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Blog 12

This week I discovered the photo sharing site, SlickPic. This site offers something for everyone, from the beginning photographer to the professional photographer. This online image hosting service offers a great way for beginning photographers to showcase their images and get feedback from more experienced photographers. However, professional photographers will enjoy the ability to create different collections and albums of their photos that they can share with potential employers.

 The ease of uploading is the most obvious attribute to this particular photo sharing, however this combined with the ease to share photos onto similar multimedia services such as your Blog is what makes SlickPic a really outstanding site for everyone. 

Not only is it sleekly simple to organise and share your own photographs, both privately and publicly,��SlickPic has the amazing function of being able to see the most popular photos shared by other SlickPic users from around the globe. 

One of the stand out features of this site, however, was definitely the ease and accessibility to be able to edit photos once you have uploaded it to your profile. You are able to make every photo perfect and just the way you like and upload it to your albums all in the one server. 

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Blog 11.1

The other day I filmed my friends skating on a Lumix GH3, I edited the footage simply using iMovie (2011). 

The main part of the process was scrolling through all the footage and choosing the most appropriate shots. Afterwards it was important for me to edit the clips to the song I chose (Luck I Got What I Want - Jungle). I also had to change the colours of some of the shots, the shot of the birds and the lighthouse for example, as the lighting at the time of filming was different to that of the shots of the skatepark. Overall it was a very fun process and I am now going to start filming and playing around editing a lot more. 

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Blog 10.1

I have had some experience with digital video editing as I studies Media in my final year at high school and have always had a strong interest in film in general. I have had experience using iMovie and Final Cut. Final Cut is a far more superior software to use than iMovie as it allows you have more control with the content with which you are editing in all aspects to your film (video clips, sound, colour grading etc;).

  With the progression of technology the way in which people can easily film professional style films/videos is astonishing. For instance, television show Numb3rs publicly announced that they used the Cannon 5D Mark II to film many of their seasons. Also the academy awarded documentary Searching For Sugarman filmed many parts of the feature film using simply an iPhone camera. These days, anyone can take professional looking footage it is simply the content which you are filming is vital.

We all know that social media has become a heavy tool for advertisers to try and share their products to the world. GoPro has been a leader in this by creating amazing videos using their very own product. By this, people want to view and share their add in a way that has never been possible in the history of advertising. 

  Final Cut Screen Shot

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Blog 9.1

For some reason Tumblr did not allow me to upload my audio file directly to my blog. 

For my digital editing I used two files: Fall in Love by BADBADNOTGOOD and a speech made by the comedian Bill Hicks. By adding the two tracks together I felt that I was able to highlight the important points Hicks covers in his famous 'Just a Ride' speech. The fluctuating fast and slow paced piano riffs resonate well with what Hicks has to say.

I cut the speech up into several parts and added them over the top of the BADBADNOTGOOD track to make the speech fit with beat of the orinigal song.

You can find my audio track by clicking this link.  

WARNING: content of this track may offend

Bill Hicks

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Blog 8.1

I have has absolutely no personal experience on digital audio editing, however my housemate is a music producer and goes under the name Thomas Jack – check out his Soundcloud when you have the time. By living with him I have gained a very basic understanding of how music is edited. He uses a program call Ableton, by using this software he is able to manipulate sound and adding audio files to create an entirely new sound. He can adjust the key, the tone and the timing of any song or a sample snippet of the original song so much that he is able to call his own “original” sound. I once asked him whether he was worried about being caught via the copyright laws by using someone elses song even he does edit them to its very core. He responded by saying that even before digital sound editing an music producing people were doing the exact same thing, only by using the same chords, notes and chord progressions on a guitar for example. People would use the same chords from a song that they had previous learnt, but ‘edited’ it by using their original strumming or beat. It goes the same for digital sound editing; even though people often uses someone else’s work by editing the original sound and adding your own original ideas to it, a song can become your own.

  An interesting story I heard regarding this was about he music Baauer. If you remember, there was once trending social media sensation of people posting videos of them selves dancing to the song “Harlem Shake” by Baauer. Once this trend went viral, the song became very popular – more popular than it ever would without these millions of videos from people around the world, everyone knew about the song even the person who originally said the words: “Do the Harlem Shake”. Plastic Miller a Brooklyn hip-hop artist original said these famous five words in his song Miller Time. As a result, Baauer saw little of the money made from his song “Harlem Shake”.

  Copyright laws have become somewhat irrelevant in the 21st century music world. One simple sample can be edited, changed and manipulated so much that it has absolutely no affiliation to the original sound. Like the Internet, digital audio has nearly become a lawless enterprise. 

    Music Producer 'Baauer'

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Blog 5.1

This Week I took my own photo of two friends standing on the side of a property near Lexton, Victoria . My image was edited using iPhoto, 2011. 

Hugo & Jim (original image):

Firstly, I chose this photograph as my original image as I really like the lines within it. The fence line from the foreground to the background coincides really well with the two subjects in the picture. Furthermore, the horizon line creates a strong outline for the overall aesthetics of the image. I did not, however, really like the colour in the image - they are disjointed and bring a sense of inconsistency to the photograph. 

Hugo & Jim (edit):

I much prefer the edited version than the original photograph. By cropping the image I was able to adapt the rule-of-thirds to the photograph which creates more symmetry within the image. Furthermore trimming the top of the image the two subject are more in focus than the original as viewers are not distracted by irrelevant aspects of the image. I also re angled the image to straightened the horizon line the background to enhance symmetry, 

I adjusted the colouring of the image, by lowering the saturation and shadows of the image it brought out tones that were not in the original. I also added a yellow temperature and a slightly green tint to the image which helped mask the overall colouring of the photograph and I was able to flatten the subject a lot more with the background of the dry grass in the background. By this, I feel it resonated with the setting of the image, that being in the Australian outback.

