YEAR

ONE
SEMESTER
ONE KARL GOOKEY
CONTENTS
9. Brief #8 - Protest Graphics

Tools used:
Adobe Illustrator CS4, Pencils,
Scalpel, White Spray Paint

1. Brief #1 - Typographic Animation 10. Brief #9 - Structured Animation

Tools used: Tools used:

Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe
Photoshop CS4
2. Brief #2 - Typographic Composition
Tools used:
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe
Illustrator CS4
Audacity 1.3, Adobe After Effects CS4
11. Brief #10 - InDesign Layout
Tools used:
Adobe InDesignCS4
12. Brief #11 - Advert Antithesis

3. Brief #3 - 3D Typography Tools used:

Adobe After Effects CS4
Tools used:
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe 13. Brief #12 - Digital Animated Murals
Photoshop CS4, Autodesk 3ds Max
Tools used:
4. Brief #4 - Typographic Animation 2 Adobe After Effects CS4

Tools used:
Audacity, Adobe After Effects CS4

5. Brief #5 - Themed Animation

Tools used:
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe
Photoshop

6. One day brief - Poster Campaign

Tools used:
Adobe Illustrator CS4

7. Brief #6 - Digital Illustration

Tools used:
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe
Photoshop CS4

8. Brief #7 - Analogue and Digital

Processes

Tools used:
Sketchbook, Pencils, Fujifilm Finepix
S9500, Canon MP180 scanner, Adobe
Photoshop CS4
Brief #1
Typographic
Animation
20/09/10
Tools used: Assignment
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe Photoshop CS4
This brief was the first brief on this course and
also the first time I’d undertaken a brief of its
kind. I had never even created one piece of
stop motion animation before this but I’d always
wanted to try it out.
From the moment the brief was set, I’d had
an idea floating around my head about words
being typed on a computer screen and then
being “printed” out of the computer in some
sort of stop motion involved way. Although this
wasn’t much, it formed the basis of what would
become my final idea.
I believed that if the text was going to appear
to be moving on its own, an illusion of life, it
was going to need something else to allude to
this idea. To reinforce this illusion of the letters
having their own movements, etc. I applied a
different typeface to each letter in the hope that
this would give each letter its own personality.
• Choose a sentence, phrase or collection of words
related to a movement or set of movements.
• Produce a stop-frame animation using the
typographic letter forms from this sentence,
phrase or collection of words.
• Your stop-frame animation must have a
minimum duration of 30 seconds, and a
minimum frame-rate of 12 fps (frames per
second).
• You are expected to use photography, and
may photograph your letter forms in places
and spaces that relate to your ideas. You are
discouraged from using pre-made images as
backgrounds.
• You are expected to output your animation as
a video file, to host it on a media-hosting site
(youtube, imageshack, photobucket etc…), and
to post its weblink/URL to the blog.
For example, the typeface for the letter “j” made
its decender height lower than it does for this
typeface and made the lower section more
curved. This brought images of a long springy
letter and so I would make this particular letter
have more of a jumping motion than the rest
and so forth. This thinking, to do with the letter
“j”in particular, influenced the words I eventually
chose for the final animation as you will see on
the DVD in the section for this brief.
a modicum of personality, I figured that these
letters would want to escape their newfound
surroundings. This ended up being the
conclusion of the animation, with some letters
trying to escape down the plug hole and the rest
trying to escape any way they could which in
this case meant hiding (and then disappearing)
underneath a bag.

As you can see from the image at the top of this

page, I intentionally made some images blurry.
This was to give the illusion of speed. I originally
toyed with the idea of simply using a smaller
amount of images to give the impression of
quick movement but I felt that it would seem
too unrealistic. I realised that if an object is
moving quickly in a video, it would have a bit of
motion blur on it. I achieved this effect simply
by pressing the shutter button, letting it auto-
focus and then quickly tilting the camera in the
direction of the movement. This gave me the
effect I wanted.
I also used a variation of this effect when
showing quick movement of the camera, as
shown in the last 10 or so seconds of the
animation. This was achieved using the same
method as before but instead of tilting the
camera, just before the shutter closed I zoomed
in quickly using the manual optical zoom.

