efaulandblog-blog

[efaulandblog-blog]

this didn’t upload yesterday for some reason so I’m trying it with youtube

identity is something that I find tricky. although I know how I want to be, it seems like I spend most of my time in limbo between that idea and the creation of it. so the grunt work feels like the most me there is. my nails are something I use to express my identity and even though that feels important to me, the process is more important. performed identity is there, but it isn’t the majority of who I am.

realism in film doesn’t usually express this either. it shows you the moments that are engaging, the ones that you’ll sit through. so i guess this isn’t a failure with identity but the failure of identity in general.

[efaulandblog-blog]

The Feeding

For the final project I was inspired by Yoko Ono’s the cut. While I didn’t let people cut my clothing off I did have people feed me. Being feed put me a vulnerable position I couldn’t control how they fed me or how much.

I work at Casa Bonita, so I decided to walk around and ask my co workers to feed me sopapillas. And take a picture because it took longer than a minute to find people to feed me.

Thoughts and Reasoning:

Eating is something everyone struggles with. It could be eating too much, not enough, healthy or unhealthy. In our society a lot of pressure is put on food aka body image. To give away that power and to feel some vulnerability I say some becausei do know all the people I asked to feel extreme vulnerability I would have had to ask people I don’t know and well this was my place of work so I didn’t do that.

After living in China for two years and having my physical appearance, specifically my weight talked about and scrutinized almost daliy I have become more aware of the struggle. (I am a 135lb 5 ft 6in tall person...I think perfectly average)

What I did:

To push back at societies that think I’m too big or too small because in America I am often told I’m small and should eat more. I decided to give the power away and see what people would do.

I filled one basket with fresh sopapillas and I had another that was empty. I walked around Casa Bonita and every coworker I came across I asked to feed me or not it was up to them.

What others did:

Some feed me the entire sopapilla, some only gave me a bite, the most interesting was the ones who wanted me to spit it out after I took the bite. Some agreed to take a picture during but quite a few said they would feed me but wouldn’t take a picture with me. Making me feel a little ashamed, like it was a secret to eat. Harkening backs to eating and body image is a serious concern.

In the end:

I definitely tried to lighten the heavy body image mood with taking silly photos while eating the sopapillas.

If I could do something different:

I would have like to sit in one place and had people approach me to feed me, and have more people intentionally watching others feed me rather than whoever happened to be around as the audience.

[efaulandblog-blog]

project 3

In response to Cubitt’s “Projection: Vanishing and Becoming” I used the theme of projection, most obviously through light and shadow. Lighting is something I am sensitive to; I’m aware of the effect it has on an environment and the mood within it, so naturally I have various colored lights around my home to create different moods. In this project, I filmed some of my roommates smoking cigarettes on our porch in the glow of a red lamp. Cigarettes are a prevalent example of vanishing and becoming in my daily life and though we all know the dangers of smoking, I still find it to be picturesque. The original audio was left in the video because I thought my roommates’ narration was humorous and meta.

[efaulandblog-blog]

Project #4

[efaulandblog-blog]

Project # 4, Connected, Video Games in The Woods

For my final project, I chose to take an idea I had for the second project. When doing the 2nd project I wanted to take images of people on their phones and paste them in some of the most well known natural wonders of the world. Having a person staring at their phone while in the presence of natural beauty would have been a fun thing to capture, but I did not have to photo shop images to do that, images of people using their pomes in nature is a normal occurrence these days.

The main idea behind this piece is that we are always connected. Even when people travel and explore the most remote places, they are able to share that place with the rest of the world in a matter of seconds. People no longer have to travel or experience the outdoors; they can visit the outdoors through different forms of video and media. In some ways this can be a good thing. People that don’t have the means or ability to travel and explore the world can, via these different digital avenues.  In other ways, this sucks. The excitement of these new and unexplored places can be discovered by logging on to the Internet, so there is no need to travel and explore to see them.

