A Game of Bluffs Promo Work

Whilst i’ve been hard at work editing my short film ‘A Game of Bluffs’ I’ve also been busy promoting the film ahead of its release via social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Whilst some people have been putting up trailers to their films I decided to promote mine via still images as I did not want to give away too much about my film or give an impression of the finished style. Just like my film, I’ve chosen to centre the promotion on the characters using the tag line “Four Guys, One Poker Game, but who’s playing a Game of Bluffs?”

Essential Readings Part 1 – Micro-Celebrities and the Branded Self

As part of our first week of 161MC we were given a number of useful resources to read and look into as part of our self development in creating impact in media.

Our first reading was ‘Here Comes Everybody – It Takes a Village To Find a Phone’ Clay Shirky. This charts an incident where by a woman named Ivanna left her phone in the back seat of a NYC cab which ended up in the hands of another girl named Sasha who would go on to refuse to hand back the phone. The tale goes that Ivanna with the assistance of her friend managed to drum up enough interest across the world with the power of the internet which resulted in Sasha being arrested and the phone taken from her. This read really emphasised a shift into a digital age and the power of the internet to unite people in a collaborative effort over something even so small as a phone. To me this piece goes to show that since the creation of the internet we have gained a new leash of freedom and power that we have not experienced before as human beings and that the power of group action and persistence can achieve anything. Author of ‘We the Media’ Dan Gillmor coins the term ‘the former audience’ to describe “people who react to, participate in, and even alter a story as it is unfolding”, which really summarises exactly what happened in the case of Ivanna. The audience became active in the unravelling story and as a collaborative effected the ending.

Following on from the powers of the digital age and on to the coined term of the ‘micro-celebrity’. Facebook is becoming one of the largest social media site in the world as of the 3rd October 2013, there were 500 million People using it. Twitter has what it calls 232 monthly active users. In this crazy world of social media almost everyone has some form of digital footprint traceable through the internet. In ‘Blackwell Companion to New Media Dynamics’ Jean Burgess and Axel Bruns describe micro-celebrity as “the commitment to deploying and maintaing one’s online identity as if it were a branded good, with the expectation that others do the same”. Reflecting on this description it is my belief that anyone with a Facebook or other social network website partakes in the micro-celebrity life style, editing what photos are seen and what aren’t, selecting carefully what status to post, what tweet to tweet, all the time bearing in mind that others will see what you put out and will judge. Not everyone does this knowingly and even fewer do so knowing how to use it to their advantage. By using Social Media sites like Twitter and Facebook and presenting a united image of ones self you can begin to develop an interested fan base in something that catches their interest that you also find interest or in fact produce. This was not something I had considered before these readings and the true power of the internet became apparent to me after these readings.

Related Task Blogs:
https://grantsnaithyr1.wordpress.com/2015/01/06/digital-footprint-part-1/

https://grantsnaithyr1.wordpress.com/2015/01/08/digital-footprint-part-2/

https://grantsnaithyr1.wordpress.com/2015/01/12/digital-footprint-part-3/

https://grantsnaithyr1.wordpress.com/2015/01/14/anna-kendrick-on-her-media-presence/

Web 2.0 Narrative

This weeks task is to take a ‘classic’ narrative, a story retold through many films, TV shows and/or plays. We should understand this story inside out and research its structure, history and social function. Our research should be shown clearly through our finished product. To create this we should make use of various online tools such as Googlemaps, Youtube, Camtasia, Xtranormal, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram to retell and update your chosen story. Whilst we were being set this task I figured a lot of people would be drawn to creating something similar to the example pieces we had been shown in class such as ‘The Digital Story of the Nativity’ which utilised social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter to tell the old story of the birth of christ. I want to avoid falling into this trap and instead came up with the idea of retelling a story through a means that I had always wanted to experiment with, Machinima.

Machinima is the use of real-time computer  graphic engines to create a cinematic multi-media production. Notable items that fall into this category include: Red vs Blue, Nixxiom Machinima and Tales of the Past. In recent years with the advancement of technology and its more accessible appearance on the internet has seen this style of media production flourish even going so far as to inspire entire film festivals to the craze.

The particular game I have chosen to use to create my Machinima piece is Blizzard’s World of Warcraft. World of Warcraft is a massive multiplayer online role playing game set in a fantasy world of orcs and humans that has gained millions of players and enjoyed over ten years of success. There are many great examples of World of Warcraft machinima and below are four notable ones that I have chosen as examples.

