#like I want to draw and decode and write and consume media

[astralknightsky]

Having a migraine while my brain is deep in a hyperfixation is painful

[mcmactictac]

So I’m trying to write a paper on the pros and cons of fandom culture for a media class right. And let me just say it makes me SO MAD trying to find sources because there are so many genuinely wonderful things about fandom and there are many complex social issues reflected in them. Yet so many of these articles are all just based so heavily in sexism? Like playing into that “crazy fangirl” stereotype. And listen I get it yk some people are like that. But I want to talk about WHY fandom is so important to so many people.

Everyone is so quick to judge without getting any understanding of where the sense of attachment comes from. Yes, fandoms have bad people. Yes, there is fetishization, doxing, and a shit load of other problems. It just drives me nuts that those problems are pointed out and no academic sources make an effort to figure out why those problems occurred. Like the relationship between society and fandom is so fucking interesting and its really interesting to see how different fanbases reflect different viewpoints on things.

Also I’m tired of everyone saying we control the media. I have not sat through years of queerbaits; through all of November 5th and the hell that came after it for people to say that producers always listen to fans and give them whatever they want/target everything towards them. Like yes ofc massive media companies are going to take advantage of people cause sadly that’s just how so many of them are. But that doesn’t take away from the genuine meaning and support that media gives us? 

Like brief academic moment here we’ve been talking about Stanley Hall’s model of communication and the idea of encoding and decoding, and how media can have multiple different meanings. I fully agree that people’s own cultural experiences and personal contexts change the way they interpret something. And it’s absolutely fascinating to see how fanbases can have such a large majority of people who draw the same conclusion from media based on their experiences. Especially with queerbaiting and queer coding. I've been thinking about BBC Merlin a lot recently and how interesting that show is not only on its own but in relation to it’s fandom. How so many people can watch it and see magic as something so clearly queercoded, and identify themselves with that characters, and then other people can insist that we’re grasping for straws. 

I just wish it was taken more seriously yk? Like the good and the bad that comes along with it are both very real and intense emotions, especially with so many neurodiverse people in fandom space who become hyperfixated on media. That’s something that has a massive impact on people. Fandom can be a space to connect with others, to explore your own identity, to critically reflect on what you’re consuming, to inspire yourself to create! 

Whenever people outside of fandoms talk about fanfiction it’s always about slash fiction and YES that is a part of it but I have read some truly incredible and impactful fanfictions that has understood the target audience better than a majority of media sources. Fanfiction that can speak to you, reflect your own feelings, provide a sense of comfort or a way to express emotion. Like yes there’s fic’s that are just smut but I’ve seen just as many 100k+ fics that are like focused around found family, mental health issues, AU’s with incredible worldbuilding, fans who put the devotion into creating well rounded characters and expanding upon the foundation placed before them. I’m tired of all that being ignored, because it should be appreciated. I’ve seen so many people who manage to communicate a certain feeling or emotion through fanfiction better than in books I’ve read.

And as so much of adolescent culture shifts online I think fandom spaces are HUGE in terms of self discovery. I’m tired of adults invalidating fandoms because it’s just “made up of obsessive teen girls” there is so much more to that and every day I am tempted to write an essay (not for class) on it because I have so many thoughts on it and I absolutely hate that people refuse to take it seriously.

Wow ok clearly had some feelings there thanks for coming to my TED talk 

[henrikvanderswoon]

MURDER AT TURQUOISE INN: A Nancy Drew Story Written by 10-year-old Yours Truly Readthrough

Alright, guys, you asked for it! It’s pouring down rain outside, I’ve grabbed some tea, I have my entire Nancy Drew game music track playlist going, and I’m ready to crack this s nutcase wide open.

Absolute ridiculousness below: 

The fact that this story is titled “Murder at Turquoise Inn” is already sending me, and it has nothing to do with the fact that I spelled it terquoice on the cover page.

I also started this story out with a letter to Ned. God bless. 

Dear Ned, Beth Robertson was murdered! 

As if Ned (or anyone else) even knows who the fuck Beth Robertson is, Nancy. 

I named the owner of the inn Tina Mulberry, and I think that was very sexy of me. 

“I turned to do something, and when I came back, she was dead on the floor! I could tell because her heart wasn’t beating and she wasn’t breathing!”

I mean… that’ll do it, Tina. That’ll do it. 

Oh, but she can’t prove anything now because she ran to get help and when she returned the body was fucking MISSING.

Bess throws a conniption fit every time someone says “Beth.”

“Oh, hello, Nancy,” she greeted.

“Hello,” Nancy greeted back. 

That is some…some god-tier writing right there. 

I really had no concept of space and time in fifth grade.

It was a huge room. Bigger than the cafeteria in Ned’s college.

Oh, was it? 

A message from the author: Hey kiddos, if you’re snooping around in someone’s closet and you come across a completely conspicuous button just chilling on the wall, don’t press it.

The three girls came out of the closet.

Well, there you have it, folks. Nancy, Bess, and George are gay. Everyone’s gay. Even your cat is gay.

Tina has a niece named Lily who calls her Mrs. Mulberry. Also, Tina consistently neglects her work duties in favor of writing a screenplay at the front desk computer and I have no idea why. 

The murderer is walking around leaving stupid messages with the drawing of a knife on them trying to curse everyone and I’m so confused. Where the hell was I going with this? 

“I KNOW YOU SAW BETH DEAD, BUT IF YOU TELL ANYONE, A DEADLY CURSE WILL FALL UPON YOU.”

WHAT DOES THIS EVEN FUCKING MEAN?

The lines in this thing are really just peak writing:

George took off after him at a safe distance to avoid being seen. But BAD LUCK FOR HER, the man jumped into a car and drove off.

 Someone sabotaged the girls’ rental car while they were away from the hotel, and this couple they literally just met are like: “I just remembered, we have an extra car that we don’t use. You could use that.” Who the fuck–?

Uh, oh. They got back to the hotel and found their own curse lying in Bess’ suitcase:

LAY OFF THE CASE, NANCY DREW. YOU MADE MRS. MULBERRY TELL YOU THE MURDER STORY. NOW THE CURSE IS UPON YOU TOO.” 

This sounds like a ten-year-old wrote it… wAiT A MiNutE–

Literally nothing in this story explains what the curse would even do to them. I love myself.

The culprit: *leaves threatening messages warning people not to speak about the murder or they’ll be cursed*

Nancy:

“Oh, hello,” Jackson greeted.

“Hi,” Nancy said. “Say! Have you heard about the murder?”

I ALMOST SPAT OUT MY TEA.

Also:

“I’m going to the store to, um, get some stuff. Like food.”

“But there’s foot here.”

“I just want to BUY things, okay? You’re so NOSEY!”

Jackson stormed off, leaving Nancy astonished. That put him on her suspect list FOR SURE.

This is a literary gem.

The way the dialogue sounds in this thing…I mean you can just tell the only written media I had been consuming at that time was the 1930′s books. 

“I think,” Nancy replied. “That tomorrow we should go to the place where I followed Jackson.”

Giving me Scooby-Doo vibes too. 

The number of times Bess says something like, “Why, Nancy!” or “This is horrid!” really makes me want to turn this into a drinking game. Take a shot every time Bess speaks like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. 

“Oh, fiddlesticks,” Bess exclaimed. 

…

No comment. 

Also, Nancy’s unadulterated sass my fifth-grade self gave her is both the worst and the best thing I’ve ever seen: 

“But what if the house isn’t empty?” Bess asked. 

“Bess, please. Ever heard of the word: S-N-E-A-K?”

I want to harpoon myself. 

There’s an elaborate maze of tunnels running underground that connects the hotel to this sketchy house miles away. The characters consistently find themselves back there several times throughout the story and literally nothing about it makes any sense at all, nor is it ever explained.  

“Man, that passageway confuses me,” said George.

Thank you, George, it confuses all of us. 

I’m actually embarrassed about how many times I refer to the group of characters as a “threesome” or a “foursome” in this thing. It’s really just the worst.

The culprit purposefully leaves behind their real initials multiple times in this story and has the audacity to be surprised when they get caught at the end? Iconique™. 

“I’m just a weird ol’ guy, Sweety-Cakes.” 

Ned, are you okay? Was I okay when I wrote this? 

Ned’s coming to visit, and he brings Burt and Dave with him and boy howdy did I forget about those two. 

“This mystery sounds dangerous,” Burt remarked. “Shouldn’t you leave this case to the men?” 

“I’d like to see you try,” Nancy fired back.

Yaaaassss, Queen. Get his ass. 

Also the murderer has now resorted to hitting people with a driverless vehicle and I’m honestly convinced ten-year-old me was on drugs. 

“Good! We were starting to get worried about you.” 

“Oh, don’t worry about me. I…wait…wait, actually, worry about me!” 

The line goes dead here because Lily’s car was uhhhh T-boned. 

My only regret in this story is that the Hardy Boy’s are not here. Although, in hindsight, they’re probably lucky they didn’t get subjected to this shitshow. 

Meanwhile, George thought maybe Bess had made a mistake and walk’s into the men’s bathroom. She walked in but found no one–well, except a bunch of screaming men. 

I don’t even know what to say. 

They went to see Lily in the hospital and Bess got hit by a driverless car in the fucking parking lot. WHAT KIND OF MADWOMAN WOULD WRITE THIS I CAN’T BREATHE.

That night, back at the hotel, Nancy gets lured out of the hotel and into the back forest behind it because someone’ s playing weird music and I’m just now realizing my child self had no idea what kind of theme to run with here (murder, hauntings, curses, GTA) so I just went with all of them at once.

“I could just destroy it,” Ned said as he studied the lock. “Stand back.” Backing up a few yards, he bolted for the cabin door and broke it down with a strong kick. “For Nancy!” he shouted. 

HeR Interactive’s Ned could never.

 So they find Nancy tied up in a cabin in the woods and, lo and behold there’s a trap door that LeADs InTo tHE UnDeRGroUnD TuNnEls. Who’da thunk?

And of course they find a journal written in code, and the code key just happens to have been left in the cabin. 

“I’ve written this journal in code so if anyone finds it, they will not discover my secret. Okay, now that I’ve said that, here is my secret.” 

This is the first line Nancy decodes. I’m…

Naturally, we find out that Beth Robertson was not dead, but just kidnapped (don’t even ask me how the fuck they got her body to appear dead…drugs?) and being held in the underground tunnels. 

