Blog Post #3- Movie Clip

My video, Das Rad, or The Wheel in English, shows the development of the world from a rocks perspective. Winner of the best short animated file, this German video has been translated and accepted to be part of the Animation Show 3. In this video, we see how a couple of "rock people" live life and how they view the development of the world. Some interesting points that I noticed from this video were the materials that the animators used to create the rocks. i can't tell if this film was made by advanced claymation, or if it was all created by digital animation, or even if they actually used real rocks. that shows how believable the animation was for the video. The super speed of the movie is very important to the plot because I believe that it symbolizes how quickly time moves for the rocks because of how long a rock lives. a day to us, feels like a second to them. throughout the clip, we see small villages appearing in the background while the rocks go about living like they always had. eventually, one of the rocks starts playing with a circular rock that he had found and we can see that he starts to realize the power of a wheel. at this point, an early caveman comes and sees the circular rock that the rockman had been playing with. from this point, man creates the wheel and once the wheel is created, the development of the land around the rock men is sped up twice as much. we see a road appear, and soon the villages grow larger and larger. At one point in the video, the speed of the development becomes so extreme that the rocks don't know what to do. this clip is very symbolic because it shows the progression of man and how it's just been getting faster and faster and never slowing down. Another ironic point was the billboard that was put up by the rock men that said built to last and eventually just broke down. By that, the creator is showing that he believes nothing is "built to last" As the development went on, the sky grew darker and everything became much more polluted until everything just stopped. I believe that the creator of this movie was trying to get a point across of how much our world has changed but I don't think the creator is quite a fan of how much we've developed lately. He makes a statement about what he thinks will happen in the future about how mankind will be the end of mankind. After all this development, everything is just swept away and everything starts over again as new. The movie tends to have a negative point at the end that makes you think. To me, that's what makes a good video/essay. It has to make you think deeper about a part of your life or some experience you've had.

Blog Post #2 - Diagrams

My diagram, which pictures a volcano in full blast, is probably viewed as a more elementary example in the world of diagrams. As I was searching for a diagram that interested me the most, I realized that many diagrams now-a-days aren’t very visual at all. Now, maybe I’m wrong here, but I thought that one reason for even creating a diagram was so that a person could put their information in a more visual set-up. But, when I looked at all the examples, they were all pretty much just a bunch of words in a bubble. To me, that’s not visual at all. Now, I may sound somewhat perturbed here, but that’s only because I am such a visual learner. Diagrams were how I survived many or any science class. So when I see people just putting the same boring notes into little bubbles or squares and calling them diagrams, I have to disagree.
So today, we are going to learn about volcanos! This wonderful diagram, which I have so gratefully taken from the Education World Website (http://www.education-world.com/a_tech/techlp/techlp039.shtml), shows a volcano at full eruption. We also learn each of the different parts that work together to create a volcano. We can see the craters, the vents, and even learn where the sill is located. To me, this is very informational. I think that the labeling on this diagram is very basic, but it also needs to be because the whole diagram itself is basic. I also like the fact that the diagram has a cartoon look to it, almost as if someone had doodled it on the paint application. I believe that this factor is important to the diagram as a whole because it helps the diagram connect to its audience who is obviously fairly young. I’d say early to middle grade school to be exact. One of the biggest differences that this diagram has had to suffer now that it is on the world wide web instead of in a fourth grade classroom is that it is very limited. It can always only be a drawn diagram. Maybe, if the designer gets creative, they can add some animation to it and make the volcano actually explode over and over again, but it will never be the same as some 3-D model that a little kid stays up all night working on. We will never be able to see the combination of baking soda and other ingredients that make a chemical reaction that spills over the edge of the volcano and makes an exciting mess all over the classroom table. We lose all of that, but I think we are starting to get used to missing all of these things with the internet. We are starting to become too digital and wrapped up in technology that we forget to get our hands dirty with the real diagrams. I know that this isn’t very close to the idea of what you wanted for the blogs but still…it needed to be said.

Blog Post 1

"I want to see a piece of the essayist. I want to see a mind at work, imagining, spinning, struggling to understand. If the essayist has all the answers, he isn't struggling to grasp, and I won't either. When you care about something, you continually grapple with it, because it is alive in you. It thrashes and moves, like all living things." (Atwan 22)

-Alan Lightman

My quote, by Alan Lightman, really hits home with me. I think his abstract wording and ideas help me to relate to him. When I read an essay, I too want to learn a little bit about the writer, not just the topic. For me, an essay is truly successful if it makes the reader want to go out and search about the topic on their own. A good essay should bring up all the questions lingering in the essayist’s mind but doesn’t always have to answer them. They may possibly leave some of the answering up to the reader to discover. Another good point that Lightman brings up is how a reader should be able to feel the passion of the writer through the ink and pages. Its chain reaction, when the writer is truly excited or interested in the subject, the reader tends to feel the same. An essayist who really struggles with a topic, almost to the point where it seems to haunt him, will automatically become a better writer because he pours his emotions, frustrations, accomplishment, and more onto the page. If the writer isn’t struggling, in a good way, the reader won’t either. Thus, if the writer isn’t interested in the topic, there can be no hope for the reader. Again, the wording is brilliant and it caught my eye, especially the line, “When you care about something, you continually grapple with it, because it is alive in you. It thrashes and moves, like all living things.” I believe that when you stumble across an amazing essay, or any piece of writing, you will be able to feel the words trying to thrash themselves off the page. They scream at you, grab your attention, take you along for the ride and don’t let you go until the writing is finished. After you finish reading, take a deep breath and all you can do is mutter, “wow..” Now, I know this doesn’t happen very often, but isn’t it amazing when it does? Those are the pieces of writing that you’ll remember.

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