Amie McClean

Meshes of the Afternoon is a short film which allows you to get in touch with all of your feelings. It’s long panning shots with short clips of the main character will allow the audience to feel a build up of fear. While the short shots with the long shadows allow the audience to feel the desire to know who left the flower.

When the woman falls asleep we go into a dream state which is allowing the audience to see how the woman feels. We see the shadow figure has no face but the desperate chase makes the audience feel as though they need to know who it is.

In the dream state we see the knife has moved to the stairs again triggering a fearful response from the audience making them need to know what is about to happen.

The knife once again moves to below the sheets and it’s at this point the tension builds to a peak when we see the woman sleeping as though the shadow figure is herself and she is watching herself sleep.

However, in the end we realise the knife has been the key all along and just as we find this out we realise it’s all too late and she is already dead.

This short film plays with the audience’s feelings and makes them feel as though the woman has had her own voice in her head telling her what to do. This gives the audience the impression she is suicidal and lonely.

Another one of my photos on my gallery page is Sunset on the still water. Due to the reflection on the water it reminded me that as much as we cannot see it due to the reflection of our world above the water, there is a whole other life going on underneath.

It is another still image that gave me more of an idea for my own film as polluting the water, kills the life underneath that we cannot see. it is another side to the water that no one thinks about, but everyone has an impact on.

It shows how perfect we think the world is, but no one truly knows what’s going on underneath the surface until you take a closer look.

My valleys to the sea photo which can be viewed on my gallery page reminded me of len lye’s Rainbow Dance and the fact that layers in a scene can make a scene seem bigger or smaller.

The photo itself was taken 40 to 50 miles from the sea but from the photo it doesn’t seem that far. It allows the audience viewing the photo to wonder how far it really is and what is the challenge between the land and sea.

It gave me the idea for my own experimental film due to it reminding me that all life needs water. The idea spawned from here as without water there would be no green plantation and the earth would be a meaningless wasteland planet.

I visited the Game of Thrones Tapestry when it was touring in the Ulster museum in Belfast. It reminded me a lot of Heiji Monogatari’s Scroll with the way the media is presented to the audience.

It is one continuous set of media which allows the story to be told by splitting the scenes into different still sections. This allows the story to be told the way it happened but also allows the audience to come up with their own ideas as to what happens between the scenes.

The tapestry is already 66 meters long and there is still another season of the show to be added onto the end. The tapestry will tell the audience two stories. If they follow it one way it tells the story the author wanted to tell if they follow it the other way it tells a completely different story.

The fact the scenes are split allows the audience to wonder what is going on between the two scenes which allows each persons understanding of the media to be totally different, even though they are looking at the exact same tapestry.

Len Lye’s Colour Box is another great example of Len Lye’s work with the General Post Office. It’s another experimental film which allows the audience to view an advert for the post office without being dictated to by a standard narration.

Len Lye’s colour box is an assortment of colours and designs moving around the screen. The objects on the screen seem to move even though they are stationary. This kinetic movement is achieved through the vibration of the objects or the designs on the screen and also by changing the position of objects on the screen.

The short film itself relates closely to the Post Office by seeming as though the designs have been created by ink stamps on the screen. This creates the idea of ink in the audience’s mind, which will allow the audience to relate this to the Post Office.

Towards the end of the film we are shown prices and weights, which is the direct link to the Post Office. This allows the audience to finally understand what the short film is about. It also allows the audience to relate the ink stamp like shapes to the Post Office. The audience are then able to make their own assumptions about the film without being dictated to via a narrative storyline.

The scroll is set to show kinetic movement of the characters on the scroll. Although the scroll nor the characters on the scroll actually move, we get the sense of movement as we glide our eyes along it.

The drama unfolds as you look across the scroll with gaps in between each section which allows you to create your own idea of what’s going on between each “scene”.

If you glide your eye from left to right it creates a totally different idea of a story to it you glide your eye right to left. It gives the audience the idea that the story they see might not actually be the story that is unfolding in front of them.

The image itself is very symbolic of kinetic movement, even though nothing within the still image itself if actually moving. It’s a 2D image but is made to seem as though it’s 3D by showing movement of the characters without them actually moving.

The image appears to be moving by showing the 2D characters at different points within the story. The same characters can be seen more than once within the same image to show the kinetic movement of the characters within the story. This allows the audience to see the movement, which in turn will tell its own story.

Two movements within the scene that are very obvious to the audience is the flapping motion of Joesph and Mary to the cradle and the dancing of the angels in the sky.

Within Len Lye’s “Rainbow Dance” the short film seems as though it was made in after effects, due to the over exposed images and the way they are placed like 2D figures onto the screen.

The film shows the movement of figures within the frame by still images being placed at different points on the screen. It makes it look as though the images are moving by placing over exposed 2D images of for example people jumping.

It is very symbolic of still images staying on the screen as though it is a collection of photographs in a montage to create the film.

It is a very creative way of making a Post Office advert without the dictation of what exactly it is promoting. It is a way of advertising without actually pushing the main idea of the product they are promoting.