Many of you who are familiar with the Burgeron family know of the family ghosts, Mama Boo and Little Boo. See here for a post about Mama Boo that has a link to another about Little Boo.
In that post, Mama Boo says she’s not gonna tell us what happened to them or how they became ghosts because she says all that matters is that they’re still around and hanging out with the family and having fun and singing and such, so why dwell on how they got there? But really, how can she think we’re going to just rest with that? There have been rumours ever since she and Little Boo showed up, so many years ago that few can now remember when it was. It was all so hush hush at the time that no one seems to have written down what happened, and now those who can remember aren’t around anymore.
Some say the Boos drowned in the floods of ’57, but that makes no sense because we know they were around before that. At least, that’s what I heard from someone who said she heard it from one of the family members, who heard it from his grandpa, who said he distinctly remembered them being around during the war to end all wars.
Some say they succumbed to that god-awful flu that wiped out so many people during that god-awful war, but so did several members of the family, and why were the Boos the only ones to hang on as ghosts? Others say they died in an accident involving the family still, and the strength of that backwoods brew kept them going as ghosts for the foreseeable future. Well maybe, but then why aren’t the rest of the Burgerons who took some mighty big draughts of that stuff while alive also ghosts after they passed on?
I got no answers here, only rumours and unasnwered questions. Somehow we gotta get that Mama Boo talking.
ds106 daily create for June 18, 2014: “Go out into your yard (or jump the fence into your neighbor’s yard) and find an interesting piece of ground. Zoom in with your camera’s lens, and take a picture. Share your square piece of Earth with the world.”
So it was kinda late by the time I got to this daily create, and I cheated by making it a patch of pond rather than a patch of earth, and even more by taking a photo of a patch of pond on our kitchen counter.
My son, 6 years old, is raising tadpoles in a very large saucepan. We have gathered rocks, pond water, and water plants and made a small environment for them. We feed them boiled lettuce, which they seem to love, and change half the water every day. It’s really fun–one of them has newly grown legs!
I played around a LOT with the macro lens and settings on our camera, and eventually needed to set up the tripod and set the timer delay to 2 seconds so that my pressing the shutter button didn’t shake the camera. This was the best out of the shots.
In GIMP, I opened up both the aurora image linked above and an image of me and my son in Australia from September 2012. To cut us out of the original image I used the process described here, which involves using the “paths” tool–something I’ve never done before. In case that page disappears, here are the steps.
1. Click on the “paths” tool and go around the parts of the image you want to “cut out.” When you reach the first path marker, be sure to hold down the “control” button when you click that first marker to close the loop (although if I remember correctly, on my Mac the control button didn’t work and I think I had to use the “command” button, but my memory is fuzzy on this).
— Then you can move the anchor points around with the mouse to adjust where they are and adjust what is being outlined, which is nice.
2. In the window that has the layers in GIMP (see screenshot below), click on the little white button that looks like it has two sliders. You should be able to there choose “selection from path” (you can’t see it in the screenshot because I’ve already done it and I can’t recreate it…this is just to show the white “slider” button). This creates a selection from the path.
3. Create an alpha channel–this means to give the image transparency, so when you cut out part of it you don’t get white space but a transparent space so the image underneath it will show through. Go to “layer” on the top menu and choose “transparency,” then “add alpha channel.”
— This step is really important for the part where I had to erase something (see step 5).
4. Now you need to cut out the background from what you’ve selected, so you need to invert the selection and cut out that part. Go to “select” on the top menu, then choose “invert.” Then you can just use control-x or command-x (for the Mac) to cut out the background. You should just have the piece you created a path around on a background that looks like a checkerboard (see top layer in screen shot above).
5. For mine, I still had part of the original image between myself and my son, between my left arm and his right arm. I needed to get rid of that, so I just used the “eraser” tool and erased it. What was underneath was just transparency, so the aurora image showed through. If I hadn’t added the alpha channel, when I erased part of the image I’d get a white space there.
— I also needed to erase around some of me and my son because there was a bit of the original image around the edges, which looked strange
6. I had to scale the layer (top menu: layer->scale layer) to make it a bit smaller, and then move it where I wanted.
7. Then the fun began with playing with the colours of the layer with me and my son. I just messed around with Colors->Curves until I got something that looked kind of ghosty. Then I reduced the opacity of that layer (with the slider on the top of the screenshot above) so we were kind of transparent. Finally, I used the “blur” tool to go around the outlines of me and my son so we didn’t have such sharp outlines. It made us blend into the background image a bit more.
