Monday 23 May 2011

To blog or.....

               To blog or 

                     
                     Where did it go right?
                     Where did it go wrong?
                     Would I do it again?
   
                     Better to blog, or ebook or weebly?

            Questions i’m asking

       Why not facebook?
       Why didn’t you comment?
       Should I correct apostrophes?
       For one off projects or for a course?    


                  Did it replace blackboard?

                                                                                    How password was distributed
             
S                                                              
             
P                                                                Personal enough to follow?

If                                                                If it’s just for us, why make it public?

                                                                 Was it visual?

Blogging....

The blog is an easy and simple way to communicate and keep all your pictures, video's weblinks etc in one place...
I found using the blog easy and simple.. When you click on 'New post' there is a bar across the top of the comments box with icons, where you can insert images, video's, links and jump breaks.

The pictures and links uploaded almost instantly, but I found the video's took too long to upload, or just didn't upload at all... Video clips from youtube and on the web uploaded. But when I tried to upload video's from my documents, it would not upload.

We blogged everything... Updates from what happened in lessons with pictures and video's. Good research sites. Script idea's, costume idea's, questions etc.... and everyone who follows the blog can comment on it, so we were able to get other peoples opinion..

The blog is accessable to anyone with internet, and is very easy to find...

Hope this is useful, Ria :)

Sunday 22 May 2011

To blog or.....

please add a comment about the use of blogs from our recent experience. thank you
vanessa.

I have found the blog quite useful, not only for communication, but also as a research tool. It enables the group to access all the same materials at the same time (so no excuses), if you are absent for a day or so, you can visit at any time and see what work has been carried out while you've been away. 

due to its nature, being online, you are able to upload pictures, videos, mp3's, website links and a whole host of other useful gems. so if you find a link to a good website all you have to do is copy and paste the url and it turns it into a link on the blog. 

however, it's not all rainbows and unicorns, the only way that a blog will work properly is if everyone views it on a fairly regular basis (for our show it was getting updated so often that at least twice a week was necessary)also it will only work if everyone puts in a fair amount of work to it. if you find research and don't upload it, you aren't helping the group or the project you are working on. 

hope this has been helpful Paul 

Friday 20 May 2011

Unit 4 Presentation .... Ria :)

Unit 4  - Non Omnis Moriar


Research:

0        Devising techniques          
0        The Collaborative process
0        Forced Entertainment
0        View points training
0        How memory works
0        Different types of memory. E.g. long term, short term, flashbulb, collective..
0        What is memory?
0        Suzanne Corkin
0        The story of Henry Moliason
0        Script writing
0        Blog/Facebook
0        The hippocampus
0        Synapsis
0        Mnemonics
0        Attended a production meeting on the 06/04/11

In this presentation I  am going to focus on….
My research into the story of H.M
0       How in depth was it?
0       Where and how did I source it?
0       What did I see/read that most influenced me?
Viewpoints (Article and lessons)
0       What have I gained from my viewpoints training?
0       How did the reading and the sessions benefit my research into my character?
The Blog
0       How did the Blog influence my practice?
0       How did it inform the groups practice?
0       Was it useful?
0       Did it work how we wanted it to work?
0       How could it have been used more effectively?

Research into the story of H.M.



0       When we were first given the topic of memory, I struggled with the research as it is such a big subject..
0       Science / Brain
0       When we were given the story of H.M, I then found it easier to research.
0       WHY??
0       Because I was really interested in the story. This made it easier for me to research, as I was researching because I wanted to find out more, not because we were told to.
0       I feel my research was quite in depth as once I read H.Ms story, I would do more research into other aspects of the story that interested me.
0       For Example Brenda and Suzannes relationship.
0       Not a lot of information about them in the Esquire article.

Research into the Story of H.M.
Where did the research come from?
0       Newspaper articles online
0       T.V show BBC 4 The Brain - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00t6zqv
0       Radio interviews with Suzanne Corkin
0       Radio interviews which included audio footage of H.M. Speaking to Suzanne
0       Articles from the M.I.T website written about H.M and his progress by Suzanne Corkin  - http://web.mit.edu/bnl/publications.htm
0       Emails from Suzanne
0       YouTube clips - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCTw1MZ-uF8      
0       Internet Websites about H.M
0       The Brain Observatory website Slicing of the brain.
0       Video clips from CBS.