This type of digital manipulation to photography in this day in age is vital to all photography. In this context I feel it is very much a good thing as it can improve the original photograph as you are able to highlight the original themes of the photograph whilst maintaining its rawness. 

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Blog 3.1

An amazing digital story that appeals to me great is “Humans of New York”. This blog appeals to me in such a way as I was going to do a similar project to this throughout Melbourne as I share a great intrigue to the story of the everyday person and I believe that not one life is more significant than the other.  This blog strongly possesses all elements of digital story telling, and clearly expresses each individual story to create a wider portrait of New York City. Compared to other digital stories blogged Humans of New York main focal element is it’s photography as it utilizes this to explain their story; hence being awarded ‘Best use of photography’ at the Webby Awards. The linearity and manipulation of the web page makes it incredibly user friendly as you simply scroll down the page to view each individual story. This further cements the relationship between the user and blog; which is needed for the website to build empathy between the user and the person photographed. Furthermore, the configuration on each photograph makes it easy to re-blog each story to easily allowing multi-nodal communication for each user to share the story that interests them the most.

I have never really thought to analyse any website in this depth before. Having a sound knowledge on these elements, I now know, makes it easy to separate and categories each web site. Furthermore, I now can see what makes a more user and content friendly website. 

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Blog 1.1

Hi there, my name is Charlie Perry and I like to party. I am a 21-year-old Advertising and Marketing student living two separate lives in Bathurst and Melbourne.

As I have a newly found passion for film and photography I have begun using Adobe Photoshop and Final Cut Pro. I am also a regular user of iTunes, Microsoft Word and Microsoft PowerPoint.

Some of the websites and social media platforms I use consistently are VICE, Gmail, Mumbrella, Soundcloud, Tone Deaf and of course Facebook. 

I feel that Web 2.0 and the semantic web, like many digital products, are designed to make our lives simpler and easier in order to access and obtain the information that is most important to us. The semantic web was created to condense the content on the world wide web by creating a relationship with formatting the data we access on the internet. In other words. In enables data to be described in ways that makes sense to both humans and computers. Therefore, I like a website that tailors to my needs and is constantly updating, like Facebook. I am also attracted to websites that contain heavy content yet aesthetically simple, like VICE and Tone Dead. This allows me to easily scroll through and assess, what I believe to be is, the most important information.

It is interesting to view the timeline of the history of the internet as we see that one of the first applications utilised was a means of connecting humans together socially: with emails; just three years after the first ever node was connected for the military and just one year after the first ever electronic formatted document was ever publish on the web. It is also interesting to see how quickly advertisers were able to utilise the way in which we inherently connected with one another; with the first 'SPAM' email being sent just eight years after the email was created in 1972. 

I believe, however, the development of Web 3.0 and the way in which we, as a 21st century society, perceive the usage and practices of digital technology is getting to a point where we are (ironically) going backwards. We are becoming so dependent on these technologies as a means of learning, accessing "important" information and most alarmingly social interaction that we have nearly lost our perception on the difference between the importance of the physical world and the digital world; with many spending majority of their ‘life’ through the digital world – and it has become an acceptable, embarrassing fact.

 This is a short film the represents my thoughts above. 

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Blog 2.1

Analogue Media:

-       Pens and pencils

-       Notebooks

-       Books

-       Newspapers

-       Vinyls

Digital Media:

-       Digilal-SLR camera

-       Computer

-       iPod, mp3 audio files

-       mp4 video files

-       Online magazines

-       Online newspapers

-       Digital books – on my Kindle

  I much prefer to use analogue media for many of my daily media activities, such as reading, writing and sometimes listening to music, as I am attracted to the tangibility and overall physicality of using each particular medium.  However I often find myself, out of convenience sake, using the digital forms of these mediums. For instance, I often do not have time to read the newspaper in the morning so I read the digital version online whilst at work. I also download the majority of my music onto my computer, as it is faster and far simpler to organize my songs. Again, I sometimes buy vinyl’s of my favourite records to be able to have a physical copy the music I love.  I have recently been given a Kindle from my brother as he knows I loves to read and tells me it is the best way to be able to read as many books as possible, as it is again much easier to possess the digital copy of a particular book than trying to find it in different book stores – however I am quite turned off the idea of reading a screen to enjoy the art of language.

These days I feel you can possess almost any form of analogue media in the digital form. Although it is mostly for our convenience, I do prefer the concept of the physicality of these medias, such as music and books, that I love to be in my hands and in turn creating a personal sensation to each and every one of my books and vinyl’s. In other words, things like books and music become more than a ‘digital format’ but a priceless possession that is mine and mine alone. 

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Blog 1.2

There are many issues regarding copyright on blog sites such as Tumblr. For instance, it is important to ensure you have confirmed that any image you use on your blog has copyright permission; if you are unsure, it is best to not use it at all. Furthermore it is vital that you do not copy and past content straight from the web page onto your blog, and that you have a clear hyperlink and reference of the web browser you obtained the content from originally.

Creative Commons is a non-for-profit organisation that allows users to share their creative content with other users though the use of free legal devices, allowing users to access and obtain free copyright licenses to give the general public permission to use their creative content. Furthermore, users are able to alter their individual copyright conditions to tailor their needs. By this, it allows people to have a legal benefaction in regards to other people using, sharing their creative work under the Creative Commons license.

You can see a full list of free, publicly available onlineresources specifically for images that can be used online here.