Author: Madison Eberhardt

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Video Project Documentation – Madi Eberhardt

Link: http://imanas.shanghai.nyu.edu/~ds5665/project3/homepage.html

Description of the Project:

Originally, the plan was to create a very interactive website in which you could dictate what a person did (like Talking Tom). Although, this limited how creative we could be with our filming process, so we decided to instead do a day in the life of Steve. It was really fun filming this, as Steve has so many interesting talents we got to include in the project. Through an interactive website, you can chose how Steve’s day goes by picking various options throughout his day. For example, you can chose what time he wakes up at and that ends up leading to how the rest of his day goes. We really wanted the user to be able to interact and make their own decisions when using our project and make it relatable to every student here at NYUSH.

Process:

At the very start of the brainstorming process of this project, we struggled a lot to achieve an idea we were all really excited and confident about. We all wanted to be able to film from interesting angles and have lots of room to be creative. Our first idea restricted us from doing this, so when Steve came up with filming a day in his life, we decided this was a great idea to accomplish this with. 

The first part of the project we did was the filming. By using the really cool stabilizer from the IMA Lab, we were able to get a bunch of smooth creative shots of Steve. We also used the tripod to get shots from higher angles above him to give a birds eye view. While we did divide up some parts of the project (Steve did lots of coding and was the actor, I did some coding and the filming, and Kat was the major editor), we actively participated in all aspects creating it so that it all blended together into a piece the three of us had envisioned. 

Issues we ran into:

One of the issues I ran into was with the buttons on the page. I wanted them to become a different color when you hovered over to click it. Steve had figured this out before, yet we needed this to happen with multiple buttons on a page instead of just one. I ended up figuring this out by making a class called “button” and then did an “id” for each button under this class with “:active” for each.

Another little issue we all ran into was actually using the camera. For some reason our first camera we borrowed had a full SD card and would turn off in the middle of filming. This further delayed our filming schedule and lead to us having to change cameras and SD cards. This camera worked perfectly and we were able to film the next day with the stabilizer and tripod.

Post-Mortem:

After completing this project, I was overall happy with the way it came out. Although, I do feel like we were too ambitious with it. There were some things we didn’t have time to finish.

My favorite aspect of it was the shot of Steve doing his homework and the interactive aspect of being able to click the button multiple times to make him work slower or faster. 

I think that if we had more time, I would’ve liked to change the layout of the pages to be more interesting instead of just centered for each video/button. We have viewed so many creative art media projects, and I think we could’ve made the layout way more interesting. This could’ve included making the video full screen with the buttons laid over the top of the video. Also, I wish we could’ve included being able to tap on something in the video to make it change. We originally were going to do this, but we thought the buttons were better for this idea.

Screenshots:

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Week 8: Response to Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – Madi Eberhardt

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s, “The Danger of a Single Story,” is definitely one of my favorite ted talks that discusses an issue that is very important to recognize in society/media today. At first she describes while growing up in Nigeria, multiple British stories gave an impression on her. She states in her talk, “I did not know that people like me could exist but in Africa.” She then goes onto explain the interaction between her American roommate and herself in which Adichie was stereotyped to a single story that is often told about Africa. It is this single story that creates unnecessary stereotypes. By individuals only learning one perspective about another culture or place, it leaves an incomplete understanding of the culture or place. This stereotyping and unawareness leaves our society with a disconnect between the diverse cultures that surround us. I found it interesting when she mentioned the story about how her family hosted a boy, and even she began to stereotype her own culture.

I believe our media has a very significant role in this issue, as this is where we hear and learn about people, their cultures, and places most often. For example, Africa is often seen as being a poor country with starving children and having a lack of technology. Our media tends to stereotype cultures or places without even it being noticeable. The media and the messages it gives to its audience is so powerful, especially today. I wonder if it is the creator or the audience who should be more conscious of creating this single story, where does this issue start? I think it should start with each individual, as more people need to be more culturally aware and begin recognizing our biases/stereotypes with an open mind. Communication with others is so essential, and our society tends to lack this when it comes to keeping an open mind about the perspectives, values, and cultures around us.

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Week 7: Audio Project Documentation – Madi Eberhardt

Audio Project – A Map of Shanghai Sounds (Madi & Clover)

Link: http://imanas.shanghai.nyu.edu/~mne234/AudioProject/(please open on chrome not safari)

For our audio project, we decided to do a map that takes you through different sounds in Shanghai. The sounds we chose to record and edit were from our school’s cafe, a KTV bar, a park, and the music from the ladies who dance to traditional Chinese music (near the Century Ave subway). Through this experience, we hope the user can get a sense of the city and further get to know it. We discuss what the school and places mean to us, so that the user gets an idea of how much Shanghai is so important to our lives.

