Module 4

             Presentation Reflection:

There were a couple of ideas that I loved during Holden’s presentation. The first was when he said that Mekas “was creating a living clip of history” with his experimental diary films. Not only do I think that the idea is a beautiful and poetic way of looking at his work, but it is also a wonderful way to look at any work of art. Art reflects life, and life reflects art. Mekas' art told his history, and his history inspired his art. That reminds me of a movie I watched a while back (I can’t remember the name) where a guy wanted to be a blues singer. After not having much success, his mentor told him, “If you want to sing the blues, you must have had the blues.” I suspect all artists to some degree, have painful parts of their past that they have channeled into creative outlets. The other idea was when Mekas explained how he used “bits of time” and “”bits of footage” to make his films. I was reminded of the Maya Deren article, where she insisted that a filmmaker didn’t necessarily need a lot of (or expensive) equipment. No excuses from either of them, just make your freakin’ film!

Sound Recording Reflection:

I enjoyed the experience, but I think I underestimated how important (and often difficult) it is to get clean sound. Like Jack D, I recorded the sound of a bird chirping. My mistake was recording too close to a road, so I picked up nearby traffic. I’m determined to try again. While I got a couple of good recordings at Long Leaf Park, I’m going to venture out to a more secluded location, Carolina Beach State Park perhaps. Going out in the field with the sound equipment was also fun, but next time, I may just take the H6 instead of the shotgun mic because it drew some strange stares at the park. The workshopping exercise definitely made me want to create my own library of clean sounds that I can warehouse for future projects.

 

Synesthesia Reflection:

After Todd mentioned synesthesia last semester, I wondered if I had a mild form of it. The TedTalk video makes me think that maybe I do… or maybe it’s just psychosomatic. To me, it makes complete sense why more artists have this genetic trait, but I wonder if it’s the chicken or the egg. Did their synesthesia prompt their art, or did the art prompt the synesthesia? The art of the girl who paints music is not just painting colors; she’s painting shapes too, so maybe there’s a little cymatics at play in her art. I wonder how many people know of this condition. I believe the percentage of people who have it would be higher than 4 percent if they did. I’m also curious when most people with synesthesia were officially diagnosed.

Cymatics Reflection: 

Well, stating the obvious… those sound experiments designed by Chladni are so cool! And the Pink Floyd and Beethoven images are incredible. It’s like each one had its own accompanying light show. A couple of his statements also intrigued me. First was when he talked about all the senses, referring to them as “data.” It made think about how sound can influence emotions in a film ie. how certain music can make you sad or scared or how sound effects can trigger physiological reactions. Maybe it is something with how the frequency (or form) of the music or sound effects interacts with the ear and hearing process. Perhaps, it’s a primal, evolutionary response to stimuli with different frequencies ie. predators, inclement weather, etc.  The line, “cymatics had an influence on the universe itself” also totally blew my mind. I believe that it’s too much of a coincidence that objects in nature mirror cymatic images of sound…there has to be a correlation. And I love the last line in the “Seriously Mad Vocal Experiment” where a guy can be heard saying the shapes correspond with crop circles. Right?