Response to Freak Factor

http://changethis.com/manifesto/64.04.FreakFactory/pdf/64.04.FreakFactory.pdf

After reading David Rendall's "Freak Factor: Discovering Uniqueness by Flaunting Weakness":
The manifesto was about how to better your output at the workplace by improving your input. How one can do this is by finding people's natural strength and utilizing them, appreciating who works with or for you by evaluating them for their good qualities, by exaggerating weaknesses instead of eliminating them, and by helping employees adapt through failing and practice. We need to embrace everyone as they are (through even their weaknesses and failures), and help them strive to bettering themselves, not for us, but them individually. I agree with Rendall in the aspects of awareness, amplification, and adaption.

Awareness:
I agree because we all need to not only be aware of other's weaknesses to find their strengths, but we need to be aware of our own. For me, I know I cannot draw. However, I realize this and know that I am good at writing. Though I am weak at drawing pictures, I am good at describing pictures or emotions and that is my strength through my weakness. Knowing that I cannot draw a good image helps me to further describe an image in my writing, allowing me to become a better writer.

Amplification:
We can all exhibit out weaknesses to own own advantage, the trick is knowing how to. I believe that a weakness can be turned around fairly quickly. In my example above, I noted that I am bad at drawing. Yet I believe that someday I could use this in a way to make people laugh. My drawing is so bad that it is humorous - and because I would like to someday write for comedy (television or a comedian) I can turn it into something that can be either displayed for humour (cuz it is that bad) or use it as inspiration to create jokes. By knowing your weakness, you can display it; but by being open to your weakness, you can make it your strength.

Adaption:
By adapting to our weaknesses, we can grow comfortable with our strengths. My strength of writing (and I like to think humor is as well) can grow better if I adapt to my drawing weakness. So what I need to do is realize that i am bad at drawing. After that I can sit and think: well how can I adapt to my poor drawing. And when I come to the conclusion that I can expose that weakness for other's humor by making fun of it, or just drawing a terrible picture, then I am adapting to the weakness and helping my skills in my strength grow.

Audio Response to Collapsus

www.Collapsus.com

Reflection on Our Gaming Presentation

I believe that our presentation for our game design, Calus, went fairly well. We took a lot of time in coming up with the concept, and delivered what we proposed to. However, I believe we could have presented it in a more professional manner, rather than presenting it as we did - just for class. We did not seem very convincing in trying to sell the game to investors, and I wish we had been stronger in the area. I also feel that our rules may have been too basic and that we should have gone into more depth with it. I think the only rules we had were that if you kill innocent bystanders then the furies come and you have to fight them, and that you have health that needs replenish or you will die. I feel that we could have gone into more depth by adding what limits the world has, the rules regarding money use, rules of the levels/worlds, and rules about the character. This was the hardest because we knew we only had 15 minutes to present and did not want to take all the time getting out all the rules. We wanted to go into more depth because we felt the rules could entice the audience further into the game, but unfortunately we could not. I believe we presented strongly in the other areas (goals, mechanics, and objectives). The goals were to beat each level, then each boss in their respective worlds; the mechanics were basic Xbox/PlayStation controls on those platforms, and a over the shoulder view; and our objectives were to gain powers and weapons (and titans) to eventually meet with Zeus once more and to defeat him (all of course in more depth).

Reflection on other's hero/villain

First I looked at Cam's hero, whose name I cannot find, and villain Caligula. I found his hero to be very creative with the attire, his eyes, and the colors. What I liked best was the colors: red & yellow, and gray & brown. I feel like the combination of red and yellow help show that this is the hero, while the brown & gray show that he is a knight. What I also noticed is the lite hue of red on the shield and how the yellow has a darker than normal hue - and I find this to compliment the two colors even more. I cannot see much regarding the lighting he used as the photo is so small, but it seems that its a consistent light on the entire figure which presents a noble mood perhaps. The movement is very superhero-like: quick, witty, and balanced. This superhero is good with his sword, and you can tell he is smart by his parallel movements. The villain, Caligula, is presented well as the villain with his hands in the air, sort of seeming to demand power. I cannot see many colors besides the skin color, and white garment; nor can I see any lighting (the picture is too small).

Next, I looked at Mike Stephen's superhero Minute Man. I really like how Mike drew his villain, with a very shadowed picture, and a variety of brightness/saturation. Shadows do not only occur throughout the entire drawing, but also (which I like a lot) on Minute Man's face under his hat. This helps create the impression that Minute Man is very mysterious. And though this mysteriousness can be confused with a villain, Mike uses good colors to rid the confusion. His use of a gold glove on Minute Man's right hand helps present that this superhero is noble and honorable. I like how he made the glove brighter than anything in the picture, which is symbolic in showing that here is where Minute Man's power comes from. He then saturates the gold into Minute Man's hat and ribbons, helping create a good complimentary combination of that gold and a saturated burgundy-colored suit. I found his movements to be fantastic - the ability to freeze time. And also with how Mike made him walk - so elegant and high class. It gives you the impression that you don't want to mess with this guy, and that he is well known.

Unfortunately, Maddie has not yet posted her image of her superhero or villain. I will update this later if she has it uploaded.

This American Life Response

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/178/superpowers

Written Reflection on the Video Joke Assignment --**Videos are posted further down**

For our video joke, we chose the joke involving the Economist, Mathematician, & Accountant. I directed the video with humans (not the one with the stuffed animals). In that video joke, we utilized movement to convey the meanings we wanted to get across because we were to voice-over the dialogue. How we did this was by having the characters in the video show emotion with their hand gestures, the way they walked, sat, and acted with their body language. We also utilized line in this video with the eye contact that was presented between the characters, and by the character's directionality of where they were sitting and facing as this line showed who had the dominating power over the other character.
In the 2nd video, we decided to use Kramer's script involving stuffed animals. With this video, we had to utilize shape because we were using the stuffed animals. Our reasons were because we thought the shape of each animals body would help present the animals position of power. For example, the pig was a circular shape, which helps show power, and the pig's character was powerful as he was the economist that gets the job. Meanwhile, the duck's shape was more triangular, and we chose that character for the duck because the triangle shape presents a less dominant character. We also had to utilize rhythm for this video because, as the animals do not have real movement, we had to create rhythm to the movements so that they seem realistic and catch the audience's attention.

As I discussed the contrasting elements between the two videos, there was some affinity. This occurred with the tension and release created by the scripts' joke: the audience tensed for the beginning, wondering if this businesswoman/businessbear will find a person for the job. Then the economist comes in and gets the job, and the audience is released.

My Hero and Animation - The Janitor