I chose a bedroom (and later, kitchen) for the

location for this animation because I felt it was
necessary for the theme of the animation.
Given that in this animation I gave the letters
Brief #2
Typographic
Composition
27/09/10
Tools used: Assignment
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe Illustrator CS4
This brief put me more in my element when
compared to the previous one. In the past, I’d
had a lot of experience in tracing over objects
with the pen tool in both Adobe Photoshop and
Adobe Illustrator. While this was mostly in the
capacity of tracing over an object to use as a
selection rather than a shape, it was still very
useful. One thing it had not prepared me for
however, was the practice of using as few points
as possible. When using the pen tool previously,
I’d used quite a few points to capture some very
detailed areas. So that required a bit of getting
used to.
I chose the words new, hope and decay for this
project as I believe that, while contradictory,
they all fit the image I chose.
• New
In this image, there are both old and new
structures and objects. Out of these old and
Raw Material
1. Use photography to collect two alphabets, one of vernacular
type, and one of abstract typographic forms.
2. Find/select a high-resolution image of an exterior/urban
environment. (Scan or re-photograph the image if it’s not in
digital form.)
Conceptual Process
1. Define the atmosphere of your selected image in words.
Technical Process
1. Trace paths from your collected alphabets in Adobe Illustrator
2. Extract a colour palette from your high-resolution image using
Adobe Illustrator.
Output
Make 3 A5 illustrations that evoke the atmosphere of your original
image, using only your collected typographic forms and your extracted
colour palette.
Attitudes to colour: Of these illustrations, one must make use of
complementary colour, and one must make use of subtractive colour.
Attitudes to composition: Of these illustrations, one must employ the
rule of thirds, and one must make use of the golden ratio.
 new objects, the new vastly surpasses the comparison to some other people. they
old in terms of boldness and eyecatching certainly wouldn’t have been happy with it.
ability. The shop signs are a great example
of this. The bright colours of the signs are • Decay
far more eye catching than the shop fronts My final word, decay, was inspired by the
themselves. tower block in the background of the image.
I feel that this shows part of the urban decay
• Hope process. The building very much looks like
I chose the word hope so as to imply deeper it could be abandoned and the way that it
a deeper meaning to the image, compared looks like it might be falling apart doesn’t
to the somewhat superficial meaning of the help this assumption.
first word I chose.
Taking into account the run-down look of
the buildings in this image and this stark
contrast to the bright signs outside these
buildings,I feel that the word “hope” in this
image signifies the feelings of the owners
of the shops featured within. These shop
keepers, managers or owners set up these
shops in the hope that they could make a
better life for themselves. While their life
before may not have been bad by relative

Assignment 2: Typographic Composition

Karl Gookey

I chose the words new, hope and decay for this assignment. I feel that while these words are
largely contradicting, I feel that they also t the image that I took these colours from.

New: This word ts the image in that the area pictured features
old elements with the new making its bold appearance. In the
illustration for this word, I chose to have the word at the bottom
of the image, with a projection of itself above to show what it
could rise up to become.

Hope: I feel that I captured the sense of hope coming up from

the darkness with the word getting brighter as it rises. I used
the colours from the signage in the image to show the hope
that the owners have for their businesses.

