FIN

Last blog of the year.... I know some of you guys might feel overwhelming for being the last time we will have this class. Some others, like in my case, will be alleviate. I personally did not enjoy this class as much as others because of the fact that I am not into animation stuff. I like watching videos, reading, pictures and everything related to it but I am not the person who likes to actually talk about it or get into it deeply. But what I can take out from this class is the new experience with blogging. I thought that it was great to have the opportunity to express our thoughts, questions, feelings, etc through these blogs. I wish everyone Merry Christmas and good luck on the finals... don't be this guy!

                                   

The Night Before Christmas

Last week I went to the movies to watch "The Night Before Christmas". I didn't watch the trailer before picking that movie because my friends said that it was hilarious, plus the fact the one of my favorite actors was in it (Seth Rogen) I wasn't too worried about it. The movie is basically about three lifelong friends, two of whom are Jewish, spend the night in New York City looking for the Holy Grail in different Christmas parties. It is a comedy different from the other movies you have seen. I recommended for the guys who love to laugh and have a good time.

                                     


                        Link to the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ShIAH_G-Iuw

DBZ

We have been talking about films, games, animation, and no one has ever mention anything about Dragon Ball Z. One of the most world-wide known Japanese animation series and personally my favorite one of all times. I grew up around this fabulous anime. Everyone would talk about it at school, posters, magazines, backpacks, pictures, video games, movies, and an infinite of different stuff. It was the biggest thing back in the late 80's 90's, 00's, at least in South American and the occidental culture. I am not really sure what was the impact they had here in the US. Anyway, I wanna share with you guys the initiation of this anime.


You could say that Dragon Ball portrays the adventures of  Son Goku in its maximum adventure essence. As the different characters start growing up, interplanetary threats began to shape the main story of Dragon Ball. It's here where the weird kid with crazy hair and mokey tail takes his firsts steps in search of Dragon Ball, where he meets his friends for life (Yamcha, Krillin, Bulma, etc) that will help him defeat the thousands of enemies that he come across with.



                                        

Did you know that...

YouTube is more than videos of cute animals, painful falls, next teen idol, etc. We find a ton of different things that makes us watch for videos for hours on the computer or our phones.
But I bet you didn't know that you can find documentaries for free that exclusively dedicated to us and they are completely legal.  I will share with you guys two top documentary channels that you must watch.

To begin, "Top Documentaries" is one of the channels I recommend. They offer a large variety of videos from music videos to nature. Sports, art and history are also included. You may find some videos in Spanish too, so if you are learning Spanish it is a good source to learn.

                     

Another channel to take a look at is "National Geographic Videos". You may think that is the offcial channel of National Geographic but that is not the case. It is actually dedicated to the producers of these amazing documentaries we see in it.

                               

Check it out!!

Rock in English and Spanish

For many years I have been a big fan of Rock in English as well as Rock in Spanish. I could say they are my favorite genre of music. I'm gonna share with you guys two top world-known songs that I love and listen to it often. Guns N' Roses smash hit "Sweet Child O' Mine" is such a great song and the fact that "Slash" who is incredible with the guitar makes it one of my favorites. I also like the version with the stunning Fergie.

                                        

Another song that has had a big impact in the world of Rock music is "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by Nivana. This is just one of the many songs that I like such as "Come As You Are", "About A Girl", "The Man Who Sold The World".

                                      


Though now a rarity, once upon a time music television stations like MTV and VH1 actually played music videos including these videos picks for the best rock music videos of all time.

Lastly, I wanna share also a world-known  Rock song in Spanish song called "Musica Ligera" by Soda Stereo.


                                       

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpiY999wHTM (Musica Ligera)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzdYxgSZztY (Sweet Child O' Mine with Fergie)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTWKbfoikeg (Smells Like Teen Spirit)

Gangnam Style

I'm pretty sure you have guys have heard this song. It has the most views in the history of YouTube with more than 2 billion. Why and how did this song become so famous around the world? I personally heard about this song because of social networks, everybody would post videos dancing this song or talking about it. I listened to it the first time but I did not like it, after a couple of months it was on the radio and parties that I have been to. I guess I had to like it plus I think it's funny.




