Ethics

The main areas of ethical boundaries lie within;

- What is socially acceptable, meaning how far can we alter an image until we see it as wrong

- Copyright boundaries, meaning the limitations to what we can use as sources, etc.

For copyright there are limits to what an individual or group of people can use, and this falls under creative commons and their licencing terms, which are;

- Attribution -"This license lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon your work, even commercially, as long as they credit you for the original creation. This is the most accommodating of licenses offered. Recommended for maximum dissemination and use of licensed materials."

- Attribution no derivatives - "This license allows for redistribution, commercial and non-commercial, as long as it is passed along unchanged and in whole, with credit to you."

- Attribution non commercial - share a like "This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms."

- Attribution share-alike - "This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to “copyleft” free and open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use. This is the license used by Wikipedia, and is recommended for materials that would benefit from incorporating content from Wikipedia and similarly licensed projects."

- Attribution non commercial - "This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, and although their new works must also acknowledge you and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms."

- Attribution non commercial no derivatives - "This license is the most restrictive of our six main licenses, only allowing others to download your works and share them with others as long as they credit you, but they can’t change them in any way or use them commercially."

Quotes taken from - http://creativecommons.org/licenses/

Although i would have to use specifically licenced works, i do not need to pick and choose, because i am a student and this falls under academic work so copyright law does not apply.

Week 12 - DVD label finished

This is the finished version of the DVD label

Overall, i find that the DVD label is by far the best part of the overall project, i feel that it reflects the Gears of war franchise perfectly, although there are a few downsides, such as;

- The xbox 360 segment to the disc looks sloppy, although i considered removing this section completely, just like i did with the DVD inlay, although i thought that the disc would look bare with it removed, so i kept it on

- The blood veins coming out of the Omen, i feel like i was on the right track but i went the wrong way with it, maybe if i had applied the same effects as i did with the Omen, it would have looked much better

- The font for the "Gears of war Emergence", this had totally slipped past me and i hadn't realised until too late that the font hadn't been changed, although it doesn't make a major difference i feel that it is slightly unfinished


Positive points;

- The template was implemented perfectly, and all ideas i had come up with in my head has been successfully transferred to the project

- The clipping masks work as i expected them to

- The omen itself is to my standards, perfect, mainly because of the applied effects such as the brush tool, and the additional photoshop added effects

- The postitioning of all of the objects are perfect and really reflect the franchise and its previous games


Techniques used;

- Clipping masks for the overall circlular shape of the disc, this was to keep any spill from the edges going into the white area which would be cut when printed, also a clipping mask was used for the BBFC logo for the same reasons

- Pen tool, this was used to create the catstick games logo, i felt that this tool did the job perfectly

- Transparencies, i used a transparent circle in which i used an inner text wrap to create the legal info on the disc

- Brush tool, i applied effects to the brush itself and added the effect over the omen, to give the effect of scratches, and again for the veins coming out from the omen (explained previously)


What i would do next time;

- Do more research into techniques, although the gears of war franchise disc art is more minimalist than fully worked on, i would look into learning how to make my own omen and apply effects

Week 12 - finished trailer

The finished version of the trailer is overall to a decent standard, overall i find that it is satisfactory.

The reasons why the video wasn't as good as it should have been;

- Certain transitions could have been explored more, meaning that i used to dip-to-black feature far too much and should have explored other techniques, for a more varied trailer to contrast different skills

- Around the 15th second there is a slight glitch in which it flashed an image, I had found no solution for this because i had tried to remake the clip but had some errors

- Around the 18-19th second the clip itself is too bright and the focus is taken away from the main point, next time i will change this and prevent it from happening

- Around the 47-54th second the clips transitions occur too fast, meaning that the effect of suspense isn't as prominent as if i would have made the transitions slightly further apart and slower, meaning the dip to black should have lasted longer

- Not enough variations in sound, there is only a backing track and one sound effect, although it is sufficient i feel that the trailer is not as good as it should've been mainly for this reason, next time i would add in sound effects of explosions and gun shots

- The ending, the ending is very sudden and i should have had it fade to black, the reason for this is that it transitions out peacefully to correspond with the music


Although the video has its bad points, there are some good points, such as;

- The transitions, although generic are smooth throughout the video and very little errors made

- Around the 20th second the clip effects really bring out the red in the scene and really keep the attention of the viewer

- The suitability of the music to the video, I find that the backing music goes well with the overall video, because of its depressing overtones


What i would do differently next time;

- Put more time into the trailer rather than focusing on the images, this is because i focused more on completing the photoshop and illustrator tasks because they are more challenging, meaning that less time was spent on premiere

- More sound effects, this is because the trailer itself is satisfactory, i think that with more sounds effects that the trailer will be more active and come to life

- More effects, i mainly used the dip-to-black, although it works well, i feel that there is room for improvement in this area, and if there was a next time i would definately pay more attention to effects

Week 12 - Finished DVD inlay

The finished version of the DVD inlay for Gears of war : Emergence.