Decay: The building in the background is a stark change from

the bright signs in the foreground. While the foreground seems
to be trying to stay bright, the building seems to be decaying. I
used the grey from the concrete and the green from the gratti.
Brief #3
3D
Typography
04/10/10
Tools used: Assignment
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe Photoshop CS4,
Autodesk 3ds Max
I enjoyed this brief much more than the two
briefs I had undertaken previously as I had
always wanted to know how CGI artists made
a 3D object look like it was actually in a scene
that was either made up of an image or a piece
of footage.
During this brief, I found that I had problems
importing my own vernacular type from
Illustrator and into 3ds Max. So instead of not
carrying out the brief until I figured out the
problem, I decided to use the text took in 3ds
Max and simply extrude the text to make it 3D.
I didn’t end up figuring out the problem until a
couple weeks later when Tony suggested that
there may be some path overlapping, which
there was.
Even though the final outcomes didn’t fit the
brief exactly, I feel that they are still of legitimate
Using outline paths from your own vernacular
type collection (week 2), create three-dimensional
typography in 3DStudio Max.
Composite your three-dimensional typography with
a high-resolution image of a real-world environment
(could be the image you chose for assignment 2
(week 2)).
Your typography should take the form of a word or
a series of words that expresses – or contrasts with
– an aspect of your chosen environment.
Light your three-dimensional typography so that
it matches the light in your backing plate (high-
resolution image).
Render out a series of three stills OR a five second
animation.
Post your completed stills or animation to a media-
hosting site and paste a link into the blog post.
value, even if only to me. This is because I word a cloudy effect. I also feel that the colour, a
believe that I learnt a lot about lighting a scene medium pale blue, ties into the calming theme.
and also about making an object fit in with an
image as the scene. I chose the first and third words (nature and
I tried to match up the shadow colour and calming) because of their obvious links with the
intensity with the shadow underneath the bench environment. Nature, meaning the trees and
in the centre of the right-hand side of the image grass in the background of the image. Calming,
and I feel that it worked out signifiying the notion that
pretty well, especially in the people sometimes use
first image. parks and park benches
as somewhere to go to be
I applied a bump map to calm and let the world go
the “nature” object to give by.
it a leafy feel, like a pile of The second word, heat,
leaves overlapping on the is a contradictory word. It
floor. was actually quite cold on
that day. Also, I thought
I also applied a bump map it would be interesting to
to the “heat” object. This use a word that describes
bump map in particular something you usually can’t
I feel worked really well, see with your own eyes.
as the bump map gives For all the viewer knows,
the impression of small the temperature in the park
random bumps on the could have been 1°C or
letters, making them look 35°C.
like blisters as if the heat is