The art of creating a World of Warcraft machinima is something I have always wanted to experiment with and as such I had already done a bit of background research prior to this. I was made aware of two useful programmes that would assist in this process; FRAPS and WOW Model Viewer. FRAPS is a recording programme that allows you to record your screen during in game play whilst WoW Model Viewer allows you to take any character or item from within the games database and place it against a green screen to manipulate at free will to place against a backdrop, thus allowing you to do certain things you otherwise couldn’t achieve with game mechanics. Ian Beckman gives a great but brief description of how to achieve this in his tutorial.

I set out to download these programmes however it didn’t run too well on my laptop and WoW Model Viewer just didn’t seem to cooperate at all so I sent out a few messages to others who had had success at creating WoW Machinima in the past in the hopes they could offer up some advice. I am dedicated to this idea (even if I haven’t decided on my story yet) but I realise that time is a factor in this week project and if I can’t figure out how to get the technology functioning then I will have to adapt my idea somehow.

Anna Kendrick on her Media Presence

A short read about Anna Kendrick who comments about her own presence on social media websites such as Twitter and how she approaches her own representation as a genuine individual, speaking her mind openly. It makes for an interesting read regarding how people vary in the way they represent themselves in the media but it raises the question; Is this her genuine personality that shines through in such interviews and tweets or is this the image that she wants to portray to her followers knowing that consumers more often than not are attracted to controversy. Let me know your thoughts, i’d be interested to hear.

http://www.nylon.com/articles/anna-kendrick-cover-february-2015

Digital Footprint – Part 2

For the second part of my assigned task we were now asked to consider the digital footprint of another professional media practitioner and how they represent themselves. So to do this I decided to pick a favourite director of mine in James Gunn from such films as ‘Super’ and most recently ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’.

On what sites do they present themselves on the internet?

So James Gunn has a Facebook page which he operates himself and posts fairly often to it as you may have seen I posted a quote of advise to fellow filmmakers from James Gunn on my blog a month back. He also operates a Twitter page on which some of his posts are the same as on Facebook however he appears to use this more regularly than Facebook, whether this is because her recognises the rising popularity of Twitter for following celebrities or whether this is just because of ease I am unsure. He has his own website ( http://jamesgunn.com ) which I only just discovered since starting writing this blog and can I say it is eye catching and intriguing. The opening header of his website says “the official website of filmmaker james gunn for shit outside the norm”. This particularly struck me as a website is a means of advertisement to potential employees, and although James Gunn is now a big name surely this was still a resource for potential employers. However it is in keeping with his relaxed and casual display of self throughout all media outlets.

What kind of images do they use and do they brand themselves?

So with James Gunn having recently released hit sensation Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy it is clear that James Gunn has since been branding himself as a Marvel fanatic by posting images not only about his hit film but also others related to the MCU such as this image of Daredevil in his early black costume sporting the line “For those among you complaining about Daredevil’s initial costume in the series may I remind you of this…”

Considering Gunn is signed on to direct Guardians of the Galaxy 2 it is within reason that he would show support to Marvel so as to keep employers happy, however nothing about James Gunn’s appearance on the internet appears out of synch with him being interested in things such as comics and so it could simply be a very real appearance of himself.

Do they give interviews?

Yes, Yes he does and I have seen some interviews with Mr.Gunn that have been a delight to watch. Here is one where he discusses writing and it really captures the laid back approach of James Gunn to his media professional career. It is a really interesting watch not just because it shows us what he is really like but also because it is an eye opener to just what the industry is like these days and what it takes to be successful as a writer.

Digital Footprint – Part 1

As part of our new module 161MC Creating Impact in Media Production we were asked to stop and analyse what is called our digital footprint, our presence in the open expanse of the word wide web and whether this presents a coherent message to consumers. I am currently active on Facebook, WordPress, Twitter, YouTube and Vimeo however I am new to Twitter and have yet to really do anything but follow others.

Taking a look at my footprint across the other media sites it is clear that I have a passion for film and the moving image. My last few posts on Facebook have been film related and my only contributions to Vimeo and YouTube so far have been my own short films. Since starting my university course, one thing I have began to realise is that I am already a media professional. Actions I have taken to present myself as such have been on my Facebook page where I changed my profile picture and cover photo to more career oriented images whilst keeping a slight amount of casualness and fluid creativity. I also did the same with my YouTube and Vimeo channel as I realised that these are the kind of sights that potential employers would be looking upon and they would have to sell me to them in the future.

Areas I could improve on are apparent. My Facebook page has been littered with various status’ throughout the years that have been unprofessional in style, I have been debating restarting fresh or starting a second page so that professional and social could be separated somewhat (although as was illustrated in todays lectures, that is never truly possible). What I do know is that I am still a true media professional who is learning and adapting at an astonishing rate.