Echoes of Birth

Visual Metaphor Project by Jean Zhang & Irene Yu

 

Concept & Story

Our concept is the power of life, especially the beginning of it, the birth. With the abstract metaphors of objects encountered in the process of laboring and the perspective of the child, coming to the other space, the world. He encounters different spaces in the process, feeling his mom’s calling out, and turns from being confused to trying to find his destiny in life. We want to show the power of life itself and also the link between the mother and the baby.
For this topic, we were inspired by the song I Remember （我记得） by Zhao Lei. This song’s lyrics use abstract content that talks about the process of labor. For example, Zhao used luggage to represent the placenta, the Nile as the amniotic fluid, etc. We wanted to use the visuals to present these items from this child’s perspective.
We thought about different elements that can represent the process of giving birth and we intended to combine them with the perspective of the child by having shots about him. We considered having a sole character and showing the process of labor in an abstract way, revealing this is the process of labor only at the end of the film. But we wanted to add the perspective of the mom to show the connection between them and make the work less abstract and easier to understand. Therefore, we add the character of the mom and use the red line as the connection of their destiny.
We want to experimentally explore the way to use metaphors in the visuals for a topic in real life. Also, we want to see if we can use this special perspective to show the power of life and the process of childbirth, which is hard to be directly filmed in reality. We don’t want to have a cliché of simply praising the effort of the mom but also show the power of life and the connection of destiny.

 

Creation Process & Execution

We used the storyboard to have a clear plan for shooting, we designed the different angles and camera usage for shooting and the flow of the story going on. We connect the different scenes with the script that we have for the voice-over. With the storyboard, we had the “checklist” when we did the shooting. It also offered easier communication with the actors and gave us a clearer outline of the editing process.

We considered different lighting and background scenes for the story. The flow goes from the emotion of confusion to the sense of finding and reaching the destination. For the lighting, we used different color backgrounds including black, grey, and white. The change in the background can illustrate the different moods and the amount of light included also shows the process of approaching the point of giving birth.
We shot most parts of this film in the lighting studio, intentionally creating a blank background to show the null sense that the character is facing. Therefore, we explored the lighting in the studio and tried different angles of lighting and settings. We used three-point lighting and sometimes only kept the key light for a better shade on the character’s face.

For the challenges, when we wanted to shoot the part that required the special lighting effect of making the ground and the whole picture look as being covered by the sparkling surface of the water. The after-editing could be quite hard and it seems really weird. Therefore, we tried the lighting methods in the lighting studio.

With the laser transparent paper, we add color to the scene by using the reflection of the white wall. In the editing stage, it is hard for us to avoid the viewer discovering that our images were shot in a light studio because the paper in the background is so obvious. Therefore, we used Premiere in the editing stage to change the color settings and add a vignette effect to make the background darker to avoid the overly obvious traces of the paper background.

Also, we considered a lot on the connection of our voice-over and our visuals. We had the scenes shot mainly focusing on the character, which made our work a bit too “connected” and may have given the audience a boring feeling while watching. Therefore, we added elements of different objects and the connections of the mom and the child with juxtaposition. In this way, we make the work more interesting and deliver the story more clearly.

For the editing, we added a lot of changes in lighting and coloring to make the color better suit the moods that we wanted. Also, we added the juxtaposition and black screens to connections and transitions in the video. The sound is also adjusted to fade away in the end and sometimes the volume is changed to achieve a more balanced sound with the voice-over sound.

 

Collaboration

Irene and I worked together really well and were always in a good pleasure. At the beginning stage, Irene took the responsibility of script writing, and I focused on storyboard creation more. We quickly came to an agreement on the topic and concept, and we brainstormed and adjusted the early-stage work together. We don’t have a so-called clear job division as we always worked together in the later part of audio recording, video shooting, and video editing. We covered the main work at an early stage and always discussed them together to adjust them to a better version.

Irene always had a great sense of sound arrangement and scriptwriting. She arranged the audio settings and combined them with the script for the work in Audition that can be easily put into Premiere workspace. She also contributed a lot on the part of having a connection between the mom and the child. It was a quite hard part for us to figure out how to have a suitable connection and keep the story flowing fluently. She offered ideas including the juxtaposition of having the red line connections which is really brilliant. She also gave new ideas on subtle adjustments for the video in a really detailed way. I think she has great creativity in ideas and adjustments. Also, she is always well-arranged in handling different tasks, and she can focus on a lot of detailed things that I don’t happen to discover.

 

Aesthetics & Results

For the aesthetics, we used different camera angles to create a more immersive atmosphere. We showed the dynamics of the characters in this small space through different camera angles. We tried to find the connection between this character and the world through the lens angle and expressed the loneliness and confusion of this character through a single shot. We used aesthetic shots that are in an artistic way to express this vision. We used medium and close-up shots in most places, which makes the background environment seem emptier and makes the image look better. We intended to create a slow and deep atheistic in an abstract style. With the voiceover with a strong sense of storytelling, we have the story delivered in an aesthetic way.

We have a variety of perspectives, immersive styles, uniform colors and more downbeat mood styles. We aimed to give the audience an immersive feeling and transfer the power of birth in this relatively simple but interesting camera language. 

 

Credits to 

Starring: Jerry Cao, Willa Xu

Voiced by: Eric Wang

Backup Support: Lin Sun, Freddie Yang, Jackie Chen, Yuhang Zheng

Music: I remember–Zhao Lei

Great gratitude to

Yunmi Her, Ian Zhang, Eric Parren, Iris Qin

and all my dear classmates and friends that offered precious advices!!!