affecting the word itself.
In the third image, the word “calming” also had
a bump map applied to it but instead of being
a hard bump map like the previous two, this
one didn’t have any hard edges which gave the
Autodesk 3ds Max is one of the programs
that I had barely, if ever, used before and this
experience has only wanted me to use it more
often.
Brief #4
Typographic
Animation 2
11/10/10
Tools used: Assignment
Audacity 1.3, Adobe After Effects CS4
Use a voice recording and script of some song lyrics
Despite not being prepared for the long (read: to derive ideas for a short digital animation in After
very long) hours in carrying out this project, Effects.
I had a lot of fun doing it by the time I was
nearing the end. The voice recording will provide you with a
I really enjoy using After Effects and for some structure for the animation, which should use only
reason I’m always amazed that you can apply typographic forms.
an effect to a video, after almost ten years of
only applying effects to single images. Your animation must also include sound design,
that either reflects the feel of the lyrics, or what is
Because of the fact that this animation was only described in the lyrics, or both.
allowed to consist of typographic forms, I had to
think of a way to show or allude to the feel of the Please upload two versions of your work, one
lyrics using only colours and text. version with the lyrics recording left in, and one
version with it removed (leaving only sound design
The first way in which i did this was in terms of and animation
the background colour. The song lyrics, shown
on the facing page, deal with the idea of a
person not being able to deal with the pain of
being away from their partner and how the pain
leaves when the partner returns. So, I felt I had
to go with a colour that would signify both pain
and passion/love, the obvious answer being the I also added some sound design into the
colour red. animation. This took the form of some ambient,
somewhat ethereal sounding, music and the
The second way I tried to incorporate the sound of rain drops falling. My reasoning behind
symbolism of the lyrics into the animation was this was that I imagined a couple saying these
with the text itself. words to each other
Meaning, the position Hoobastank - Disappear standing in the rain
and animation of the There’s a pain that sleeps inside completely soaked, and
text or individual words. It sleeps with just one eye yet despite these less
For example, I used And awakens the moment that you leave than ideal conditions,
the position of the Though I try to look away they were completely
individual words to form The pain it still remains focused on each other.
a container of sorts Only leaving when you’re next to me
where the word “inside” The music came from
would drop, Do you know, that everytime you’re near the idea of it being akin
I also did things like Everybody else seems far away to a moving scene from
this in other parts of So can you come and make them disappear a romantic film of some
the animation. Such Make them disappear and we can stay sort.
as about mid-way
when the eigth line comes up, the words “far
away” swoop down from above the rest of the
line and curve off into the distance. Giving the
impression that, as you may have guessed, the
words are going far away.
Brief #5
Themed
Animation
18/10/10
Tools used: Assignment
Fujifilm Finepix S9500, Adobe After Effects CS4
For this brief, I chose a painting of Archduchess
Isabella by Frans Pourbus the Younger. I chose
to develop my idea along the theme of present
monotony and future dreams.
In this day and age, a McDonalds is an
extremely common sight and frankly it would
be odd to meet someone who claimed to have
never been to a fast food restaurant of some
kind during their life.
In the latter half of the 20th century and the
21st century so far, we have become very used
to having an excess of food. We not only have
what we need, we have much more than we
need.
In comparison, during the 17th century food
based a lot more in subsistence farming,
meaning that people only grew what they
needed and only ate what they needed. If you
ate to excess you were either seen as a bit of
Use a good quality print out of an oil painting (16th – 17th
century) as a starting point for a stop-frame animation
(wikimedia.org is a good place to look).
Alter the painting as the animation progresses, by introducing
other elements – backgrounds, objects, etc – and removing
others.
Consider developing your ideas along the following themes
discussed in “Ways Of Seeing”:
1) What’s shown (wealth/power)/what’s hidden (exploitation/
consequences).
2) Present monotony/future dreams.
3) Increase in envy/increase in democracy.
The animation should last approximately 30 seconds and
should contain NO text.
At the end of the animation, insert a title card detailing the
time, money, and technical resources you dedicated to the
work.
The frame rate of the animation must be 12fps (frames per
second )or above.
Use Photoshop or software of your choice to assemble the
animation stills, and output the work as a video file.
 to the confused onlookers.

During this course, the stop motion briefs have

not exactly been my favourites. And as such,
i will admit that I have not paid them as much
attention as I could have. I believe that is a
major failing on my part as I should not have let
this impact on the quality of my work.

an idiot for eating all your food stores before

you can grow more, or you were seen as very
wealthy as eating enough to put on more weight
than average meant that you had more food to
spare than most people and therefore you were
very rich. But, by todays standards the excess
of the 17th century wasn’t anywhere near the
excess of today.

