Author: trp297

Attached is the link to the video project: 

http://imanas.shanghai.nyu.edu/~mvb312/commlab/week-9/video-project/index.html#

Created by: Winny, Matt, and Ploy 

Description: Our idea is to create a fake social media website where users can post blogs. Our storyline follows that there are 2 vloggers who traveled to Shanghai. They kept on posting but then one of the users disappeared. No one knows where she went or what might happen to her. Later some of her fans pointed out that she was being followed by a strange guy dress in black. We ended the story with a new report who interviewed people who last seen the disappeared person. We left the story as a mystery and for the audience’s own interpretation of whether the stalker is responsible for the disappearance of this blogger. 

Process: We began by creating the storyboard of what we would like to include them in the story, how many scenes, and which angle we want to use take the shots.  We find that the storyboard is very useful since we always refer back to them. However, when we actually do shoot it, we changed the angle a lot since there are many other occurrences, such as too many people, and whether the camera can catch the stalker who is behind. As the project progresses, we decide to work both the website and the filming at the same time. This is because our shootings are not intended to be on the same day. For instance, one scene is in the hotel when they arrived and the other scene is also in the hotel but on another day. Therefore, our shooting has to go back and forth so that it could really make it believable that it is different days. To save time, we chose to simultaneously shoot and also code. 

Methods: To make the project more realistic, we intended to shoot with our phones so that it could reflect the real nature of vloggers. A lot of the post of social media are all taken by phone. Also, we intended for the videos to be vertical as it reflects the nature of vloggers taking selfies. However, in our last scene, of the news report, we shoot it with the camera. This is because we want it to look more professional with better video qualities. We also want the sounds to be more professional so we used the shotgun microphones. 

We did some basic edits to the videos of the vloggers because we want it to remain similar to what vlogs might look like. However, we did quite a lot of edit on the new reports. First of all, we need to connect the videos from the camera to the audios from the microphone because it is of different qualities. I did that by muting the camera audio and then replacing it with the microphone audio. Since we need to combine many interview scenes together, there are many issues that happened. For instance, the sounds are not at the same level. Therefore I need to go through audacities and then make those sounds on the same level by maximizing some. Then I combined those scenes together. 

For the coding part, I am responsible for the codings of the captions and the comments of each person on the website. What I did is set the function so that each person have a corresponding first name, last name, and username. When someone post, I set the post number. For instance, the second person who comments, Lauren, have been set a number and then I defined the user number with let Lauren = user [2]. Then within the post, I used comment, commentUser, and commentText. 

Post Modem:

I feel like the overall arching of the project was pretty successful since it is credible and believable. It looks pretty real as vloggers. However, if we have more time, I wish we can change the aesthetic of the website. Create more functions that are useful as part of a social media site. For example, we do have the like, share and comment button. However, we still do not have functions such as messaging and maybe entering into other profiles. I also think we should use the page more since there are empty spots surrounding the post. Lastly, I still find it a little unrealistic when the newest post is not at the top but rather is at the bottom. We decided that it is quite unrealistic if they have to scroll up to see the most recent post, so we stick to our plan of reverse chronological order. Overall, I am like how it turned out but we definitely could make it better if we have more time. 

Reference:

we used the beginning of the news report from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sU0ZWicyypM 

“The Danger of a Single Story”, the Ted Talk speech given by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, explores the negatives of understanding something from just one perspective. She explains the danger of a single story as the “show of people as one thing, of only one thing, over and over again and that is what they become.” One of the biggest example she pulls up is the single story that exists in the literature. For instance, the story behind Africa always correlates with how poor they are and how they live in a struggle to escape poverty. Those stories are stereotypes that are incomplete and could be untrue. 

After listening to the talk, I really agree with Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. I feel like sometimes we are too caught up in the way we suppose to think and behave because we are introduced to the single stories that are filled with stereotypes that were created. After I listened to her example of “African authenticity”,  it seems a very controversial issue to judge whether something as authentic. Can we link authenticity to the stereotypes? Just because the stereotypes set it to be like that, doesn’t mean that it is actually like that. This, therefore, links to my opinion that a single story alludes us away from the true authenticity and more towards what it should be seen like, which is often misleading. 

What I got from the speech is that we shouldn’t stick to any single story under all circumstances. This is because we are acknowledging things that maybe are not true and incomplete. At the end of her speech, she nicely concludes that if we “reject a single story, we will regain a kind of paradise”. I agree with her and will try to put myself in multiple stories that can ultimately let me understand everything better and not be caught in a single story. 

Link to Audio Project  http://imanas.shanghai.nyu.edu/~kv795/week6/audio/audio_project.html

Our Audio Project was created based on the sounds within NYU Shanghai. We made the audio project to be an interactive game, similar to the matching card game. In this game, the player supposes to match the audios (sounds of NYU Shanghai) to the corresponding images. 