Because this makes perfect sense. 

“You seem different. Your voice doesn’t sound the same and you’re a little shorter than you usually…” Tiffany trailed off. “You are Jackson, aren’t you?”

“No,” Ned said. “Thanks for asking.” 

This is 100 times funnier without context so I’m not giving you any. 

I don’t know about you guys, but if I was arranging a meeting with a colleague and they showed up in a ski mask and a hooded cloak, I’d be a little suspicious.

“But you’ re supposed to be delivering Nancy Drew poisonous flowers from her ‘boyfriend.’”

Oh my god this bitch pulls a gun on Ned and together the rest of the group (you know, the ones who haven’t been hit by a car) fucking go APESHIT on this woman’s ass. I CAN’T BREATHE. 

And of course they find Beth tied up somewhere in the tunnels and get her to safety, and they learn that Bess and Lily are recovering well in the hospital and go to visit them and everything’s all bright and happy. 

THE LAST LINE OF THE STORY HAS ME SCREAMING, THOUGH. To the point where I’m just gonna sign off here and leave you all with it. 

“Man.” Lily looked sad. “I wish I hadn’t missed almost the whole thing.” 

Bess spoke up. “I, on the other hand, am glad.” 

[gaslightgatekeepgodot]

A (sizeable) rant/essay concerning my experiences in the Tumblr JJBA fandom.

None of you asked to hear this, but I’m getting pretty pissed off at some people in particular (I will not name names, though I may heavily implicate some people) and it’s finally started to kinda spill over. So I’m letting it spill; take it or leave it.

I’m... Fairly irate at the moment, and writing out my feelings does tend to help me calm down in situations like this, so if I was going to put this anywhere the best place for it is probably on the public internet. Again, take it or leave it: this is the internet, you don’t have to interact with me if this concerns you or your ideals. Just click that handy little block button on my profile and you never have to see little Nat mouthing off again.

If you want me to summarise (I know not everyone wants/is able to read a fluffed-up pillar of text) or explain my reasoning behind anything I’ve said below the cut, feel free to direct message me here or on Discord @nati bati yi#1462. Once I get this off my chest I’ll be more than willing to chat to people about it. <3

(Before I say anything else, this is not intended to be a callout in any way, shape or form. I don’t mention the specific names of anybody, and the actions I do mention here will only point to specific people if you know them too. Anyone on the outside should have zero idea of who anyone I bring up is; I do not want anyone to get harassed over this, and I very much do not want to start drama - that’s what inspired me to go off and write this hunk of garbage in the first place. I’m just... Sick to death of the fandom as a whole.)

Anyway. Here we go.

From what I’ve been able to tell, being in this fandom for just under a year now, there are two main halves to it: the gay-hating, stale-meme-parroting dudebro side, who seem to mostly congregate around YouTube and Reddit, and... Whatever the side based on Tumblr (and probably now Twitter) is. I don’t spend a lot of time on Reddit, so naturally I’ve been more exposed to the Tumblr side of the fandom, and after experiencing the ideals some people here want to force on other people I’ve come to the conclusion I’d almost rather be immersed in the bigoted dudebro side. And I say this as an ace-spec/gay trans man.

I’ll start with the blocklist.

I think most of us on Tumblr came to the conclusion that the blocklist was utter bullshit, but I did see a few people in a Discord server I have since left (I will expand on this later) defending the reasoning behind some ships being on there, citing the fact they had been abused in a relationship with a similar age gap. I can definitely see why that would bother a person, and I do not want to erase the fact that people have been and will be abused in similar relationships, but you can’t project your singular experience onto every fictional, non-canon character relationship and every person who ships it. For one, not every relationship is going to turn out the same just because it meets this one criteria of “the age gap is too big”, and, also, you don’t have to write fiction to totally reflect reality. You are in full creative control. Maybe if the characters were real people they wouldn’t click, but if you’re drawing a picture or writing a fanfic you don’t have to go along with that. You can write them so that they’re good to each other, while still keeping it in character. Araki has said that Jotaro and Kakyoin’s personalities don’t work together very well, and that they wouldn’t have become friends or even spoken to each other if Jotaro wasn’t a Stand user... But Jotaro/Kakyoin just happens to be the most-written about JJBA ship on AO3. Me? I love Jotakak. It’s about the only thing I do ship. And I’ve read some quite frankly amazing fanfiction where the two boys are paired and they work together, and it’s still very much in character. Of course, I’m very much against loli/shota content or content depicting characters who don’t look very old- if someone drew Koichi in a sexual situation I would be pissed as all hell, but I don’t have to engage with that content any further. I can just filter out the tag/block the OP and move on. You don’t need to make a fuss and tell/imply to people that they are paedophilic for enjoying well-written content where a 17-year-old is in a healthy relationship with a 22-year-old, platonic or otherwise.

My second point brings in some of the things I’ve learned while studying media this past year. My main point here: not everyone in an audience is the same. There is a reason differential decoding and the uses and gratifications theory exist. The uses and gratifications theory states, at its most basic, that the audience of a media text is active, not passive; i.e. they are not just absorbing every piece of data thrown at them by the text they are consuming, and they are consuming different media to satisfy a need- for JJBA, that need could be entertainment, escapism, identifying with a character similar to yourself or to give you something to talk about with your friends. Differential decoding arises when someone consuming a piece of the media does not entirely go along with the creator’s preferred reading of it- an example might be how a sizeable amount of people enjoy villainous or “disgusting” characters such as Dio, Cioccolata, Stroheim or Melone, when they were clearly written in canon to be abhorrent, unlikable people for varying reasons. I can also say that, because the audience is active, and consume media based on their personal needs, that somebody writing fanfic of a ship you don’t like isn’t going to make incest or paedophilia more socially acceptable. I don’t consume that content, because I don’t feel the need to. Sure, real paedos might, but they’re a minority. Just because a couple hundred people or so read a fanfic on the free web where a grown adult does the dirty with a little kid, doesn’t mean to say everyone in the world will suddenly start thinking it’s ok. Mention it to any sane person in real life and they will not like that idea any more than you do.

And my third point is more a personal thing than anything else, but there is a community I used to be part of (and was part of almost from the beginning) where I didn’t feel welcome because of people causing drama over things like what I mentioned above. I started multiple discourses entirely by accident by saying I didn’t understand why everyone though X ship was horribly problematic and worth getting mad at people over. I still don’t feel like anyone deserves to be harassed over characters and ships they enjoy, but that doesn’t mean to say I support all of it. Along with generally feeling ignored by a lot of the moderators of that server, as well as their friends, I was just sick to death of how they seemed to single out some certain people to say, “hey, don’t do this” when other people seemed exempt. I was verbally warned for posting innuendos in a general chat (but it’s not like I could anywhere else on the server, because I’m not 18 yet), but at least once every day I would see two people flirting in-character in whatever channel they happened to meet in, and it never seemed to be in a roleplay channel- I couldn’t see into NSFW to check if they did it there too, but the fact it would leak out into gen concerned me. They would throw innuendo after innuendo at each other, and they never seemed to stop, or be told to stop. Yes, I could have messaged the moderators to say it made me uncomfy, but one of them was a moderator themselves, so I felt a little out my element doing so. 

Another thing that bothered me is when I tried to join an offshoot of that server for kin, and the admin - I assume - of said offshoot server messaged me (with some other conversation concerning it in between) that, despite the fact I only wanted in to help me figure out what it meant to me, I wasn’t allowed in because somebody was uncomfy with doubles. I completely understand that, but I had spoken to the only person it could have been (I wasn’t given a name, but it wasn’t difficult to figure out who it was) multiple times about that character and how similar we were- hell, we had even roleplayed together as doubles of that character and no problems were ever expressed to me. If anything it seemed like we left off in a spot we could have carried on from later. It might not have been intended that way, but being told I wasn’t allowed in there made me feel excluded from the community nonetheless, especially because I’d had a few people tell me the night before that they wanted more people in there and that I’d be totally welcome. I was also told, before any of this happened, that the same person blocked a friend of mine in another server for going on a small rant about how they didn’t like the way Josuke acted in the episode where he plays dice with Rohan and ends up burning his house down, because they kin Josuke..? At least, that’s what was relayed to me.

But, hey ho, it’s all behind me now. I won’t lie; I don’t really plan on ever going back. I don’t want to engage anymore, because it makes me uncomfortable and anxious thinking about it, so I most likely will unfollow most (if not all) of the blogs pertaining to that community tonight. I do have a few people still there who I miss speaking to, but I’ve DM’d all of them on Discord at least once since I’ve left and talked to them about either how I miss them or something entirely unrelated to the server. I’d like to talk more with them, but DMs are always awkward for me to begin with... I have a feeling they might not want to talk after reading this, and I think I’m ready to accept that? Might be difficult not being able to scream about fanfic as much, but I won’t impose on anyone if my presence makes them uncomfy. I don’t want to be that guy.

I’ll say it again: now that I’ve got this off my chest and subsequently calmed down a lot, I’m more than willing to talk about any of it. Just shoot me a message on Discord and I’ll reply when I’m able and feeling up to talking about it again. For now I’m probably just going to go back to pissing about on Flight Rising or play Smash or something

[droneseco]

The Philips PicoPix Max One Portable Projector: Small Box, Big Picture

Philips PicoPix Max One

8.00 / 10

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The Philips PicoPix Max One is a small form factor battery-powered projector that is easy to use and gives a sharp, bright, native 1080p picture. It lacks the features of some other small projectors but makes up for it with a no-nonsense easy to use menu system and is perfect for watching films on the go or giving presentations.

Specifications

Brand: Philips

Native Resolution: 1080p

ANSI Lumens: 800

Projection Technology: DLP

Connectivity: HDMI, USB Type-C

Throw Ratio: 1,2:1

Audio: 2 x 4 Watt internal speakers, 3.5mm Jack

OS: N.A

Lamp Life: Up to 30,000h

Pros

Small enough to easily travel with

No-nonsense, easy to use menus

Enough battery life for films and presentations

Small enough to easily travel with

Cons

Lack of Android OS could be a turn off for some

USB Type-C not readily supported

Buy This Product

Philips PicoPix Max One amazon

Shop

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Want a big bright video the size of a wall? You need a projector. Unfortunately, your options are limited. You could get a super crisp and bright image using a commercial-grade cinema projector which will put dents in your wallet, ceiling, and electricity bill. Alternatively, you could get a miniature "pico" sized projector, which has all the benefits of being cheap and small but gives a smaller, low-quality picture as a trade-off.