Even so, if a 17th century duchess somehow

appeared in modern times, and she saw
somewhere that sold so much food, she would
eat as much as she could to show off her wealth
One Day Brief
Poster
Campaign
21/10/10
Tools used: Assignment
Adobe Illustrator CS4
I found this brief to be quite exciting, mainly
because of the clear brief joined with a small
time frame in which the job had to be finished.
Since I’ve done a few small jobs for people and
promised (and then delivered) a finished design
within a matter of hours, it was a familiar feeling
but nonetheless one I enjoy.
I chose an article detailing NASA’s efforts to
gain funding from some of the richest people
and businesses on the planet to help them carry
out a series of missions that would result in the
colonisation of the moons of Mars and then
later, Mars itself.
I chose this article because I had heard about it
a day or so before this task was set and it was
an article that interested me.
The colour scheme for my poster consisted of
very clear colours, in fact it could be broken
down into mainly orange, white and grey. The
A new client has called you and needs a poster sent to them in
two and a half hours! They are a large agency and will have a
lot more work for you in the future if your design is successful.
Payment is £200 for the initial design.
1. Take the news article you spoke about yesterday and create
an A4 poster for a campaign to highlight this article.
2. Place your image in situ (TV, underground escalator poster,
road billboard etc)
You can use any methods you like but you need to consider the
lessons and subjects we have covered so far.
• Colour schemes: Mood and colour pallets.
• Time and space: The narrative and order of importance in the
message and design.
• Message and meaning: What different elements of an image
add to the whole?
• Typography: Your type should add to the meaning not save it.
Make sure the font fits the message.
1. Start by gathering at least 20 images to use as reference or
parts to be used in the design (copyright not an issue for this
project)
2. Edit your image information for you final design.
3. Remember the message has to be both clear and interesting
enough to catch the public eye in situ.
off-white of the background, signified the well the font because it reminded me of the kind of
known off-white colour of space shuttles and font you would see on a poster of a sci-fil film.
rockets. I also chose the colour to allude to the Something futuristic looking but not too “out
idealistic view of space travel seen in television there”.
shows like Star Trek and the like.
The three images below are what came out
The image of Mars and its moons, I feel both of the one day brief. The top-centre image
captures a simplistic is my final design.
view of Mars and The bottom-left and
combines its look bottom-right are both
with that of an atom. variations that didn’t
This similarity to an pan out.
atom conjures up
thoughts of scientists
studying the moons
of Mars, conducting
experiments, etc.
This would not be a
pleasure cruise.

And finally, I chose

Brief #6
Digital
Illustration
25/10/10
Tools used: Assignment
Adobe Photoshop CS4
I found this brief to be less exciting than others. I
had been making similar images in my own time
for a few years now and I didn’t feel like I got out
my full potential with such restrictive parameters
in the brief.
All three digital illustrations had components
taken from photos I had taken in the past couple
years.
Mobile phone screensaver #1 featured a road
sign which had been cut out of a photo taken
near Epping High Street in Essex. The sign was
rotated so it was on its side and then duplicated
to form a vertical line of road signs. This
vertical line layer was then itself duplicated and
reflected. This was my black and white design
with a mono-rhythmic pattern as it is the same
sign duplicated.
Mobile phone screensaver #2 featured a small
Design 2 x screensaver graphics/illustrations for your
mobile phone
AND 1 x screensaver graphic/illustration for your
computer desktop:
For raw material, use only your own photographs of
textures and/or objects.
• Of the three designs, one must be black & white,
one must be two-colour, and one can use a colour
palette of your choice.
• Of the three designs, one must have a regular
rhythm, one must have a flowing rhythm, and one
must have a progressive rhythm.
• Of the three designs, one must be mono-rhythmic,
and the other two must be poly-rhythmic.
Present your three designs on a .pdf (or .jpeg). The
presentation should include large scale versions of
the designs, in-situ photographs of the designs as
they appear on your mobile/desktop screen, and
accompanying text detailing the characteristics of each
design (see above*).
section of a photo taken in a field in Epping, of paper textures I photographed a few years
Essex during the summer. This selection was ago.
then sheared and duplicated to accentuate
the look of the
wheat plants.

