Making/Building
After our initial ideas stage, we now had a very clear understanding of our Art & Culture theme, and how we wanted to communicate it using our set design. We also knew some of the key features that we wanted to include in our Rube Goldberg machine.These were:
Wine/Wine bottle and wine being poured as the human nudge that starts the machine, marbles used in some parts of the machine and specifically on the guitar strings to create some interesting audio, a spiral in some form created by the objects to hint at the Channel Logo, and confetti falling across the set design as the final outcome/task that is completed by the machine.
On the day of constructing and shooting our ident, we all brought in various objects that we knew would fit the Art & Culture theme of our set design. The objects were things such as: candles, rug, postcards, books, lights/lamps, statues, playing cards, CD's, guitar, masquerade mask and etc.
We then spent all day experimenting and constructing our Rube Goldberg machine within the set design we had started to put together. We first wanted to complete the Rube Goldberg machine, and then to finish/polish the set design by adding all the smaller objects into it afterwards, so that whilst we were constructing the machine they did not get in the way or distract us. We knew what the key features of our Rube Goldberg machine should be, so we spent the day connecting those key features through a variety of trial & error and testing of our mechanisms.
Some of the mechanisms we used we had taken inspiration from our research, as well as the initial workshop we had done the week before. The most noticeable of these influences is the use of liquid, within our initial workshop we included water and a pulley system within our Rube Goldberg machine, and in our final ident Rube Goldberg machine we did something similar, but instead used wine and tubbing, to also induce a pulley system.
Our Workshop:
Everything we had aimed to do and all the key events/features we wanted to include in our Rube Goldberg machine worked and were successful, apart from one. One key feature we could not test or try out until we came to shoot the ident, this was because the feature included making a mess of the whole set design. This was the use of confetti. We had planned that the final outcome of our Rube Goldberg machine would be a cup being knocked away and revealing a pile of confetti, which is placed right next to a working fan. In theory we hoped that when the cup is knocked away and the confetti revealed, that the fan would blow the confetti across the whole set. Unfortunately this was not the case. The confetti was either too heavy, or the fan not strong enough, or both, but our plan did not work out.
At this point we did not have access to any other materials that could be used as alternatives to make our idea work, so we decided to simply embrace the mistake and try and make something fun/funny out of the situation. We got Jess to hide behind the scene (the shelf), right underneath the pile of confetti, so when the cup gets knocked over and the pile of confetti disappointingly does not move she can pop out from behind the shelf and blow on the confetti to rectify the situation. We filmed a few takes of Jess doing so and we were very happy with this result. Although we had failed in making our Rube Goldberg machine complete the final task, we thought that the content that came out of that situation was even better, as it was more interesting, light-hearted and humorous. Later on during our final feedback, this part of the ident turned out to be everyone's favourite. Which just proves that sometimes even if things don't turn out they way they are meant to, simply thinking on your feet, being creative and embracing the moment/having fun can turn the problem/mistake around and make it even better/more successful.
Editing
To edit our ident I used Adobe After Effects. I choose this programme because I am quite familiar with it, and it allowed me to edit the videos we had filmed in a professional and accurate way. We had many various shots of our ident, and it was my challenge to edit those shots in a way that communicated our theme, as well as told the story that we had designed within our ident in an engaging and clear way.
The biggest challenge I faced was making all the shots we filmed flow seamlessly. Within our Rube Goldberg machine we also had two tangents/outcomes that happened alongside the main/final outcome. These were the wine glass filling up with wine, and the marbles rolling down the guitar. It was quite difficult to edit these two events happening in a way that did not make them seem as if they were the finale, as well as not making them seem too off-pace within the video/ident. I believe I had managed to avoid these problems in the way I edited the videos. The two tangents/extra outcomes I made sure to show the extend of, but also cut away to the next shot/scene quite quickly, so it was clear to the viewer/audience that that outcome was not the final one. I also made sure to edit the video in the exact chronological order of how our Rube Goldberg machine occurred, so that all elements and all shots within the ident made sense and the cause/effect of each outcome was clear.
