1. the concept of my project is based on the simple question: what is the difference between humans and AI? No doubt, it is a complex problem. but we only have less than 2 minutes to tell a story, how to do so? at that time, I think of a mind experiment. in that mind experiment, a girl who was the top expert on Earth about color. she knows everything about color, from their nature to the literature describing them. however, because of certain diseases, she has never seen any color. so when she was cured and see the color for the first time, does that increase her knowledge about color? the nature of this thought experiment is about whether experience counts as knowledge. at first glance, this may have little to do with the topic I choose. but with further interrogation, you may find the similarity between that color expert with AI. AI knows every knowledge human masters. they have it all, in their digital brain. they are more knowledgeable than anyone on Earth. however, they are also less knowledgeable than everyone on earth as well because they have never felt anything ever. they never feel the breeze of the wind although they may know thousands of ways to describe that tender feeling. they never see the blossom of a flower, never love someone, or lose something. this conflict is the main thing I would like to discuss in my final project. after some thought, I decided on the structure of the video. the video will follow the cliche of three paragraphs. In the first paragraph, the main information will be laid out. there’s a guy who lost their loved one so they created an AI to represent their loved ones. they kept communicating with the AI, always beginning with the sentence “I miss you”. then the AI will respond with all sorts of sentences from the books that the guy feeds it. the second paragraph is the paragraph where things begin to go wrong. One day, the AI caught a virus, and all the data was lost. but the guy didn’t know about the loss of the data. so as usual, they said to the AI “I miss you” However, the AI won’t respond. so they begin to say it again and again with nothing happening. however, there’s something happening. so in the third paragraph, we looked at the story from the AI’s perspective. for the AI, after losing all the data, it finally understands what is the feeling of loss. although it has read so many books about loss before. it wants to respond to the guy who is constantly saying “I miss you” on the other side of the screen. but without the books, how to respond? with some struggle, it responds “I miss you, too” and it completely shut down. in the word “too” the AI tries to convey everything it feels. after hearing that response, that guy felt for the first time that he is being understood and he felt complete again. the reason for me to do this theme is that in one of my writing classes, someone used Chat GPT to write their essay and was found out by the professor. he used half an hour in the next class to discuss with us the future the university is facing when Chat GPT emerges. in my opinion, the university is a place to teach knowledge as well as a place to let the students experience certain things they will encounter in future life. these two functions are similarly important. and the AI can never replace the second function. so I want to express that point. based on that idea, I thought of this topic and also this story. 

2. the process of creating this project may be a bit different from other’s projects. first, I thought of the story and has a faint idea of what to shoot. then after two telephone calls with my group mate, we decide to use stop-motion animation and will not use real humans in the shooting. we also decided about the voice-over should be a poem that is somewhat relevant to the video and mainly let the video explain itself. after deciding all that, we bought a wooden figure to represent that guy in our story. and shoot some images in my home in Shanghai as there’s a very clean and large table as well as a clean wall. after some shooting, I began to write about the poem that should be read. and written the poem and the translation of it, I started to draw the storyboard. after drawing all the storyboard, we began another shooting in my home for certain images we missed in the first shooting. 

this is the storyboard I draw. the lighting is mainly natural light with a reflector to represent a kind of lighting that is unreal with no shadow. because the attitude we hold is that it’s hard for the AI in real life to say “too” in real life. so this is just an imaginary story. the BGM is selected by both of us. we first presume the length of our video and started to find the music that is story-like and is not strange to end at about a minute and 30 seconds. when creating the storyboard, the main problem is how to let the video itself tell the story without the voice-over. our solution is to use objects that can provoke emotion. for example, when we want the main character to lose their loved ones, we use the image of the breaking of chopsticks, the separating of dumplings and two hands originally holding together separating. and when we want to express the guy feeling incomplete, we use the scene of him doing a jigsaw but couldn’t find the final piece. when we want to express the guy accepts the AI as part of his life. we use orange candies to represent that guy and green candies to represent the AI. because they are contrasting colors. the green candy slowly occupies the space of orange candies and then the candies with the shape of a bear surround them and wiggle to show their happiness of being together. when editing, we use the material glitching of the computer as a special effect a lot along with the filter of several kinds. we also use masking too. 

3. because my partner is sick with covid during the first half of the production process. I did all the things in the preparation stage. including coming up with the story, writing the poem which is the voice-over, translating the poem, and drawing the storyboard. then, when she got better, she took up the role of shooting and recording. after the shooting, I took up the role of editing all by myself and she looked for BGM. I really appreciate the complete trust and cooperation she expressed during the whole process of the project. by discussing with her, we come up with the idea of the candy, the voice-over, and many other things. I learned patience and the calmness we should all have when facing a deadline. 

4. the main artistic theme of our project is poetic and also unreal. we use contrast color as well as filters with AI sense. our cutting is basically quick. the pace is mainly slow, quick, and slow. I got all my inspiration from myself when it comes to the camera language. 

