Pier feedback

I put my theme as censorship because I guess thats what this has become. My essay is exploring how media effects fear and discusses how things are adapted in relation to fear. And I guess the adapting has bled through into being a censorship issue. I proposed my layered comic, I've decided that the layering will be on both words and image. I was thinking like having a poem on each page and heres cut holes in the higher layers in places where the same word has been used. But at this point I wasn't sure if I wanted to create a narrative or to just have chosen subjects to do it on. And whether or not I should generalise it or have it on specific happenings now, like the paris attacks.

Zatul filled out one of my feedback forms.

Things she said:

Look into movies that share a strong link with your subject

Specify your target audience

Go more gross

Try colour

Package it professionally 

Try making a few different comics

What I will do in respect to this:

Define my audience which I'm pretty sure is adults because obviously it would need to be censored for children.

I'm going to look at more horrifying things in movies, like saw games etc

I may try to explore colour in relation to what it emotes. Like finding the right stock for each layer of comic. Then i might play with shading and bitmapping it so it works on the coloured paper.

Separate my ideas into multiple comic ideas. Just try lots of different idea til something fits.

Sophie also filled out one of my feedback forms.

Things she said:

Figure out where you are going with this

Consider advertising and campaign as a media

Do more thumbnails and quick idea generation

Don't labour too long over non-final images

Don't think this would work as a comic

Look at banned adverts especially for sti's

What i will do in respect to this:

I will figure out what my opinion is and what i want to convey overall.

I don't really have an interest in advertising and I want this to be more of a social comment on the state of affairs so I probably won't be doing adverts. But adverts is a good point to make as some are only shown after certain times to protect children.

I need to do some quick work and just blast out a load of ideas so that I have a book of visual thinking to work off of.

Research more things that are censored to protect children.

Gross time

I originally started doing a big A3 gross drawing with lots of different elements that would be deemed unsuitable for children; heads on stakes, rape, cannabilism, Ed Gein and his skin mask, and ripped apart animals in the trees. But time was running out before our crit and I still hadn't finished doing the gross line work. So to prepare for the pier crit I made two smaller scale versions of my idea so that I could get the concept across. I code to do a cannibal and a head on a steak. I made the children's version just completely omit the gross thing and replace it with something happy such as candy canes and a happy meal.  At the bottom the was a little line of text saying please tick here if you are over 18, and if you pull the flap out of the corner the box is ticked underneath. It was kind of acting like those internet pop ups where you are asked to confirm your age. As a blockade to under 18's but my point is that it is easy to surpass those, intact they are less than useless because it only reinforces the idea of it being adult content which is forbidden. I think my point is changing to that the protecting of children has lead to the idea of it being forbidden which is just like one big red button saying do not press. How could they resist? 

Thinking practical

I was thinking through themes and what could be the overarching theme I take into my practical.

Trust is a big theme in my essay because it speaks about people not trusting each other and the loss of community. But another running theme was protecting children. Especially among the films because they have been rated with the protection of children in mind, there are banned films to protect children, should they ever see them. It's less about protecting the film watching community but more about tip toeing around the next generation, fearing that we will negatively influence them and start a new crime wave and loss of morality. 

Thats when I was thinking of a more literal way to protect children which was to give them blinders like horses. I like mocking the idea of it and I think thats what I want to say with my practical work. That we shouldn't have to adjust what can be released for children who are not meant to watch it anyway. Surely it is the parents responsability to protect their child from adult media. I want to step out of the 'norm' to protect everyones feelings and views. With social media connecting everyone so that everyone has a voice it means that anyone could disagree with you and their voice would be heard, therefore being a detriment to your original message. I want to hurt feelings and be disapproved of. 

At this point my idea is a layered image that is on one layer horrific and full of horrible things in a lot of detail. But then the following layers will dress it up and edit it to make it more suitable for younger age groups. But it will be over exaggerated edits to show that my opinion is opposing to it.

Feedback

Things I need to do in respect to this feedback and the learning outcomes

Start practical work that is saying something.

 Have a critical opinion.

Write more of my essay, 

arrange the evidence into an order that makes sense

 introduce each point instead of just jumping between ideas. 

And there MUST be a point to bringing up evidence so that my essay is saying something and not just stating facts. 

Kitty Genevese

So i tried to make it into an issuu document but this happened and I've no idea why. So here it is in a list of images:

I decided to do my sine in coloured pencil because its been a while since i had a play with analogue media. Unfortunately I did the last two pages portrait by accident so with some sneaky editing with the patch tool they were fixed to landscape. This was a quick piece of work to kick start my cop practical, I think it worked because I've been drawing more since.

