Lecture #1 - Two TED Talks

I decided to watch two Ted Talks for this lecture.

The first was a TED Talk by Don Levy on A Cinematic Journey through Visual Effects.
In it Don Levy talked about how visual effects in cinema can be thought as essentially what magicians do. They create illusions using three basic principles. They are assumption, which is that people assume things in our world are the same as things in the world presented, presumption, which is people can presume things in the world presented will behave as we expect, and lastly, context in reality, which is does the items presented make sense in reality. In then becomes the obsession of the magician, or the visual effect artist, to never betray the illusion. He then showed some different clips of visual effects in cinema over the past hundred years. These showed different aspects and types of visual effects over the years. It was a very interesting TED Talk.

Link to the video: http://www.ted.com/talks/don_levy_a_cinematic_journey_through_visual_effects.html


The other TED Talk was Amit Sood: Building a museum of museums on the web. This was a very interesting TED Talk about the google art project. This is where google created virtual museums very similar to the new google maps. Whereas instead of walking along a street via your web browser you are walking through a museum! Then you can click on individual paintings and see them at 10 Billion pixels. This means you can zoom in to see the individual brush strokes and cracks of the paintings. People can also create their own virtual collections of their favorite art works and discuss them with their friends. These seems like an amazing project that google made and I am definitely glad I learned about it!

Final Project #3 - Marclay/Tinguely MashUp - Christmas At Someone Else's

This project was an interesting project for this being a digital media class but I had fun. Chohnny and I combined our two ideas. Her original idea was to have something robotic painting the vinyl, and my idea was to have an elongated abstract record player. So I think we did a pretty good job combining the two ideas. We built the middle part on top of my record player, then we added the Santa, and the speakers and then spray painted all the pieces. The Santa, depending on how wet his brush was, would push down on the record, which would slow it down and add a strange creepiness to the music. This made it feel familiar, because of the Christmas themes, but creepy and uncomfortable so it was like having Christmas at someone else's house.

Here is a picture of our project:

Final Project #2 - BYOB - Rudolph's Acid Trip

For this project I decided to just use my skills in Adobe Premeire to edit clips from rudolph the red nose reindeer. It turned into a freaky looking and yet funny video. I think it's hilarious.

Image from the video:

Video to be uploaded soon.

Final Project #1 - Broken Record

 This is the broken record that I made!

ART 345 - Project Two - Sounds from the World

Here is the link to my soundcloud page with sounds I gathered for this project. Eventually all of these sounds made into my video triptych whether they were edited heavily or not.

https://soundcloud.com/patrick-zbella

Planes Flying:

Dog Barking:

Pages Being Flipped:



Bus:

Project Five - Audio Tour - Bricks - JPZ

This is the link to my audio tour.
http://www.unr.edu/art/digital_media/tour/midtown/007%20Bricks%20--%20JPZ.mp3

Bricks by J. Patrick Zbella

This work depicts an unnamed fictional character that narrates the moments before his death. It is unclear exactly where he is and who he is with, but he is somewhere else telling the listener his story. The story shows him walking downtown contemplating death and suicide, until his unforseen death. And as he is dying he comes to several realizations about his life.

I intentionally made it unclear where he was; whether he is in hell or heaven or some other after life, I left that bit up to the interpretation of the listener. I did this because the story focuses on life and living and not what comes after. Though, my interpretation is that he is in some sort of heaven or purgatory but is still bitter about his circumstances because he is incapable of fulling understanding them.

I wrote the piece, recorded and directed the voice actors, as well as created all the music for the piece. The music is just me and my guitar and some effect pedals.

Project Four - Performance Art Piece

This is the video of my fourth project.

Walking With Yourself


This project consisted of me filming myself walking past the camera in several different areas. It was actually surprisingly difficult to film myself, as I had to set the camera up where I thought it would work, then walk past it, then view the footage and then adjust accordingly. After I got all the footage I ran into problems editing the videos. First it was difficult to figure out the spacing between the three different videos so I had to time how long it took to walk through the NV Gallery and then edit from there. I also somehow messed up my export of the videos because they turned out with a terrible quality and were all pixelated. But I decided to just go with it because I thought the loss of quality to the second me might be an interesting idea. I also realized how this project was all about not knowing what to expect, not only as the viewer, which is typical for viewing art, but for the artist as well. I had no idea what mine looked like or what it was going to look like till I watched it back. This added a very cool sense of randomness and adventure. I had no idea what to expect, really, only what I had taken with me and then I just winged it. I did not turn out how I'd imagined but that's okay because that's a part of this performance. The piece itself represents the difficulties of trying to follow your own intentions; whether from your brain or heart.

Project Three - Video Triptych

Here is the video:

This project has been my favorite to work on so far, and is one of my proudest accomplishments. I shot all the footage my self, added the special effects with After effects, effected some of the audio files in Audition, and the edited the whole piece in Premiere.
The video depicts the main character, myself, appearing to wake up but then slowly realizing he is in a nightmare. The visuals slowly get stranger and stranger until the crescendo into a quickly paced explosion of images until he eventually awakes.
My goal with this project was to create splendid and surreal visuals.

Sounds Gathered from My Life

*Sounds to be added*

Digital Media Youtube Mixer - Project One

Here is the link to my project: http://www.unr.edu/art/digital_media/345fall2013/Patrick_Zbella.html

Artist statement:
     I decided to ask my fellow band members and other musician friends to play something in the key of Am, but I didn't want to just film them in their typical music environments, like a garage or studio. I wanted to film musicians in unique environments where you wouldn't expect to find them. I was especially lucky when filming my trumpet playing friend because when we went to go film by the train-tracks a train was just passing by. This added a very interesting affect to the piece as a whole, and ties in well with the others sounds of the other players' surroundings, like the freeway, wind, etc.