Process

The first thing we did was create the HTML page so that we had a base to work off from. Then we recorded the audios and collected them into one folder. This kept us organized so that we could put everything together as one. For the park, I remixed 3 different sounds. I recorded the sound of a water fall, some birds, and the street outside to combine it all into this park audio. The KTV bar I did in a similar way and just blended and edited the audio from a KTV bar near our dorms. The other sounds were recorded to their original sound without adding anything. When you first open the home page, music immediately starts playing. I edited this by finding some Chill Hop music and an audio of a rainy city background. I mixed these two together for the background music of the page. The photos used were also taken by us.

Through buttons, you can navigate to different places to hear the sounds. We used ‘let’ to define them, then ‘addEventListener’ to give an action to these buttons. For the audios, we made 3 buttons to either play, pause, or return home. The specific audio will play once you click on it. We also added two introduction audios to the beginning that will play if you click on the button. These are voice recorded by Clover, and we had another NYU student (Jamie) to give an introduction audio as well. 

Lots of coding was needed for all the buttons and linking them to the correct audios, so this was a bit confusing and difficult to navigate through. Although, once I was able to fully understand how the ‘let’ functions worked, I was able to replicate and rename everything so that it could work properly. 

Post Mortem

Overall, I think the project definitely met our goals. As we progressed through it, more and more ideas came to us so that we could further expand from our original idea. I was very happy with the look and style of it, as I wanted it to look interesting and aesthetically pleasing. I think we accomplished this. If we had more time, I would’ve wanted to record a lot more places all throughout Shanghai so that we could have an extensive map (also maybe a more interactive one) of sounds for people to hear the city through. This would include finding more significant popular locations in Shanghai and adding them to a more extensive map. 

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Week 7: Response to “Theft and Artistry” – Madi Eberhardt

This weeks reading, “Theft and Artistry,” was a really fascinating article that made me rethink how much of an impact the way the art/music industry portrays a message through culture.

 I found the specific examples of the effects of cultural appropriation in music videos like the Coldplay/Beyonce one very interesting. Cultural appropriation is such a widely debated topic today and a lot of the entertainment industry is having to address this issue. I believe it is very important that ones culture is respected and not stereotyped in any way, although sometimes I think the line between social stigma of “disrespect” seen in art, and art representing another meaning is often blurred.

The quote I feel really illustrates the negative aspect the art/music industry faces today is how “It’s just seems so damn corporate.” Even though these artists, such as Beyonce or Taylor Swift, hold so much power and influence, they are still simply motivated by money and the corporate companies that help to run everything. Corporate will take anything they find the public will be attracted to and reproduce it (such as how Justin Bieber’s song supposedly was based off Latin-American reggaeton), no matter if its appropriating a culture or not. The industry is often so focused on the money aspect of the art that it often ignores the message being presented to the audience and how it might effect others.

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Week 6: Response to “Ecstasy of Influence” – Madi Eberhardt

In the “Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagarism” by Jonathan Letham, he discusses the definition of copyright over time and how today it has affected the culture industry. Artists are typically brought to their own gifts in art through discovering the work of someone who is already a master of it. It was interesting when Letham quoted, “Finding one’s voice isn’t just an emptying and purifying oneself of the words of others but an adopting and embracing of filiations, communities, and discourses. ” As by us being inspired by others artwork, we are able to take what we’ve learned from their art and turn it into art from our own unique perspective. 

Although, copyright is leaving our art and culture with a stagnation in growth. Thomas Jefferson believed it was a “necessary evil,” as nowadays it’s almost impossible to regulate technology and media. The culture industry can no longer control the use of its art. For example, he even explains how Disney (with a very extreme situation with their levity in copyright laws) has taken inspiration from past artists like Shakespeare. With no regulation on this, generations are now forced with responding to the “same mixture of intoxication, resentment, lust, and glee that characterizes all artistic successors.” In turn, by reproducing and copying ideas off of each other’s art, we are only making the world smaller and never growing our culture to something more. In my perspective while I think this is very true, I do believe that if we make copyright more strict, then it will limit the inspiration given to artists now. There would be less of. culture industry if we aren’t allowed to be creative with the work of others. 

Lethan also goes into the commons of a language and how it isn’t the community in which owns something, but the people as a whole. It is owned by nobody. I question what he actually means by this and if this is considered a bad or positive aspect of the culture industry. After reading this, I now question whether todays copyright situation is actually beneficial to the culture industry or if it is actually hurting it, making it more and more just a reproduction of the past.