Just Say Yes

On the subject of volunteering, the words 'just say yes' are as suitable as any other if not more so. This lecture sought to raise awareness of the benefits of volunteering.



Volunteering was promoted as being beneficial in many different ways and although I've never done much of it myself, I know people who have.

Volunteering does have some good perks, and it was promoted as being a life experience in that you could make an impact on somebody elses' in life. It looks especially good on a job application as it means you are up to the task of a challenge, are willing to help out, and it means you are able to go travelling and see the world. Volunteering was described as being essential to creating an inclusive and mutually supportive society. I agree with this, even if the volunteering is on a small scale, it can have a significant or noticeable impact on the local society.

Other benefits include the experience of working with others, an increase in self esteem and self motivation, and tackling problems such as social exclusion and isolation. For those looking to increase their social circles, this is perhaps one of the best ways to do it, as you will find other people looking to do the exact same thing. Knowing more people with different ethnicities, from different backgrounds will make you a more well-rounded and acceptable person. You can gain management skills and gain work experience. You can work with professionals in the industry and get great advice, whilst at the same time boosting your portfolio. You may even meet contacts that will help recommend you for a job.

I believe volunteering could be used for anything. In the subject of films, games and animation, these forms of media could be voluntary brought to those who would not otherwise have access to them for them to enjoy as much as we do.

Local opportunities in Leeds include the Run for Life, St Gemma's Hospice, Leeds Children's Charity and St George's Crypt, Light Night, Festivals, schools and various other local charities. Globally, volunteering for recognised names like Unicef are nothing but commendable.

Sectors and Services

The UK's Economy is the 7th largest in the world and 3rd largest in Europe, a well globalised country. London is on par with New York in terms of being a financially central city, and the largest industries include aerospace, pharmaceuticals, and oil and gas from the North Sea.

An industry sector is divided into sub sectors; primary, secondary, and tertiary. Primary deals with extraction and harvesting of natural resources. Secondary deals with processing, manufacturing and construction. Tertiary deals with knowledge and services.

There is also the public sector, that is publicly or state owned, such as the NHS, the private sector, which is privately operated usually for profit, and the third sector which is voluntary or charity / community owned businesses for none profit distribution.

Industries include creative, education, health and social work, financial and business, hotels and restaurant, public administration and defence, real estate and renting, tourism, transport, storage and communication, wholesale and retail trade.

The creative industries alone include advertising, architecture, arts and antique markets, crafts, design, designer fashion, film video and photography, software, games and electronic publishing, music and the visual and performing arts, publishing, television and radio.

Most independent games and creative producers are taken care of by government set up fundings with endorsements from the EU. Groups like Creative England help set up the sustainable growth of independent creative business, by developing recognised talent and increasing awareness through publicity via exhibitions and distribution.

Evaluating

Evaluations are something I am very familiar with writing already. My personal way to go about it is to avoid descriptions about what things are, but why they are; how they are, how and why they are not something else. Generally the idea is to explain the reasons behind your point, when making an evaluation. You are not telling someone that a Ferrari is red, but why it is red, because of the connotations associated with the colour red. It is explaining the cause and reasoning behind an approach to something.

Typical things when writing an evaluation are similar to a review. You once again look over what it is you have been asked to do and how your final product compares to the brief you are set.You are looking at the good, the bad, what could be better, what could be worse; the strengths and highlights, unique features and common mistakes, regrets and proudest achievements behind whatever you are evaluating. In the case of evaluating my own work, I tend to follow all these examples.

"Working with Unity and Maya proved somewhat tedious but rewarding as more effort was invested. More time went into introducing subtle changes like particle effects and getting the lighting right than I would have thought, and I spent a good amount of time planning and considering what assets I wanted. I think the planning stage was very helpful, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to jump into Unity and simple spew out anything that came into my head; it likely would have been a very messy game environment."


Here, in the most recent evaluation I have produced, I address several issues. The difficulty of working with programmes, the problems I encountered and how I overcame them, the consequences of actions I have undertaken in response to unforeseen circumstances of producing my work as intended.


Analysing and reflecting on your own work is critical, but it means reflecting on everything; not just what you did, but why and how you did it, and what you didn't do and for what reasons. To evaluate is to effectively summarise the reasoning behind of the decision behind all other decisions made in critically reviewing work.

