Forgetting Oneself from Kim Berens on Vimeo.
It seems strange, but it feels now like this wasn't my first stop-motion video. It seems like I'd done it before this. When I was making it it didn't seem like I'd done it before this, but now it does. Maybe because I've seen so much stop-motion since and done a couple more project using the method.
When my professor introduced us to this assignment, my first thought was, "how can I use Photoshop?" I came up with having an invisible person. Every frame where skin appears I cut the person out and added the inside of the clothes that would then be visible. I also added the light when the light turns on because it was washed out.
I think people liked the video because it was unexpected that the person in the video would not have a body. After that it's the, "how did they do that?" reaction. If I saw a video like this, I'd want to know how the artist did it, even if I knew how I would do it, I would want to know how another would attempt the same thing.
Vote Nov. 2nd to Save Troy Library! from Kim Berens on Vimeo.
With the Vote November 2nd to Save Troy Public Library, I learned... don't post a political information video the day before the election when you're attempting to sway the votes. Of course, this wasn't entirely my fault. If you consider the circumstances and use a few key synonyms then it may even appear that I'm an ambitious, determined and enthusiastic worker! (which is my attempt in the following sentences). The election (obviously) was November the second, but the project wasn't even due until the ninth! Professors usually give adequate time to do an assignment, and having it done a week early was very difficult. Regardless of posting it so late, 9 people liked the post and three people commented. It's not very much, but a couple of the people I don't even talk to! So it made me feel good.
There were of course problems. For whatever reason, when exporting a 24 fps file as a Quicktime, the video had ghost images, which were ugly and made it hard to understand the video. But I needed to post it. I figured that as long as I got the word out there, people would mind the ghost images. For my class however, I either had to change it to 12 fps and cut out half the frames (looong and tedious) OR, what I ended up doing, which sounds convoluted, but really is quite straightforward: I exported the video (without audio)as a swf file and imported it into After Effects, then exported it as a Quicktime and imported it into Final Cut, where I added the audio and exported it again as a Quicktime. See, really not difficult.
And the week after November second was niiiice.
As for the content, I think it comes across very well. My Dad, who I believe to be very politically knowledgeable, gave his thumbs up, and many people from Troy liked the video on Facebook, meaning they understood the message.
It was a great introduction to Flash and time-based media, something I really enjoy and, as a designer who has spent many years dedicating hours to Photoshop, I seem to be spending a lot of energy on pursuing time-based design!
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