*A photo of young Stephen Leacock, Canada's beloved Humorist - Circa 1915*
Approach:
This week began with showing our completed explanation videos to the class, and completing my "Final" proposal for my class regarding the project I would work on for the next 4 weeks. I thought that the rest of the class made good videos, and mine was not necessarily the best one of them. I regarded most of them as situational depending on the format. Most were more whimsical in their approach, and some were serious. I think it would benefit my classmates and myself to help them with video-editing software if they want their videos to have more impact, but only if they deem necessary. I also read one of the books on my list of research regarding Humor & Existentialism. "Humor and Humanity" but Stephen Leacock. I also happened to be a subject of testing for Abby Ayers and Victoria Campbell on their project based on learning from interactive experience. I dressed up in a Motion Capture suit and they attempted (with the help of a peer) to integrate moCap software directly into Unity. Choices Made: A hard decision to make was how to lay out the rest of my schedule for the remainder of the 4 weeks. It seems like a lot to handle based on the work for my other classes. But I have a feeling that once I get rolling with the script and the storyboard that relate back to my notes. I wasn't sure where to start with all of the readings that I could implore, but I decided on the book that was the oldest as to have a solid base on my research; that way I could see the change through history and how it affected and was also simulated in recent humorous works. Even though the actual reading wasn't dealing with the term "existentialism", it actually made use of it's "Humanity" in the title and had some interesting points on living, dying, how we perceive ourselves and others, and as well how others have become accustomed to accept anything that may be given to them in a "neat package". I feel like because of the time period of this book, many of the findings may not be true, but it is interesting to see a comparison to present day and how many views of humor were shown and portrayed previously. Relevant Sources: Some quotes from "Humor and Humanity" [Stephen Leacock - 1938] with page number included: 13-It squares exactly with the remarks of the philosopher Thomas Hobbes, of the seventeenth century, who expressed his incisive thought with a point and brilliance given to few. "The passion of laughter," he says, "is nothing else but a sudden glory arising from sudden conception of some eminence in ourselves, by comparison with the inferiority of others, or with our own formerly." 13-It thus appears that our sense of humor, like so much else about us, sprang from lowly and even discreditable origins. With certain races of mankind, humor never seems to have got beyond this primitive brutal stage of cruel exultation. 17-Humor, in other words, has changed from a basis of injury or destruction, to what one may describe as a basis of ‘incongruity’ or ‘maladjustment’. 34-[Punsters] Common observation shows that his activity is a menace to society. It runs easily to a sort of mental degeneration in which the unhappy victim tries to make puns all the time, hears only sounds and not ideas, his mind as vacant as a bell waiting for its clapper. Many people hate the idea of drinking because of drunkards-and so do many hate puns because of punsters. Poetic justice therefore warns them in time. 46-But this is only in the same way as a person may be sentimental without sorrow, pious without religion and didactic without learning. It is this possibility of replacing true with with imitation, gold with dross, that has led to a tendency to degrade wit as the crackling of thorns under a pot. 53-This lack of proper terms to designate their art, as felt by humorists, has been felt and remedied in other branches...But the humorist still has no better terms than to ‘write a take-off’, or ‘make up a parody’, or to ‘give an imitation’, and so on. This cheapens his whole art in the literary sense. 57-The boy stood on the burning deck Eating peanuts by the peck. The flames rolled on, he would not go Because he loved the peanuts so. 60-Those who try to make people laugh, necessarily get afraid that they may not see the point and won’t laugh, or won’t laugh enough. Hence the tendency to make the point sharper and the angle of vision wider, to respond to the cruel demand, ‘louder and funnier’. ...And so on. A quote that really stood out to me from Leacock: "The price paid for knowledge is the loss of the eye of innocence. Very likely we enjoy things better if we don’t know too much about them. I have often noticed that music seems to give great pain to people really musical and that an art gallery irritates the artist." How this is related to humor is interesting in itself. Having an eye for intelligent conversation may lead to an individual not seeing the full picture of the situation, but having little to no regard for anything intellectual may lead a person to laugh at anything and not think of the consequences from finding it humorous. This isn't necessarily true, based on the idea that mood should be a factor, but is something I wonder about testing for my animated sequence I plan to create. Questions Raised & Needs: This week I had many doubts about my ability to convey my ideas. But a reading from our professor expressed that having no clue about a study is necessary to explore and "play" with the tools around us. According to a reading assignment from a writer Rachel Philpott, "I believe that practice-led research that uses ludic (showing spontaneous and undirected playfulness) research methods must achieve a fine balance between methods of playful diverse exploration and analytical specific exploration in order to be successful." From this statement my questions began:
Next Steps: For my steps for this week I plan to get my rigged-character Chuck to a point where I feel comfortable animating him in a short narrative story. I also would like to determine whether or not to explore 3D or Live-Action backgrounds and see if they strengthen the narrative altogether. I want to read more books regarding humor, and find books that are about existentialism and ontology (branch of metaphysics dealing with the nature of "being" [alive]). As for the research from the readings, I believe I can use them as a stepping stone for my script and a basis of support for my explanations to peers or an audience that may choose to watch the short that I create. -Taylor Olsen Comments are closed.
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May 2020
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