In my tutorial with Fred he didn't really like it. He said "zines are for amateurs, professionals don't make zines". I don't think thats true, i've bought many zines from professionals. But i get what he was trying to say, its not enough for a cop practical piece, but as i said this was more of a tool to start the visual thinking process and not really to be a final piece. 

I liked using the poetry again, I think it adds a good flow to my narrative work and it means that I don't have to draw as many details, I only have to illustrate the verse. I quite like the idea of doing short comics, but a set of them so its not just a stand alone thing. 

Cop essay to date.

Copy cat theory is the theory that if an event or action is broadcasted in media and gains a lot of attention then people will copy it to gain the same attention for themselves. Big examples of this theory are copy cat murders and copy cat suicides. This questions the way we absorb information from the media and what we learn from it. Certain things can be sensationalised and in today's society media has become a concrete part of our lives, like food and water. It is the bread and butter of the information we learn, but is the way it comes across giving skewed views on morality and the state of society. 
"The national suicide rate rose by more than 10 percent the month after Marilyn Monroe died—and that was before 24/7 media coverage." 
(Schonfeld,Z. (2014) Did Kurt Cobains' death lower the suicide rate in 1994? Newsweek. [online] 4/4/14. http://www.newsweek.com/did-kurt-cobains-death-lower-suicide-rate-1994-244332 [accessed on 10/11/15])
The rise in deaths in that year is thought to be down to copycat suicides. People wanting to show their dedication to Marilyn, possibly thinking that their death would be broadcast alongside hers. Because of this fact, in 1994 when Kurt Kobain committed suicide there was a lot of fear that there would be a multitude of copycat suicides to follow based on his popularity and cultural reach.
 "“When we looked at the completions before and after Cobain’s death and used the previous years and the following years, we actually saw a drop-off,” Jobes said. “And we had a marked and dramatic increase in calls to the crisis center.” (Schonfeld,Z. (2014) Did Kurt Cobains' death lower the suicide rate in 1994? Newsweek. [online] 4/4/14. http://www.newsweek.com/did-kurt-cobains-death-lower-suicide-rate-1994-244332 [accessed on 10/11/15])
There was actually a drop in suicides, which puts into question what was different between the media reports of Marilyn's death and Kurt's. It is thought to be partly due to the speech Kurt Cobain's girlfriend gave after he died. She did not speak about how she missed him but instead let everyone know how selfish she though he was. Referring to the band's guitarist she said; "''He goes: 'God, Kurt was cool'. No, he wasn't. 
''Not in the sense of that action. That action had a horrible effect on our family. It's not cool. It just wasn't cool. " So no longer was the coverage sensationalising the suicide but instead condemned it, and with such high authority, in the eyes of Nirvana fans, she made it 'uncool' to die. And I think that her speech had a direct impact on the way people absorbed the news. 
April 1994 not only saw the death of Kurt Cobain but it was also the month that guidelines were issued on covering suicides in the media. It was brought up by the medical community the year prior and once it was put into practice there were help lines and warnings alongside the report. It acted as a safety net for reporters, so they could discuss the suicide as before but now would have a hotline number underneath. I think it was a small measure but mental health is a taboo subject and to have the helplines put into the media helped give them the coverage they needed. Almost in a pseudo copycat fashion many more suicide and mental health hotlines have been set up since. So in this example; media of past suicides created a fear that the suicides would be copied, bouncing off of that the media has added some precautionary warnings to the news report of it. Although it hasn't changed the way in which the story is portrayed verbally.

Copycat theory suggests that our actions are motivated by the attention at the end. This is a theory that B.F.Skinner explored in his 'radical behaviourism'. One of his most notable experiments was the 'Skinner Box' in which rats were put inside and if they pushed a lever they were rewarded with a treat, although the first instance of pressing the lever is almost pure coincidence in exploration the following attempts to pull the lever are purely based upon the reward at the end. They learn that an action evokes a response; a reward. In contemporary society fame is seen as the epitome of rewards. We live in a culture of constant coverage and contact. We are more aware of our celebrities lives now that we have ever been before. Their whole lifestyle can be obsessed over and devoured through a twenty four hour connection to the world, in the form of the television. It is seen as a simple flow diagram, get noticed, get famous, be rich, enjoy the perfect life. The romanticisation of fame has become an epidemic. I challenge you to find a children's non-cartoon show that isn't about having some amazing talent that will make you famous, or already being famous. We feed our obsessions down to the next generation.