Copyright

Copyright is not as modern a concept as people may think. It is designed to prevent theft of original ideas and make more easily established the legal owner of an idea. It refers to the creations of your mind. Inventions, literary and artistic works, symbols, names, images and designs used for commercial purposes are covered under copyright, just as films, games, photos, designs for more abstract things such as fashion, and is even inclusive to food recipes.


Patents, trademarks, registered designs and copyright all categorise under intellectual property. The first patent taken out was for a Typewriter in England, including a QWERTY keyboard. This patent was taken as early as 1714. 


Logos such as the Apple logo, the Nike tick are instantly recognisable and protected under intellectual property rights to prevent other people from using their logo as a Nike product when it is in fact not.


Copyright that is breached is copyright infringement, and there are often legal battles between companies regarding material that each company may believe to be theirs. A recent example of this is Steam and Blizzard's claims to the name DOTA.

During the game's unveiling at Gamescom 2011, Gabe Newell explained Valve's perspective on acquring the trademark, which was that IceFrog desired to develop a direct sequel to DotA and that players would likely recognize it as such. Blizzard filed an opposition against Valve in November 2011, citing the Warcraft III World Editor and their ownership of DotA-Allstars, LLC as a proper claim on the franchise. On May 11, 2012, Blizzard and Valve announced that the dispute had been settled, with Valve retaining the rights to the term "Dota", while Blizzard would change the name of their map, Blizzard DOTA, to "Blizzard All-stars".

Breaches of copyright occur across the world. Another example in China is that of 'Obama Fried Chicken'.

  

Presentations

Making a presentation is about making an informative awareness to an audience of something, introducing an idea; showcasing something, explaining it. Sharing a problem and asking the audience's participation or their opinion of it, explaining your research and revealing your own opinion of it, and detailing and evaluation that summarises your thoughts on the subject.

A presentation that doesn't do these is bad; and the difference between a good presentation and a bad one can mean the successful pitching of an idea or the immediate failure to attract any attention to it.

Presentations should contain as little text as possible; small sections of information for people to be able to immediately identify the purpose of the slide and the information on it, without having to sift through irrelevant details. An explanation should be given over it explaining any other details, including ones already mentioned but more in depth, and ones not mentioned that are relevant but not entirely trivial.

Clip art looks cheap, rushed, and low resolution images make the presentation look ill prepared. Images should be crystal clear and of a high quality, so that people are immediately able to identify what the image is, and can appreciate that time has been taken to cast the image in a good light. A low quality image reflects low quality standards.

Bullet points can be boring and distracting although they work well when used in the right context.

Videos to reinforce points made as both valid and evidenced can greatly increase the impact of the points or ideas you are trying to make, even if in the form of research, and can better hold the audiences attention.


Simplicity, efficiency, connections and a minimal but concise amount of slides are paramount to a good presentation.

Social Media Success

The lecture was about thinking, talking, learning, seeing, hearing connectively, being creative and looking at networks.

In recent times networks have expanded beyond electronic links and can now more accurately describe a vast network of socially linked medias and communications. Facebook is used for more than just talking to friends and keeping up to date. Every modern business and every famous person has a page for them or multiple groups dedicated to them, sometimes with hundreds, a few with millions of followers. Biz Stone, CEO of Twitter, refers to it as an information network, rather than a social network - as news is instantly broadcasted to thousands of people every second.

MySpace is similar but has a particular niche in recent times for musicians and songwriters to host their music and videos, similarly to YouTube. Flickr and Photobucket fill a similar niche for photographers wanting to share their photos, just as DeviantArt is home ground for many traditional and digital artists of an ameteur or professional level.

Skype is a software application that can be used to make free voice or video calls over the internet, and even make group calls and be able to host online conferences.

Who Are You?

In this presentation we were challenged with defining our characteristics through our capabilities, ways of thinking and styles of working. These are the aspects of our personalities that enable people to understand our approach to our work, what it might be like to collaborate with us and how we might perform in a team situation. These are the professional aspects of our personalities and are known as Personality Type Indicators. 
 

We were asked questions such as:

How your personality traits work in your favour or create barriers for others to overcome?

Do do you make judgements about others based on their occupations or the way they dress?

How much do your skills say about your personality?

How do others perceive you?

After answering these questions we were given the necessary steps required to help understand ourselves better and how to more effectively communicate our ideas more clearly. We looked at examples and case studies, people who had also tried to define personalities, through archetypes; something I was familiar with from the first module. Carl Jung, from 1875 to 1961, describes The Self, The Shadow, The Anima or Animus, and The Persona.

