Before I could even answer the questions, I was a little worried as to what Alan had mentioned to make my story more like a story. I started reading the article more in depth and pondered whether to make it more like an advertisement or an educational short clip. So to get inspired, I watched several animations and chanced upon one which is to my liking. It is entitled: Undo-a story of a man who finds a book- story of his own life.
http://www.aniboom.com/video/1012/Undo/
I find the message to be rather sophisticated, a message that really hits one heart; so I have decided to do something likewise.
The questionnaire really stimulates my thinking making myself clearer of the objectives and how is it going to be executed. In fact, some questions which I thought were not as much of importance now seems important to me.
While answering the questions, my mind was still filled with thoughts whether the target audience should be adults or children. Anyways, i was thinking as the man floats up to the sky, he sees a Heaven gate and when the gate opens that's where he was hit and fell down. I know this is redundant but I would just like to write down my thoughts.
Bearing this in mind, i concentrated hard in answering the questions. Hope it is of substance.
Questionnaire:
1. Who are you telling the story for (primary audience)?
•People with high self-confidence/boastful and proud
•People who acts before they thinks
Mainly Teenagers to adults (ages 14-35)
2. What reaction do you want?
•Shock
•Disbelief
•Reflective upon oneself
[I want my audience to feel shock or rather a state of realization that looks may be deceiving. I want them to know that though things on the surface may seems fine but just one wrong turn would make a fatal mistake- even as worst as this.]
Ultimately- to think first before they act
3. Is the narrative omniscient (all seeing) or restrictive (viewed from a single perspective)?(If the narrative is restrictive, whose viewpoint are you using?)
Omniscient (all seeing) as I want them to feel how the priest is feeling and to have a thought of being cautious if facing a similar situation.
4. List the important events of the story.
-Showing his desire to publicize the building of spiritual rest stop
-His vision in seeing his desire coming true
-Priest being kia-su, equipping himself with many gadgets
- The wind sweeping off his course
-Facial expression of priest being panicky; praying to God
-Balloons scattered everywhere; body found floating on ocean
-A phrase would appear “Things may not seem as it plans. Think. Think wisely”
5. Which aspects of the setting of the story are important (time of day… location… period of history…) and how do you intend to establish these important elements?
-Held at noon, around 3-4pm
- Atlantic Ocean, Brazil;
-20 April 2008
To establish this, an example of the cloud is seen and the sun will be shown to imply it is noon time.
Brazil songs will be added to further hint the audience that this is taking place in Brazil. Zooming out from the map may be also another option.
This is where the balloon flight takes place as shown below:
Villas and even high raised buildings are added to show the history period of 2008.
6. What traits of the characters in your story are important and how do you intend to establish these traits?
Priest
-Family oriented (concerns for people)
-Kia-su (afraid to die)
I would establish his traits by:
-Showing him hugging the people around him and waving to them when setting off
-People kissing and calling Priest as father
-Equip with gadgets
-Through his panicky expression and him praying real hard to God
7. In what order are the important events (step 4 above) covered? Is it a strictly linear sequence of events in time, or does the story contain any flashbacks or other interruptions to the sequence of events?
Strictly linear sequence, only one thinking bubble will pop out
8. How does the story flow, does the pace change? Does it contain a surprise? Consider your answers to 1 and 2 above when making your response.
Pace accelerates as priest began to panic.
Yes. It does contain a surprise. The audience thought that the priest knows how to use GPS and never expects that he just brought it for the sake of protection without fully understanding how to operate it.
9. How will you use sound to help all your responses to 5-8 above?
Sound effects are added in terms of kissing, footsteps etc.
A soothing Brazil song would be added where sounds of wind, even thunders are added to indicate how panic the priest was. Loud, messy sound added to give more impact. Once, phrase shown, song fades out slowly to indicate the seriousness of this matter.
10. Does your story need dialog?
(write out the dialog)
Yes, dialogue is needed.
Crowd cheers: " Father, have a safe trip ahead ya."
Sam: " Father, i really hope your wish will come true."
Priest: " Sure it will. I'm so well prepared; just wait and see for my good news."
Wind Changes
Priest: "Oh my god! Why the sudden changes?!!"
" AHHH!! Can anyone hear me? Holy smoke.. I don't even know where I am. Can you just help me!!"