Research into the story of H.M
How was the research sourced?
0       From links that were posted on the Blog
0       Links on other websites directing you to specific information
0       Information in Radio interviews that linked to web pages and science blog.
0       Emails from Suzanne Corkin.... How did I get her email?
0       She replied to my emailed which had links to articles that she wrote about H.M., Which included tests and tables to show his improvements
0       She also sent me a word document which she had typed explaining about the Changeover from Brenda to Suzanne and how it happened.
0       This helped inform my research because it gave me a better idea about the relationship between Brenda and Suzanne, and between Suzanne and Henry.

Viewpoints Training
What have I gained from my viewpoints training?
0       I felt like I gained a lot from the viewpoints lesson and from reading the article. 
0       I understood the article, and could identify with most of the viewpoints.
0       It helps me to identify with how my character would act if she were nervous 
0       In the video clip I am about to play, Suzanne is about to meet Henry for the first time so she is feeling nervous.
0       Lets watch the video clip……..

Viewpoints Training
 (Video Not Available )

Blog!!!
http://memoryplay.blogspot.com/
How did the blog inform the groups practice?
0       Kept the group up to date on developments that had been happening during the lessons
0       If someone was absent, they were able to see what stage we were at by viewing the blog updates.
0       Put our research, script ideas, character ideas on the blog so that the rest of the group could see our developments.
0       Communication
0       Pictures and videos we could refer back to them
0       Ideas - Questions
0       It also helped inform other disciplines of where we were in the rehearsal process.

Was it useful and how could it have been used more effectively?
0       More people using the blog
0       More people updating
0       More ideas and contributions posted onto the blog, as in lessons there were so many ideas, but some were forgotten as they werent written down, so by posting them on the blog, we could always refer back to it.
0       Missing out on good research sites There were so many sites and videos posted on the blog that some people missed out on as they werent using it.
0       The production team said, they found using the blog very useful as they were kept up to date on our devising process.
0       They also posted all the information from the Production meetings on the Blog, so we were able to see where they were at in their process, along with Set and design who posted images of the developments on the set for the show.


The Blog and Ria

0       Personally, I really enjoyed using and updating the blog.
0       It was easy to update and upload images and videos. So we could then go back and see what we have done.
0       Updating the blog was a lot easier and quicker than writing logs at the end of every session, and it all stays in one place.
0       The research sites, and videos etc that were posted on the blog, were really useful and I used them to contribute to my research.
0       There was a lot of tutor/student communication.

Bibliography:
0        Double take, collective memory and currant artThe southbank centre/ parkett/ 1992
0         Viewpoints and composition reading  from the Viewpoints book. Page 7 -13
0        Forced entertainment – the travels 2002, the anti theatrical director, the company
0        The performers guide to the collaborative process – Sheila Kerrigan
0        Organising your material, getting stuck in and cutting.
0        Posterior Para hippocampal place learning in H.m – Suzanne Corkin
0        Email: corkin@mit.edu
0        Double take, Collective memory

Tuesday 17 May 2011

Presentations

sounds really good. if you did not get a copy of the metro article today, come and get one in the office. also, look back at the blog, entries such as collaboration in march ask some important questions. Maybe study the brief together as well and see what the criteria are so that you can address them in your presentations. remember presentations will go onto blog!
Come and get your responses to articles to use in your presentations from the office.
vanessa

Presentation Study Day!

Hellooo...

Actors, as we have Presentations on Thursday, myself and few others from our group have decided to have a Presentation Study Day at Uni tomorrow...
We are going to nab a room that is free, work on our presentations, show them, time them give each other feedback etc etc... As we feel it will be very helpful and a good practice for Thursday!!

You are all invited to pop along and work with us... we are meeting in the Canteen at 10am, then we will go and find a room!

Riaaa :)

Monday 9 May 2011

Done!

Well done everyone. 4 shows, 1 q&a, the funniest italian run all done. Fourth show was the best. Not much audience feedback on the blog yet. What do you propose we do with blog now?
vanessa