 My process was to  load my truck up with my tv, tv satnd , a chair, head set and a playstation controller. I drove around up Golden Gate Canyon and took random dirt roads, Unitil I found a place that I felt would be a good spot. I unloaded my truck set up my phone and then beagn filiming. there were a few cars that went by on a different road, that could see where I was but I’m not sure if they saw me. I was worried and nervous to do it but when it was done it felt good and i was comfortable doing it. I Like this idea and think it would be fun to try other places.

[efaulandblog-blog]

vanishing and becoming

I wanted to make a burglary/stalker sort of video. the flashlight acts as a sort of projector because the room is dark and nothing can really become, at least in this circumstance, without the spotlight on it. there’s another sense of becoming with each thing shown that adds to the idea we have of whose house we’re in. an identity is being added to. then I make too loud of a noise and alert the person who lives there. the flashlight has been used to help me, but now it’s something that will give me away. I think this is true of becoming, too. sometimes it puts you in danger to be seen and if you don’t want that or aren’t ready for it, that can be a bad thing. it’s a tedious thing.

[efaulandblog-blog]

vanishing + becoming

It’s interesting to think so much about a medium and to apply meaning to it. I’ve done this to a smaller extent with other projects, but there are some mediums that are so widely used that I think less about their possible meanings and think of them for their visual qualities. It really does allow room for meaning within a work that might not be there without the extra thought toward it. I think it’s fine to have some things used purely for the feeling they give the piece and that it can add to it in a different way, but now that I’m thinking about it, I really do enjoy work that make that connection to what it’s made of. The vanishing point of a projector is something I never considered, probably because I was busy looking at the projection, but I really like this idea and the way that a vanishing point here is the beginning, not the end. This simple rewiring of that concept is kind of amazing. To be extremely cliché here: it’s all about “perspective”. It’s easier for me to understand concepts like this when it is something visual and three-dimensional like this is. I think it’s more powerful too.

[efaulandblog-blog]

homewrecker music video

[efaulandblog-blog]

chapter six

While reading about duration I was thinking of a lot of pieces that I’ve felt like I suffered through because they were so long (in distance and time). I’m realizing now that while deciding how long a piece will take, you should be determining where breaks will be. The breaks could be points of interest (even just writing about the piece) to make it more engaging. At the botanical gardens they have different art installed and information very frequently and even a bench to sit on and watch from makes it a place I could spend a lot of time.

I have been a big user of decisive moments because sometimes i think feelings can be stronger when we don’t get to see everything. We fill in the blanks ourselves, instead. It can almost be more interactive. I now think that there are ways to do that beyond a still photograph that can be even more powerful in telling a story.

[efaulandblog-blog]

the loop

I chose to play with images that had a certain mood to them that I enjoy. They play into the subliminal themes in horror where things are hidden and sort of claw their way in. I wanted to use the animated feature as a way to make things feel less settling than they were to begin with. I tried to do this in the distorting of the knife and the blinking of the eyes, as well as some of the others that flicker or fade to black. I mostly wanted to play around with making animations of the things that I like and to try to further what was already there through repetition. I think I will be making more of these with my own pictures in the future. They were such an interesting new thing to learn.

[efaulandblog-blog]

disco by surf curse (gif made with gimp)

[efaulandblog-blog]

I like the sudden halt to the smooth movements from before, here. and it’s very satisfying to watch the mud fly out over and over

[efaulandblog-blog]

I like how it is so slowed down at the beginning, form far away and when it zooms in it is more frantic

[efaulandblog-blog]

this one, especially with the fabric flowing, is just nice to look at

[efaulandblog-blog]

I love this for the force you feel on her in the image, what feels like free-falling, but underwater.

[efaulandblog-blog]

this one is even more animated, and interesting to watch over and over as her shoe sort of melts away a sort of robotic bird version of herself.

[efaulandblog-blog]

This one captures the moment of revelation that the creature is her.