When I first read the print version of Future Ex Buys Pajamas, the tone of the article was very lightheaded in my head. The author, John Bresland, seems to have an almost self-deprecating style of writing that seemed humorous, as he talked about exploring Paris wide-eyed, like Bambi.
Category: reflections
Audio Intro – Reflection
The one thing that I found to be very apparent in translation between the two media was the obvious loss of meaning between certain aspects in each, respectively. From the text to the audio, there was an entire atmosphere created for the piece. I imagined a black and white effect over the world and imagined that the visit was taking place some odd decades in the past. A certain eeriness took control of the tone and what I originally considered to be a mildly romantic piece became creepy, comparative to a Shia Laboeuf - Disturbia. The final video described the making of a successful suspense scene, and numerous of those characteristics became more apparent when I listened to the audio piece again. Even just listening to the audio version had my attention, fully invested from the start to end. The text piece I merely scanned over in a quick 5 minute read. Audio adds a dimension of experience that is hard to compete with when black font on a white background is the opposition. A level of involvement is introduced, and with that comes attentiveness.
Intro to Audio Reflection
I initially read "Future Ex Buys Pajamas" as a strange journal entry written by an American overcome with culture shock in Paris. Therefore, when putting these texts together, I found elements like the slow, sexy jazz music that sounds almost as if it belongs in an 80's sitcom and the eerie, almost mysterious voice that sounds as if it is coming from a megaphone kind of off-putting. The audio version of this journal by John Bresland, in my opinion, does not match the text, meaning that the two seem almost like completely separate genres. However, I can say that I was very intrigued when I first heard Bresland speak through his words and remained in that state all the way to the end.
intro to audio reflection
As we discussed in class, something that the aural medium does better than the visual/written is that it adds tone of voice. Especially in a technology based world now where we often communicate through text instead of voice, we sometimes worry that our tone will be lost. Emojis have helped us hint at tone of voice, like if you add a laughing emoji after it then it won't be taken as seriously if he didn't have that indication. So when I listened to "Future Ex Buys Pajamas" it gave the piece a tone of voice. I think most of us were surprised at the tone (which was achieved through tone of voice as well as the music that went along with it). But it also made me realize that it is an uncommon occurrence to have the opportunity to hear the author's tone while reading the piece.
Audio Unit Reflection
I read John Bresland's piece differently than he did aloud. His rendition reminded me of a noir protagonist going recalling the events of the day. The ominous music and effects supplemented the atmosphere and the aesthetically aged recording of his voice. Bresland makes the story seem like it was set at a time much earlier than what I interpreted as present day. I'm curious what a visual representation of this story would look like.
Audio Reflections
Immediately I was shocked by the tone of the audio recording. When I originally read it, I read it in a matter-of-fact tone, but the audio version is much more ominous thanks to the gravely, deep sound of the speakers voice combined with the repetitive beat and melancholy trumpet sounds. With this difference in tone, I also notice specific details more. The specific imagery, like chickens, burning leaves, erotic glances, and black stockings, are emphasized by the silences the speaker leaves and the accent sounds that either overlapped or followed the words. Near the end when he says the paragraphs about being a victim of his own manhood, the lack of background sound makes the paragraph seem incredibly long even though it is just a small portion of the work. I got such a different sense of this work through the audio than through reading it. And I must say, I enjoyed listening to it much more. I was more engaged and intrigued by the story as a whole and almost concerned with what would happen next.
Audio Reflection
I was very surprised when I listened to the audio version of "Future Ex Buys Pajamas" because the tone that I had when reading the essay was vastly different from hearing it read aloud. First of all, the voice was much darker. It almost reminded me of a black-and-white film where they have a grainy, harsh narrator describing what characters are doing. When I was reading to myself, I found the piece to be deep and insightful when highlighting the differences between cultures and victimizing women for being too overexposed. When I listened to it though, I think he's trying to be more ironic, attempting to show that the fact that the narrator thinks that it is worrisome that women secretly find relief in pajamas and comforters is ridiculous. The narrator is so focused on his manhood that he can't recognize that women might find dressing in lingerie as freeing. I think that tone is an important aspect that radio can give us that text can't, or rather, it's more difficult to spot. I also thought it was effective that he added in music and put a filter over his voice to make it sound more muddled. It further shows how distance the speaker is from bottom issue in the story: that the speaker values his own beliefs over those that differ from him.
