week 2

10/3/11

How film and storytelling affect People

• The power of film being able to change
• Ukraine was affected by the “killingfields”
• Documentary (How Art Made the World) – The powerof how narrative to tell a story
• Feature film are using techniques from centuries ago
• Artist many years ago used techniques to capture our imagination
• Every year 7 billion pay to go watch the screen to tell a story
• When we watch a really good film, we become involved. The feeling of being in the same place as the characters. It captivates us
• “Babe”, storyteller – George Miller
• How does the film get its ability?
• Ancient origins – very dawn of civilisation
• Mesopotamia – many things originate. Mathematics and also farming
• In the 19^th century, a british archaelogist, Austin Leonard were looking and found tablets that contained unreadable markings
• Brought back to London and discovered it was the first written language
• Assumed at first that it was tax recorded but after many years, it was then discovered that it was the first story that was ever told. It was placed in Urich.
• The story in Ulrich, still survives today.
• Gildamesh is a man that is a hero in the story. Action hero, story passed down for generation and is still a very popular story today
• Most stories (good) have a hero. Aka Star Wars
• Hero is defined by the action and moral response to events
• Gildamesh was a hero when he defeated a pride of lions
• In 1645 BC, hardly anyone could read a script
• Ashabalohof tried to turn people away and had stories of him as hero instead of Gildamesh.
• Gildemesh was known as the supreme lion slayer.
• The tablets are made of four images of Ashabalof.
• Freeze frames that capture the excitement.
• Originally they would have been painted in bright colours and displayed in the palace of Ninevah.
• A story is developed with beginning, middle and end.
• Ashabalof was the first to create visual stoiries.
• Other stories of him, like his victorious battles with the Edomites
• According to Ashbalof, the river was filled with their corpse
• Gory and explicit images
• Visual techniques not only have beginning , middle and end but is made more interested with sub plots.
• We don’t fee; engaged with the characters enough
• Artist made us care about characters as greeks helped create characters that we believed in.
• They enjoyed their myths
• On the coast of Spalonga, Italy, the greeks placed sculptures of the story of of Adisus.
• The statures are now in museum.
• Historians have placed the work as they had placed 2000 years ago.
• How did they advance visual story telling.
• Includes Adisus and cycliops
• To know story, the statues are more emotionally gripping.
• Statues show just before the climax in action.
• No longer just a story of what happens but also how it happened
• Bringing characters we can relate to is crucial.
• In order to tell a story, you need a character audience can engage with.
• The greeks invented audience can relate to.
• 100yrs after Christ, Romans improved story telling more.
• Trojan columns in Rome – highest storytelling building in the heart.
• 35 feet high and made of marble
• Over 2000 years its held fascination of powerful men. Napolean wanted to move it but it was breakable.
• What was it about the column that was so fascinating?
• All the stories of all the tales are on this column.
• Trojan column is said to be a movie epic
• 59 times the hero appears but the antagonist/villain Recopulus appeared also.
• The masterpiece of storytelling of of Trojan helps film directors today by dividing scenes, known today as a cut.
• Another is a birds eye view, low angle view.
• They discovered that by different angles, it dramatize the story.
• The creation of Trojan column found a way to make better. The world first ever trailer.
• Even through use of all the techniques, not enough to captivate. Missing element.
• Cambridge universe – answer to question.
• Researches discovered and dismissed the doodling over 200years.
• Then in the 20^th century, an English man, Balwin Spencer lived among Aboriginals and discovered that Aboriginals were obsessed with paintings. On bark, walls etc
• Spencer’s curiousity helped him notice the Baramandi fish, the “Mother”. Images the were repetitive.
• He had a revolution that images were painted 1000years earlier and still painted today.
• Spencer wanted to discover and unlock secrets of ancient paintings.
• What he discovered next was that these doodlings weren’t just drawings but story telling.
• A single image told a whole story.
• In 1960, David Attenbra and his crew went to visit these paintings in cave.

The Narrative in Visual Communication

2 Methods for studying visual culture

(Telephone engineers)

Shannon and wearver

1 process theory

1. Information source

2. Transmitter

3. Receive ----- noise source

4. Destination

(Study of literature, linguistic model)

Semiotics

• Denotated
• Connotated
• Sign
• Symbols
• Indexes
• Rebundancy

Ambiguity

Male, Female, couples that love kids, friends, friends with benefits, separated, married, had a fight

Visual picture and subjective analysis:

Me: Family cottage

Linguistic: views communication of meaning and suggest that one message is going to mean different things to people depending on different factors. It focuses on the receiver and the social political and economic environment in which they live.

This theoretical approach to design applies not only to graphic designers but also fashion designers, product designers, illustrations and architects.

Decoding Visual Messages

Signifier

Red circle with bar

Signified

Something forbidden

Eg. Cigeratte

The values of any culture are incorporated into the sign systems we use.