The Philips PicoPix Max One promises to deliver a large, crisp 1080p picture while being small enough to fit in a rucksack. Not only that, it's battery-powered and supports USB Type-C. Could this be the perfect compromise?

Nearly. It's not without issues, but there is a lot to like here.

Pico in Size, Max in Picture

The Picopix max one is a small form factor full HD projector, capable of projecting native 1080p video at up to 120" in size. The onboard 3000 mAh battery promises up to three hours of view time, and the onboard USB-A port can be used to power a casting device like a Chromecast or Fire TV stick, making it pretty convenient as a portable media device for watching TV or giving presentations.

The main video input is HDMI, but there is also a USB Type-C port that can be used as a video input or a power output provided both functions work with your device.

Power comes via a DC barrel jack and included 65w power plug, and there is an optional 3.5mm audio output if you don't want to use the onboard dual 4 watt speakers, which are nothing to write home about - more or less as good as laptop speakers, but to be fair no projector gives all that good audio especially at this price range.

The projector comes with an infrared remote and has capacitive touch buttons on the projector body for menu hopping without it.

In terms of mounting it has a single-threaded socket on the bottom compatible with all tripods, and most mounting boards for projectors, though its small size and light weight make it much easier to mount than most others.

Unlike its big brother the PicoPix Max (not that they differ in size) this projector has no onboard wireless connectivity, or operating system capable of playing and storing media. You'll need to connect it to a laptop, smartphone, or casting device. That said, the PixoPix Max One costs almost half the price of the PicoPix Max making it a good budget alternative.

The contrast ratio of 10,000:1 and throw ratio of 1.2:1(D:W) allow it to work in a variety of settings, and whether you are projecting it large on your living room wall, or going for a smaller image closer to a screen it gives a crisp picture without needing to fiddle with many settings.

The video can go up to 120" and remain sharp, provided you are in a dark room with a decent, non-reflective flat surface to project onto.

Out of the Box Experience

First time setup of the Max One is very simple, just plug it in and turn it on. The auto keystone correction is fairly decent when projecting on a flat plane but anything beyond that is going to require some manual keystoning.

This is made pretty easy with the remote, which is also where you focus the lens. Oddly I couldn't find a menu setting on the projector itself for this, so you really don't want to lose that remote!

One of the benefits of not having an Android operating system is that it really is as simple as plug it in and go. No menu hopping, connecting to Wi-Fi, or setting up user accounts.

The PicoPix Max One in General Use

For testing, we mainly used a Chromecast and had no issues. As for battery, we managed to watch a whole film on the medium brightness setting (while also powering the Chromecast).

Before getting started I'd fully charged it, so we were able to more or less watch a film on it straight out of the box. The battery lasted the whole way through and by the time I turned it off the battery was still showing some charge - you'll have to have a long business meeting to outlast it.

In fact, all HDMI use was without issue. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for USB Type-C.

USB Type-C Woes

Before going on it's important to give a little context to what USB Type-C video is, as many issues here may not be the fault of the projector and more an issue with USB Type-C adoption and regulation.

Video over USB Type-C (using a regular USB Type-C cable with no converters), uses DisplayPort Alt Mode. Not all devices support it, and it can be hard to find solid information on which devices do. In the case of my Google Pixel 4a smartphone, Alt Mode is turned off in software at the kernel level. I'm not sure why that's the case, but luckily I own that Chromecast that Google also conveniently sells.

In my experience, I never got direct USB Type-C video input working, even after trying on multiple devices. Your experience may differ, and it'd be unfair of me to mark this against the projector when this is still an issue found across a large range of consumer devices. This might change in time, but without a firmware update, it seems likely the Max One will always have these issues.

More importantly, if you use a USB Type-C adapter dongle you won't have this issue. These dongles come with HDMI conversion built-in and are widely supported. If you are already using a dongle like this to attach your laptop to an external monitor, you won't have any issues.

Charging? Well… Not so Much

One of the interesting qualities of this projector is its ability to charge USB devices, and the prospect of using the projector's internal 3000 mAh battery as a power bank seemed like a great bonus feature.

Unfortunately, the USB Type-C charging just wouldn't work regardless of what I tried. Turning USB Type-C charging on in the menu wouldn't charge a dead device. When the device was turned on it didn't work either. A little USB snooping showed that the projector was controlling the power delivery negotiation but bizarrely was trying to charge from the device rather than actually charge it, and changing settings on the smartphone didn't do anything to remedy it.

By contrast, USB Type-A charging works just fine, but only when the projector is on. Unfortunately, whenever the projector is on the fan and projection LED are also on. This means charging is only available while actively using the projector.

This is still fine, and it's a handy feature, but it does mean you can't use this as you would a regular power bank, which would be handy for use on the go.

It's also worth noting that no onboard media player means that you cannot use a thumb drive to play videos. The USB Type-A port only provides power, and the projector itself has no onboard decoding for video files.

It is a shame as it would have been a convenient addition, but it would step up the complexity of the operating system. As previously mentioned, the more expensive PicoPix Max has these features built-in, and when you consider that the price of the Max One plus a casting device is still hundreds of dollars cheaper, it's a fair trade-off.

Should You Buy the Philips PicoPix Max One?

So, to the big question. Is this projector worth buying given the issues I had? I'd argue yes, as the majority of these issues cannot be leveled at the projector.

At its core, this is a powerful mini projector that is incredibly portable and simple to use. The padded carry bag easily carries the projector, Chromecast, and an HDMI cable. It's not going to replace a proper home cinema projector any time soon, but it's not meant to either. It worked perfectly well for movie night when plugged into a decent speaker, and unless you live in an aircraft hanger you likely don't need a bigger picture than the 120" it offers.

When compared to other small form factor projectors at this price, the big draw here is the native 1080p resolution, something many others lack. Sure it's missing the onboard Android TV operating system or built-in Bluetooth speaker, but in terms of picture quality, you are hard pushed to find a pico projector at this price range that performs this well.

The Philips PicoPix Max One Portable Projector: Small Box, Big Picture published first on http://droneseco.tumblr.com/

[zak-animation]

BA1b Summary: Week 5

Animated Sketchbook Whilst I’ve begun to put a focus on the Digital Metamorphosis project, I still managed to complete a few pages in my sketchbook - primarily working on the ideas of visual memory and imagination. Last week, I explored the use of black ink to create random marks, blots and smudges and then finding characters, scenes and creatures amongst the masses. This week, I wanted to develop on this process by adding colour: and exploring how this would affect my thought and imagination process when designing and ultimately ‘decoding’ these marks.

The week began by independently researching the idea of a ‘deliberate accident’ in art further, as a way to add some theory and context behind these pages. This led me to explore the work of Justinus Kerner, a doctor and poet who produced ink smudges on hand-written letters. Kerner would later transform these accidental blots into a ‘bestiary of grotesque creatures of chance’ in his published book Klecksographien. Kerner would illustrate demons and creatures from these random shapes; a collection of skeletons, winged monsters and terrifying creatures. Whilst my illustrations aren’t terrifying, they are beginning to explore the idea of creature design in particular: something that might be a result of the complex shapes in the ink blots. Traditionally, animated characters and heroes follow simple shape structure and thus that may be a reason behind my primarily creature-based designs.

For this task, I experimented with a range of coloured inks in order to evoke a range of emotions.  Looking back, the red and dark pink pages were the most exciting, with some very interesting creature designs and character ideas based around repetitive brush techniques and blurry marks, something I felt evoked a strong sense of movement when drawing over them with a fine liner.

Finally, I wanted to experiment with mixing the inks and produced an earthy shade, which resulted in more mystical, calm deity-like beings. Interesting how my mind saw the red marks as more villainous and aggressive whilst the purple creatures seemed more morally ambiguous, and the earthy creations connoted more of a peaceful calm effect. To put it simply, this is colour theory in effect: how our mind reads colours as different meanings, picked up through our own personal life and the environment we’ve grown up in.

Next week, I want to move away from these ink blot creations and base my designs off existing sources, sketching real-life animals and natural features as a way to develop my understanding of animal anatomy and inspire my own more imagined and fantastical creature designs.  

Narrative Theory This week’s Narrative Research session introduced a range of new narrative concepts and theories, as we looked at Christopher Booker’s 7 Plot Types, experimental animation and delved into the psychological reasons in which humans tell (and consume) stories.

Whilst I’ve spoken about the purpose of stories before, I’ve never once looked into the concept at an academic level, such as the reasons established this week. Learning about the different plot types was interesting, and it was quite surprising just how many plots that I could think of which followed a specific plot perfectly. Despite this, I think it’s important for us, as animators and storytellers to challenge (at least one of) these narrative conventions. As an audience, we want to be entertained: not bored. Personally, I’ve always thought that subverting one area of a narrative structure almost ensures an engaging storyline. I consider storytelling a form of ‘edutainment; a way of educating our audience but sending them on a fun ride in the process. It’s these main reasons - to educate, inspire or entertain - that drive almost all stories today.

Additionally to this, I was able to further explore the steps of the Hero’s Journey, as described by writer Christopher Vogler. Writing about the steps in more detail has not only cemented my own understanding of the structure, but it’s inspired me to apply this narrative structure to my chosen film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. This week, I’ve also been able to write up my initial ideas for this project: exploring my potential films to explore and the subject material they offer before reaching the conclusion of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

Alongside being a film that everyone’s talking about, Into the Spider-Verse offers a variety of subjects to discuss: visual storytelling, cultural significance as ‘more than once wears the mask’, alongside ideas of adaption and interpretation. When collecting research for the film, I’m going to be exploring all facets of the storyline and film itself before honing in on a specific area, evidencing more than one analytical directions before I start writing the first draft.

Over these last five weeks, I’ve been able to explore a range of narrative theories and concepts from character archetypes, fairytale functions and heroes journeys. As a way to begin my research and analysis into my chosen film, I plan to revisit all of these narrative ideas and concepts introduced on this blog and apply them to Spider-Man. Next week, I specifically want to break down the film’s plot using Vogler’s interpretation of the Hero’s Journey, a subject we explored just recently.