Thursday 5 May 2011

Wednesday 4 May 2011

director Notes from 2nd dress

  • caretake audience sightlines more
  • initial video needs to be louder
  • audience need giftbags before video so that they can read programme. does taz say about installation afterwards?
  • ryan's mic on at the beginning.
  • ryan reference timeline more
  • projection was not right on the screens
  • robbie careful to not block projection when you go to greet henry
  • 'how do you feel about how you look?' gently, you dont want to hurt henry
  • slower doesnt mean more emotional. needs more pace.
  • good op to audience rory
  • five screens needed for operation shadows.
  • actors check table and personal props. there was a script on the table! dress etiquette; stay in character, dont talk back to audience.......
  • doctors write on screen much much more. remember the lecture initially was conceived to be supported by huge mobile of brain with everyday objects. we dont have that, so we need the screens to support what you are saying visually.
  • do we draw a bigger better brain with labes on one of the screens?
  • taz, during robbie speech, write on board ' tan, tan tan, tan tah...'
  • brocca area on brain map on screen
  • fix toby's brain (!)
  • toby hair
  • ty give phineas tamping bar and patch?
  • robbie ' no longer cage...' more subtle 
  • robbie ' that he did phineas' no longer makes sense as phineas last line changed. check.
  • ty good temporal lobe. more please
  • good demo of magic tab taz more and properly.
  • give us time to think about first kiss. encourage us to remember if we dont .....
  • toby work on speech to relate to audience experience
  • rory magic appearance great
  • taz dont come out of character
  • where has tom gone?
  • after bette ' thank you' bette dont go. paul come in faster.
  • suzanne get hm permission before you take suitcase from in front of him.
  • paul blocking ria in  i will only give it to you..
  • good hand acting rory
  • toby come in faster after rory
  • henry ria cant hear you.
  • 2nd time with luke, why not hug again?
  • ty, 'wait, anarologist????
  • ty look at us, you seem more focused on movement than us.
  • pointing to paul's brain for numbers needs to be accurate. ish
  • ryan cheer up
  • brit suitcase..!!!
  • ryan with brit speed up.
  • henry dont lose humour.
  • toby and shaune need more light
  • scene needs more choreographing. good underplaying jar actions.
  • doctors movement? check cue.
  • rory take other screen. good pace.
  • it's been lovely to meet you is cheery.
  • shadows of death need 5 screens?
  • keep light on suitcase right to the end.
  • fade opera slowly.
  • obituary louder.
  • lets all say follow the suitcase? or follow me, take a seat etc.......
  • stand still dont shuffle in the end scene.

Saturday 30 April 2011

Thursday 28th - Run through

On Thursday, We were in the theatre for an LX Plot... Which ran up to about 2 oclock...

After lighting, we went to wardrobe to get our costumes on for a run through which the ND's watched... We ran through half of the play and had a Q&A to find out what they thought of it..

Some of the audience did not understand where they were suppose to be at all times, most of them followed the suitecase.. but didn't know when to move.. During this run, we didn't have the AV screens, so the doctors were unable to move the audience with the screens...

They thought that we all needed work on Characterisation, and "own " the space alot more, as sometimes it got abit boring..

With all the scientfic text in the piece, some felt that we needed to really understand what it is we are saying, so that when we are speaking it, it makes sense to the audience.. Also work on pronunciation of some of the scientific termanology...

We need to make our relationships clearer.. as at the beginning of the piece, when people walk up to Henry as Jaccapo is speaking, it wasn't clear on how some of the characters reacted... However, we did not get through the whole play, so some characters were not introduced at all of introduced properly.

We also asked if the movement sequences during the piece took away the concentration of what was being said by other actors, for example, when Britt and I do the movement sequence when Ryan is speaking his little monologue... the audience said that it was not interferring with concentration, and they were still listening to what was being said.... They thought that the movemnt bits werereally nice, but sometimes didn't understany what they were suppose to be representing... As they haven't seen the whole piece, aome of these sequences  make sense alot later on..

The audience felt that we needed to believe in the piece for them to believe in it and enjoy it... as we went in there quite negative about how it was going to be, and  the audience sensed that... We told them that because we had been in th theatre all morining, it was a big change moving to a smaller space, and not having the set and the props which add to the piece alot...

They understood the story and liked what they saw, they want us to give it more omphhh and really believe and enjoy whatwe are doing...

After the run, we went back to costume to get the final alterations done on our costumes!!

Please add anything I have missed..

Ria :)

Henry Speaking

Ria has found this. Zac, can you get the sound? it is towards the end, as you can see in the transcript.

http://www.kpbs.org/news/2009/dec/10/first-complete-brain-dissection-also-social-media-/

Henry Speaking

hello please help. we were plotting sound on thursday and we are really missing a good clip of real henry saying something poignant to finish the show with. 
can you please help find something and send me link?


i 'm sure i have heard him say somewhere if it helps others... but i cant find it.
thanks hope you are all having a good break
vanessa

Wednesday 27 April 2011

Wednesday 27th Run Through!