Eventually we came to discuss our personality descriptors and were given the means of finding out which we were and what it means. I found my description to be quite accurate but found myself in agreement with other summaries as well, as I don't think you can accurately judge a human being from any single personality test. I came out as an ISPF, as did many other people.

This chart also helps define one's personality by scoring each topic out of 100 on level of importance. The idea is that the more space the red line encompasses, the more balanced your life is. I feel that this is personally more appropriate for judging someone's personality as you are then able to reflect and change on seeing the results, rather than simply dictating what sort of personality you have, and your strengths and weaknesses and vices according to the results.

The Bouncer

The Bouncer is a short film made for Channel 4 I found a while ago but forgot to blog about at the time. The film depicts the recount of a man who acts as a bouncer for a nightclub, who is training in the gym. Only the particular event he is recalling is of the night a rowdy man kills his work friend over a petty dispute, and the Bouncer takes out revenge on him by hunting him down and killing him. The Bouncer is then told to stop strangling his mate in the gym by a police officer, having been lost in his memory; and the audience then comes to the realisation that the gym they are training in is in a prison.

I like this short film because of this interesting plot twist in the narrative, because we are lead to assume that he got away with it until the very end. The film carries many moral messages, both subliminal and explicit, and the audience are left to different interpretations of whether what the bouncer did in the film was right, wrong, or a confusing example of both at once, as in my view it was sort of vigilante justice. I found the story very compelling and it received a lot of positive reviews from people, especially bouncers who can relate to the subject matter and have been through similar experiences. I have read some of these accounts online and found that the film is very truthful and honest to life, no matter how brutal it may be.

Voice Actor - David Hayter

As with the two other voice actors I've mentioned, this one worked primarily in Metal Gear Solid and I don't know them for many other roles; but what I like about him is the distinguishable and unique nature of his voice and how well it fits the character he plays. David Hayter is another of my favourite voice actors. He also has a resemblance to the character he plays.

David says he feels great about portraying the voice of one of the most recognised game characters ever, even though one can get known for voicing any character, and that it is a good way to express himself. This demonstrates that even voice actors can get into character and connect emotionally to the personality they are being asked to, or trying to portray. Even here it's hard to imagine that he is the voice for Snake; his normal voice doesn't sound anything like him, but I suppose that's part of the voice actors job; being able to sound different.

David, like the other VAs, has also done normal acting work but it is his role as Snake that makes him most widely known. This goes to show that even voice actors can have breakthroughs by voice acting a  character just as normal actors can suddenly be catapulted to fame by a successful role in a successful film.

Voice Actor - Phil LaMarr

Undoubtedly one of my favourite voice actors solely because he voiced Samurai Jack, I later found out that he also voiced Vamp in Metal Gear Solid and many other shows and games I used to play in my youth. The fact that one man voiced so many inspirational characters, is an inspiration in itself - especially when he did it so well that I didn't even realise until recent times.

Phil has voiced both old and young characters of various ethnic origins; it was hard for me to put a face on him until I actually saw what he looks like. That is one particularly unique thing about voice actors. If they do their job well enough, the face you match to the voice is that of the character, rather than the person voicing the character. This requires a good level of skill and talent at acting, that famous actors can't achieve in the way that audiences go to see a film because of the actors rather than the characters they play. The same thing might be done with some voice actors, but I don't go out of my way to see films with voice actors I know about.

The rising popularity of video games, animation, and films, along with combinations of the two such as machinima and heavily narrative driven games, means that the call for talented voice actors is on the rise, and I would count Phil LaMarr as one of my primary inspirations.

Voice Actor - Quinton Flynn

I think voice acting isn't as important today as it will grow to be in years to come; film, games and animations are increasingly reliant on actors who are not seen, but heard. Quiton Flynn is one of my favourite voice actors because of the characters and work he has been involved with in so many different things I like; he has played Raiden in Metal Gear Solid 2, Reno in Final Fantasy; Advent Children, Kael'thas in World of Warcraft, as well as providing various and additional voices for countless other games.

The popularity of voice actors is on the rise I think; some claim it is very easy whilst others claim otherwise. Often, notable voice actors for films, games or animations have specifically been already famous people. Now, voice actors are becoming popular by themselves in their own right, and admired for their vocal talent and the range of voices they can use. Voice actors are well considered before they are approached for a a role. The same voice actors have played the different characters and it can be a long time before I realise this if the actor is good enough.

Portal Live Action Film

I watched this a while ago and after recently re-watching it, it's still as good as I remember. Having played the Portal games myself I can relate to what the film is about in relation to the narrative of the actual games.

