My sword is out today...
One of the challenging parts of working in an online program is the online communication. It's very easy to miscommunicate intent and meaning. Best to document everything and be crystal clear in communication.
Another challenge is that the course outlines are, at times, remedial and don't match up with the production schedule and needs that the project requires. This is easily remedied and I've found, with a few exceptions, that the facilitators understand this challenge and are flexible and supportive.
The best facilitators in the MIU online program have significant experience in production. They are masters of their craft and are able to offer powerful insights into process and artistic endeavor. The weakest facilitators, thankfully a minority, are inexperienced and have little or no production experience. They try very hard and deserve our kindness and support...but usually provide very little in the way of useful information or insight. Very much like academia in general I think.
My intention in earning a Masters degree is to qualify for a teaching position at the University level. The fact that I have near 30 years experience in 2 career fields, Industrial Design and Entertainment, yet lack that piece of paper (the terminal degree) has become, for me, a sadly humorous indictment of how teachers are valued or not valued in our countries education system. Even with the diploma I don't care about tenure, position or fame in the world of academia. I care about artistic endeavor, the soul of the artist, mentoring great students and living my mission as an artist.
This attitude will probably make me a threat to my future colleagues as I was in the past with tenured design professors who couldn't do the work they were "professing". Several at Cal State Long Beach were in that category. One in particular who taught product rendering was in the class of what I call "silver pencil artists". Those who think that coloring something with a silver prismacolor pencil is sufficient to render an image to look like chrome. Ooof. This is the "those who can't do - teach" problem. Fortunately my experience in the MIU program is that the facilitators, even the inexperienced ones, are actively engaged in work or have massive experience to inform their teaching. Some of them simply don't have the relevant experience required at times to facilitate the class or the students they are working with.
What I think: having a masters degree does not make you a good teacher or an excellent artist - pursuing a masters and attaining it simply affords the opportunity to explore the depth of artistic talent. What a student does with the opportunity is the core of the matter. As with all conflict - the outcome will hold some truth to be learned. My truth now is that I have 3 quarters (after this one) to make my thesis film. Those around me in the program can either help me, watch me do it, or get out of the way. No time for philosophizing. No patience for foolishness or laziness. No more smiley faces with winks or tongues sticking out. Hate that stuff. This is the thesis phase.
REQUIEM this week: I have been reading Bruce Block's book: The Visual Story. So far I find some pieces interesting but the content is sometimes a bit contrived. Although the concepts are not all that different from the universal principles of art and design...the practical application of the principles he describes in the book are worth embracing. The most interesting thing I find is that while I am reading the book many new and interesting ideas about the cinematography for REQUIEM are popping into my head...which I hope will make REQUIEM more powerful in it's visual story telling. The use of color to differentiate between the real world and the old man's memory world and visual progression for example.
that's all for this week.
D_
Friday, April 27, 2007
Monday, April 23, 2007
Command and Conquer 3 - Has Arrived
This is a concept illustration I did for this great new addition to the storied Command and Conquer franchise.
Production paintings like this one are one of my favorite parts of the production process...REQUIEM will be no exception.
D_
Spring Quarter 2007 - Week 3
A very long week...
Along with development on REQUIEM we are selling our house, buying a new one and I am in transition in my job as Senior Art Director at Electronic Arts Los Angeles studio.
I've been at EA for 3+ very intense and rewarding years. Going back into game development was an opportunity to grow and develop my abilities as an art director...and the experience has given me that in spades. From Medal of Honor, Command and Conquer 3 Pre-viz art direction and 2 years on an unannounced next gen title I have enjoyed the people, the culture and the process of making art at the highest level I've experienced in a game development studio. Much different from my work on direct to video features in practice...the same in principle.
The transition is focused on creating a structure that will enable me to work from home. Although it is not settled yet I am confident that the all things will work out for the best.
On the pre-production/development front for REQUIEM...I am a little behind. But I am also encouraged by my progress on the animatic. My efforts are focused on camera work, visual language of the shots. Or what my facilitator calls "making the cinema great". I will stay with this phase, holding here and iterating until it is perfect.
Much of the shot structure is still in my minds eye. The task is to get it clearly out into the animatic so that others can see and verify that the story I want to tell is indeed the one they are experiencing.