8. I didn’t collapse the two layers into one (which you could do by right-clicking on the top layer (or control-clicking, on a Mac) and choosing “merge down), but left them separate in case I wanted to adjust the layer with me and my son more. Having it separate means you can adjust colours, etc. on that layer alone.
A few people are getting together to do a ds106 project for fun this summer–creating a fictional family that is getting together for a family reunion in August. We’re also going to go through the ds106 open syllabus and make gifs, images, audio, video, etc.
I just created my character in the family: Mama Boo, mom to Little Boo (and yes, Little Boo’s picture is a picture of my real son)–we’re both family ghosts.
I’m going to syndicate any future posts I write for that site here; we’ll see how it goes.
I went a little bit down the list and just decided to watch this one. I was instantly hooked because of the little kid who looks about the size of my 6-year-old son. I can imagine him doing exactly this. That’s probably why I’m drawn to this one and decided to analyze it!
It’s not clear whether the kid is a boy or a girl, and I just thought of him/her as a boy because I imagined my son…but there’s a reason we might think of her as a girl (see below, under 0:15-0:20).
Here’s my 5-second-interval play-by-play.
1. 0:00 to 0:05
— We are introduced to the character. The camera starts off on her feet and slowly moves up her body to her head. We get a sense that she’s a small-ish child.
— She’s moving along a white corridor, which is vaguely reminiscent of a white interior to a spaceship. There is a bright light behind her.
— Then the camera angle switches to the rear and we see her cape swishing after her as she goes down the hall. Now the bright light is in front of her—she’s walking towards it.
— Throughout, the “Star Wars Theme” is playing. Wonder how much they had to pay to use that music?
2. 0:05 to 0:10
— There is a quick cut and suddenly Darth Vader is walking slowly towards an exercise bike as the music builds. There is a bright light coming from a large window behind both Vader and the bike. We get a shot from the side as she takes a couple of steps. She is on the left of the bike.
— Then the camera angle switches to being ahead and somewhat above her, accentuating her small size as she purposefully puts out her hand towards the exercise bike.
— At first I wasn’t sure just what the heck she was doing. But after a few more seconds it became clear.
3. 0:10 to 0:15
— Quick cut to Darth Vader standing in front of a dog in a dog bed, lying down. Vader is to the right of the dog in the video. Again with the forceful hand gestures, this time two hands purposefully aimed at the dog.
— Quick cut to closeup of the dog’s face, still lying down in the dog bed. The dog doesn’t raise its head, but only lifts its eyebrows and ears a little (do dogs have eyebrows?). It’s clear that the dog could pretty much care less.
— Back to the original camera angle of Vader and the dog, and Vader lowers her hands in a kind of dejected fashion.
4. 0:15 to 0:20
— Quick cut to a much more forceful gesture in front of the washer and dryer—stepping forward with one foot as well as using both hands. This lasts just one second or so. The step is in time to the music as it builds even more. The camera is slowly panning inwards.
— Quick cut to a side view of Vader standing at the foot of her bed, with a doll sitting on the edge of the bed. Vader is to the left of the doll. This time she puts one hand out, then the other, again in time to the music. The room is decorated in somewhat girlish colours, and the doll suggests a girl as Vader. But then again, this is pretty sex-stereotypical of me to assume. But assume I am.
— Quick cut to a closeup of the doll’s face, which of course remains impassive. The camera is slowly panning in towards the doll. The doll cares even less than the dog.
5. 0:20 to 0:25
— Cut back to the side view of Vader and the doll on the bed, with the camera still panning inwards. Vader lowers her hand dejectedly and slumps her shoulders and head, giving what looks like a heavy sigh.
— Cut to a side view of a hallway; the dog passes by with Vader walking close behind, holding her hands out towards the dog. Clearly she’s trying to get the dog to do something, and the dog just wants to get away.
6. 0:25 to 0:30
— Cut to Vader sitting at a kitchen counter, moving her hands as if to do something, but we can’t see what. She’s aiming at something outside of the view of the camera.
— Cut to a bigger picture of the same scene, and her mother pushes a plate towards Vader as she moves her hands along with the plate—as if trying to move the plate herself.
— This is the only place I noticed so far where there is another sound besides the music—the sound of the plate going across the counter is layered on top of the music.
— Vader visibly crumples her body again, putting her hand to her helmet as if disappointed.