Watching the making of was fairly interesting but doesn't display anything new. I wasn't expecting much, given it is hardly a high budget Hollywood breakthrough of a film, but does show that even conventional methods of implementing special effects into a film can make a wondrous difference. The film doesn't focus too much on plot although it's clear there is a thought through narrative to the character and the environment, and I think it was made mostly for the viewing experience.

It would be cool to see a full length film of Portal. I think it would be a very interesting concept with a lot of opportunity for interesting shots and cinematography. It would be very CGI heavy and it would take a good story to give sense to the otherwise senseless using portals to travel everywhere, but if it were combined with a genre like crime, I reckon  a Portal film would be a good film if made feature length and high budget.

Cyriak - Bits and Bobs

Some of Cyriak's unused or old animations. Why they're unused I don't know, they're rather funny but equally creepy. I can't help but notice a lot of the time you can see Patrick Stewart.

I'm a fan of Cyriak's other animations and I like seeing things like projects or animations that go unused, so I can see them simply for enjoyment.

What these animations were intended for or why they were not used isn't exactly stated. Cyriak only states that they are 'a compilation of left-over animations I found lurking in the dark corner of my computer'. 

Pure Pwnage

Pure Pwnage was a web show started by two people, Jarett Cale and Geoff Lapaire; based on the lives of flatmates Jeremy and Kyle. Jeremy is a 'pro gamer', or actually just an unemployed man who plays games all day and does not fit at all well in society, and Kyle is going to film school and he documents Jeremy's life as a gamer including typical day to day challenges. The first episode was picked up by PC Gamer, who featured it in their magazine, and new audiences began crying out for episode 2, then 3, then 4, and it eventually became a fully developed series complete with an actors, a story, character development and all the norms of TV media.

The success of the show lead to a Canadian TV station signing them on to produce a TV show. I think this is an admirable story about the power of the internet reaching to audiences that were never previously targeted in general mass media, and it is generally good to see them where they are now as I have followed their progress over the years since they started with my two brothers. Catchphrases from the show are now part of gaming culture, and is the indisputable source of 'Boom headshot!'. The show also makes references to popular gaming culture, so gamers and people with an interest in gaming alike can refer and relate to it. As a gamer myself I still find it hilarious and even my parents make the occasional reference to it now and then.

The show is usually only available in Canada but there are a few episodes available on YouTube and likewise over the internet. They have since stopped making the webseries. given their new schedule and the accidental death by car-crash of one of their actors in the show.

Metalocalypse

Metalocalypse follows the lives of the death metal band Deathklok- the most successful cultural force of entertainment in history (at least, in this fictional universe).The idea for the series came about after creator Brendon Small asked what would happen if there was a death metal band that was fifty times as famous and successful The Beatles, and what would happen if the bandmembers happened to be incompetent idiots who didn't know or care for anything else outside of being death metal.

The show became a success and a 4th series has recently began airing. Demographically it targets 18 - 30 year olds, and includes a lot of violence, drinking, drug use, and typical stereotypical activities undertaken by famous rockstars. Some of the episodes revolve around minor and trivial problems that the Band to to great lengths to solve, perhaps even unnecessary lengths.

To be honest there's so little they could do to make the show better besides promise people they won't stop making it. As a general supporter of the death metal genre overall it's both relevant to my interests and funny as hell. There is a real narrative behind the show but the band doesn't really know about it, and is usually the focus of the ending episodes of each series.

Diablo III Trailer.

The highly anticipated additional to the Diablo series, Diablo 3, was released today: and whilst I myself have not been anticipating it as much as others, my interest in the game did pick up significantly once I watched a few trailers and cinematics. I am familiar with the game on a mutual level. I haven't played any of the preceding games, but like Diablo III, I know them to a small extent.

Firstly when I watched this trailer I couldn't but admire the animation in it, at first made to look like an illustration in a book becomes a fully realised war between the factions of Heaven and Hell. The occasional pauses or slowed down moments remind me of Zack Snyder's "300".

It then cuts to an equally admirable but more realistic 3D animation that takes place in the presumed present times, as opposed to the past time of the war we saw in the book. As a sequel, the trailer doesn't need to establish as much story as most games do, as most players will already be familiar with it. However, even for people like me - who only know about Diablo and it's story through what they have willingly gone out of their way to learn; it makes a lot of sense and I want to play it all the more.

