Hybridity Blog

What have you Learned about Hybridity?

- I've learned that it's when one artist, adds in another story or art piece/topic, incorporating as many forms that's necessary, in order to to fully investigate a subject.

How do contemporary artists use the concept of hybridity in their artwork?

- The person I'll be using for an example, is Tim Burton. He seemed to use different people, who were living in real life, and made them into his film. For example: "For a boy his age, he's considerate and nice... but he wants to be just like Vincent Price." Here, he is putting together a short horror story/film, using a popular and famous horror actor, Vincent Price, as his topic and narrator. Tim Burton continues to add in popular artists, such as Edgar Allan Poe. He focuses on creating a mood on darkness, and imagination, and thoughts that run in your head. How the little boy starts out like any other kid, before transforming into his world of imagination, thinking of all these dark, things, I.E: Living with bats, turning his dog into a zombie, dipping his aunt into hot wax. His eyes going wide, his grin taking up his face. Tim Burton, does a good job in making the mood dark, uncomfortable, and shocking. He allows the unexpected to occur and keep the audiences attention. 

How might you be able to use hybridity in your own artwork?

- By focusing on the main theme and question: What am I trying to get across the audience. And once I figure that out, I'll get more information on things/topics related to mine, and add in other people or quotes, making it not so much focused on what is happening, but the point that is trying to be crossed. 

For example: If I'm talking about climate change, That would be my main goal. I'll then add in my information, before doing research and adding in other characters that may go against climate change, or have someone from the past who talked about it. It's about the actions and the language 

Is there something that you found in your investigation that specifically interested or inspired you?

-It was interesting to see how many popular directors, or even growing directors and filmmakers, use the hybridity techniques. Alfred Hitchcock also fits into this category. He would create these films, such as Psycho, that would make your head turn and ponder son many questions. The unexpected would occur. The way the girl is murdered in the shower and you see a women's outline, or how they make you think It's the mom the whole time, but in the end, you realize it's the guy, who just pretends to be his mom. It really rattles your mind, and makes you think "Wow, I would have never guessed that." I feel that shows/movies that have an unexpected twist in them, can turn out either really well, or really bad. It's just a matter of how creative you are, and whether or not you understand what message you are trying to convey to the audience.

Theme Concept 2021-2022

This year for Digital Portfolio, I plan on focusing on Political and Social Issues. The way I will work on this concept and create my project(s) is by getting real life events, and turning them into short films. I will also be creating false stories-(Imaginative)- and continue showing Political and Social issues through fictional and Nonfictional events. I will be focusing on more then one topic, to hopefully express feelings to the audience and show current events, and what it's like to have to go through what that person is going through- and then looking at how the Government and other people around them are handling the situation. Whether it would be them agreeing or disagreeing on the matter, or how the person(s) physically or emotionally react to the issue. 

For example, I am thinking about creating a film that is involved with the Texas Rape law, and how our government has handled the situation and how people from around the U.S. have handled the topic. For the film, I won't focus more on the rape aspect but how/what women are doing to fight back. It'll focus on a single girl who lives in Texas and is fighting for women equality and fighting against the law, following her as she goes through struggles. She will post videos of speeches she made, showing as she gets a lot of backlash, bringing her down a bit. But one day she gets a text from a random stranger who wants to help her. She's hesitant at first but the more they text, the more they gain their trust for each other. They end up meeting up getting more and more people/followers, fighting against the government. In the end, the women who fight, end up winning, and the government takes away the law. 

   https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2021/09/03/texas-abortion-law-facebook-twitter-legal-risks/5717693001/

The second film that I plan on focusing on is LGBTQ+ matters and how being a trans boy, whether in the past or present, can affect so much of their life. It'll focus on him being bullied, and how there was laws made, and rumors of conversion camps. The kids at his school would throw things at him, make him depressed, call him slurs, etc. He would end up getting very depressed. Falling behind in classes, not eating or getting out of bed. Then, one day, he decides to turn on the TV and sees a "Breaking News" update, explaining how a young teenage trans boy was bullied and ended up ending his life. The news anchor then continues to talk about how the Trans group the boy was in, is mourning the loss. The Protagonist of the story ends up searching the group name and finds that they are allies of the LGBTQ+ community, who wishes that anyone who is part of it, to join and become part of their family. The protagonist then watches a welcome video and what the group is part of, and ends up going to one of the meetings. 

https://www.euractiv.com/section/non-discrimination/news/thousands-protest-russian-style-lgbtqi-bill-in-budapest/

Throughout the year, I will be continuing to create different films based off of society and how we tend to handle things. Some of my films will be true, and some of my films will be ones I base off of events, but add in my own little twists. I'm excited to see what will happen. 

Production Blog Post

 The process was slow and I was not able to film until just recently do to getting my actors together. I have almost the entire shooting completed now though.

Investigation

     There are death in my thrillers and I have been trying to make them as realistic as I can. I have been researching ways to make death on camera more realistic. 

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/theatreblog/2011/nov/02/what-makes-good-stage-death

I read multiple articles but the above article I believe was best for what I want to do.

The article was on plays but there were certain parts that I believed would truly help me to make the deaths in my films more believable. The deaths I have had so far are too dramatic for the most part but they can't be too calm either. I need a middle ground.

1) Keep convulsions to a minimum

2) Make fake blood (ketchup is not the same shade as blood making it less believable)

3) Try to die on your stomach to hide any breathing

I also think that makeup to make wounds is a good idea and can be used to make the scenes in my films more realistic. This will work for not only deaths, but for injuries. To create wounds in future films I must use a five step method:

1) Clean the spot where I want the wound

2) Outline the injury spot in a black or brown marker

3) Use red lipstick or fake blood on the wound

4) Apply a layer of clear lip gloss

5) Apply blush around the spot

https://www.wikihow.com/Make-Fake-Cuts-Using-Makeup?amp=1

Work log: I have been working on filming and editing this week.

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Production

 Production so far is going poorly. There have been many problems with filming and getting the family together is not as easy as I believed it would be. I have only been able to film one scene so far. I do have plans to shoot future scenes and it is a short story so I should be able to get it in by the deadline. That is the only thing to do now in the film until after production.

On Wednesday I was able to shoot one scene of my script which did go well.

Experimental

    I have fully decided all the factors that will go into making my film and will now begin to shoot it. While I shoot the film I will have to decide a good schedule to get my family together. I will try a couple different schedules in the hopes of finding which time works the best for everyone. I will be the video recorder and will have to decide what music and effects to add but I have time to decide because that will not start until after production. I also need to choose who will play each part. 

    Lastly, I will have to choose what time of day to shoot the film. I think early morning or evening would work best because it will give a darker but not too dark natural color scheme to the film.

    This week I have gotten every thing ready to shoot like the costumes and scripts printed for my family in hopes to begin filming next week.

Brainstorming

    I am brainstorming about one thing in particular this week. I am trying to find the locations to shoot this film. After a lot of debriefing I have concluded that the ideal option is to film at my dad's house and my mom's barn. The barn is a big part of my film but the big conflict I was facing was would my mom's house or dad's house be better for the indoor scenes? My dad has many props because of his love for Halloween and he has a bigger house with more room. My mom's has a lot of animals that would have gotten in the way where at my dad's house there are only two. So after taking all of that into consideration I have chosen my dad's house.

The barn has many noisy animals as well which I had to take into consideration. The animals would take away from the suspense of the film so my Nan has agreed to "babysit" them at her house when we are filming because they can not be inside do to the fact they would make a mess.

This week I worked on my script and on Thursday my Nan agreed to "babysit" the barn animals.