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February 25, 2005
As of Yet, Untitled
CTIN 499 Computational Film Sketch
Title: TBD
Concept/Theme: This film explores the central role commuting and transportation have on our experience of the world, especially in a sprawling metropolis like Los Angeles. Three characters (husband, wife, and elderly father/father-in-law) make their way from a common starting point to pursue their daily commute-the elderly father walks to the local donut shop with his faithful dog companion, pausing in the park along the way to chat with other neighborhood locals; the husband drops his wife at the rail station and proceeds by car, racing down boulevards onto the freeway, taking conference calls on his cell phone, and getting trapped by traffic jams, all the while images of snow capped San Bernardino mountains fleet by as unnoticed as the giant billboards advertising new televisions shows and the current lottery prize; the wife boards the MTA Red Line, noting the artwork in the station before boarding the train, struggling to maintain a comfortable personal space as the train car fills with commuters, students, tourists, panhandlers and all manner of persons.
In each vignette (father, husband, wife) the pace of images proceeds coincident with the pace (and relative peace) of the commute: pedestrian=slow, meandering pace; driver=frantic and fast paced, with the world fleeting by as if on screen, until traffic jam; rail rider=speedy and steady pace. The image-speed will not be “real time” but will be “proportional time”. That is, each of the three characters spends the same amount of time traveling within the storyworld (diegetic time), but standard cinematic techniques of time compression and ellipses, in addition to the rapid image speed, will allow the portrayal of significantly different distances covered by the different modes of transport.
The progress of each character can be followed by means of an interactive map. The icon representing each character will move along his or her route appropriately and the user can investigate each.
Interaction Design: The screen is divided into 5 frames, on large and four _ size thumbnails on the left hand side of the screen (one per character and one for the map). The map has three icons (each color coded to the character's costume) moving in proportion to the corresponding characters' commute. Clicking the icon will load that commuter's image track into the large window. To begin the piece, the three character thumbnails are not loaded, all characters are on screen in the large window and selecting a character populates the sidebar thumbnails and loads that character's image-track into the main window.
Misc. Notes: Currently thinking that the “image track” is still image montage, sound design (not described above) also a key element to capturing the experience of these commutes/lifestyles.
TBD elements: title, authoring platform, narrative closure.
Posted by sruston at February 25, 2005 10:43 AM