                                   


This south Korean artist arrived to United States to participate in the TV shows Ellen Degenres and Saturday Night Live. From there on, after 4 months he made world history dethroning Justin Bieber most watched video " Baby" with 805 million views.


Here is the link to the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZkp7q19f0

The first musical video

Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen, led by Bruce Gowers, released in 1975. His repeated TV broadcast caused not only that his single was number one for, but that the song became the anthem of an era irreplaceable, and that marked a before and an after in Rock music. The clip is now considered "Mom" of such audiovisual format.

After this overwhelming success, soon many other music videos were released, which in consequence resulted in the creation of a cable channel devoted exclusively to music broadcast 24 hours a day. I mean MTV, born on August 1, 1981 with a start of four million subscribers. That number grew dramatically in the years following. The first video shown was "Video Killed the Radio Star" performed by The Buggles.

Video clips produced in the 80s were colorful. Usually, they all had the singer in a fairly simple set design, making cuts to get different shots of the singer.

                                      

Documentaries

I have always loved documentaries, my dad is a fan of watching documentaries and if it wasn't for him I don't think I would be interested on them. I enjoy watching the different documentaries in History channel, Discovery channel, or Animal Planet. My favorites are the one about the universe and animals.

Documentaries make us get closer to what happens around us, where reality works as a stage of a situation and the camera as the eye captures what is going on there at any given time. Documentary films aims to show concrete facts of the daily life, wild animal life, universe mysteries, etc. They are all stories whose purpose is to trap us, because of the narrative, the discourse on the conflict, the characters, the images, in short, every viewer has their argument. 

                                               
                                                       

I welcome you guys to watch documentaries because they are awesome in every way plus you learn so many new stuff..

Five Nights At Freddy's

What games do you guys usually play on your phone when you are bored? Probably Candy Crush, 2048, Cube jump, minicraft, etc. They are all fun games but I bet you are tired of them. Have you ever tried to play a scary game? I am a fan of scary games like Resident Evil, Silent Hill, The Last Of Us. I want to introduce you to this india point and click survival horror videogame called Five Nights At Freddy's, it will make you get goosebumps...

                                   

I bought this game for my phone a while ago when it first came out. It was a top selling game for about a month and I know many friends that play it. In this game, we are a security guard that is in charge to check the different cameras placed in several rooms of the restaurant during our night shift from midnight to 6 am. Every night the animatronics are left on just to prevent its parts from rusting or damage. We must prevent them from leaving the restaurant... These animatronics don't believe that we are humans; they think that we are a robotic skeleton without a custom and so they will try to kill us. We cannot run away, nor fight back, all we can do is to stop them from approaching our office by closing the gates of each room so that they can't move around.

                           

Censured?

I've been always curious about how and why movies are censured but never really found out because I've never ever looked at the rating of the movie or game that I'm gonna watch/play. I was raised in a catholic family but  my parents never prohibited me to watch rated movies. Obviously when it comes to pornography it was different.. I guess cultures are different? When I moved to Florida about 3 years ago I met friends in high school that every time we would go out to the movies they would worry about the movie's classification. I just didn't care, I just wanted to watch that movie everyone was talking about. In Peru I have never been in a situation like that with my friends. I don't think I'm the only one who affirms that similar scenes as the ones in rated movies or the ones prohibited to under 18 people, are shown in TV at any time. Also, there are movies with similar content that are not rated. So what is the point? Here is the definition of rated...

R- under 17 with the company of their parents. Adult content. Inappropriate language. Intense violence, nudity, drug abuse.

In my opinion parents should allow their children to watch any movie they want, but not to the extremely point of letting at 6 year old kid to watch movies with nudity or violence scenes. Young people want to be able to watch horror, action or even comedy movies, we love that. Oh! but wait we can't because they are rated! IT IS JUST A MOVIE !

                                       

Videogames...

The Indie movie film was absorbing. Who wouldn't have the same feeling of being afraid not to  success after creating a game that only you and your friends spent so much time on just for fun or just to express themselves?  I really got engaged with the movie. I had the same anxious feeling as the guys in the movie. I never really thought how hard it could be to make a big impact in the gaming industry regardless of the type of the game. I love games, I personally enjoy playing them. "FIFA", "PES", "COD" are some of my favorites I also like adventures games such "The Last Of Us" or "Resident Evil"..

