Jim discusses the Top of Tech Noir and the upcoming weeks, then I share my two cents, and then Dr. Oblivion offers some words of wisdom.
“Cheers, I guess,” says Dr. Oblivion as he introduces the video segment of ds106. Snarky Dr. Oblivion comes first, letting you know that video, done well, is not easy, but good Dr. Oblivion follows to let you know it’s worth the effort.
We have two weeks of projects here: 2/7/25-2/14/25 and 2/14/25-2/21/25
Week 5
Finish this first section by Friday, 2/14, and link or embed it in your weekly summary.
Reading movies
This week we’re moving from audio to video. We’ve been looking at related aspects – photography, sound, design – all along, but now we’re going to look at cinematic camerawork, and how it all comes together.
Read:
Film analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_analysis
Film Analysis – Storytelling https://pressbooks.pub/storytelling/chapter/film-analysis/
Watch:
For me, this raises the question – How much of what we consider good acting is really good editing? When we watch movies, we identify with the actors. They are what we see and hear. We pay attention to story and dialogue. This week, I’m going to ask you to pretty much ignore that part, and pay attention to everything else – the camera, the lighting, the editing. The ways that video tells stories.
The video above comes from Tony Zhou’s great series, Every Frame a Painting in which he analyzes details of film making. The entire series is worth watching and highly recommended, but I’m going to point out these in particular:
Memories of Murder (2003) – Ensemble Staging
Akira Kurosawa – Composing Movement
Joel & Ethan Coen – Shot | Reverse Shot
An interesting point about all of these is that they are about design. It may not be design in the graphic sense, but staging, composition and sets are all carefully and deliberately planned out to achieve particular goals, that is to say, designed.
David Fincher – And the Other Way is Wrong
F for Fake (1973) – How to Structure a Video Essay
The Silence of the Lambs – Who Wins the Scene?
Note that the focus in these is not on plot or acting, or even if the movies are good or not, but rather on the techniques, like editing, that the directors use to tell stories.
Here is Alfred Hitchcock on the the Kuleshov Effect:
Apply what we’ve learned
Now that we’ve spent some time thinking about how films are made and how we “read” them, let’s apply that new information to a scene from a video.
Option 1: Looking at Black Mirror once more, “Hated In The Nation,” (Netflix link, better video quality) the 6th episode of season 3, addresses issues of privacy, surveillance and cyberbullying through the lens of a Nordic noir police procedural. Warning: Some scenes in this episode are rather intense. As we watch this, we may consider how it represents tech noir and how it perhaps differs. We should also pay attention to how the language of video – photography, editing, sound production – are used to tell the story.
Option 2: If you would rather not use the Black Mirror episode, identify some particularly effective scenes from another video related to our theme. Here is the Tech Noir/Cyberpunk Media list again: https://docs.google.com/document/d/17J4JdpgCguZT4PBQKvAuSrNeeisAF23NhNjDjj_tRBU/edit?usp=sharing.
Whichever option you choose, Pick a scene to analyze in a video essay. Use the critical lens of this week’s reading and resources. This means you are going to make a video, using a scene from a video, and discuss the scene in voice-over narration. You can upload your video essay to Vimeo or Youtube. (Note: If you have a google account, you have a Youtube account. Vimeo may be a better choice for the video essay because their content police are more easygoing.)
Note: The focus should be on how film-making technique is used, not acting or plot or if the movie is good. It may be easier to analyze something that is not a favorite for the purposes of this assignment. If it helps, here is an example video essay. Please note that this is not the only way to do it. Creativity is always encouraged.
This assignment is a slight variation on the classic ds106 Video Essay assignment in the Assignment Bank. For this class, you need only analyze one scene, although you’re welcome to do more. In particular, your analysis should reflect what you learned by reading the film analysis readings and watching the Tony Zhou videos.
iMovie and MS Photos app are good tools for this project, and OpenShot may be a good free alternative, although I haven’t tried it yet. OBS (Open Broadcaster Software) looks like fun too. There are extensions for Firefox and Chrome to help with downloading clips. There is a whole page with advice and information that should help with this assignment, and the ds106 Video Essay assignment has a few tutorials linked to it. The Digital Knowledge Center is also a great resource. They offer tutoring on video editing.
When you’re done, blog your video essay (that means embed the video in your post, and write about the process of making it and what you got out of it.) and tag it videoessay.
Daily Creates
Do two this week
Plus, the usual commenting, and vote for this week’s Best of ds106 Use this form to vote.
Week 6
Finish this second section by Friday, 2/21, and link or embed it in your weekly summary.
- Assignment- Revisit goals
In week 1, you stated your goals for the course. Now that we are a third of the way through ds106, how would you revise or refine those goals?
Review your assignment posts and weekly summaries. How do they make the case for your efforts to challenge yourself? Do they do a good job of showing and explaining the evidence? Are there areas where you feel you need help?
Respond in a blog post and tag it revisitgoals. Frame the post as the story of your journey and growth through the course so far, and look for ways to incorporate digital media as examples. The point here is to self-evaluate your progress so far, based on what you want to achieve and what you’ve accomplished. Therefore your post should reference and link back to previous posts and projects. If you choose to do your reflection as embedded audio or video, include the links as a reference list in the post.
- Video Assignments:
Your choice of either A or B
A. Talk to the Bot (if you are brave)
As a way of experimenting with video editing, you should have your character engage in a back and forth conversation with Dr. Oblivion. This is a video version of the Consult with your doctor audio assignment. The difference is you will have to generate a Dr Oblivion video from the MP3 recording you get from https://oblivion.university/.
Here are step-by-step directions for generating a Dr Oblivion video from an MP3 recording of one of his responses:
Note that some of the processing steps can take considerable time, perhaps 30 minutes. The script has been producing errors for me, but I have been ignoring them and moving on and it has worked. YMMV.
Feel free to split your Oblivion video(s) to insert your character’s part of the conversation. This part of the conversation does not need to match your input to oblivion.university. It might help to get a couple Oblivion videos to get the full range of his personality. If you can animate your character, that’s great. If not, you could use an avatar image with a voice-over. Include it in a blog post along with reflections on your creative process. Tag it talktothebot.
B. Your choice of 3 video assignments from the Assignment Bank. Involve your character in some way in at least two of them.
3. Daily Creates
Do two this week
- Commenting
Keep it up! This is how we maintain our sense of connection and community. And keep voting! Vote for this week’s Best of ds106