" Ehh.. Forget it." *Gulps*
Priest prays: " Oh Heavenly Father, please hear my cry. I do this is for you. Really it s for you. Just save my life; i will do your every command. I am just a dot to this world. Please spare me and land me to safety.
Etc...
Still left alot of things to be done.
Wish everyone best of luck!
CHEERS~!
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Day 02
All of us were told to collect 3 stories. In fact, i found more than three but have narrowed it down to just three of them. I must admit, it was an enjoyable time having to read different sorts of weird stories. Some gave me chill down my spines, others made me think how 'stupid' and redundant the way they die. I really empathize with them.
So these are the 3 chosen stories:
1)The Balloon Priest
(Padre Baloneiro)
2008 Darwin Award Nominee
Confirmed True by Darwin
(20 April 2008, Atlantic Ocean, Brazil) A Catholic priest recently ascended to heaven on a host of helium party balloons, paying homage to Lawn Chair Larry's aerial adventure. Larry, the beloved survivor of a Darwin-worthy fiasco, attached 45 helium weather balloons to his lawnchair, packed a picnic lunch, and cut the tether--but instead of drifting above the Los Angeles landscape as planned, he was rocketed into LAX air traffic lanes by the lift of the weather balloons. Astoundingly, Larry survived the flight.
Adelir Antonio, 51, was not so lucky.
His audacious attempt to set a world record for clustered balloon flight was intended to publicize his plan to build a spiritual rest stop for truckers. But, as truckers know, sitting for 19 hours in a lawn chair is not a trivial matter even in the comfort of your own backyard. The priest took numerous safety precautions, including wearing a survival suit, selecting a buoyant chair, and packing a satellite phone and a GPS. However, the late Adelir Antonio made a fatal mistake.
He did not know how to use the GPS.
The winds changed, as winds do, and he was blown inexorably toward open sea. He could have parachuted to safety while over land, but chose not to. When the voyager was perilously lost at sea, he prudently phoned for help--but rescuers were unable to determine his location, since he could not use his GPS. He struggled with the unit as the charge on the satellite phone dwindled.
Instead of a GPS, the priest let God be his guide, and God guided him straight to heaven. Bits of balloons began appearing on mountains and beaches. Ultimately the priest's body surfaced, confirming that he, like Elvis, had left the building.
Story was taken from:
http://darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin2008-16.html
2)Falling in Love
2007 Darwin Award Nominee
Confirmed True by Darwin
(20 June 2007, South Carolina) A passing cabbie found a 21 year-old couple naked and injured in the road an hour before sunrise. The two people died at the nearest hospital without regaining consciousness. Authorities were at a loss to explain what had happened. There were no witnesses, no trace of clothing, and no wrecked cars or motorcycles.
Investigators eventually found a clue high on the roof of a nearby building: two sets of neatly folded clothes. Safe sex takes on a whole new meaning when you are perched on the edge of a pyramid-shaped metal roof. "It appears as if [they] accidentally fell off the roof," Sgt. Florence McCants said.
This is a true Darwin Award trifecta: TWO people die, WHILE in the act of procreation, due to an ASTONISHINGLY poor decision. Bottom line: If you put yourself in a precarious "position" at the edge of a pointy roof, you may well find yourself Falling in Love at the same time.
Ironically, one of the deceased was named "Tumbleston."
(Some reports list the name as "Tubleston.")
Story was taken from:
http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin2007-05.html
3)Bizarre Death
1994 Urban Legend
At the 1994 annual awards dinner given for Forensic Science, AAFS, President Dr. Don Harper Mills astounded his audience with the legal complications of a bizarre death. Here is the story:
On March 23,1994 the medical examiner viewed the body of Ronald Opus and concluded that he died from a shotgun wound to the head. Mr. Opus had jumped from the top of a ten story building intending to commit suicide. He left a note to that effect, indicating his despondency. As he fell past the ninth floor his life was interrupted by a shotgun blast passing through a window which killed him instantly.
Neither the shooter nor the descender was aware that a safety net had been installed just below at the eighth floor level to protect some building workers and that Ronald Opus would not have been able to complete his suicide the way he had planned.
"Ordinarily," Dr. Mills continued, "a person who sets out to commit suicide and ultimately succeeds, even though the mechanism might not be what he intended, is still defined as committing suicide."