Overall i find that the back cover and spine are near perfect (to my standards at least), but the front cover could have been done far better the reasons for this are;

- It makes no sense, this is because there is a fair amount happening and that the focus isn't precise, as with most other covers

- The quality overall of the image isn't terrible, although there are jagged edges to the imported images/ layers, such as the "Corpser" (Spider) has some jagged edges

- The cutout of the city, i used a previous project in which i had cutout a city beforehand, i decided this to be better than a single building, this isn't a perfect cutout and i have done this do the best of my ability

Positive points to the front cover;

- The red silouette is fantastic, if i were to recreate this image, i would definately do this part the same mainly because it goes with the theme overall of gears of war and fans of the series can identify the character

- The juxtaposition of the calm lake next to the dying city, i did this mainly to create a sense of emergency and a sudden catastrophy

- The models (flying), i used concept art and pictures of toys to create these parts, because they aren't taken from a video game, there is a sense of realism about them- especially since they are miniature

Overall success of design to implementation was fairly successful, especially the spine and back cover, again the front cover was changed for reasons i will mention next.

The differences with design;

- BBFC logos, i decided to remove them from the spine and front cover mainly because i felt it wasn't necessary because we were tasked with creating the cover itself, although i have included it on the back to give the overall cover a sense of realism

- Xbox 360 cover design, i had changed my design (in my head) and included it in my draft, i later decided that it affected the overall quality of the image and decided not to include it- the reason it affected the quality is that it limited my image size, in which i needed a fair amount and the fact that i personally prefer it the way it is now

Overall i kept to the design, keeping predicted images in the same area, same with titles and legal info.

In the end i decided to change the image for the front cover (from the single building to the city) because i felt that the wasn't much possibility for exploring potential skills with the single building because the image was already filled with this building, i felt that switching to the city gave me the space i need to add in other images and explore potential.

If i were to do this project again next time, i would change the front cover mainly because i am unhappy with it currently, the reason for this has been mentioned previously, although next time i will definately do more research into the subject and look into other peoples work and see what i can learn from that, although i explored the overall tools, etc, i feel that research would have benefitted me far more than what i have done.

Although i feel that the spine and back cover are good, next time i will research into making it more production level quality, as with the front cover.

Techniques used;

- Effects, i gave an outer glow to the city and the title text to make it stand out more against the black background, i felt this was necessary because otherwise the city would blend in with the background and be hard to see, i also gave the "marcus" layer a red overlay to create that 2d flat silouette effect.

- Levels, i used this on the back cover for an image, and on the front to bring out the red darkness, as i was trying to get red of the slight blue overtone to the city, as the image was taken during daytime

- Layer mask (Brighness and contrast), i also used the pen tool to outline the city, in which i made a layer mask, and transferred it over to the B&C, i did this as stated before to remove the blue/ light overtone to the city

- Opacity, i had gotten a dust texture for the image, and decided to use that to filter the black background to give the effect of smoke, i felt this was necessary because it brought the focus from the reader forward

- Basic tools, such as selection, placement, magic wand tool (to remove white parts of an image)

- I have included an outside image on the disk, i felt this was necessary as some work went into it and was included in the finished product overall, i have used levels and effects to alter the image, this image has been altered twice (once for back and spine) in which i would edit the settings for certain parts and then import

- Filter, i have decided to use a blur filter on some of the "Reavers" (flying monsters), mainly because i wanted to give the effect that they were party in the smoke of the background, just to give it a sense of distance and to try and avoid a flat image

Week 10 - Trailer

So far for the trailer I have compiled clips from other existing media, noted in previous blogs, and i have applied visual effects to them, I have also added a black colour matte and added in my logo to stretch in and fade out at the start.

The effects I have used currently;

Time echo - this is to bring out certain effects such as blood spatter and explosions after the second title, I want to draw the attention to the bright colours to give a contrast from all over the video and glorify some of the game's  potential effects

Fade out - I have used this to apply an effect to my logo on the startup on the video so it transitions onto the next clip more smoothly and gives the effect to the watcher that it's happening quickly

Dip to black - I have used this to transition between titles so it isn't a solid transition, which give the impression that the work itself isn't of a good quality

Week 9 - Premiere

For my trailer I have chosen to use 30 FPS, AVCHD 720P, mainly because of the source footage (gameplay and trailers) are set to 30 FPS and having the main project set to that will make it look smoother.

I chose AVCHD 720P because of the video format, it will be easier to export and import files whilst maintaining a fairly high quality for the project.

It is also set to DV for the standard for video editing, it is also in widescreen so that most machines can view it without the black space.

My source footage (taken from youtube);

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twYqFHMXI7w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYiij5EW1RM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiHY91AcG9E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUnpLYE_ei8

Not all of these may be used for the trailer, but i do intend to have as much footage as possible while maintaining high quality.

For the tools i do intend to import my logo as an image and create a black matte background and add some possible effect to the logo as the trailer starts, and have a fade for the logo as well onto some footage.

I also intend to use the array of tools at my disposal.

Week 7 - Premiere

Today in lesson we were introduced to Premiere, a video editing software.

The techniques we learnt are;

Selection tool (this allows you to select certain clips for the overall video)

Track select (allows you to position clips)

Ripple edit (allows you to set the time allocated for a clip, e.g. if it's 30 frames long and you set it to 0.5s at 30fps it will play at double the rate)

Rolling edit (alloes you to allocate certain times in which the video starts playing)

Rate stretch

Razor (Lets you cut a section off of the selected clip)

Slip

Slide

Pen (allows you to set contrast levels and pitch levels and can be changed using the CTRL key for the gradient of the fade in, fade out)

All of these tools will be useful in making my trailer.


Brainstorming for ideas;

Black and white with "mad world" playing with clips from the other gears of war games.