Videogames are specially designed for universal entertainment, to all gamers and casual players. We always find something to get distracted, something to get apart from the real world for at least some time and what better way to release all the stress from work or school playing videogames. There are many other ways to do this. I am a soccer player and I try not to spend a lot of time on it because of obvious reasons...school..soccer...gym, etc.

Games are awesome, it is incredible how technology has improved and changed. I remember playing Nintendo 64 with my older brother about 15 years ago, now we have PS3, PS4, Nintendo Wii, XBOX, with such realistic games that are so entertaining. 

       

                                  

Michaela Pavlátová (Tram)

Recently, I read on the internet about Michaela Pavlatova. She was awarded with an Oscar for one of her films called "Reci, reci, reci" and many other awards for other films. She is one of the few well known female animators in the world and has been considered as the defender of feminism and other noble causes through her very interesting animated films.

We have talked about sex in class but not much, though I've found this film called "Tram" I think you guys may like it. This film starts on a gray day on a gray city. The protagonist is a tram driver with voluptuous breasts that starts her journey on a normal day. On the road, only men get in the bus, they all look the same, reading the same newspaper. Suddenly, in the middle of her working routine, her sexual imagination arises and eventually she shows it. Everything changes, she unbuttons her blouse and begins to move the shift levers up and down desperately… and... and you guys have to watch the rest of it.

Sadly, I could only get the trailer of the film..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_QT-JaDswY

Caroline Leaf

I don't think I have ever seen what the talented Caroline Leaf show in his projects. It was fantastic to see how she developed a unique technique making use of an atypical material (sand) that I thought it never existed in these types of films.. It is great to know there are people out there that can demonstrate incredible things and show different communicative possibilities of animation.

I read a little bit about her after class to understand how she came up with this fabulous idea. Leaf stands out from current trends in animated film. We are always watching the same animated where technology has invaded and make these films less interesting. Leaf continuous her work as an artist manipulating with a variety of different materials. During an interview talking about one of her movies "Howbeaverstolefire" She said: " It has never seemed interesting to me to use computers to do my job as an animator. I like to use my hands and manipulate everything. See how I bring to life inert materials and move them in any way my mind can imagine".

                                 

       I hope to see more of this type of animation in the film industry. Who would not love it?

Evil?

I don't know about you guys but I like watching horror movies. It is not the only type of movies I watch though, drama, comedy and action are of interest too. Sadly, not much people I know do like horror movies and that sucks because whenever I want to go to the movies it's hard to convince someone to come with me.
But what is a horror movie? what do we see in it? Obviously stuff that scare us to the point that I have had times before when I was younger that I could not sleep. It is hilarious I know. We see scenes were horrendous creatures and supernatural things happen. Evil creatures appear and we run from them because we don't wanna be killed or just because of the fact that they scare us. In our world we see the evil everyday, we hear it all the time and we don't do anything about it. Why? Let's not be afraid of them. God brought us here with a purpose, to follow Him, to listen to Him. At the end, you are the only one who can choose what is right and what is not.

                                    

Images of Jesus Christ

I did some research on how has Jesus been described through art since the beginnings of time, but I will only post a few, but first I will talk a little bit about it.

I was raised in a catholic family, in Peru, the catholic religion prevails. Every time I go to church I am surrounded of several statues and pictures of angels, Jesus, and Maria.When we pray, or when we talk about Jesus Christ, we automatically picture an image of a person in our minds composed of several elements: Most likely pictures of what we have seen in movies, or art, or about what we have read, and those personal elements are the fruit of our sensibility, our imagination, and our way of understanding and living the faith.

The Lord said to Moses, " Do not turn to idols or make metal gods for yourselves, I am the Lord your God.

Christians that come from paganism wanted to avoid any confusion between Christ and the pagan gods, so they used symbols and allegories such as bread, fish, lamb..

                                      

                          The most famous picture of the Good Shepherd is from the IV century.