One of the brief requirements was to include the 'Up Next' screen with the Channel Nought logo in the last 5-10 seconds of the ident. This turned out to become another challenge. Due to the concept of our ident, each frame/shot we filmed was quite busy and had a lot of visual elements within them. Consequently, when I placed the 'Up Next' screen text/content over the last shot of our ident, the text/copy was getting lost on the screen and not legible/clear at all/ The challenge I now faced was finding a shot or an effect that could solve this problem. I did not want to sabotage our storyline by using a different shot, because then the ident would not have been chronological, and the final shot would not have made any sense to the viewer. However, I also needed to find a way to make the text/copy legible and easy to read. I decided that adding an effect to the video would be the best way to do this.
Fist I tried to take advantage of this problem, and to be a little more creative with the way I edit the last shot to aid text legibility. I choose a circular blur effect that mimicked a swirl, and therefore would hint back to the Channel Logo. When applied to the last shot, this effect solved the issue of text legibility. It seemed that I had not only solved the problems we had, but also added an extra meaning/connection between the ident and the Channel. Unfortunately, although the circular blur effect seemed to work well and in theory it was a good idea, visually it seemed a little off. We felt that such an effect was a little old/dated, and that it also seemed a little awkward.
When we showed this idea to Charlie to get some feedback, he also agreed that the swirling effect, although clever, was a bit too much and kind of ruined how impressive our ident was up until that point. What he suggested instead was to keep it simple, and to keep all the attention on the content of the ident. He suggested looking at different, more subtle blurring and fading effects.
Going back to the video with a more direct/minimal approach in mind, what we decided to do was to simply add a black coloured fade to the ending of the ident, so that the white coloured content on the 'Up Next' screen would be easier to see and read. We took onboard what Charlie said about keeping it simple and focusing on the video content of out ident, so we all agreed that the simple fade was the best option.
I went on to apply the fade, as well as to clean up and make the content feel seamless and flowing. As well as fading the video/last shot of the ident, I also faded in and out the text/'UpNext' screen so that there were no harsh cuts in content and so that the transitions between the video and the information felt easy and natural. I also added a slight fade-in at the start of the video, to tie it all together and make the ident feel cohesive start to finish.
The brief also asked that the ident contained audio. We knew we wanted the audio to relate to our theme of Art & Culture, but we also did not want it to be too distracting from the Rube Goldberg machine and the natural audio/sounds that were generated by the machine. The sounds such as wine pouring into the wine glass and the marbles running down the guitar strings created very engaging and interesting sounds, so we wanted to make sure that those were audible and clear throughout the video. For this we needed the background music/audio throughout the video to not be too overwhelming or attention-grabbing, so possibly something instrumental rather than with lyrics/words.
We looked at several different songs and instrumental music pieces, and then watched the ident start to finish with each piece playing to figure out which was the most appropriate and effective for what we wanted to achieve with the audio. We wanted our audio to also represent the Art & Culture theme, so we tried to look for music/soundtracks that would be recognisable to a large audience. We looked at classical music, waiting/elevator music, movie soundtracks and etc.
In the end we chose the instrumental elevator music. We choose this for several reasons. The first being that the music was not too distracting from the content/video within the ident. The second was that the pace of the elevator music instrumental seemed to fit quite well with the pace of our video and Rube Goldberg machine. Finally, we also choose this audio because the elevator soundtrack is very well known to a wide audience, so in a way it is part of society and culture. Out of all the soundtracks/music/instrumentals we looked at, this one is likely the most recognisable, so we thought it would be a good to support the Art & Culture theme we were portraying.
The elevator music instrumental fit in well with the pace of our ident, so I did not need to edit the soundtrack too much. The only part within the ident where I edited the audio was when the final outcome, the reveal of the pile of confetti, happened. I did this to bring attention to that moment through silence, and to enhance the humour of the moment when Jess pops up from behind and blows at the pile of confetti. By making the audio go silent, I created a moment of suspense and confusion for the viewer, where they are left thinking what has happened and what will happen next. The silence suggest that all action is over, so when Jess pops up from behind the shelf it makes the moment even more surprising and unexpected.