Audio Lesson 1 Reflection
Reading Bresland's text was already attention-grabbing, but hearing the audio made a much larger impact. First of all, the addition of a non-linguistic, bluesy sound element gave the text is an intriguing atmosphere. But it wasn't so distracting that you couldn't focus; it complimented his words nicely.
process reflection
I really enjoyed the visual project, even though I found it frustrating at times when my ideas weren't working out the way I thought they would. But ultimately, I'm happy that I ended up making an event poster because I think it was a good way to practice design elements, and I can see myself having to make one again in the future.
Project One: Reflection
I found this project to be significantly more difficult than I anticipated. Though I feel that I fully fulfilled the requirements for the project, I certainly could have done more in terms of overall exploration of the software. I manipulated elements of the piece that I possessed general comprehension of, and missed out on a few opportunities to compose a more collectively dynamic piece.
Reflection on Guiding Attention with Visuals
This paragraph is an excerpt from my prose reflection:
Project 1 Reflection
I decided to turn in my project when I realized that it fit the baseline criteria. My only goal for this project was to become more familiar with GIMP, and I think I've succeeded in that regard. I feel more confident in manipulating images and quickly accessing the tools to change things.
Lesson 3- Reflection
After reading about fair use, I realized that the copyrighting of media was never something I have taken too much consideration into. While we start learning in high school that it’s important to cite our sources, plagiarism is bad, etc., we mainly regard that in terms of academic integrity. I just assumed that anything on the web is up for grabs (as long as you cite it). I never considered getting permission, since everything I used was for school purposes. I find it interesting that there is such a fine line when it comes to fair use, and it has me thinking of how vast these issues must be on the web since there seems to be infinite access to other creators’ works. It really begs the question that even if you aren't following these guidelines/using someone else’s work without permission, how likely is it that you will face consequences? What are the chances that the original creator will come across your work? And if they do, how likely is it that they will do something about it?
Lesson 3 Reflection
My immediate knowledge concerning copyright came from how licensing worked using Soundcloud and uploading your music. When publishing a track you're given the option of choosing an "All Rights Reserved" or "Creative Commons" license. When I had previously done a quick internet search to find the difference between to the two it seemed that in general, a Creative Commons license is more liberal with its sharing options and while you can enable certain permissions with an All Rights Reserved license you have to specifically choose under a category what a person can or can't do with your music. Besides music publishing, I have lots of experience with citing sources in MLA format. Following the readings I'm still not sure about the differences between specific licenses yet but I definitely have gotten a sense about the guidelines for using other people's property in your own work.
Reflection on Copyright and Fair Use
After reading the sections on copyright and fair use, I was surprised to realize all of the details that go into citing something, even the image of a cereal box. First, I find it odd that we don't learn any of this information earlier in our education, at least I never really knew about the importance of copyright laws, besides plagirization in essays, until my freshmen year of college. In a world where technology has become a major integral part of our society and work life, we have unlimited access to text, images, and graphics that are not our own. Sure, we can cite the name or author of these art forms, but in the end we could still be punished legally if we do not receive permission from the creators. In education, the fine line between what is acceptable/what is not when using various works is slightly more blurry because it depends on the purpose behind its usage and the size of the audience it will reach. How do we know, then, when it is appropriate to utilize images and texts that aren't ours? And how do we properly cite them?
Copyright and copyleft
So this may not be the soundest advice I've ever received, but a very wise man once told me regarding copyright issues, it's better to apologize than to ask permission. Really, you can publish whatever you want online, but you have to take it down when someone asks, or else you'll get sued, he said. This is, at its core, true: as it says on the Measuring Fair Use site, the only way to know for sure if it's fair use is to get taken to court.
Lesson 3 Response
In reading the copyright overview I was reminded of the situation with Disney. I remember reading that the dates surrounding how long something remains under copyright are heavily influenced by the copyright of Mickey Mouse. Mickey first appeared in 1928, so how long will it be until iconic Disney material becomes public domain. How will we be able to progress into the future of copyright if so many images have been used and re used, thanks to the advent of the internet. It will be interesting to see how Disney will fight to maintain their copyright. I can't imagine Mickey Mouse being free for the public domain.
Ethical Sourcing Reflection
The pictures I chose were ones of my family friends for their wedding. While I know these are considered fair use, I wonder if I need to get their permission to publish them in any way on the internet, even if they are part of a school project. They will be present on a public domain and so I wonder if there are steps I need to take to ensure that this is allowed. And if they were strangers, would I still be allowed to use them for academic purposes? In my mind, I think yes because the only people seeing them will most likely be my classmates and professor.