Run Through

Today, We done a run through and blocked the WHOLE PLAY!!

We have decided:

  • On our blocking for each scene
  • Where we want the audience for each scene, do we want them standing around? Or sitting in the lecture theatre?
  • New scenes, nearly all of us have written, are writing or adding to a scene for the play.
  • No scale electrics to explain Synapsise, as it was broken, but a lovely idea..
  • Do we use the doodle bug? I think it was decided that it wouldn't explain it very well?
  • How and when Henry gets transformed from young to old, how the audience know....
  • We have added in scenes that explain, relationships, science bits, family...
  • Decided what voiceover we are using
  • What else needs to be recorded
  • Music????????

We were in the theatre for an hour...... So we were able to work with the set (Which is AMAZING!!), and get a really good idea of the space we are going to have to perform in... how much room we will have to move the audience around with. Also being able to use the AV screens abled the doctors to mark out, When, How, Where and Why they are going to be moving the screens... To move audience? To hide something? For shadows?

Also, most of us felt that being in the space made us more excited and optomistic about the performance...

Some felt that the show lacked energy... Because of the characterisation? Because of the script? Because of the way the story is being delivered?....

We all feel that we need to work on characterisation and really bring energy and truth to our characters...

What the actors need to do???

  • Learn lines!!
  • Email the new scenes to Vanessa this evening!
  • Work on characterisation
  • Remember the blocking
  • Work on our Projection... Otherwise the audience will not hear us, and what we are saying will be lost...
Please Add anything that I have missed!!!

Thanksss......

Ria :)

Tuesday 26 April 2011

How to explain memory

Hello all. There is a really interesting article about how freud likened memory to a magic slate. Not sure where it goes and if but some text about how metaphors have changed and they keep changing. But now we have the real thing to look at and digitise etc…..
Some ideas are that we write that (see notes) and also get the audience to use a magic slate as part of that piece. They might write down a memory. Then it wipes clean but you can still find it in the memory. Might we also link it to memories of buildings and so anticipate what happens in the bar afterwards??? And they can leave them behind with messages on them? (see picture below)

From the greeks onwards, we have been trying to find the right metaphor and analogy of how memory works. They said it was like a library, like an aviary, like a theatre, like a room, like a book, like a computer,

We are done with metaphors henry. We now want the real thing. Sliced, saved, shared, digitised. Parbola escrita… what is written stays and your brain might contain all the answers and all the questions. Each metaphor reflects the technology of the time



Wednesday 20 April 2011

Synapsis Bullet points and Today's silks session...

During today’s silks workshop, we tried to use the silks for the ‘pass over scene’ between Jaccapo and Suzanne, and also we tried to mainly use them to explain how the Synapsis works.
During the Jaccapo and Suzanne scene, we created some nice images using the silks, but we didn’t know what the intention of the silks was actually for… Why were we using them? What did they represent? How do they represent it?....
As we couldn’t answer the questions, and in this scene the silks didn’t actually help in telling the story, we decided that we will not be using them for this scene, and find another way to do the pass over…
For the Synapsis scene where we explain the bullet points below, we thought of many many different ways of using the silks, we tried tying knots in them, people swinging, people doing areal positions, climbing up and having a knot tied in when you come back down, joining them, linking together and so many other ideas…. But we didn’t feel that it helped to explain what we want to explain, we felt that the silks didn’t really help in showing the journey that needs to happen when forming a long term memory. 
So we thought of using a Train set? Or Scale electric? Or cars on a track? Where, if one piece of these is missing, they will not work. We think that using the train tracks idea will help us explain the Synapsis story to the audience, and it will make more sense to them, so they will be more likely to take in the information that is being given to them.
When we come back off Easter break, we are going to be experimenting with the Train tracks and Scale Electrics and coming up with new ideas for scene that were originally blocked over by the silks.

Taz wrote the main points for Synapsis:  Bullet Points
·         The synapsis neuron is connected when a sense is received and the initial connection is then made
·         For the impulses to travel through the neuron, there needs to be a Connection
·         That connection is made by calcium protein, this holds the synapsis together
·         The bigger the impulse, the more calcium is produced to make a stronger connection
·         The stronger the connection, the better the memory
·         Henry had no hippocampus, therefore could not make the connections to form long term memories
·         The true function of the hippocampus is still being debated by scienctists today.
Ria :)

Silks Photo's 20/04/2011




Pics from Silks session.... Ria :)