'Cultural acquisition of a specific learned response among rhesus monkeys' is an experiment where monkeys were paired up and exposed to an object, one test subject from the pair would have been previously exposed but was blasted with air whenever it tried to interact with it. This was done until the monkey was fully deterred from touching the object. When put together and exposed the second monkey would acknowledge the first's fear and hesitance and it then shared the same response of avoiding the object. This shows that a piers actions can heavily influence how you react to things. Without even communicating, just through body language you can understand how others are reacting and then judge how yourself should react in comparison.

In the same case study wild and captive monkeys were exposed to snakes and snake like objects that blocked the monkeys from a reward. The wild monkeys were instantly fearful of the snake and would not reach out for it, whereas the captive monkeys had no problem with the snake and reached over straight for the thing it recognised as a reward. Some captive one's even picked up the snake. This showed that the wild monkeys had learnt the fear of snakes through their rearing from their parents, but the captive monkeys had no reason to fear the snakes and therefore didn't. This shows that the upbringing heavily influences the way the child thinks, especially in relation to fears. Many schools today teach stranger danger and as a result children are more fearful of people they do not know. 


In media, shocking things do well and that's why the media seems to have such a negative view of the world. It's more interesting when it's a tragedy. This is not a new theory though, throughout time tragedy has been a popular subject and even more so if it is true. I believe that this is what started the franchise of horror based on true stories. A prime example is that of Ed Gein; Gein was an American man from Wisconsin who lived a bizarre life with his mother who he was obsessed with until she died leaving him, a full grown man now, alone in their house. Gein lived in a farming area and so he lived without much interaction with the rest of the town, earning himself a name in the local children’s scary stories.  Gein was a murderer and a grave robber, he took women, mainly his mothers age, and would kill and skin them. He used the skin for many things such as the infamous Lampshade, but also for wearing and dancing around in. Gein was clearly a mentally unstable man.  Once caught the story of Gein went wildfire through the media, such sickening and gory details were reported over the news explaining the different things he had done.

Gein remained in peoples minds since it was one of the most gruesome serial killer stories for a while. Seemingly it stuck in the mind of the horror genre. Gein inspired a multitude of horror films taking aspects of his case and blowing them out of proportion to create the next big horror flick. He inspired Hannibal, for the obvious reasons of they were both cannibalistic, but he is said to be an inspiration for the character Norman Bates in ‘Psycho’. They took the aspect of his mother obsession and used it, Once reported in the media it became another motif for horror, a man who is very close to his mother must therefore be mentally deranged and in love with her. It’s now accepted as a character cliché of murderers.

PRACTICAL WORK IT BEGINS

So to start off my practical work I wasn't really sure what to do because I've focused in on my research so much it feels weird switching over to practical and having nothing. So I have decided to, for now, not think about the final product too much. I just need to get some work done really. That's what we agreed in my tutorial. And here I am a week later only just giving myself the kick up the butt that was needed.

I decided to look at the Kitty Genovese murder, since I'm using it as an example in my essay.
I've wrote a little poem about the incident, I was trying to go in the direction of my last years cop project where its not just something about something, its something that has a comment on the way something is. I want it to have a purpose basically. I haven't illustrated it yet but I'm getting into my new work method of writing the narrative first and then planning images afterwards. I think this will also help improve the synthesis between my words and drawings which is good because that's already the purpose of one of my 603 briefs, so now I'm doing it doubly so.


A woman screams,
People hear,
But no one comes to aid.
Stabbed to death,
Outside her home,
A tabloid story made.

Tears in her eyes,
Blood on her clothes,
She laid down in a stairwell.
The man returned,
Stabbed again,
Her defences didn't fair well.

Stabbed in her hands
And down her back,
Her life began to drain.
He raped her limp
And blood-soaked body
Leaving once he came.

Lying in a pool of blood,
A door is finally opened.
A woman holds her in her arms
But Genovese is broken.

911 is dialled
They arrive just after four.
But before they reach the hospital
Kitty breathed no more.

38 witnesses,
Stood by,
A tabloid said
'38 motherfuckers'
You are why she's dead.

When a cry for help is ignored,
When a fatality comes to light,
It's upsetting that we fear each other
When we could unite.

(illustrated pause)

New York City
Summer 64'
A woman outside screams,
Will YOU open your door?