7. 0:30 to 0:35
— Cut to a view of a driveway and a car pulling into the driveway.
— Cut to Vader with her head in her hand. The dog barks, and she lifts her head, as if she knows what the dog barking means.
— Cut back to the driveway, and Vader’s dad gets out of the car with a briefcase. We hear the sound of the car door close. He walks toward the house with his arms outstretched a bit.
8. 0:35 to 0:40
— Camera angle from behind the father, with just one of his hands visible in the shot (the one with the briefcase), outstretched a bit. We can hear birds.
— Vader comes running out of the house, shakes her head at her dad with her hands out in front of her (the same gesture she’s been doing); we get a bit more of the dad in the shot and see both his arms fall.
— Cut to an interior shot of the car, looking at the dashboard and through the windshield at Vader, who stops in front of the car. Nice way of getting the dash into the ad!
— We also see the dad walking towards the house through this view though the dash. It’s clear he’s just going inside and letting his daughter be.
9. 0:40 to 0:45
— Side view of Vader standing in front of the car. This is similar to the side shots of her standing in front of the dog and the doll, though she’s back on the right this time.
— We catch a bit of the dad’s body walking out of the camera to the left, apparently into the house while Vader stands in front of the car with her hands outstretched.
— The music builds to a climax as she moves her hands backwards to push them forward again.
— Cut to a closeup shot of Vader from the side; the music falls as she pushes her hands forward; the music suddenly gets much quieter. Clearly something is going to happen.
10. 0:45 to 0:50
— Cut to a rear-side closeup of Vader and the car. Only the front grill and headlights of the car are visible, with the car logo clearly prominent.
— Vader stands still with her hands aimed at the car, as the music goes quietly forward, with her cape billowing in the wind a bit behind her.
— Suddenly the signal lights flash and the car starts. She jumps back, visibly startled. The music stops completely.
— Cut to a closeup of the remote for the car, held in a hand. A thumb moves away from one of the buttons.
— The music from the beginning starts up again as we see the dad and mom at the kitchen window, the dad’s arm at an angle that one would use if one had the remote in one’s hand.
11. 0:50 to 0:55
— We see the mom only from behind and the dad only from the side, but the dad lifts his eyebrows just a bit and they both turn back towards the window. A wonderfully subtle gesture that says it all.
— Cut back to Vader and the car in the driveway, but this time with more of Vader and less of the car in the shot. She turns forcefully from the side to a frontal view, unsteady on her feet a bit, as if to be looking into the kitchen window.
— Cut to a wider view of Vader and the car in which we see the whole car again, from the side-front view. It’s a very typical view of a car in a car ad. It’s like there’s a “car-in-a-car-ad” angle, and this is it. There is a subtle light on the front of the car that looks like it could be the beginnings of sunset.
— She turns forcefully back towards the car, using her hand to move her cape out of the way in a kind of strong, “I did it” gesture. She is master of the car.
12. 0:55 to 1:00
— Cut to a title screen with information about the car.
— A circular cut (I’m sure there’s some other word for it) with the sound of a light saber—the title screen becomes the car logo as the cut moves around a circle.
— Music fades quickly.
Some overall thoughts
I thought I’d try to analyze this commercial according to some of the ideas in this post about JCVD’s ad with Vovlo involving the splits, and a little bit using the “story spine” idea from Ken Addams.
— The beginning, and all the way through to 0:40, is the beginning part of the story spine, the “once upon a time.” The character and her routine are established. She tries and tries, but the force isn’t working for her. This is the storyline.
— This also establishes empathy—we feel bad for the poor kid who can’t use the force like she wants to. She is really trying, over and over. And what’s more, she tries harder with each attempt. As the music builds, she uses one hand (with the bike), then two hands (dog), then steps forward with two hands (washer and dryer), then does one hand forcefully and then the other with one foot forward (doll). But it just isn’t working. And then the ultimate embarrassment—her mom has to push her sandwich towards her. Head in hand, indeed.
— The “then one day” part of the story spine is when she stands in front of the car and the music changes. There is a clear sense of anticipation for a second or two as the music completely changes to much quieter and she stands still. Then the car starts and she jumps backwards. This is clearly the surprising revelation in the JCVD post. We know something is going to happen from the music, but we’re not sure what.
— I don’t know if there’s a sense of admiration and awe in the audience at this point (JCVD post), but there is certainly a sense of awe in Vader!
— And by the end, she has achieved “mastery”—she has mastered the force.