Initial Idea

Our ideas changed a lot throughout the process. Initially, we want to create a project that once you hear the sound, you know where you are. That idea surrounds the places within NYU Shanghai. However, we cannot find the sounds of each room and place that would make it distinct from one another. Our next idea, therefore, is to create a nonlinear storyline where we walk around that place to make it seems like you are actually in that place. For instance, we walked around the 8th floor to record the sounds of different music and dance rooms. However, when we came back and check our recordings, the sounds do not work as it is very unclear, with lots of background voice as we record pass doors. At last, we record objects of NYU Shanghai rather than the places itself.

Recordings

We plan to record 8 objects and 8 corresponding images so that we could create 16 squares in total; which in the HTML page could be created to be 4 rows of 4. The recordings were harder than we thought. A lot of the recordings does not work because there are too much background noises, or that other sounds were more dominant than the sound we want. For instance, we wanted the sound of the coffee machine in the cafe but the sounds of the people were too loud. Therefore, our whole recording process took very long. I kept recording and then checking how I can adjust the quality of the recordings in audacities. Whenever I see that it does not work, I need to go back and record again. Another example is of the gym which is too similar to the stairs. Since our project is to make the audience guess what this object is, it must be really clear. Therefore we decide to keep only one as it is too similar. Additionally, I sometimes also need to create the circumstance so that it is easier to record. For instance, I wanted to record the beeping sound when the food is ready in the 2nd-floor cafe, but it is always crowded with people with loud chattering noises. Therefore, I asked the cafe worker for the beeper and took it into the stairway so that the background noises are cut down. One thing I found out that work extremely well is to record during the weekend at the AB. 

Editing the Audios

The editing parts of the audio were also challenging. The thing I found most annoying is the use of noise removal. I really like it since it is useful to cut off the unwanted background sound. But sometimes it is hard to find the right level where our wanted sounds would not be cut off. A lot of times, it affects my audio a lot and creates pitches that sounds totally wrong. Therefore I need to reduce the amount it is applied to the audios. Other functions that I use is the fade in and fade out button. I don’t really like the audio to start and end abruptly.  I also used the amplifier to make the sounds louder or softer. One function I really like to use is how I can trim, duplicate, copy, and paste audio wherever I want. One of my audio is of the lift. During the recording, I went from 1st to 8th floor and then there was a long pause. Therefore, I use the functions to cut and move it accordingly. Before this project I never edit audios. I feel that audacity is a really great tool and I sure would use it again in the future. Overall the recordings were really challenging to make it sounds professional, but it was worth the trying. 

Codings 

The codings are extremely hard. It is because a lot of the function we have not learned before. We faced many problems throughout the process. We know how we want the page to look like but we don’t know how to put it into the computer language. After reading many articles from the websites, we found the way. The hardest part might be the drag function so that we drag the image to the corresponding audio. Then we also have to link the image and audio together as only one combination work. If the combination is correct, then the opacity goes down in both the image and the picture to show that the pair is found. If the pair is wrong, the opacity stays the same. We also have to create the button to reset the whole order, so that the audience does not remember the old order to play. Since there are so many codes and functions that need to be incorporated at the same time such as the loop and transparency, it is very hard to keep out the orders and the place of each element. 

Post Mortem

Overall, this project is very time -consuming and challenging to us. It is a lot of work as we faced many obstacles. Even until the night before submission we were already thinking if we should create a new project as this one seems to be impossible; which is why I already create a backup one. Luckily, we got it working just in time. I am very happy to work with Kat and I’m pretty proud to submit this ‘sound of NYUSH ‘ project. I definitely learned so much from this project. 

Written by Jonathan Letham, “The Ecstasy of Influence”, explores the relationship between ‘inspiration’ and ‘plagiarism’. Letham summaries his views that arts are created by inspirations. If we consider inspirations as plagiarism, we are limiting ourselves to these different art forms whether it is movie, cartoons, writings. and etc. I think this sentence ultimately sums up Letham’s view regarding people who claims the wrongs on those artists who are inspired, “[they] are attacking the next generation of creators for the crime  of being influenced and by doing so  they make the world smaller, betraying what seems to me the primary motivation for participating in the world of culture in the first place: to make the world larger” (65). 

He then provide many different examples to prove to us how artists are inspired by different things that allow them to create the art they created. He claims that if we are not suppose to be influenced by any other things that already exist, the arts we have today wouldn’t exist. 

After reading this article, I feel like I totally agree. I really like his approach to of influences by arts rather than the art plagiarism. I realize it is so true that when I create art, I need to be inspired by something. Without being inspired, I wouldn’t have the motivation to create a masterpiece. I feel like even if something feels very original and unique, there are elements within that existed and were made base upon an inspired element made by someone else.

However, after reading the two assigned readings, I am wondering to which extent would an artwork exceed the level of inspiration and into the level of plagiarism.  Since art is always repeated and recreated, how do we view plagiarism? Does plagiarism became less of the concern in the world of arts?