Next week, I will begin collecting research sources for my essay exploring Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (through online videos, books and any other media of discussion) and decide on an essay question. It’s a little early to begin doing this, however I want to start work on this project ahead of time rather than leaving it till last minute. Whilst this wasn’t the case in the last unit, I did feel somewhat rushed, and want to begin writing a first draft for my self-proposed deadline of 29th January, in preparation for our tutorial.

Digital Principles This week in Digital Principles, I’ve put a focus on practical development and experimentation: designing the main elements of the sequence in Illustrator and After Effects in the simple flat design aesthetic I’ve established so far. As a reflection of the week as a whole, I feel like I’m making good progress in this project and will (hopefully) be able to produce a final sequence I’m proud of.

The week began in Illustrator, as I created a series of Heptapod language icons for my animation. By simply using shape layers, my new illustration follows my design language; smooth with visually pleasing arcs created using bezier curves and the pen tool within After Effects. It’s much more visually appealing and consistent with my own sequence.

I’ve managed to complete a full iteration of my first sequence, in which we pan upwards through the alien ship. For this animation, I decided to take it upon myself to learn After Effects in more detail past simply playing around with shape layers, and watched a series of online tutorials to fully grasp the idea of a virtual camera within the software. This is something I briefly explored last week, and through iterative development, I’ve been able to complete the first sequence.

It’s not a perfect sequence, however. Whilst the camera motion is smooth, and the final zoom into the Alien Window is appropriately cinematic, I can definitely improve this first scene. Firstly, I’m very tempted to add Louise and Ian to the Window Room, in the form of small silhouettes in the iconic orange hazmat suits. This is an idea I explored initially in the project, and it’s something I’d like to include in this sequence.

To summarise, I’m really enjoying working on this brief. It’s the project I’ve devoted the most time to, and I’ve found a new approach to animation in the medium of motion graphics. What I like about my approach to this project is my experimentation with new software; rather than working directly from a hand-drawn reference, I’ve challenged myself to learn After Effects in detail.

Next week, I plan to continue the animation process: completing the heptapod language sequence using offset trim paths, and begin work on the actual transformation between the final heptapod icon and the Shell, using keyframes paths. I’ve written a plan for my final piece, and so at this point it’s simply a matter of completing the sequence through iterative development. As a whole, I’m happy with the amount of progress I’ve been able to make this week on the project, and look forward to the next.

[blog-brand-strategy]

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[youdecode]

Self-love When Life is Tough

It is time to pamper yourself by taking good care. The importance of self-love is valuing your self-worth.

If certain changes to your lifestyle could boost your self-love then go for it.

SPOILER: You Only Live Once ! 

Let’s dig straight into self love ideas

  1 – Mindful Eating:

Do you ditch the idea of healthy eating and throw whatever you see into your mouth?

This attitude in turn shapes one into a fairly unhealthy and youthful individual.

At this point, a complaint wavers on one’s lips . . . why am I getting OUT OF SHAPE?

The answer lies in the lack of self-awareness.

Choose the right diet instead of grabbing food like a starved individual in famine. Monitor your mouth.

Put the brakes on your eating at moments when feeling stressed, anxious, or overexcited. WHY? Because it’s easy to lose awareness of what is going on in your body, how hungry you feel, and what the best food is for you at that time.

Drink about 3 liters of water daily for cleaning your body and eliminating the toxins. Examine the oil . avoid hemp oil.

As it will add most of the fatty acids inside your body (omega-3 and omega-6)

Make sure to always have leafy Greens veggies in every meal of yours whether it be cabbage, spinach, lettuce.

Sprinkle a bit of parsley and watercress over your food. you will get the sparkle of minerals and vitamins surely visible onto your face.

Feeling low about your living situation? You will feel so better to snack on seeds as the zinc and sunflower seeds boost energy to a whole new level.

Replace white items with brown whether it be sugar, bread, or rice. As brown items are more healthy and cleansing for your immune system.

2 -Add Humor in your life

Try to be more humorous not for others but yourself. Intentionally find humorous situations.

If you 100% want to get the solution of How to love yourself and be confident then maintain a spark in your life by being playful.

Create self-love moments. No One will do that for you.

Sail on the journey of making hilarious signboards and place it near your window. See how people react and ditch the fear of being judged.  Board can have a picture of your pet with a label: Fully equipped with weapons, this pet refused medications. Beware!

3 – Learn to say No

If you are doing certain things while compromising your happiness, just so that others do not feel bad, then you need to stop.

If something just does not feel right, do not do it.

You can channel the time in doing things that you truly love instead and those which align without your values.

4 – Practice Detachment

You might seem odd at first, but you are surely capable of keeping your phone away for some time.

Enjoy that alone time.

If you are sitting alone with your phone then you are not alone.

You are more than occupied and you are encountering several people virtually.

It is preferred that you find a day for yourself where you do not occupy yourself.

Unplug for preferably for a day or a few hours. 

5 – Recipes

When was the last time you tried a new recipe? Can’t remember?

Dig into your kitchen.

You can especially try baking. I have been baking since 12 (but by far I have only mastered chocolate brownie and vanilla sponge cake )!

It is really rewarding as not only it boosts your skills, but it also becomes therapeutic.

6 – Making your own space

Question yourself: what turns your space into a magical one?

For me it is the fairy lights.

For you it can be candles.

Just treat yourself by recreating your surroundings so that they make you happy.

7 – The mess around you

There is a huge probability that messes around is creating a mess in your head!

So get rid of unwanted things for freeing your mind.

8 – Time for treating your body!

Start with refreshing your skin with a face mask, then go for a warm bath and then moisturize your whole body!

9 – Let your nails SHINE! Yes, dress them up

When was the last time you wore your favorite nail color? Don’t remember? Try this.

10 -Journaling for success

I cannot stress enough how journaling can make your day.

It has the power of seeping in all your stress and delivering you your desired future (manifestation).

I highly suggest you get writing either before sleeping or right after waking up whatever suits you.

My love story with journaling is quite old.

If you are not yet aware of it then I highly suggest you see triple G’s super journaling technique.

11- Get your mind off anything?

How awesome it is that we can get rid of the constant chatter!

Negative thoughts are capable of draining your entire energy, no matter how much you practice techniques of self-care.

I highly suggest that you learn practical ways of sharing your thoughts.

If you have not scanned these 10 powerful strategies of stopping the thoughts then you are missing on a lot! (of what? happiness)

12 – Go through your old childhood photo albums

Refresh your mind by reliving the moments.

13 – Watch Ted Talks

Ted talks can surely make your energy levels high when you are feeling down.

14 – Prepare your favorite warm beverage

Be it coffee, green tea, hot chocolate, or just tea.

15 – Read Something

Sink yourself into the other world by pulling a book and reading a bit of it.

16 – Remove toxicity

You need to remove toxicity around you. Get rid of unwanted people in your life who just seep away all your energy.

Unfollow the negativity from every possible domain of your life (every social media handle)

17 – Find new inspiring people

Befriend the energy boosters.

Have you ever experienced your energy mounting up when you interact with genuine people?

Like, attract like! Find, & befriend.

If this sounds challenging then today contact the genuine people. Bring positivity to your life.

18 – A gratitude list is therapeutic

You can either make the list while journaling or maintain a separate one.

The way I do it is mentioned in triple G’s journaling technique.

19 – Goal setting

Again I expounded the importance of setting dreams and manifesting them in my journaling technique.

But you can plan in any way you like, Just plan and ensure that you witness progress.

20 – Feel the freshnesss

Have you filled a satisfying feeling when you hop in a fresh, new bedsheet? If yes, then why not do it right now?

21 – Bring in new plants

Get closer to nature by bringing in new plants.

22 – Dress Up

Dress yourself up even if you are not going anywhere!

23 – Go all for art!

Draw anything you want. Let your creativity flow even if you think you possess none (which I surely do not believe in!) Get coloring printables and get going. You can even paint it. What you should paint it? Your feelings! The canvas itself will be filled.

24 – Show time!

Re-watch your all-time favorites shows

25 – Nap my friend

You will not agree more that how satisfying it is to hit the bed before bed time. So? Include naps in your routine!

26 – Reconnect with your friends

When was the last time you made a get together plan with all your friends and even that failed?

Yeah you recalled it!

So now treat yourself to reconnect.

Virtual reconnecting is best for this moment in time! So go for video conferencing . . .

27 – Planning ahead

Plan a bigger adventure for the time when things will eventually get better!

Just plan it, add it to your bucket list and feel nice about it.

28 – Get all crafty

If you love journals like me then you can prepare a colorful bullet journal.

29 – Befriend Morning Routine

Try conquering your mornings for a fulfilled day.

Wake up early, watch the sun and enjoy the quietude. 

30 – Get bigger things done first

Plan your to-do list, the boring and biggest task first. Why?

You will be in a position to appreciate yourself more. Yes, that self pride on a small achievement.

31 – Get Some Fresh Air

When was the last time you went for a quick walk, consumed some fresh air, and listened to the motivational podcast?

If it has been long, then you should treat yourself with this dose of motivation.

32 – See the future

Budgeting will make you feel that everything is under control. Go for this reinforcement.

33 – Pick a new hobby

You might be having ample of time at this tough life situation.

What can be better than mastering any skill? Nothing right? So, Give it a shot.

You can even learn a new language.

34 – Implement these!

Comments time!

Which one of the self love activity will you implement? 

   The post Self-love When Life is Tough appeared first on You Decode.

[sr15txbrock-blog]

BLOG POST #3

Sullivan Chapter 8: Media fandom and audience subcultures (189-212). Navar-Gill, A. (2018). Fandom as symbolic patronage: Expanding understanding of fan relationships with industry through the Veronica Mars Kickstarter campaign.Popular Communication, 16(3), 211-224.

Week 9 revolved around the themes and ideas of media fandom, audience subcultures and symbolic patronage. Sullivan’s Chapter 8 discussed many different aspects of “fandom” as well as the stereotypes associated with fandoms. Sullivan cited Jenkins and stated that “The difference between watching a [television] series and becoming a fan lies in the intensity of their emotional and intellectual involvement.” (Sullivan, p. 198).