This is probably the video that assured me I would download the game and play it on the night it was released. Whilst that didn't actually happen, and I do intended to get it downloaded and play it when I can, it was this video that changed my mind completely. It's strange to think that of all the gameplay videos and information that was already availible, it was an animation produced by the collaborative efforts of the games production company, Blizzard - and that of an independant animation firm Titmouse, (whom I am also familiar with for producing Metalocalypse) that got me into the game.

The animation is wonderful and I really think the collaboration was a great success. I'm hoping to see more like it for the Warcraft series, because quite frankly that would be awesome.

Archetype Movie

I found the official website for the Archetype movie based or made from the short I found.

"Your memories are just a glitch."

http://www.archetype-movie.com/

The website has little information right now aside from the film teaser, the short, a synopsis, other videos, and a galleries page.

The galleries page features some nice concept art that matches well with what I saw in the short teaser and it is a good indicator as to what we can expect from the film. I found myself comparing it to the Matrix at one point with the use of a chair to enter some sort of second reality, although this is hardly the focus of the film as it is in the Matrix (as far as I can tell with Archetype, at least, as there arn't a lot of details about it yet). I'll be keeping an eye on this website.

It is worth noting how movies are advertised today and the internet is a great way of getting your title known, especially if it catches on virally.

Comet

Watching this made me feel like a child again and rightfully so, this wonderful 2D animation recaptures the brilliance and imagination of a typical childhood dream. I found the lighting in the opening minute to be really good. Watching this animation was both interesting and amazing. It wasn't a narrative that needed much explanation or reason behind it as it is supposed to be like a dream. It made a change from the rather action packed, dramatic, explosive and compelling story-driven animations and films I have seen lately and it felt good to watch something that didn't have too much meaning behind it besides what it is; capturing the essence of a childhood dream.

As people grow older people are less inclined to imagine and I think this illustration highlights this best. The world wouldn't be very mature if we all still acted like children, but it would hardly be a bad place, either.

The animation was made on request by the music composer, to be made as a music video. This explains the lack of sound effects in the animation and I feel it is worth mentioning that the music is very fitting.

Archetype - Aaron Sims + The Chase - Philippe Gamer

Archetype is a short film utilizing CGI animation. It is very realistic and the storyline appears to be that of a robot that malfunctions and believes it has a family like a human. This obviously triggers some questions as the robot was brought in for questioning after it produced a large EMP explosion that it shouldn't be capable of doing. Directed and written by Aaron Sims and produced by White Rock productions, I learned that from this short film a feature length version is being set for production and I anticipate it's arrival. The description from the snotr link is as follows:

RL7 is a two-meter tall comba robot that goes on  the run after malfunctioning with vivid memories of once being human. As its creators and the military close in, the RL7 battles its way to uncovering the shocking truth behind its mysterious visions and past.

http://www.snotr.com/video/8986/Archetype_by_Aaron_Sims

http://www.snotr.com/video/8979/The_Chase

I also found this animated video of a police chase, chasing four female presumed protagonists. The effects and cinematography are all praiseworthy, especially the part where they drive around the circle road and the police cars end up falling and dropping. The camera angles are very off set and give the impression of imbalance. I would not have done the same myself but now that I have seen what such angles can do to your interpretation of a scene I will be keeping my eye out for similar angles in other animations and films I come across. Of course, the funniest thing about this particular animation is the ending, and it carries a nice message that I intend to live by: you don't stop having fun because you grow old, you grow old because you stop having fun.

Voice Acting - Regina King

Regina King stars as the voice of two main characters in The Boondocks, an Adult Swim animated series based on Aaron McGrudger's comic strip. I have had an interest in voice acting for a while and I want to give it a try. Among my favourites are Phil LaMarr, who did Vamp in Metal Gear Solid but most importantly for me, played Samurai Jack. Mako, who did Aku in Samurai Jack and also Iroh in The Last Airbender, and David Hayter, who acted as Solid Snake in the Metal Gear Solid series.

This is a behind the scenes look at how the voice acting was directed and produced for The Boondocks by Regina King and even includes some animatics and examples of particularly good voice work in various episodes. She also describes some of the processes behind voice acting which are often just as much about being mentally confident and in the zone as it is about being physically confident and willing.

I'd like to give voice acting a go myself some time and there have been plenty of opportunities in the past where I could have done it, but as mentioned it is likely just a confidence issue I hope to overcome. I think if I wait a few years I'd be a little more suited for it.

Additionally there is another video with John Witherspoon.