— There isn’t the full story spine here, since there isn’t a “because of that, and because of that,” and then a “since that day” ending. But we can get a sense as viewers of what she thinks the future will bring—success in using the force. We can also get a sense that she might end up being disappointed again, which is a bit of a downer.
I really enjoyed doing this assignment. I caught so much more by focusing on each 5-second interval. I noticed the change in music, the change in camera angles, the fact that Vader tries harder with each attempt and that the music builds as she does so.
I was impressed by the way the story is told in such a short time period, while still showcasing the car as the main point of the ad. Having the view of Vader through the inside of the car was pretty darn cool as an idea to get the interior shot of the car in the ad without breaking up the story. All that was needed from the dad was a short, small, subtle gesture of the eyebrows, mirroring to some extent that of the dog earlier in the ad.
I was able to notice how the side views of Vader and other things are switched: when she approaches the bike she’s on the left, when she’s standing in front of the dog she’s on the right, when she’s standing in front of the doll she’s on the left, when she’s standing in front of the car she’s on the right. I would never have noticed this balance without stopping every 5 seconds.
I got quite a great respect for telling stories within one minute through this assignment and the things we watched/read for it. Amazing what can be done in a short period of time!
GIFaChrome 12/13/13 Product Launch on DS106Radio  Show Archives ds106 Radio Archive for GIFaChrome Launch ds106 Radio Archive for GIFaChrome Launch (featuring Alan Levine, Christina Hendricks, Dav…
As if just doing the GIFaChrome project weren’t enough during the Headless version of ds106 in the Fall of 2013 (see the previous post for a description and rundown of what we did), we also decided to have a radio show product launch of the GIFaChrome camera. Quite a few people did amazing audio for this radio show, all of which you can hear at the Radio Show Archives link given at the top of this post.
Here I will just say a few things about the audio that I did for the radio show. I can’t believe how quickly all this came together—we basically did the entire project and the radio show in 1.5 weeks. I managed to squeeze out two audio projects in just a couple of days.
Roxy Louridge archival audio
I had the idea early on in the project that we could say we’ve found some old audio from the very first creator of the GIFaChrome film. I cam up with a story, the name (clearly a play on Rochelle Lockridge, or Rocky Lou, the CEO for GIFaChrome), and the name of Roxy’s dog, Corlin (a play on the GIFaChrome mascot, Colin Dog, who lives with Mariana Funes). The only problem was that I wanted to have it be scratchy, as if it were from an old phonograph recording that was heavily damaged such that the audio gets completely covered over by the “scratch noises” at crucial parts. Rochelle said she could use an effect in Garage Band to simulate this, and voila….
GIFaChrome commercial
I also scripted and recorded a commercial with my 6-year-old son for the GIFaChrome camera. I recorded his and my sections separately and then edited them together using Audacity. He never really quite understood what he was talking about when he said his lines, but he was a good sport!
I got the music for this commercial from Kevin McLeod’s free music site, incompetech.com (all music there is licensed CC-BY). The piece I used is called “Friendly Day.”
In addition to these two audio pieces I did for the radio show, I acted as co-host for the GIFaChrome launch with Alan Levine. This was our second time co-hosting a radio show for the Headless 13 ds106, as we also worked together hosting a three-hour show during which we played all the group radio shows for this course. You can find the whole show, broken up into pre- and post-show discussions of each, here.
But back to the GIFaChrome launch. The idea for this radio show was to have a party atmosphere, as if we were broadcasting from a live party during which the camera would officially be launched. Alan Levine has a great summary of the radio show launch and how he managed a number of the audio effects, including the party sounds. Alan had all the audio pieces on his computer and designed the script for the show. The whole show, as well as the various pieces, can be heard from Alan’s post about the show. As usual, I just sat back on the Skype and talked while he handled the technical end of things. But I have learned enough in ds106 by now that I should be able to run a radio show with multiple people on Skype at the same time. It’s not just a straightforward thing, but I just need to try and ask people along the way and eventually I’ll get it to work. Sitting around wishing I could do it is going to get me nowhere.
Afterwards, we had a Headless 13 ds106 radio campfire, in which anyone who wanted to join in could call Alan on Skype and discuss their Headless experience. Alan has an archive of that radio discussion as well. I had to leave partway through, as that day was insanely busy for me, but it was great to be able to reflect on how this whole Headless thing worked, with others.
And speaking of reflecting on the Headless thing, that is what I do in the next post!