“Fandoms are associated with the cultural tastes of subordinated formations of the people, particularly those disempowered by any combination of gender, age, class and race”. Meanwhile “... fans are deeply engaged in their favorite media texts. Fans often reinterpret media content and create their own cultural productions in response”. This idea of a fandom community ties into the concept we learned called poaching.“Poaching”, which was forged by Michel de Certeau and later expanded upon by Henry Jenkins is basically the act of taking something that isn’t necessarily yours. For example, at conventions like Fan Expo, fans come and create costumes or merchandise of pre-existing characters from the show/video game/whatever they’re a fan of, (which they don’t own).  In lecture, we discussed that a form of poaching could be fan fiction. (Fan fiction is when fans write spinoff-like stories based on the original material/content). De Certeau also argues that audiences are not passive consumers, they are active interpreters. (Which can be related to Stuart Hall’s encoding/decoding model of communication). Poaching offers consumers the opportunity to create their own material based on their interpretations of the work, they can also interject their own imagination and personal touches which can also form a type of escape from reality into these fandom communities they’ve created. “Fans who outwardly and proudly claim their affirmation with their favourite popular culture texts, particularly when those media are generally considered to be ‘fluff’ or mindless distractions from reality, may be challenging the status quo through their activities” (Sullivan, p.196) The basis of Navar-Gill’s article discusses the relationship between fans and media industries, categorizing fans into either “affirmational fans” or “transformational fans”. This theory involved a kickstarter campaign that was made to help fund a follow-up film to the cult classic series of Veronica Mars. The campaign raised 5.7 million dollars from fans of the show that were interested in seeing the follow-up film. Seeing as the fans took on the role of financing the movie (which was typically the role of an executive producer) it was called into question what kind of role the fans would get in the making of this film since they were the ones sponsoring it.

“...while ‘audience power’ and the boundaries of participation in participatory culture are still contested concepts, symbolic patronage provides one measured example of a way in which audiences now have a greater ability to influence production and industry decision- making” (Navar-Gil, p. 223) This brings me to one of the ideas discussed this week; “patronage”. Patronage is like a sponsorship, funding or support that someone or some organization can receive or give to another organization/person.  “Patronage situates artistic work in hierarchies of quality and taste; the ability to gain a patron or patrons legitimates an artist.” Also in the article, the author stated that; “Though Veronica Mars Kickstarter backers provided start-up capital for the production of the film, as is often the case in patronage, the symbolic and cultural function of their support was more significant than the financial one.”She also said that; “…when corporate producers are seen as interfering with the vision of a creator who is strongly backed by symbolic fan patrons, they lose credibility in the eyes of the audience, which can be damaging to their brand. “ (Navar-Gill, p. 222) The author wanted to investigate how big of a role patronage concepts played in a role of the production of this kick-starter-founded film. This was where she conducted a series of interviews with some of the fans who sponsored this campaign. Professor Good discussed this in class but the jist of it can be summarized in this quote from the article: “Drawing on a series of interviews with Kickstarter backers who supported the Veronica Mars movie, I argue that the experiences and perspectives of Veronica Mars fans during the Kickstarter campaign demonstrate that these fans had a relationship with text and industry that cannot be cleanly understood as either celebratory or lovingly subversive [affirmational or transformational]” (Navar-Gil, p. 212)

Fandom’s aren’t always defined as either transformational or affirmational, sometimes they can engage in a combination of both of these through different fan communities. Depending on how fans treat media industries as well as original media texts dictates whether they are considered affirmational fans or transformational fans. Affirmational fans – “celebrate the text as is and accept industry guidelines for textual interpretation and participation.” In other words, they don’t challenge the creative decisions put in place by the producers or writers of said media texts. They discuss elements of the texts while still remaining firmly within the creators established storyline. Transformational fans – “tend to twist and reimagine the text in non-sanctioned ways through creative work, asserting a kind of moral ownership over the text.” So, these types of fans would challenge the original work and would twist and rewrite the text for their pleasure. An example of transformational fans would be fanfiction authors.

One audience example that I would like to expand upon for this week would be a fandom convention like Fan Expo. Fan Expo is a Canadian fan convention where fans gather to appreciate their favourite shows, comic books, movies…etc.

https://www.fanexpocanada.com/en/home.html

This is a good example of some of the themes we touched upon this week because Fan Expo is literally made up of fandoms and fans, affirmational and transformational. It’s a convention for the most die-hard fans of certain media we see how big of a power this convention has solely because of the fans which could be connected to symbolic patronage in the sense that this convention is so popular and financially stable because of these fandoms/fans.

Sullivan Chapter 9: Online, interactive audiences in a digital media world (213-238). Wasike, B. (2013). Framing news in 140 Characters: How social media editors frame the news and interact with audiences via Twitter. Global Media Journal - Canadian Edition, 6(1), 5-23. Week 10, we discussed interactive audiences in our digital media world in Sullivan’s Chapter 9, as well as how social media editors frame the news and interact with audiences via Twitter in Wasike’s article. As discussed in lecture, we use Twitter as one of the most popular microblogging sites, its prime for audience interaction and it’s “prowess as an adept news breaking tool”, this is important when discussing audience interactions in this digital media world. In Wasike’s article, there was a mention of SMEs. SME’s are “the faces of the media agencies in the digital world, best positioned to control how news flows into the social media sphere.” (p.8). Sullivan discusses the online, interactive, digital media world. “... media audiences today have come to expect the ability to provide instant feedback to media producers and to other audiences. In this type of interactive media environment, where do media producers end and the audience begin? Is it even appropriate to speak of the “audience” as a distinct entity anymore?” (Sullivan). These days, with all the user-generated, we see and acknowledge the audiences power.

One audience experience that truly combines the power an audience has with audience interactions on Twitter would be the example that Professor Good touched on in class about Twitter attacking Trump for refusing to visit the cemetery to honor the US soldiers that died in France, because it was raining. The audience on Twitter “pelted” Trump with pictures of Obama trekking through the rain to visit that same cemetery. As quoted from the Huffington Post article about this: ”As many as 1,800 American soldiers killed in the World War I battle of Belleau Wood are buried in the French cemetery. But Trump ditched his planned visit and stayed in his hotel room because of unspecified “scheduling and logistical difficulties caused by the weather,” according to a White House statement. Instead, a delegation led by Chief of Staff John Kelly traveled to the cemetery 50 miles outside of Paris by car. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron were among the world leaders who made the trip.”

The twitter universe was outraged by this that they responded with hundreds of photos of former president Obama attending various events in the rain in order to make Trump feel incompetent. Many of the photos had captions praising Obama and slamming Trump, for example – user @Erik_Wells tweeted a collage of photos of Obama standing/speaking at events in the rain and captioned it: “A real leader supports our fallen men and women in uniform in the rain, snow, sun, day, night, at home or overseas. True leaders do this because it is not about them, but those who paid the ultimate sacrifice. Shame on you @realDonaldTrump. Thank you! @BarackObama”. This was an excellent example of how audiences used their power to convey a message across a larger sphere – seeing as this trend went on and people in different countries participated in criticizing Trump and commending Obama. We see first-hand how audiences and human interest can have a great impact on the economy and how that is all conveyed through technology (Twitter, to be exact).

https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/twitter-pelts-trump-with-photos-of-%20barack-obama-in-the-rain_us_5be76113e4b0769d24cdebb7

Sullivan Chapter 10: Conclusion: Audience agency in new contexts (239-249). Athique, A. (2018). The dynamics and potentials of big data for audience research. Media, Culture and Society, 40(1), 59-74.

Our final week (and the final chapter we read of Sullivan’s) was all about audience agency, as well as Athique’s article on big data and its relation to audience research. “as objects of media influence, as quantified constructions of institutions, as active users, and as subcultures and media producers. By now it should be clear that the definition of the term ‘audience’ has been contested throughout its history” (Sullivan, p.239) Sullivan discussers “audience shifts”. As audiences go from mobile platform experiences to transmedia experiences (transmedia, referring to the “-the coordinated use of multiple media platforms (or technologies) to craft a narrative. Unlike traditional storytelling in a single medium like television, film, or books, transmedia narratives open up the possibility for audience participation and dialogue with media producers.”) and finally transitioning into amateur “prosumer”/ ”produser” content where the audiences create and produce their own content for each other’s consumption. This chapter offers a collection of the ideas and theories from the previous chapters and how we take those theories when looking at every-changing audience studies in the 21stcentury.

“Thanks to the expansion of media texts and technological platforms, the independence of the audience from content providers is greater than ever before.

In the 21st century, audiences can access media whenever and wherever they desire, provided that they have broadband Internet access (Sullivan, p. 243)

Moving on to Athique’s article which dealt with themes of big data for audience research… Athique states:  “The numerological dimension of big data arises from the analysis of numerical trends in those inputs [e.g., social media use] in order to make inferences about the future [e.g., future audience behaviour]” (p. 62).

Acknowledging the fact that being able to see and interact with what people view/click on/watch is beneficial to collecting accurate data – is it an invasion of privacy? Yes. Throughout reading this article, one audience example I couldn’t help but think of was this idea that websites such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube… etc create ads for YOU specifically based on what you say near your phone or what you search on your internet. I have heard countless stories of this happening, it has even happened to me once or twice. I could be talking to my friend about wanting to adopt a dog at an animal shelter and the next thing I know, I start seeing animal shelter ad’s coming up on my social media. When I noticed this started happening, I had discussed it with others only to find that they had noticed the same thing. They would speak about something and then the next day, there would be ads on their social media accounts about that topic. I found an article on Global News where they discussed this notion.