D_
Along with development on REQUIEM we are selling our house, buying a new one and I am in transition in my job as Senior Art Director at Electronic Arts Los Angeles studio.
I've been at EA for 3+ very intense and rewarding years. Going back into game development was an opportunity to grow and develop my abilities as an art director...and the experience has given me that in spades. From Medal of Honor, Command and Conquer 3 Pre-viz art direction and 2 years on an unannounced next gen title I have enjoyed the people, the culture and the process of making art at the highest level I've experienced in a game development studio. Much different from my work on direct to video features in practice...the same in principle.
The transition is focused on creating a structure that will enable me to work from home. Although it is not settled yet I am confident that the all things will work out for the best.
On the pre-production/development front for REQUIEM...I am a little behind. But I am also encouraged by my progress on the animatic. My efforts are focused on camera work, visual language of the shots. Or what my facilitator calls "making the cinema great". I will stay with this phase, holding here and iterating until it is perfect.
Much of the shot structure is still in my minds eye. The task is to get it clearly out into the animatic so that others can see and verify that the story I want to tell is indeed the one they are experiencing.
D_
Story Telling as a Form of Public Memorial
Public memorials and ritual healing...
Modern society rarely acknowledges the necessity and power of ritual healing in every day life. As a consequence, our culture suffers spiritually, emotionally and physically. War, for example, wounds us as a society in body, mind and spirit. Tens of thousands sacrificed their lives in
Maya Lin’s proposal for the VVM afforded her the rare opportunity to design a singular large scale public monument in our nation’s capitol city. There are many state and city memorials to the war; however Lin’s design is the only one to honor in one place, all the dead of that conflict. As a result the VVM has become a significant place of pilgrimage for those who come for healing, curiosity, honoring and remembrance.
Memorials, commemorative objects that remind us of people who died, or an event in which people died, are one of the few remaining art forms that may facilitate healing. However, one must visit these memorials to partake of the experience in full. Current media outlets such as the internet, television and film have access to a wider audience than location specific physical memorials. Using these media as a way to remember the past expands the opportunity for cultural healing by creating memorials through storytelling.
George Santayana said, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” I believe that our collective memory of the past, including our memory of war, requires some form or symbol to facilitate our remembrance. Public memorials serve to help us to avoid historic repetition and heal the social and cultural wounds of war by keeping the memory of the dead in our consciousness. In my thesis and MFA project, I will explore and portray the VVM as a place of pilgrimage, a temple to the fallen, and a symbol of all that is right and wrong in the modern world.
As an artist I think about my responsibility to use my abilities and vision to create art and to also serve the world and the people around me. I ask myself, “What can I do? What art can I create that would serve as a form of memorial serving the same good end as the VVM?”
D_
Monday, April 9, 2007
REQUIEM Production Art
Another image exploring atmosphere, time of day and the jungles of Vietnam reflected into the walls surface.
D_
REQUIEM Production Art
These images are likely to cause some controversy. To me they represent the shadow and gold of any war.
D_
REQUIEM Production Art
In this rough image the armies of the Revolutionary War, the Civil War and the armies of the conflicts of the 20th and 21st Centuries gather to honor a flag draped casket...the symbol of the lives sacrificed in service to our country. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a fascinating design created by Maya Lin. One wall points to the Washington Monument and the other to the Lincoln Memorial. This piece also explores the passage of seasons in one panoramic view. I'll be finishing this painting moving forward.
D_
REQUIEM Production Art
This image explores another important element of the visual story in REQUIEM - the reflective surfaces of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. This is not an original idea...other artists have used this device to depict another world existing inside the wall. To me the wall represents the veil between life and death and a window from the present into the past and the future.
D_
REQUIEM Production Art
This is one of the production paintings I've done for REQUIEM. An important element in the look of this project will be the atmospherics...or what I call texturizing the air.
D_
Journey to an MFA
REQUIEM is the title of my project for a Master of Fine Arts degree in Computer Animation. My name is Duane Loose and this is my story of the creative journey from idea to a three minute animated short film.