1. the memory I choose for this assignment is the memory of me looking at the stars in the Sahara Desert. when I was about 12 years old, my parents took me to the Sahara Desert. we drove there by car from the city to the middle of the desert. In the car, I can hear the city’s noise fading away and everything is gradually quiet and I can listen to the sound of the wind blowing the sand. after some time, we arrived at the center of the desert. I get off the car and the stars just exploded in front of me. there were stars everywhere and it was beautiful. when I looked back at the place where we come from we can faintly see the light of the city. it was like a strange dream. after I went back to the city, I feel as if I was a different person. a calmer person. the aspect of my memory is not just me looking at the stars but is me remembering the whole process. the whole sound memory is about me completing the project while remembering the whole memory. so first, I put in some voice typing on the keyboard signifying I’m doing the project. the other voice of the city signifying I was very agitated and is in the city. then after the emotion reached a peak, I entered the realm of nature which signified me jumping off the car and seeing the stars. after that, typing on the keyboard appeared again which shows I was still doing the project. but this time, although I use similar elements as before, it was much calmer. 

2. I first use the sound of a glass bottle being knocked to signal that everything started. then I use the sound of typing keyboard and rapid breaths to signal I’m anxiously doing the sound memory project. I also used many sounds of the city such as the sound of the car engine and the sound of people talking to create the sense of a busy city. then I use the glass sound again to signify the end of a stage and the beginning of another stage of the sound. in the next stage, I use the sound of taking a tissue and the sound I record from the gym to show the busy sound of the city and my anxious feeling. I also used two layers of people’s talking to show the city’s atmosphere. then the glass knocked again to show another stage is beginning. In the last stage of the anxious city sound, it was the climax. I use many layers of sounds. there was the sound of opening the bottle, the sound of spraying perfume, the sound of the radio, and all of a sudden, the glass knocked again showing it was the climax where my anxious feeling reached a peak and also where I jumped out of the car in my memory. then I use the sound of a slipper scrubbing the floor to imitate the sound of me opening the car door and also a bit like the sound of wind blowing the sand. then we turned to nature. I use the sound of the people stepping on fallen leaves and the birds’ sound as well as the sound of the frogs and the sound of the wind. I also use the sound of breathing. but this time, the breath is much calmer to signify I was shocked by the whole scene. then I slowly add the sound of the machine and again the sound of a slipper scratching the floor to show I return to the car which carries me again back to the city. I then use the sound of soda water and the car flow to show I was back in the city. also, these sounds are much smoother than the sound of a car engine. lastly, I use the sound I recorded from the library to match the sound of typing on the keyboard to show I’m still doing the whole project but with a different mindset. the difficulties I encounter are first how to show the anxious city sound. I tried several times to combine different elements together to show the atmosphere of the city as well as the anxious atmosphere. I consult with my professor several times and do multiple changes to reach the final effect. the second challenge is how to use similar elements to show different mindsets. to do this, I record almost everything a second time to show a calmer mindset with a slower pace. the last challenge is how to record the sound of nature. In the end, I found several videos from the time I live next to a huge park with forests and rivers. then I extract sound from the video and create the sound of frogs and birds. 

3. if I had more time, I would improve the sound of the wind. because from the feedback I get, the sound is not like what we normally hear. we can easily hear that it was the sound recorded by the recorder which will make the audience have a bad experience. so I want to find another way to record the wind sound if I had more time. 

4. lastly, a screenshot from Audition. 

1. Amelia Ji, computer world (photo dyptych)

2. the whole concept of my photos is about falling into the computer world. in the first picture, a computer is situated on top of many books which signifies the laptop is the evolution version of books. it has much knowledge inside it. when taking this picture, I intentionally tilted the camera a bit so that it seemed as if the laptop and the pile of books are going to fall down. also, I use the second picture as the cover of my laptop which shows that there’s another world inside the real world. this foreshow the whole theme of this piece of work which is the inner world in the computer. in the second picture, I use the rotation of many screens, and inside each screen, there’s a different picture. the cover of the first screen is a picture of flowers I add some special effects on it so that it looks creepy but there’s a butterfly shape where the flower is normal and beautiful. this signified that the intention for the internet and computer is beautiful but people would do things to add a creepy effect on that beautiful world. for example, when the internet is being invented, it was for universities to exchange information. but nowadays, there’re many cybercrimes going on on the internet. so the first cover is saying people need to rip off the bad covering of the internet and the computer to see the good intention inside it. the next cover is full of eyes(my cat’s eyes). it signified that when you log on to the internet or use the computer, you are accepting to be consistently observed and being peeked at. the third cover is full of books. it’s about the nature of the computer and the internet which is to share knowledge. the final cover is a picture of sunlight with some effects so that it looks like rays of light are coming out of the screen. this shows that all these meanings are coming out of the computer and the computer is the combination of all those different things. the background of the screens is a picture of a lamp from the Imperial Palace Museum which has all the stars in the sky on that lamp. this shows there’s another universe inside the computer. a universe that’s different from our real universe. there’re many pink butterflies crossing the screens and becoming pink flowers. this shows the internet can turn things into something they are not. and from the middle of the first cover of the screen, there’re many little planets coming out of the screen. this also shows that there’s a whole different universe inside the computer. 