The desktop
screensaver
was taken from
a photo I took
in Cambridge
Botanical
Gardens. I cut
out the flower
head and
duplicated it,
rotating it each
time it was
duplicated. The
background was
taken from a
small collection
Brief #8
Protest
Graphics
08/11/10
Tools used: Assignment
Adobe Illustrator CS4, Pencils, Scalpel, White Spray
Paint
This brief focused around the protests over
the rising of a government set limit on what
universities can charge students per year. Most
people think that governments are raising the
fees themselves, they are in fact just giving
universities more choice of what they charge
students.
The idea behind this protest placard is based
around a “worst case scenario”. If the limit
is removed, fees could become as high as
£32,000 over three years for some of the
courses requiring the highest amount of
resources such as Chemistry and Biology
based courses.
The idea of someones hopes and dreams
having a price tag is offensive to most of the
general population. Some people even say that
our thoughts, wishes and dreams are the only
Process:
• Design a one-colour protest graphic on a computer – the work must
include text (slogan) AND image.
• Copy the work BY EYE (don’t print it) from your computer screen
onto A2 size paper.
• Cut the A2 paper copy to make a stencil.
• Apply acrylic paint or aerosol paint through your stencil onto an A2
placard.
Considerations:
Make your slogan from as few words as possible.
Make the design as simple as possible,
. . . even if the idea behind it is complex.
Ask your friends/peers if they think your design says what you think it
says,
. . . before you finalise the work.
Final work:
- Post a pdf or jpeg that shows:
• The original design you made on computer
• A photograph of your painted placard in use, perhaps in a
demonstration.
• A short written description of the design strategy you used (see
PROTEST GRAPHICS presentation).
things we truly possess. So people would take students and perhaps even physical strain
very harshly to the idea that people are not only through money issues.
being charged inordinate amounts to follow their
dreams, but also this is being supported by the
vast majority of the government.

I chose white on black as opposed to black on

white as I feel that I wanted a stark contrast
between background and design components,
but I didn’t want to go with the usual black on
white.

Although it originally came out from a mistake in

sticking down the stencil properly, I feel that the
way that some of the edges aren’t as sharp as
others gives it a ghostly feel. It is almost as if the
dreams are slowly fading away,

I felt that the ball and chain on this placard

holds two meanings. One, that it is a weight
holding down my dreams. And two, it is a play
on the word “pound”, i.e. the weight is worth
£32,000 and is also a 32,000 pound weight. I
feel that this further emphasises the financial
strain that this increase in fees will put on
Brief #9
Structured
Animation
15/11/10
Tools used: Assignment
Adobe Illustrator CS4, Pencils, Scalpel, White Spray Create a 30-second digital animation using software of your choice.
Paint
Audio:
I will be the first to admit that I got a little carried
A soundtrack composed of ambient and spot/incidental/diagetic
away with this weeks project and didn’t follow sounds you have collected.
the brief as well as I should have. After finding
a tutorial on Video Copilot on how to create a These sounds are to be structured around a slowed-down (50%) piece
of music, which is to be removed from the mix when it has served its
music based animation. It deals with creating a purpose as a structural model.

Video:

Progressively rhythmic animated forms.

4 x 3-second sections that have a strong visual relationship but are

not the same.

5 x 2-second sections that have a strong visual relationship but are

not the same.

8 x 1-second sections that have a strong visual relationship but are

not the same.

NO type.

particle based animation that responds to both Organise the sections into a rhythmic structure of your choosing. Your
the bass and treble in a sound file by converting work should maximise the dynamics of REPETITION and VARIATION.
the audio to keyframes as a main starting
point. Unfortunately, mine isn’t as complicated
as the example in the tutorial as the sounds
in my audio were recorded using a headset
microphone and don’t really have much of a
difference between each other in terms of bass
and treble sounds.

Instead of using different particle layers for

bass and treble, I effectively used the same
particle layer for both bass and treble. The only
difference is that I duplicated the first layer and
then played around with the settings to create a
more fire-like particle layer.

This method of animating to a sound track

involved something else I was unfamiliar with
until undertaking this project, expressions.
I had heard them mentioned in class but I hadn’t
ever looked into them or knowingly seen them
used.
In this particular instance, expressions were
used to amplify the movement of the null objects
created by converting the audio to keyframes.
Expressions were then used to convert the
movement in the Y axis to movement in the Z
axis.

While I didn’t follow the brief as best as I could, I

feel that this was a valuable learning experience
as I got the chance to play with an effect that
I am very interested in using in the future, for
future briefs. You could definitely file this brief’s
final outcome as a “happy mistake”.
Brief #10
InDesign
Layout
22/11/10
Tools used: Assignment
Adobe InDesign CS4
Week 10 brief (deadline 26/11/10)

Along with the Digital Illustration briefs, this was Create two workbook layouts using Adobe Indesign.
another part of design that I was familiar with
before coming on this course. I had created an You should incorporate scanned sections of your
A4 spread (much like in this brief) during my sketchbooks, and digital work.
Graphic Design college course before coming
to UCA. The only difference being that in the
college layout, I had to put together a spread
from a mock magazine in which a perfume
brand we had designed had an article.
It has to be said that I much prefer designing a
layout with nothing but images and placeholder
text than designing a magazine layout
concerning perfume.

