can continue to thrive just how it has for the past billions of years. It also makes me feel at peace with myself, tranquil and some how relieved as the calming music, colours, filming techniques and interesting storyline all combine to relax and help me remember to not worry about all of the little issues in my life that I more often than not mistaken for major problems. I think the intention the artist once had for the film’s outcome has been successfully achieved. Their artistic decisions have definitely made an impact on me and have helped me to interpret hidden messages.

  

Judgment:

After careful observation, analysis, and interpretation of an animation, you are ready to make your own judgment. This is your personal evaluation based on the understandings of the work. Here are questions you might consider:

•                Do you think this work has underlying value or worth?

•                 What value have you found in the work? (For example, is it a beautiful work of art, does it convey an important social message, affect the way that people see the world, make insightful connections, reaffirms a religious belief, etc.)

•                Do you think that the work has a meaning for others?

•                Do you feel that the work communicates an idea, feeling or principle that would have value for others?

•                Explore your criticism of the work as much as you would any positive perceptions. Realize that your own tastes and prejudices may enter into your criticism. Give your positive and negative perceptions.

I think this work definitely had underlying value and worth. It is such a creative film that would have taken a lot of time and thought to put together. It isn’t just a wonderful and insightful film to watch, it also conveys important messages (as I mentioned before) to viewers, and affects how people see the world. People of all ages can have different interpretations that will affect them in one way or another. Once they watch the film they can see the world as a planet with so much beauty. The only sad thing is that the human race is slowly killing the planet due to all the fossil fuels being released into the air. It makes us feel for the planet, and can remind us to always turn off lights when we leave rooms, recycle our rubbish and use our electricity sparingly to help slow down our impacts on global warming. Even though these are just small adjustments, if everyone contributes the planet can slowly become a more sustainable and environmentally friendly place.

I probably couldn’t point out a flaw in this film. I thought it was really amazing and whenever I watch it my opinion never changes. 

The only flaw I would be able to point out was that sometimes Miwa’s silhouettes were a little bit off as she moved just a bit too early or a tad to late. Except this only happened once or twice so it didn’t really have an impact on the overall film. 

Glorious Visions is such a peacefully relaxing and meditational film to watch. It can take us away from our busy lives and let us just focus on the calming music and story line, and the intriguing way Miwa uses her silhouette in such graceful precision.



Bibliography

Miwa Matreyek: Glorious Visions in Animation and Performance | Video on TED.com, http://www.ted.com/talks/miwa_matreyek_s_glorious_visions.html, (17/10/13)

Miwa Matreyek | Profile on TED.com, http://www.ted.com/speakers/miwa_matreyek.html, (18/10/13)