Deviant art

here is the link to my Deviantart.com gallery

http://joewheeldon.deviantart.com/gallery/

Transformers animation

Affter recentlly watching some of my old stop motion videos i have decided to make a 10 to 15 minute animation including my transformers toys. i recently took some test shots of some of the transformers transforming and all looks well, using what i've learnt from the previous pixilation project i should be able to make a decent animation. Now i just need to build some sets and write a screenplay. I may even use some friends for voice acting. speak up if you would like to be included.

Sackboy

Just before Christmas i decided to make my own sackboy from the recently relased Playstation 3 game Little Big Planet. After deciding owning a real life little sackboy would be really cool, i started making him, after a few days he was finished. However, i then gave him away as a Christmas present. He's still cool though. The photos above were taken by Sally Bailey.

Scarecrow mask

A few monthas ago i had nothing to do and decided to try and re create the mask of 'The Scarecrow' from the Christopher Nolan blockbuster Batman Begins. Earlier this year i had made a mask of the villain 'Leatherface' from the chilling horror film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I remeber how interesting this was and so set upon making the mask of the Scarecrow villain. I began with some conceptual sketches, i would usually do a few of these but was happy with the first two and a final pencil sketch. I then made the mask from material, cotton and wool. I was very pleased with the results.

Interactive narrative

I found the interactive narrative project a little tricky at first as i have never before used Adobe flash. However, once i was taught the basics it becam pretty simple. For my interactive narrative i decided to create a game where the player must navigate through a level by choosing which direction to go by clicking on certain words or objects. Going along different paths in the game would result in different endings or options within the game.

When thinking how i would involve images in my interactive narrative, i decided to use what i had learnt in the pixilation project and as a result all the animation in my interactive narrative is done through pixilation. I felt this gave my narrative a unique look as it was real life, and yet didnt look natural.

I then decided that the story would involve the player waking up in a basement of a strange house and the objective would be to escape. I decided to use my own house as the setting of the game and proceded to take pictures, moving throughout the house, through every room and remembering how the game would flow.

After this it was a matter of importing all the photos into flash and arranging them in the correct order. This was no easy feat as i also had to include photos for every possibility that the player could choose within the game. After this i entered text on the stills where the player would have to decide what to do and where to go. I decided to make text that was giving the player information white, and text that the player could click on red. This made the clickable buttons stand out and draw attention, making it obvious the player could click on them. I then added music in the form of "creepy mansion music" taken from the Playstation game Resident Evil. This was put on a loop. My original plan was to include sound effects such as doors opening etc, however i ran out of time and couldn't include them before the deadline.

I feel that the most interesting part of the narrative was the inclusion of a villain in the form of a masked murderer. If the player fails to pick up a knife earlier in the game the villain would 'kill' them and they would have to start again. I found the villain interesting as i was able to use a mask i had made a few weeks before as a prop.

When trying to publish my game on the internet i did run into problems. For some reason i was unable to publish the narrative on deviant art. I have yet to be succesful in publishing it.

playing with colours

originals

edits

I chose to use red and pinks, mixed with greens to show contrasting colours within my photos. I also used photos with a bright flahs of light in them as this allowed my to change the bright white light into a dark black colour, creating an altogether different feel for the photos after they had been edited. Where the eye may have tried to avoid looking at the brightness in the original photos, the black becomes more easy on the eye and becomes the focal point of the photograph.

The Meeting

For our one shot short, our group originally decided on the idea of shooting a film as if it was from the perspective of a cctv camera. Due to this and the location being outdoors we decided only to use the light that was already present on the location, but used the nightvision function on the video camera

After viewing the raw footage i decided to present my video as footage recorded by a police officer as an arrest is made, putting titles and subtitles on the video to give it the feel of police property. i also altered the light levels on the footage to try and make it lighter as the original footage was extremely dark. I also decided not to use the sound recorded on the video as it was of poor quality due to only being recorded on the cameras onboard mic. Also, i thought the lack of recorded sound helped give the illusion of a polioce recording.

Our entire group was involved during the filming process. We had three main actors, a camera operator and director/extra. I enjoyed working in a group as people off of camera have a better understanding of what is being filmed and can help tell you what to do and where to stand.