“You didn’t Google search it, or even write about it in a text. While the tech giants claim they don’t do it, the suspicion that your cellphone and smart devices eavesdrop on you has become common online chatter, prompting countless tweets and a lengthy Reddit thread.” (retrieved from globalnews.ca). This is a good example of how media uses their audiences to collect big data, whether it’s an invasion of privacy or not – it’s smart and it’s only going to get smarter.

https://globalnews.ca/news/4039276/smart-devices-facebook-listening/

[iwishiwasabigstrawberry-blog]

Fandom as audience in popular culture (blog #2)

After what was discussed in blog1, fandom of Korean pop culture is a vast and powerful group of people who do not only love the music or other media productions in K-pop culture, they also love the artists called idols, who made by entertainment companies in Korean style stardom system. According to Alan M. Rubin, rather than ritualized audiences, fandom as audiences are “instrumental audiences, who would search for specific kinds of message content, often seeking out and selecting informational material in a purposive way, suggesting greater care and selectivity over media as well as increased involvement” (Sullivan, p117). As a result of that, since fandom of K-pop stars, as audiences are active and always seeking for higher quality content, media industry in Korea updates frequently. Entertainment companies, on the one hand, make their productions more attractive, on the other hand, keep developing more talented teenagers. What they basically do is maintain the fandom and draw attention of potential fandom for profit. For doing that, they have to know what fans like to see or watch, why fans prefer what they love, and audiences’ perspectives of media text. This blog is aiming to explain how fandom as audiences are optimized, uses and gratification of fandom, and the way fans interpreting and decoding mass media text. Same as the blog1, I will share my own experience as an “Army (fandom of BTS)”.

Media rating and target marketing in K-pop culture

Thomas Streeter claimed that “what the industrialization and wage-labor system has created […] is an artificial divide between the realm of production and consumption .” (Sullivan, p80) As I said before, media industry in Korea is so booming in different areas such as TV drama, music, program show, movies etc. that even impact Chinese’s popular culture.

Dallas W. Smyth argued that “the mass media, rather than simply serving an ideological function supportive of capitalism, was instead part of the economic system of capitalism itself” (Sullivan, p81). Those productions are aiming for selling attention and getting more viewers in our leisure time, which can be understood as media’s main capitalist value –maintaining audience attention and turning into consumers. For example, Bighit Entertainment (Korean entertainment company of BTS) not only selling music-related productions like BTS’s albums, concert tickets, photo books and so on, it also cooperating with brands such as Puma. 

Fans will buy the shoes because they want to wear the same thing as their idols. When I was in Korea, I once went to a mall for buying this design of shoes but the shop assistant told me that they were all sold out because of BTS. I bought one online anyway, these shoes just look great on their foot.

The divide between our work and leisure created a need in of “continually monitor our viewing habits and purchasing activities” (Sullivan, p80). Thus, media companies want to find a way of getting into their customers’ behaviors and try to measure them for commercial purpose. “Nielsen’s invention of a system of retail and drug audits and ratings are part of what some scholars have called ‘market information regimes.’ Market information regimes refer to those systems of assessing market performance that is publicly available and is used by stakeholders in the market to assess their performance and the performance of their competitors.” (Buzzard, 512) My mother is a big fan of Korean drama just like most other housewives in China, and because of there are always elements like the car accident, cancer or a couple who find out to be siblings, she cries a lot while watching them. But I have to admit that actors in Korean have great acting skills indeed, beside of that, recently the narratives are more and more interesting for catering to younger audiences’ taste. There is one called W, which is a romantic drama of a girl who can get into comic book world and date the character in that comic book. This drama was successful by got rating in Korea around 15% an episode because of its story setting. Besides, it seems traditional that some drama producers invite popular idol stars to cast starring roles in their drama for better rating because of the power of fans. Such as Hwarang: The Poet Warrior Youth, which invited V (who’s my bias in BTS), is not that interesting and well-made compared with other drama like Secret Garden or My Love from the Star, it still got many viewers because of these idols.

Rating is slightly different in Korea pop music system from drama, once a solo/group singer debut he/she/they will be asked to have around a mouth going on stages and performing and propagating their new songs (same activities every time if they have a new album to release). In this period, there will be a “rating” competition of a number of listeners on the music player, the viewer on YouTube, and voting online. Who wins the competition can get more opportunities to join in program shows or perform in big events. For getting more “rating” idols need to work hard improving performance and body shape, some of them doing plastic surgeries often to keep good looking. On the country, if not getting much attention for a long time, this singer/group will have less work to do some even faded away from this business.  Same as dramas get low rating would be cut off, like what Eileen Meehan said “no picture of audience is complete without a close analysis of the systems for measuring those audiences” (Sullivan, p82), using rating numbers to represent a media production whether popularly is good for industry development but cruel at the same time.

Uses and gratifications of fandom

The other thing that media producers want to know is the reason why fandom choose who to love so that they can provide more attractive productions in the way people like. For instance, SM entertainment gathered a group of boys who are 16 years old in average called NCT because according to the result of rating, there seems a trend that the younger the idols are the more fans they will get. I think it might because of the maternity of those female fans, there is a member called JungKook in BTS who was born in 1997 and “Army” call him “baby” because he is really cute as a puppy. And most of all, we enjoin watching him growing up as a man. 

However, tastes of fandom are never the same. It can be recognized in changing of K-pop stars’ outfits and genre of music. It brings up the question that what makes them change? In this section, fandom as audiences is regarded active, selective, discriminating and self-aware. Like Sullivan said audiences use media for achieve their goals and feel free to choose the different type of media. Beside of that, Greenberg’s research in 1974 and Rubin’s in 1983 “ revealed onsiderable overlap between gratifications for both old and new media, suggesting that there are some core reasons for media use that cut across specific media vehicles of the time. For example, many studies have shown that arousal, escape, learning, habit, social interaction, companionship, information-seeking, passing time, relaxation, and entertainment to be the salient gratifications derived from watching television ”(Sudar, p. 507). At first, I like BTS only because V’s pretty face and deep voice, I was young and felt that he is really my dream boy and we will get married one day. During that period, I choose to watch “BTS boom” and live which recorded their daily life a lot. Watching him playing with other members in the backstage or having fun walking with his dog makes me feel that he is someone that I know rather than a star who is far away from my life. However, as I grew up I find out that what he gives me should not only be an unreal fantasy. I went to Korea, learned Korean and rap skills, I try to be better for myself not him. I started to focus on BTS’s music rather than their looks. so according to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, my need from being a Fan of BTS changed from Esteem needs to self-actualization level.  I also make friends with other “army” so that it fits my need of belongingness and love needs.

Interpreting and decoding K-pop media text

This section can also apply to the last blog about some of the BTS MVs which contain lots of metaphors and potential relations of each other, “Army” like to write articles and try to figure out what is in depth. Since “Semiotics explores how individuals come to understand their reality through the creation and use of sighs” (Sullivan, 135), I will take examples from my favorite MV I Need U. I’m sure that there would be different understanding of this MV, here is mine: There are seven members in BTS and each of them represents an element in this MV. I will explain them as the sequence of their appearance. The one in the hotel room is Suga, who represents “fire”, he keeps lighting his lighter and at last, he sets up a fire in the room. Jimin is the one represents “water”, who drawn himself inside a bathtub. J-hope is the one that needs to take pills due to hypersomnia, what he represents is “dream”. Which is on the opposite if what V represents, he killed his stepfather who is abusing his sister so his element would be “reality”. RM raps in a gas station holding a lollipop, but it turns into a cigarette in a flashback. We all know that cigarettes are not allow in gas stations, the switch between the two objectives represent “struggle”.  JungKook suffers from violence and a car accident, so I guess that he represents “death”. And Jin, who is crying in a white shirt like an angle represents “alive”.  At last, there is a scene which they all sleep serenely without color so we can conjecture that they “die” in this MV’s storyline. From the aspect of signs, the six petals holding in angle Jin’s hands are on fire, which is the denotation meaning. The connotation meaning of that is the rest six members are all suffering, and Jin cries for them. There is also mirror as a sign appears in this MV of a boundary between the real life and illusion in which they hang out together. Since in this MV they get troubles when they are alone and only seem happy when they are beside of each other, I think the ideology within this MV is what BTS’s slogan “teamwork makes the dream work”.

 Next, I would like to talk about three perspectives of fans when seeing a media text about their idols. 1. “Dominant-hegemonic position might accept the media message exactly in terms of the code in which it was produced”;2. people who take a negotiated position “making negotiated readings of texts relate to and understand the dominant code, but also filter media content through the lens of their own individualized experiences and worldview”; 3. “People occupy an oppositional position by focusing exclusively on the connotative meaning of the signs in order to mount an ideological struggle against the message and/or its productions” (Sullivan, 142) It can apply to the situation when different fans facing some negative reports of their idols. People in dominant-hegemonic position will trust the report and change their opinions on that idol, while people occupy negotiated position will still keep some of their personal ideas whether the report is real. People who take an oppositional position would disagree with that report.

 My last real-life example is related to what Martin suggests: without prior knowledge of Korean culture, international audiences might misinterpret the films they encounter via the Tartan brand. (Pett, p36) I remember that in May last year I went to Toronto for SHINee’s concert in Enercare Center,  while I was standing in line with the whole bunch of other k-pop fans there was a hockey game played right beside the Enercare Center, people who went there were wondering about what we were doing and staring at some of us, some even joking about we were about to see Kim Jong-un singing. It’s funny how we understand each other differently as two kinds of fandom.

 References

Buzzard, K. (2015).  The rise of market information regimes and the historical development of audience ratings.  Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 35(3), 511–517.

Pett, E. (2017).  Transnational cult paratexts: Exploring audience readings of Tartan’s Asia Extreme brand.  Transnational Cinema, 8(1), 35–48.

Sullivan, J. L. (2012). media audiences: Effects, users, institutions, and power. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE publications.

Sundar, S., & Limperos, A. (2013).  Uses and grats 2.0: New gratifications for new media.  Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 57(4), 504‐25.

[visualartgala-blog]

Final Paper: Miley Cyrus Transformation

Armela Mustafaj

Visual Culture

Professor Murray

15 April 2017

                     Miley Cyrus: Transformation through the Years

           Breaking into the Hollywood scene since 2006, debuting as Hannah Montana, Miley Cyrus has been a household name. From Disney’s “Hannah Montana” and world tours, to pop anthems our youth can’t and won’t stop singing; she has worked hard to earn her name. The starlet’s look has changed dramatically over the years, and with her growing up in front of the cameras, there was a whole world out there to see it happen. Identity is no longer the promise of a product. Rather, identity is the pure product we consume; either as information, an image, or in this case an artist (Sturken Page 228). The brand image of a celebrity is the impression of the products held by real or potential consumers. Her celebrity brand image once had the reputation of an innocent and sweet girl. Her fan base consisted of many young teenage girls who idolized her and were influenced by her fame. When we think of a celebrity’s brand image, we think of consistency. While Miley Cyrus was on “Hannah Montana” for four seasons, she delivered a highly performed brand promise to her viewers. Parents accepted her as a symbol of “pure” fun and the energy between Cyrus and the Disney brand seemed unstoppable. She reinforced Disney’s family values, and vice versa. The brand extended to merchandise and her net worth was thought to have been close to $150 million. Having such a fortune at a young age she reinforced the idea that a good girl can be wildly successful. Just like everything else Disney, people grow up and the good girl is now an adult. The Disney brand is kid stuff and she knew she couldn’t reach an audience of 14-year-old girls as she was hitting her twenties. Cyrus needed to find a way to remain relevant while continuing to grow her fortune.