ART 345 - Project One Screenshot

Here is a screenshot of my first project in ART 345:

Project 6

 Project 6
I wanted to color it but could't figure out how.

The New Aesthetic

This was my favorite post of the New Aesthetic blog:
http://new-aesthetic.tumblr.com/post/47612713896/google-street-view-hyperlapse-by-teehan-lax

Which included this video:
Google Street View Hyperlapse from Teehan+Lax Labs on Vimeo.

This video appealed to me because it was very beautiful to watch. It was like a moving-three-dimensional-time-lapse. All of earth was speeding along underneath the camera at very high speeds and yet the camera seemed to move and shift so slowly and smoothly. This really helped to give the viewer a sense of actually moving this quickly through the different environments with the ability to slowly tilt their head. It almost felt like a high-speed roller coaster. I'm going to go watch it again!

List of YouTube videos to be used for Project 5

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qj9OEmUr0F8 (80's)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPzlPCpQguE (possibly, birth)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cVp46W_ZEY (maybe, DJ)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFFnl2PFZnM (DJ)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taTzMLVBwYU (2:55, computer)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKn8XIfqj2U (:54, emergence of new culture)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04mN4GopRZA (3:41, greater than)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJUQD6Rr2M8 (instrumentalist)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ty0JSf1zCbA (rave)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4rRr9kD-yo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFGVDWc_5Q8 (concert)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nrux4QCSIC8 (Phillipe Thomas)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHstSuxC4LQ (3:50ish, everyone)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IitbJszd1kM (artworks)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK25YQNyjcE (shake up, :06)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pir_H7kf_JU (leonardo da vinci, olden ways)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLCEUpIg8rE (freedom!!!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CV6k_SKkHKQ (Guy Debord)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VM43UznSX1s&bpctr=1364839738 (Propaganda)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uATuM3ajhBw (combinations)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fIbrq8jFeA (fragments)

To be continued

Reading #2 Questions

1) There were some similarities between this reading and the last reading primarily in the discussion of the validity of art, or questioning whether something is art or not. My question is: is, and if so what is, there a difference is between digital art that an artist would make with the intention of submitting it to an art gallery and digital art that an artist created with the intention of marketing it to the masses like a motion picture? Does the first artist the true artist for sticking to what art has been in the past, or is he an uppity individual that would look down upon all other art that was not prepared in the exact fashion his was? And is the second artist a copout for making quite a bit of money, or is he the true artist because he wants his art to be seen, felt, and interpreted by as many people as possible?

2) During the rise of digital art especially in the '60's it seemed as though much of this new form of art was very bizzarre, out there, and shocking. Was this because that was just the style of the decade or was it because none of this had ever been done before so almost anything they could think of would have been strange or shocking? Probably a mixture of both.

Project Four - Video Emulation - Progress

So far I have decided on the two videos I am going to do. For the first I will need a mirror, for the second I will need a friend. I was going to film last week, by borrowing a camera from a friend but he ended up needing it last minute. I am going to borrow it this week. My friend is already in for the ride for being my actor for my second video, so now all I need is a mirror.

These are the two videos I plan on emulating:

Bank by Pat McElnea
http://www.ubu.com/film/mcelnea_bank.html

and

Flux Film - Evil Faerie by Owen Land
http://ubumexico.centro.org.mx/video/fluxfilm_25_landow.mpg


All though if they don't turn out well I'm considering doing the first couple minutes of the video about Stephen Beck:
http://www.ubu.com/film/beck_illuminated.html

Project Three: Montage Animation w/ Audio

"unrequited love: as told by a herbivore"

  Top: C. Willis    Bottom: P. Zbella

Love will always find a way. Whether it must travel from reality through fantasy till it finds reality again, love will always find a way.

That is the story. A caterpillar must venture through a fantasy world till he finally meets his true love.

Project #2 Montage Animation

This is my montage animation. Crystal's is the first in our story of Caterpie finding love. In mine he tavels from fantasy into reality where he finally meets his love: the caterpillar.

Walter Benjamin - Reading Assignment #1

1. Throughout the piece Benjamin compares older more traditional methods of art and more modern methods, such as paintings and sculptures versus digital photography and cinema. With paintings and sculptures there can only be one true original while movies and photographs are mass-produced a served to many different locations. Does this take away from the meaning of the art? Does the fact that art now-a-days is so easily accessible that it can never compare to the singleness, the originality, and 'pureness' of traditional 'masterpieces'?

2. If the answer to the above question is yes, that is, digital art can never be 'pure art' according to Benjamin  but is there any way to create digital art that can be considered 'pure'? Whether it be by quality alone, or by a change in production, in other words, how the public sees it?

Diptych Montage - Art 245 - Assignment 1

      Crystal Willis and I worked together on our Diptych Montage assignment. Our approach was that we each picked 10 photos, then met together and each other's 10 and then decided on five more that would help to connect our 20. Crystal went for a paired approached in her ten, where she had five pairs that correlated  I sort of just picked what I thought would look cool together in a montage, and figured I would get the message across with exposition rather than planning. When we first meet up we didn't end up finding the 5 photos then, but we ended up working on the assignment at the same time and got our photocopies then. My piece splits down the middle with the fantasy side on the left and the reality side on the right.