As can probably be seen by the layout of

this workbook, which was inspired by the
layout in this brief, I am very much a fan of
minimalism. I feel that it allows the designer to
clearly designate certain areas to certain jobs,
whichever they may be, and it allows the user
or reader to ascertain which section he or she
should be looking at to find a certain piece of
information.
I’ve always liked the idea of having very large,
almost unwieldly, headings. I feel that as a
magazine, workbook, etc. headline it is often
the most eye-catching thing on the page and
that is exactly what you want if you’re going
to entice someone to read an article about
the next every day object to give you cancer
(computer monitors apparently) or maybe if
you’re advertising the next big thing.
The idea of moving around text and images
seemed like it would be very tedious and not
fun at all. As it turns out, much to my surprise,
I was very wrong. I very much enjoy having
total control over where everything goes, how it
interacts with other elements of the layout. And,
like all things design, seeing the final outcome
(in this case, without all the guide lines) is the
most satisfying thing.

I am not a fan of the quotes you sometimes

see mid-article that seem cherry picked from a
random point in the article. I find that whenever
I read an article with quotes scattered about the
layout, I always stop focusing on reading the
article and become more focused on trying to
find the particular quote. Which, as a kid, always
irritated me because it was never around the
same area as the oversized quote itself.

When I was first told of layout design it all

seemed very boring, but to be fair I had quite a
boring teacher back in college.
Brief #11
Advert
Antithesis
29/11/10
Tools used: Assignment
Adobe After Effects CS4
1. Select a current or past TV advertisement and reverse-
engineer a written script (all visual and audio events
should be detailed).
I always like to try and inject a bit of humour into 2. Analyse your script to help you define the thesis of your
my work when I can. I can never promise that chosen TV advertisement.
anyone but me will find it funny but at least I’m 3. Add elements of antithesis to the raw material of your
consistent. I got this chance with this brief. chosen television advertisement, to expose a more in-
depth view of the hidden economic, political and social
aspects that surround the advertising proposition.
I chose a short Kelloggs advert from around
the mid 1950s, a time in which cereals are just THESIS
becoming popular and they are fast replacing
the traditional cooked breakfast. A proposition that is maintained by argument.

A hypothetical proposition, especially one put forth without

proof.

Philosophy: The first stage of the Hegelian dialectic process.

*) ANTITHESIS

Direct contrast; opposition.

The direct or exact opposite: Hope is the antithesis of despair.

Philosophy: The second stage of the Hegelian dialectic process,

representing the opposite of the thesis.
 Brief #11 – Digital Synthesis TV Ads

Original Ad Script

Advert opens to an image of a woman holding an assortment of Kellogg’s breakfast cereals, she is holding so many that only
her eyes are showing above the mountain of cereals.
One second in, feel-good music starts and a voice speaks directly to the woman as the image changes to show her looking
towards the camera. This image only stays for around half a second until the image changes to show the woman facing
slightly off-camera with her eyes still looking into the camera and her ear in view in an “I’m listening” manner.

Voice: “Family like an assortment of breakfast cereals?”

While this line is being spoken, the image of the woman alternates between an image of her looking up and one of her
looking down, to give the impression that she is nodding.

Voice: “Well, just for variety, why don’t you try the convenient assortment? Kellogg’s Variety Packs!”

While this line is being spoken, the woman at first looks surprised and then happy as the pile of breakfast cereals in her
hands slowly get smaller and smaller until they are the size of Kellogg’s Variety Packs and are organised in a line. The image
then changes to the woman holding an actual Kellogg’s Variety Pack. At this point, the series of images featuring the woman
changes to video.