           When we think of images we know that they present to a viewer clues about their dominant meaning. A dominant meaning can be the interpretation that an image’s producers intended viewers to make (Sturken, Page 56). An image or object is encoded with meaning in its creating; it is further encoded when it is placed in a given setting or context (Sturken, Page 56). Take the show “Hannah Montana” for instance, this show is encoded by meaning by the writers, producers, and the production apparatus that allows it to be made and the audience according to our cultural assumptions and viewing context then decodes it. The show is a comedy series that stars Miley Ray Cyrus as Miley Stewart and unbeknownst to her friends and classmates, Miley has a secret double life; one as a normal high school girl and the other as world famous pop star, Hannah Montana. Now because this was a Disney Channel show and was targeted for young kids, the encoding that writers and producers went for was that you could have the best of both worlds. One of the greatest lessons I learned from being an avid viewer of the show was to be yourself whoever that is. The entire storyline was based on a teenage girl who lies to the world about her true identity. Is she Miley Stewart? Is she Hannah Montana? She doesn’t know, therefore how could we? I don’t even know exactly who I am now at 21 years old much less back when I was 14 years old. Throughout the series, Miley Stewart struggled with the question of her true identity. You see her struggle to define herself and reconcile her two lives and it felt relatable to viewers because otherwise it wouldn’t have been a hit television show. Now fast forward to today with our knowledge of everything there is to know and see about Miley Cyrus, you see the similarities between the characters she played on television and whom she truly was deep inside. Decoding the Hannah Montana series wasn’t difficult. Much like Stewart, Cyrus was struggling pretending to be someone she was not all those years. She was always told what to do, what to wear, what to sing, how to act, etc. How could we ever tame Cyrus? Ironically enough, she wrote a hit song called “Can’t Be Tamed.” She once told MTV in an interview that this song “it’s just about freeing yourself from anything you think is holding you back. And I think that’s really important especially for girls, because so many people are told, ‘No, you can’t do something,’ or, ‘You need to be this because Mom and Dad say that, teachers say this (2)’”.

           She decided to rebrand her celebrity image and change the views of others. She was no longer that 14-year-old pop star with a blonde wig and microphone. This was when she chopped off her long beautiful hair and surprised everyone on television by her performance at the MTV Music Awards. It was all over the news and it instantly became controversial news. At the MTV Music Awards she wore a flesh-toned latex body suit and performed provocative dance moves, all while holding a foam finger and creating what is now her signature pose with her tongue out. Cyrus no longer represented the Disney brand and for that matter any pre-teen or teen brand. Parents were outraged and even prevented their children from watching Cyrus’s “Wrecking Ball” music video. Who did she represent now? Representation is a process in which we cobble up the world around us, even through a simple reformation of an artist, and making meaning from it (Sturken, Page 14). Miley Cyrus became set on letting the world know she was her own person and most importantly her own woman. She is now a strong and proud advocate for the LGBTQ community and is also a feminist. She is apart of a foundation she launched, Happy Hippy Foundation, which supports LGBTQ and homeless youth. In February 2012, Miley Cyrus revealed that she had received hate mail from the conservative Christians in her fan base for her stance on marriage equality. But she sticks to her guns, writing that it made her "feel sick to my stomach" to think same-sex couples would be denied legal marriages. "Without legalized same-sex marriage, most of the time you cannot share the same health benefits, you are not considered next of kin and you are not granted the same securities as a heterosexual couple," she writes. "How is this different than having someone sit in the back of the bus because of their skin color?" Being one of many celebrities speaking for the LGBTQ publicly, this ultimately tied in perfectly with her representation and how she wanted her fans to view her now. She is so set on telling her fans the truth and only showing them what was real and that is why she was so glad the MTV Music Awards happened the way it did. There are so many adolescents and young adults who struggle with their sexuality in our cruel society. Having celebrity figures as powerful as Miley Cyrus give individuals a voice to be heard. She may have lost the love of a few parents but she sure won the hearts of people who believe in equality and a just world. Cyrus praised Disney Channel for finally adding their first gay couple on “Good Luck Charlie” back in 2013 (3). “I commend Disney for making this step into the light of this generation. They control so much of what kids think! Life isn’t bright sets and wardrobe and kids becoming superstars! This is inspiring,” she tweets. This tweet resonated with me because fans of Cyrus understand her struggle. She didn’t grow up like every average child in America did, she was born with talent and with that she practically grew up in front of the public eye. The way she represents herself now will not change because she is sticking true to her colors and this time she can make her own decisions, rather than have someone else make the decisions for her.

           Let’s take a step back for a minute and talk about twerking (4). Now the roots of twerking are rich and it was commonly associated with the New Orleans scene. Its origins lie in West Africa and it’s exceedingly similar to the Mapouka dance from Cote d’lvoire (4). This was a dance done by woman and its main body of focus was the buttocks, however it was a cultural dance that existed for centuries. Of course we have construed twerking as being sexual, scandalous and controversial. Yet, if you take a look back to its original context you will realize it is a cultural expression of joy not for sexual pleasure. You would see twerking performed by women at family gatherings and weddings. It was simply dancing, nothing scandalous about it. Just like everything that media has twisted and manipulated in the past, twerking has now been branded. Miley Cyrus was the channel that brought twerking to mainstream consciousness. The world is infatuated with black culture and corporations know this. Miley Cyrus cannot twerk and yet has attempted to take something from black culture and appropriate this. She uploaded a video on YouTube twerking to the song, “Wop”, and also attempted to twerk to the MTV Music Awards. Cyrus carved out twerking and aimed to make the dance culturally appropriate. However, what ended up happening was Cyrus misappropriating a tiny element of the black cultural experience for profit and shock value.

           The male gaze is also an important term to consider when analyzing Miley Cyrus’s image. The gaze is uncritically consented to by the audience and in the gaze the subject/gazer (man) has the power, whereas the object (woman) lacks power. The concept of the gaze is fundamentally about the relationship of pleasure and images (Sturken, Page 76). When considering the male gaze there is both pleasure and pain in these ways of looking. The pleasure in being looked at includes the acknowledgement of presence, aesthetic appreciation, and looks of love or care. The pain in being looked at includes the identity as an object and the intention of the gazer. The male gaze theory can be applied through Miley Cyrus’ music video “Wrecking Ball.” There is a scene in the video where Miley places the places the hammer in the center of the shot along with her red lips licking the hammer. This draws attention and signifies the action she is carrying out. This complies with the male gaze theory because many of the scenes in this video have sexual connotations. Resulting in creating an erotic gaze for a heterosexual male. Another memorable scene from the video is her stripping naked and swinging from the wrecking ball. Now Cyrus poses in an extremely sexualized way, implying she is the object of sexual desire. There is also shots throughout the video where her bare legs are being shown slowly and this complied with the male gaze theory because she appears to just be laying in the rubble, almost like an object and her only purpose is for men to look at her for sexual purposes.

           Miley Cyrus has no interest in conforming to today’s beauty standards but still feels low when she looks at touches photos (5). She was insanely famous when I was in middle school and that was a long time ago so there’s no doubt that being in front of television at such a young age impacted her in some way. Cyrus is obviously comfortable in her skin these days but back when she played Miley Stewart in “Hannah Montana” she wasn’t so comfortable. In an interview with Marie Claire she reflected on the negative daily pressures of playing the teenage character had on her. “From the time I was 11, it was, "You're a pop star! That means you have to be blonde, and you have to have long hair, and you have to put on some glittery tight thing,” she said (5). She was working 12 hour days on set and would have coffee 'jammed down her throat' to get her up and moving. Miley said, 'When you look at retouched, perfect photos, you feel like s**t. They lighten black girls' skin. They smooth out wrinkles. Even when I get stuck on Instagram wondering, "Why don't I look like that?" It's a total bummer. It's crazy what people have decided we're all supposed to be (5).” There has been an infinite amount of photographs shot of Miley Cyrus and she has been the face of thousands of magazines over the years, all of which have been digitally manipulated to conform to societies rules on what it means to look beautiful. “I'm probably never going to be the face of a traditional beauty company unless they want a weed-smoking, liberal-ass freak. But my dream was never to sell lip-gloss. My dream is to save the world,” she says (6). Cyrus has been having fun with her own kind of digital manipulation where she posts a variety of images on Instagram of the most random photoshopped images (6). There are been images where she photoshopped herself in an image of Kim Kardashian and Kanye, her mother and her on two carrots, her boyfriend’s head on her body, her face on Nicki Minaj’s body, etc. She photoshops for unintentional purposes and it’s all fun and laughs (6).

           As we all know, Miley Cyrus is a huge figure in media today. There are fans who absolutely swear by her every move and much of what she does affect those who view her as a role model. This year’s Presidential campaign was one that everyone will remember for much of the wrong reasons. Celebrities were very vocal on their political views via social media. The concept of a public culture is an important element in how the mass media is conceived. Media forms in which are one-way, such as radio and television, contribute to a sense of shared audience among viewers (Sturken, Page 177). Our public sphere today is social media (i.e Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, etc). Cyrus was very vocal during the campaign and after the elections on her stance on President Donald Trump. She uses her voice to stand up for some really powerful movements in our country. She takes a dig at Donald Trump’s campaign with her pimped out red hat that says: MAKE AMERICA GAY AGAIN. She shows her fans that she loves all her fans including her fans in the LGBTQ. She was an important figure in the election because we need to influence young people to pay attention to politics and to never doubt the power of fashion for social change. She even broke down crying after nominee Donald Trump won the Presidential nomination. She shared a video to her Facebook of her thoughts after the election. Miley says that, “I still think that, in Hillary’s lifetime, she deserves to be the first female president, and that’s what makes me so sad. I wish she had an opportunity because she fought for so long and because I believe her when she says that she loves this country. This is all she’s ever done; she’s given her life to make it better.” She later added, “Hopefully we adjust and we accept everyone for who they are, and, so, Donald Trump, I accept you. This hurts to say, but I even accept you as President of the United States, and that’s fine, because, now, I want to be a hopeful hippie. I want to be hopeful that you will step in, too.” Cyrus also took to her Instagram to write a heartfelt message encouraging fans to be loving and compassionate towards one another. This revealed so much about her character and for her image for that matter. She didn’t care if all her followers were seeing her cry and sharing her feelings. She uses this Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook as a modern public sphere. The idea of a public sphere was generated in the eighteenth century yet there is not doubt that it has a modern relevance and is essentially a way for civil society to articulate its interests. But what is the role of the public sphere in the cyber age? Social media has made way for fans to have direct access to Miley Cyrus and they are able to like, comment, retweet, favorite her content as well as express their arguments and opinions without censorship.