That Mr. Opus was shot on the way to certain death, but probably would not have been successful because of the safety net, caused the medical examiner to feel that he had a homicide on his hands. The room on the ninth floor, whence the shotgun blast emanated, was occupied by an elderly man and his wife. They were arguing vigorously and he was threatening her with a shotgun. The man was so upset that when he pulled the trigger he completely missed his wife and the pellets went through the window, striking Mr. Opus.
When one intends to kill subject A but kills subject B in the attempt, one is guilty of the murder of subject B. When confronted with the murder charge the old man and his wife were both adamant. They both said they thought the shotgun was unloaded. The old man said it was his long-standing habit to threaten his wife with the unloaded shotgun. He had no intention to murder her. Therefore the killing of Mr. Opus appeared to be an accident; that is, the gun had been accidentally loaded.
The continuing investigation turned up a witness who saw the old couple's son loading the shotgun about six weeks prior to the fatal accident. It transpired that the old lady had cut off her son's financial support and the son, knowing the propensity of his father to use the shotgun threateningly, loaded the gun with the expectation that his father would shoot his mother. The case now becomes one of murder on the part of the son for the death of Ronald Opus.
Now comes the exquisite twist. Further investigation revealed that the son was, in fact, Ronald Opus. He had become increasingly despondent over the failure of his attempt to engineer his mother's murder. This led him to jump off the ten story building on March 23rd, only to be killed by a shotgun blast passing through the ninth story window. The son had actually murdered himself so the medical examiner closed the case as a suicide.
Story was taken from:
http://www.darwinawards.com/legends/legends1998-16.html
With these stories, we presented to our group members. We helped each other by giving comments as to which would be more likely to animate. In the end, I have chosen the balloon priest.
This time; we presented in a really astonishing method. We have to memorise our group members stories as we may be anyone of them. It was my first time doing this. It was really a refreshing method which enables us to be in a shoe of others and seriously focusing our stories twice as hard.
I was to be Kezia but sadly I was in a state of shock. Somehow something just blocked my mind and I really blanked out. Anyway, it was a memorable moment and would like to have this kind of 'presentation' again.
For me, after the whole 'presentation' was over; I really liked the stories of both Dion's and Ting Yu's. I can imagine Ting Yu's story to be very comical and Dion's to be dramatic; having many twists i suppose. Again, we have to answer the 10 questions but on our selected story.
Hope all ends well.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Day 01
The day started where we were brief of what is to be done. The amusing thing was that this time we have to make a weird story come to life(visually). We broke into groups; Tri, Shuxian, Adeline, Kevin and ME. Kevin picked a story; cleaned out.
Our story was very funny and also in a way ridiculous. It was about these sales women who were determined to demonstrate the wonders of their vacuum even though the woman declines to see it. "Normal" humans would just end there, but they barged right through, vacuuming the whole carpet for like THREE hours.
-Determined bunch of humans.
*Hope I can have their qualities too
Squeezing almost all our brain juice, we finally decided to make it as though it is an advertisement for our anger management course. Both me and Kevin wanted it to be a mixture of video and animation. I was thinking that the front part would be real footage and as the lady gets angry; she *poofed* and becomes an animation from there. Kevin's suggestion was the humans to be of real footage and the background animated. He was thinking that everything that was vacuumed will be turned red. I personally feel would be unrealistic in real life, unless they paint their stuffs.
Apart from thinking; what really stimulate our brain waves was the 10 questions that Alan provided for us. The questions were indeed of useful help. It acts as a foundation to our story; making us clearer as what elements are needed and the do's and don'ts. As we answered the questions, ideas just kept on flowing profusely. We also added some fun elements where the sales women would wear a fixed grin. *Imagines* -DAMN CREEPY
After we presented our ideas, valuable feed backs were given. Our dialogues has to be longer .
I agreed.
Today, I learnt that by presenting and even seeing other presentations could be of great help and even acts as a motivation for us to perform better. I too learnt that the questions enables us to analyze and give full thought to the story, making us have a better perspective and to really put much effort in researching to make the story not just a convincing but a good one.
So our task was to find three weird stories and present it the next day.
While I was searching for the stories. I found one which caught my attention. A man wanted to frame his neighbour so he stabbed himself and wanted to tell the police that his neighbour stabbed him. But a pity before he could even do that, he died due to the loss of blood. What was so LAME; the first stab he thinks it was too mild so he stab another time and this time was a fatal stab.
I really don't understand why he wanted to inflict so much pain to himself. I really hope nothing of this sort would happen to anyone around me.
To be continued~
No comments:
Post a Comment