I am currently in my 7th quarter of study of an online MFA program at the Art Institute/Miami International University. This has been a demanding and very rewarding program which has given me the opportunity to focus on some areas of digital production that I would not otherwise be able to do in my everyday work. Story telling, both visual and written, is my primary area interest. This is a great program well worth checking out. http://www.miu-online.com/
The process of creating REQUIEM started about 6 years ago. I had a waking vision of sorts...thinking about the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the sacred energy it holds. That vision haunted me for several years until the Winter Quarter of 2006 when I created the first storyboard for my Animation Studies class.
During that class we created storyboards and script outlines for four separate projects...one of them, SPEEDTRAP , I made into a three minute short film last year. REQUIEM was the project I knew I wanted to do for my thesis and now that process begins. It will take the next year to complete and this blog will document the journey.
Here's the back story of REQUIEM:
A chaplain in Viet Nam makes a promise to the company of men that he ministers to – that if they die in combat he will take care of their unfinished business. Facing a major offensive by the North Vietnamese the men write their last wills and include the one thing that they need the chaplain to take care of for them.
The next day the entire company is killed in action. The death of his friends shakes the chaplain’s faith in God. He leaves the Army and the ministry and freefalls into a dark existence of anger, grief and pain. He blames God and blames himself for not keeping his word. Years go by.
The letters from the fallen men lay at the bottom of an old trunk. Their voices and memories haunt his waking and sleeping hours. In a last attempt to make peace with the demons ofVietnam the chaplain decides to take the letters to the Wall- the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC
When he reaches the memorial and touches the names of his fallen comrades a vision like a bolt of lightning courses through him. He is confronted by the dead and their unfinished business of 30 years ago. He knows he must keep his promise and sets about finishing the unfinished business of the men he served.
The Wall is the story of the chaplain’s redemption – and a journey that connects the past and present. Each letter he opens holds a new journey of healing, reconciliation, justice. Guided by the contents of the letters - a few clues on a piece of paper, a small snapshot - a 30 year old address or phone number - the chaplain knows that until he fulfills his promise he can’t rest …and neither can his dead comrades whose memories reside inside The Wall.
Duane Loose
I am currently in my 7th quarter of study of an online MFA program at the Art Institute/Miami International University. This has been a demanding and very rewarding program which has given me the opportunity to focus on some areas of digital production that I would not otherwise be able to do in my everyday work. Story telling, both visual and written, is my primary area interest. This is a great program well worth checking out. http://www.miu-online.com/
The process of creating REQUIEM started about 6 years ago. I had a waking vision of sorts...thinking about the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the sacred energy it holds. That vision haunted me for several years until the Winter Quarter of 2006 when I created the first storyboard for my Animation Studies class.
During that class we created storyboards and script outlines for four separate projects...one of them, SPEEDTRAP , I made into a three minute short film last year. REQUIEM was the project I knew I wanted to do for my thesis and now that process begins. It will take the next year to complete and this blog will document the journey.
Here's the back story of REQUIEM:
A chaplain in Viet Nam makes a promise to the company of men that he ministers to – that if they die in combat he will take care of their unfinished business. Facing a major offensive by the North Vietnamese the men write their last wills and include the one thing that they need the chaplain to take care of for them.
The next day the entire company is killed in action. The death of his friends shakes the chaplain’s faith in God. He leaves the Army and the ministry and freefalls into a dark existence of anger, grief and pain. He blames God and blames himself for not keeping his word. Years go by.
The letters from the fallen men lay at the bottom of an old trunk. Their voices and memories haunt his waking and sleeping hours. In a last attempt to make peace with the demons of
When he reaches the memorial and touches the names of his fallen comrades a vision like a bolt of lightning courses through him. He is confronted by the dead and their unfinished business of 30 years ago. He knows he must keep his promise and sets about finishing the unfinished business of the men he served.
The Wall is the story of the chaplain’s redemption – and a journey that connects the past and present. Each letter he opens holds a new journey of healing, reconciliation, justice. Guided by the contents of the letters - a few clues on a piece of paper, a small snapshot - a 30 year old address or phone number - the chaplain knows that until he fulfills his promise he can’t rest …and neither can his dead comrades whose memories reside inside The Wall.
Duane Loose