One of the brief requirements was to include the 'Up Next' screen with the Channel Nought logo in the last 5-10 seconds of the ident. This turned out to become another challenge. Due to the concept of our ident, each frame/shot we filmed was quite busy and had a lot of visual elements within them. Consequently, when I placed the 'Up Next' screen text/content over the last shot of our ident, the text/copy was getting lost on the screen and not legible/clear at all/ The challenge I now faced was finding a shot or an effect that could solve this problem. I did not want to sabotage our storyline by using a different shot, because then the ident would not have been chronological, and the final shot would not have made any sense to the viewer. However, I also needed to find a way to make the text/copy legible and easy to read. I decided that adding an effect to the video would be the best way to do this.
Fist I tried to take advantage of this problem, and to be a little more creative with the way I edit the last shot to aid text legibility. I choose a circular blur effect that mimicked a swirl, and therefore would hint back to the Channel Logo. When applied to the last shot, this effect solved the issue of text legibility. It seemed that I had not only solved the problems we had, but also added an extra meaning/connection between the ident and the Channel. Unfortunately, although the circular blur effect seemed to work well and in theory it was a good idea, visually it seemed a little off. We felt that such an effect was a little old/dated, and that it also seemed a little awkward.
When we showed this idea to Charlie to get some feedback, he also agreed that the swirling effect, although clever, was a bit too much and kind of ruined how impressive our ident was up until that point. What he suggested instead was to keep it simple, and to keep all the attention on the content of the ident. He suggested looking at different, more subtle blurring and fading effects.
Going back to the video with a more direct/minimal approach in mind, what we decided to do was to simply add a black coloured fade to the ending of the ident, so that the white coloured content on the 'Up Next' screen would be easier to see and read. We took onboard what Charlie said about keeping it simple and focusing on the video content of out ident, so we all agreed that the simple fade was the best option.
I went on to apply the fade, as well as to clean up and make the content feel seamless and flowing. As well as fading the video/last shot of the ident, I also faded in and out the text/'UpNext' screen so that there were no harsh cuts in content and so that the transitions between the video and the information felt easy and natural. I also added a slight fade-in at the start of the video, to tie it all together and make the ident feel cohesive start to finish.
The brief also asked that the ident contained audio. We knew we wanted the audio to relate to our theme of Art & Culture, but we also did not want it to be too distracting from the Rube Goldberg machine and the natural audio/sounds that were generated by the machine. The sounds such as wine pouring into the wine glass and the marbles running down the guitar strings created very engaging and interesting sounds, so we wanted to make sure that those were audible and clear throughout the video. For this we needed the background music/audio throughout the video to not be too overwhelming or attention-grabbing, so possibly something instrumental rather than with lyrics/words.
We looked at several different songs and instrumental music pieces, and then watched the ident start to finish with each piece playing to figure out which was the most appropriate and effective for what we wanted to achieve with the audio. We wanted our audio to also represent the Art & Culture theme, so we tried to look for music/soundtracks that would be recognisable to a large audience. We looked at classical music, waiting/elevator music, movie soundtracks and etc.
In the end we chose the instrumental elevator music. We choose this for several reasons. The first being that the music was not too distracting from the content/video within the ident. The second was that the pace of the elevator music instrumental seemed to fit quite well with the pace of our video and Rube Goldberg machine. Finally, we also choose this audio because the elevator soundtrack is very well known to a wide audience, so in a way it is part of society and culture. Out of all the soundtracks/music/instrumentals we looked at, this one is likely the most recognisable, so we thought it would be a good to support the Art & Culture theme we were portraying.
The elevator music instrumental fit in well with the pace of our ident, so I did not need to edit the soundtrack too much. The only part within the ident where I edited the audio was when the final outcome, the reveal of the pile of confetti, happened. I did this to bring attention to that moment through silence, and to enhance the humour of the moment when Jess pops up from behind and blows at the pile of confetti. By making the audio go silent, I created a moment of suspense and confusion for the viewer, where they are left thinking what has happened and what will happen next. The silence suggest that all action is over, so when Jess pops up from behind the shelf it makes the moment even more surprising and unexpected.
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