The Car park.

After talking to my tutor today I felt it was important to better understand the carpark underneath the site, I looked at it in both plan and section to help get my head round the structure.

I felt that this was a really worthwhile task, understanding the structure of the car park has really helped me think more deeply about my design, I'm now designing with a structural grid which I think will really help.

Creative response progress

This is my final creative response to the the site, looking at people movement over the site.

Following comments from my tutor Dennis I used fishing wire as the vertical elements rather than string so that it becomes almost invisible allowing the mapping to become the dominant element.

Overall I was very pleased with this piece of work, it helped me to visually understand the movement over the site better and allowed me to suggest a location for my building.

Istanbul Projects update

Following on from the film making I did before going to Istanbul I continued to work on it.

I produced two films both leading through the site mapping the route down at both day and night.

The first video was a combination of 4 different camera shots on the same screen, the helped to develop my editing skills further, putting the footage together and getting the timings right on it. However because it was at least a 30 minute walk down through all the sites it had to be sped up and the finished video felt quite shakey, something I wasn't very happy with.

The second video was done at night, using a combination of still long exposure photographs with light trails moving through them leading down the site. I was very pleased how this came out, it took 4 of us over 5 hours to get all the photograph taken and was a really satisfying piece of work when finished.

I've really enjoyed learning how to edit and create films over the past couple of months, I feel as though its a good skill to have gained and am really happy that the tutors pushed us in this direction.

Critical Study Progress....

We've been tasked to write 1000 words for our critical study and hand them in to out tutor on 24/10/11 I've been having quite abit of trouble writing mine as I'm still reading lots of different articles and journals etc. and still haven't properly settled on what I want the question to be.

I'm planning to really focus on it this weekend and get things straight in my mind.

Creative Response.

We've been set the task of doing a 'creative response' to our time in Istanbul. I'm currently looking a creating some sort of mapping model tracking the movement of people over my site.

I've been looking at string models for inspiration.

Brief.

So we got our design brief today, there were several options one of which being a cinema.

I felt this brief would suit me due to the work I've been doing making films and also the fact that I work in a cinema.

I also think it suits the site that I've chosen, it's a public square ontop of a multi-storey car park in a residential area called Changir, its pretty much in the centre between two of Istanbul's main attractions. Takism Square and the Modern.

This is a panoramic of the site.

Istanbul

Just got back from Istanbul, had a fantastic time, the place was absolutely fascinating.

The definition between Western and Eastern influence becomes really blurred at times, and at others is very clear to see.

The importance of religion in their everyday lives is incredible to see, the contrast to our country is very stark.

I'm going to quickly upload a few photos and I'll do a couple of posts about the projects and specific visits that we did later.

Istanbul!

Off to visit Istanbul tomorrow, I'll post afew photos and thoughts when I get back!

Presentation #1

Presented our film and slideviewer to the group today, the film went down really well. People seemed impressed with the editing and the content. I wasn't very happy hearing the monologues that I'd written and read over big speakers as i thought my voice sounded awful but overall I was happy with it.

The slideviwer turned out really well too, here it is in use.

In terms of how we worked collectively as a group I wasn't that happy, I felt that most of the work was left to me and the other 3rd year in our group as we made both the film and the slideviewer while the 2nd years only supplied the research and images.

Personally I was really happy with my input into the project and feel if I can keep this level of hard work up it'll be a good year.

More Reading..

I've spent the last couple of days reading  Orhan Pamuk's Istanbul - Memories or a City

It's almost an autobiography of his childhood in Istanbul and holds great insight. Theres a specific chapter looking at Huzun which I've found really helpful in learning about the philosophies of it. 

It's also helping me to write the monologue for the film.

Critical Study.

I've also had a critical study meeting with my tutor Sarah Mills this week.

We went through all of our studies as a group and Sarah gave us all feedback on the booklets we've been working on over the summer.

She felt that I needed to read deeper into the subject and because it was so current I should be looking at newspaper articles as a source.

She also that I really needed to focus on a specific area for my study to be successful as the topic area is so broad.

I felt this was a fair response and am going to really try to get on top of it in the next couple of weeks.

Technology Lectures.

Lectures have started for technology this week, the brief for AT3.1 has been set and it is to reverse engineer a specific building, a project that in the past I've found to be really interesting and a great learning experience.

The building I have is the Hepworth Gallery in Wakefield, designed by David Chipperfield.

I'm really happy with this building as it's something I've already visited in the past and quite like.

Istanbul

Spent the afternoon planning the trip to Istanbul. Me and another student are traveling together and fly out on the 8th for a week. Getting pretty excited about it!

It's going to be a great experience as the city is such a cultural and historical gem. I'm really excited to see the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque in particular.

Group Work.

The Group project is going really well, we had a tutorial today and decided to add a second part on to the film that I've been working on.

The plan is to respond the the Huzun film of Istanbul with a film of Leeds representing how we feel the city is. I think it's a great idea and it will give me the chance to film my own footage and learn that side of the video editing process too.

In terms of the Slide viewer we've had the 2nd year students collating information on Istnabul and Cinema and we plan to make it over the next couple of days.

This is a quick sketch of how we want it to look....