Voice: “Nine cereals to choose from, ten individual servings!”

At this point the woman looks surprised at the new pack of cereals in her hands, looks at the camera and smiles excitedly.

Voice: “Kellogg’s Variety Packs!”

The ad now changes to an image of just the Kellogg’s Variety Pack and the words “Kellogg’s Best to You” appear on the
screen as they are also sung.

Ad Antithesis

In the edit of the advert I highlighted the practice of “adding value” that cereal companies undertake. I recently watched a
documentary entitled The Foods that Make Billions, in particular episode 2 The Age of Plenty1. Adding value refers to adding
extra features so a product that goes beyond the standard form of the product while adding little or no extra cost to the
manufacturers of said product. This allows the manufacturer to raise the RRP (recommended retail price) of the product and
make the consumer believe that the rise in price is justified because they believe they are getting something extra for their
money.

I believe that this very practice is shown in the original advert as the variety pack would most likely cost the same as, or
slightly more than, one box of Kellogg’s cereal; but in actual fact if you emptied all 10 mini cereal boxes into one normal sized
cereal box, you would end up with less than what you would get if you bought just one normal sized box.
1 The Foods that Make Billions – The Age of Plenty
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00wk8gd/The_Foods_that_Make_Billions_The_Age_of_Plenty/
Brief #12
Digital
Animated
Murals
06/11/10
Tools used: Assignment
Adobe After Effects CS4
Submit 3 proposals for digital animated murals in
real-world environments.
The first of my digital mural animations featured
footage of a wall mounted cigarette bin in an Each proposal should show animated murals,
area in which someone can usually be found composited into video footage of the chosen
smoking and yet it is not being used. environments.

This led me to take on a contradictory
approach to this particular mural and instead
of commenting on the situation, I commented
on a percieved situation. This situation being,
smoking areas with these cigarette bins may
as well be no smoking areas considering the
distinct lack of people using them. In some
cases they are not only not used at all, they
are vandalised by the smokers themselves.
Which makes you think to yourself, why would a
smoker vandalise something which is meant to
help them if it was useful?
People are used to the last hundred or so years
of putting out cigarettes by dropping them on
Each proposal should be at least 10 seconds long.
Your murals must have a relationship to the
environments in which they are placed.
Submit the following:
Video that includes -
1) A 10-second clip of each of the 3 locations you
chose, with the digital murals superimposed.
2) A title card before each 10-second clip, with text
explaining the relationship of the murals to the
environment.
the floor and stepping on them, or by putting
them out in their own ash tray. People aren’t in
the habit yet of using what amounts to a wall
mounted ash tray.

The second animation is less of a contradictory

point and more of a “see what is right in front of
you” point. We regularly see security cameras
all over the place, we as a country have more
CCTV cameras per capita than the vast majority
of the rest of the world, perhaps even the whole
world.

Despite this, people don’t seem to upset about

it. Maybe we are so used to seeing a CCTV
camera on a certain wall that we just don’t
notice it anymore, just like if you pass a tree on
your way home every day, after a while you’ll
forget that particular tree is there.
I think that if all CCTV cameras had a sign
simiar to this one placed somewhere in the
vicinity, people would begin to be much more
vocal about the prevalence of cameras in the
UK, perhaps even creating a massive anti-
CCTV sentiment in the media. Personally, I don’t
mind CCTV cameras. As it is, they prevent
more bad than they cause. But, it is definitely
something to think about.

The third animation is not so much an animated

mural fixed to a wall, but one that is slightly off
the wall in a literal sense not a figurative sense.

This animation shows my view that (what I like

to call) special road areas, such as Epsom high
street where it is mostly one way, need constant
reminders to drivers of what to do in that area.
Obviously regular users of said road will know
the specific combination of the rules of the road
for the area but newcomers won’t.
A feature like this would help drivers remember
the rules of that specific stretch of road and
hopefully cause less accidents.