           John Berger has written, “The state of being envied is what constitutes glamour.” The idea of glamour is central to advertising, both in the use of well-known celebrities to sell products and in the depiction of models who appear to be happy, without flaws, and satisfied (Sturken, Page 213).  We all remember when Miley Cyrus would smoke marijuana and didn’t care if she sparked public controversy online. This necessarily isn’t a beauty product or a weight loss supplement that she is promoting, however, dedicated fans may see what she is doing, realize how beautiful and successful she is and start smoking too. She could start the smallest of trends and people would follow because she has such a strong affect on her fan base. There was a period of time where even I envied her success and fortune, meanwhile she would post videos and pictures of herself smoking marijuana or anything controversial. Here I am, going to school, working, and being a good girl, however I’m not successful or famous? Maybe I should start smoking weed and chop all my hair off? Of course I wouldn’t do that. But anyone who isn’t confident in themselves and searches for a role model in celebrities such as Miley Cyrus, would probably think that resulting in more damage than good. This creates insecurities and anxiety for the average girl in our corrupt society today. Last thing we need besides being objectified as women is being manipulated into thinking that a drug would benefit our lives because in our eyes she seems happy either way.

After carrying out lots of investigation into the ever-changing identity of Miley Cyrus, it is clear that as she has matured and become more famous as her identity is becoming more outrageous. She continues to experiment with different hairstyles, fashion statements and tattoos. In fact, she now has a total of 23 tattoos, including several on her fingers, rib cage and even one on the inside of her lip. She played a huge role in the lives of teen girls around the world and will continue to inspire us in becoming our true selves. The mind boggles as to what she’ll come up with next. Will it be radiating or just corrupting? Either way, this is indisputably Miley’s moment. And she’s having the time of her life.

                                                 Work Cited:

(1) Sturken (Seperately Cited Throughout Paper)

(2) Vena, Jocelyn. "Miley Cyrus Female Empowerment." MTV, 23 June 2010. Web.

(3) Macatee, Rebecca. "Disney Channel Praise." E! News, 24 June 2013. Web.

(4) Mbakwe, Christiana. “The Origins of Twerking.” XOJane, 30 August 2013. Web.

(5) "Miley Cyrus and Body Images." Daily Mail UK, 13 Aug. 2015. Web.

(6) Mize, Chelsea. "Miley Cyrus' Photoshop Skill." Bustle, 24 Mar. 2015. Web.

[youdecode]

Self-love When Life is Tough

It is time to pamper yourself by taking good care. The importance of self-love is valuing your self-worth.

If certain changes to your lifestyle could boost your self-love then go for it.

SPOILER: You Only Live Once ! 

Let’s dig straight into self love ideas

  1 – Mindful Eating:

Do you ditch the idea of healthy eating and throw whatever you see into your mouth?

This attitude in turn shapes one into a fairly unhealthy and youthful individual.

At this point, a complaint wavers on one’s lips . . . why am I getting OUT OF SHAPE?

The answer lies in the lack of self-awareness.

Choose the right diet instead of grabbing food like a starved individual in famine. Monitor your mouth.

Put the brakes on your eating at moments when feeling stressed, anxious, or overexcited. WHY? Because it’s easy to lose awareness of what is going on in your body, how hungry you feel, and what the best food is for you at that time.

Drink about 3 liters of water daily for cleaning your body and eliminating the toxins. Examine the oil . avoid hemp oil.

As it will add most of the fatty acids inside your body (omega-3 and omega-6)

Make sure to always have leafy Greens veggies in every meal of yours whether it be cabbage, spinach, lettuce.

Sprinkle a bit of parsley and watercress over your food. you will get the sparkle of minerals and vitamins surely visible onto your face.

Feeling low about your living situation? You will feel so better to snack on seeds as the zinc and sunflower seeds boost energy to a whole new level.

Replace white items with brown whether it be sugar, bread, or rice. As brown items are more healthy and cleansing for your immune system.

2 -Add Humor in your life

Try to be more humorous not for others but yourself. Intentionally find humorous situations.

If you 100% want to get the solution of How to love yourself and be confident then maintain a spark in your life by being playful.

Create self-love moments. No One will do that for you.

Sail on the journey of making hilarious signboards and place it near your window. See how people react and ditch the fear of being judged.  Board can have a picture of your pet with a label: Fully equipped with weapons, this pet refused medications. Beware!

3 – Learn to say No

If you are doing certain things while compromising your happiness, just so that others do not feel bad, then you need to stop.

If something just does not feel right, do not do it.

You can channel the time in doing things that you truly love instead and those which align without your values.

4 – Practice Detachment

You might seem odd at first, but you are surely capable of keeping your phone away for some time.

Enjoy that alone time.

If you are sitting alone with your phone then you are not alone.

You are more than occupied and you are encountering several people virtually.

It is preferred that you find a day for yourself where you do not occupy yourself.

Unplug for preferably for a day or a few hours. 

5 – Recipes

When was the last time you tried a new recipe? Can’t remember?

Dig into your kitchen.

You can especially try baking. I have been baking since 12 (but by far I have only mastered chocolate brownie and vanilla sponge cake )!

It is really rewarding as not only it boosts your skills, but it also becomes therapeutic.

6 – Making your own space

Question yourself: what turns your space into a magical one?

For me it is the fairy lights.

For you it can be candles.

Just treat yourself by recreating your surroundings so that they make you happy.

7 – The mess around you

There is a huge probability that messes around is creating a mess in your head!

So get rid of unwanted things for freeing your mind.

8 – Time for treating your body!

Start with refreshing your skin with a face mask, then go for a warm bath and then moisturize your whole body!

9 – Let your nails SHINE! Yes, dress them up

When was the last time you wore your favorite nail color? Don’t remember? Try this.

10 -Journaling for success

I cannot stress enough how journaling can make your day.

It has the power of seeping in all your stress and delivering you your desired future (manifestation).

I highly suggest you get writing either before sleeping or right after waking up whatever suits you.

My love story with journaling is quite old.

If you are not yet aware of it then I highly suggest you see triple G’s super journaling technique.

11- Get your mind off anything?

How awesome it is that we can get rid of the constant chatter!

Negative thoughts are capable of draining your entire energy, no matter how much you practice techniques of self-care.

I highly suggest that you learn practical ways of sharing your thoughts.

If you have not scanned these 10 powerful strategies of stopping the thoughts then you are missing on a lot! (of what? happiness)

12 – Go through your old childhood photo albums

Refresh your mind by reliving the moments.

13 – Watch Ted Talks

Ted talks can surely make your energy levels high when you are feeling down.

14 – Prepare your favorite warm beverage

Be it coffee, green tea, hot chocolate, or just tea.

15 – Read Something

Sink yourself into the other world by pulling a book and reading a bit of it.

16 – Remove toxicity

You need to remove toxicity around you. Get rid of unwanted people in your life who just seep away all your energy.

Unfollow the negativity from every possible domain of your life (every social media handle)

17 – Find new inspiring people

Befriend the energy boosters.

Have you ever experienced your energy mounting up when you interact with genuine people?

Like, attract like! Find, & befriend.

If this sounds challenging then today contact the genuine people. Bring positivity to your life.

18 – A gratitude list is therapeutic

You can either make the list while journaling or maintain a separate one.

The way I do it is mentioned in triple G’s journaling technique.

19 – Goal setting

Again I expounded the importance of setting dreams and manifesting them in my journaling technique.

But you can plan in any way you like, Just plan and ensure that you witness progress.

20 – Feel the freshnesss

Have you filled a satisfying feeling when you hop in a fresh, new bedsheet? If yes, then why not do it right now?

21 – Bring in new plants

Get closer to nature by bringing in new plants.

22 – Dress Up

Dress yourself up even if you are not going anywhere!

23 – Go all for art!

Draw anything you want. Let your creativity flow even if you think you possess none (which I surely do not believe in!) Get coloring printables and get going. You can even paint it. What you should paint it? Your feelings! The canvas itself will be filled.

24 – Show time!

Re-watch your all-time favorites shows

25 – Nap my friend

You will not agree more that how satisfying it is to hit the bed before bed time. So? Include naps in your routine!

26 – Reconnect with your friends

When was the last time you made a get together plan with all your friends and even that failed?

Yeah you recalled it!

So now treat yourself to reconnect.

Virtual reconnecting is best for this moment in time! So go for video conferencing . . .

27 – Planning ahead

Plan a bigger adventure for the time when things will eventually get better!

Just plan it, add it to your bucket list and feel nice about it.

28 – Get all crafty

If you love journals like me then you can prepare a colorful bullet journal.

29 – Befriend Morning Routine

Try conquering your mornings for a fulfilled day.

Wake up early, watch the sun and enjoy the quietude. 

30 – Get bigger things done first

Plan your to-do list, the boring and biggest task first. Why?

You will be in a position to appreciate yourself more. Yes, that self pride on a small achievement.

31 – Get Some Fresh Air

When was the last time you went for a quick walk, consumed some fresh air, and listened to the motivational podcast?

If it has been long, then you should treat yourself with this dose of motivation.

32 – See the future

Budgeting will make you feel that everything is under control. Go for this reinforcement.

33 – Pick a new hobby

You might be having ample of time at this tough life situation.

What can be better than mastering any skill? Nothing right? So, Give it a shot.

You can even learn a new language.

34 – Implement these!

Comments time!

Which one of the self love activity will you implement? 

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