3. when doing the first picture, I first thought about shooting a world through the eyes of a cat. so I first took a lot of pictures of my cat. also, after some discussions with my professor, I come up with the idea of shooting different crystal-clear and beautiful things. so I took many glass bottles and damage some of my cosmetics and apply some glitter to the bottles and shoot the bottle under the sunshine. also, I shoot some flowers and lamps to make the whole scene more dreamlike. these are my cat, my bottles and the lamp.

then I found I don’t have any inspiration for this idea. so I change the idea. still, I want to show the real world in another way. but this time, I want to show the world inside the computer. after I have decided on this plan, there’s actually not much time left for me. so I fastened my pace. the first I thought of when talking about the computer is books. yes, very strange. but I do believe that books are the more original version of computers. books are a computer of the author and the knowledge. it’s like the author’s brain is abstracted into books. so I took pictures of books and of course the computer. both the small laptop of mine and the big screen of my father’s. then I thought of a small stone shaped like a planet that I owned. and I thought that the world inside the computer is like another universe. so I took pictures of them. here’re my father’s screen and books and stone. 

but still, it’s just random elements for the second picture, so what’s the first picture? I thought of a very ugly but artistic picture in my home. so I pile up many books in front of that painting but it was too short so I put them on a chair. then, I pile my computer on top of the books and make the screen black. however, the whole picture is too normal. it’s just not interesting. so I thought of m cat again. and tried to make her walk to those books ad sniff the books which are difficult. but I did it. also, I tried to stretch out my hand as if I tried to touch those books and computers. but the pictures with hand are a bit strange and the cat is making the main point of the picture become the cat instead of the books and computer. when I was struggling with how to make the picture more interesting, I thought of not changing the items but changing my holding of the camera. so I tilt the camera a bit and took the first satisfying picture. the following are the different tries I did for the first picture. 

then it comes to the second picture which is a lot easier to do now I have so many materials. I first experiment with the ripping paper effect and then I tried on the effect which will make the picture looks like it’s coming out of the picture. then I thought of making things tilt just like the first picture. so I do a rotation of the screen and make different sizes of the screen and put different things into the screen. about the little planet, I want to do the effect of an AI going wrong. so I did something to make it both blue and red. then I found blue and pink go well with each other. so I make the flowers pink and put them at the bottom of the picture so that the whole picture is not that empty. also, it goes very well with the blue planets. then after an office hour with the professor, I found that there’re nothing at the top of the picture and there was no introduction to pink and blue in the first picture. so I cheated a bit and put my photo on the cover of the computer and took another photo. so that the computer world is literally inside the computer. that’s pretty much the second picture. I think it’s very good. I won’t do anything to change it even if I have more time. here are the pictures of the ripping paper effect, and the planet.

4. these are my contact sheet and my final photo diptych.

1 I think the reason for Steyerl to talk about how the “unbroken belief” of the documentary is challenged is that the distance of the documentary is much more closer than before and the quality of the documentary is very bad. so actually it made us too close to distant things and too far away from the things we should b familiar with as there’s a barrier between reality and the documentary. in my opinion, truth informs fiction in the way that it provides the basic logic for fiction so that it follows the actual logic of the truth. also, I think it offers fiction a way to be closer to life. about how fiction may inform the truth, I think fiction can provide more imagination for the truth. 

2. I think the truth in daily media is there only to blur the line between truth and fiction. so people knew there’s a difference between the media we consume every day and real life. however, by adding truth into the media, we’re making the line between the truth and real-life blurry. by doing that, we are easier to be categorized as we’re all somewhat related to the media, and the media is categorized. so it’s easier for government to control us. I think the role of live broadcasts is reversed. it makes the fiction more real instead of making our real life more fictional. so it’s actually another way around to blur the line between real life and fiction. 

1. the five obstructions:

(1). every cut is less than 12 frames, answering all the questions in the original film, filming in Cuba, and having no settings.

(2). film in a miserable place, not specifically showing this place, make Jorgen play the men in the film, and having food in the film.

(3). absolute freedom or go back to Mumbai.

(4). film a cartoon.

(5). Jorgen should do nothing except read the voiceover.

2. how Jorgen overcomes the obstructions:

(1). use fast clips and different angles. answer all the questions while still asking some questions.

(2). go to the redlight area in Mumbai and shoot with a semi-transparent cloth at the back. 

(3). use the parallel cut of a perfect man and a perfect woman.

(4). select his favorite style of cartoon by looking at pictures and making cartoons.

(5). read.

3. the movie he produced is unexpected in many ways. he often used different ways to walk across the obstructions and make the film as he wanted. he always make the same theme about the perfect human in the normal world. so the theme is the same, in this way, we can say that he is stubborn. however, his way of demonstrating the theme is different. so in this aspect, you can say he is also changeable. 

4. actually, I don’t quite get why we are watching this film and why it is banned in China. because I have searched in Baidu and found it was banned. also, the film is quite boring as a matter of fact. so I don’t get why we are watching it……