The Greek word "Pantocrator" means "Almighty". The representation of Jesus as "Pantocrator" tries to resume the savior and creator of the world history and world in a single picture. (Xll - Xlll)

                                                     
                                            

Art and religion were distancing in the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution century. Cartesian philosophy and experimental sciences opened up a gap between the physical world and the spiritual universe. It is then when this picture of Jesus with Holy heart.

                                     

 Why did people start creating these images of Jesus. Is there a specific purpose or meaning?

William Kentridge's film

We are used to watch animated films with people interacting or dancing or fighting, etc. But what William Kentridge showed us in this film Shadow Procession using figures and shades of people walking carrying objects from one place no another was something I have never seen in my life. It is just astounding how people's imagination and creativeness goes to another level.

Shadow Procession begins with an emotional scene of figures, of people moving to a unknown destine. People including a miner hanging from a gallows, workers carrying entire neighborhoods and urban landscapes. We don't know where are they coming from, if they are running away from a dangerous place or if they are homeless people trying to find a place to stay, but we can see that they are determined to get to a certain place. Where is that place where Kentridge is taking them? or us?

                             



In my opinion, he is just persuading the audience to think freely. We can think of anything, we can go anywhere we would like if something is not right. We want to be in a place where we feel comfortable, loved, and peace no matter if we are rich or poor, or single or with a family.

The Annunciation

The paintings shown in class caused me a big impression. I just thought they were beautiful, in fact, I have always liked paintings. I have had the chance to visit great museums to appreciate them. I will talk about a painting in particular that I like. I encourage you guys to try appreciate more at paintings because of their exquisiteness and significance that could demonstrate.   

The famous painter, Leonardo Da Vinci drew this painting in 1473-75. We can observe how the angel leans towards the Virgen greeting her with his head down showing respect indicating her divine pregnancy; on the other hand, Maria reacts gently to the Annunciation making a gesture with her left hand while the other hand lean on the Bible. The background is also striking, garden, mountains and the cloudy sky on one half of the painting and building that gives a great contrast with Maria wearing a beautiful long dress. The painting was taken to Uffizi in 1867, the monastery of San Bartolome de Monteoliveto near Florence. It was first attributed to Domenico Ghirlandaio until some critics in 1869 recognized him as an early work of Leonardo, when he was still an apprentice in the workshop of his teacher, Andrea Verrocchio. 

Paradox

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it".What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? Matthew 16, 24-26

Paradoxes seem to be self-contradictory, but its enigmatic meaning is intended to create a reflection on something important. This biblical paradox is not concerned about enigmatic phrases said by our Lord, but just very deep truths that must be considered seriously because of their importance for eternal soul salvation. A paradox calls our attention and also can be seen as an insistent way of telling us that from a religious perspective things work totally different in this world.

The idea is not to be satisfied by the things that we have in this world but to follow the Gospel model, which guides us to take the right path. Only when you live under the kingdom of God, you can understand the concept that to save our life eternally we have to give it up to the extent of being willing to lose it because of Him. 

Thoughts on the World Of Glory film

I believe that most of you guys find this film horrendous, sorrowful, and painful in some way. I personally feel really bad when I see people dying, even more when they just are innocent people that have nothing to do with the situation they live in. The culprits in this part of the film are a group of bureaucrats. I feel like Andersson challenges the idea that a horrific slaughter like this will not happen again and obviously some of us do not carry cold blood in our bodies to commit such inhuman acts, and be guilty of these barbarities, but that living in such a frivolous world could not stop us from provoke a cruelty of this magnitude again right in front of us.

What thing that called my attention before the first part of the short film is that the camera never moves. We have the same perspective from where we are watching the whole time and it generates the feeling of just contemplating a picture, or painting. They never mention the name of the main character, is it because it could be any of us? We all have a family, we have siblings, we go to work, we go to church, etc. He is around people that are static, motionless that do not do anything. How live are we living this life?

                    You can't reach for anything new if your hands are still full of yesterday's junk

Bruno Soria

Hi guys, I'm Bruno Soria from Lima, Peru and I am majoring in Computer Science and Digital Media. I am a transferred student and I will be a sophomore next semester. I moved to Florida three years ago with my brothers. I finished school in Fort Lauderdale High School and continued my studies at Keiser University for about six months.

I have a passion for soccer since I was a little kid, I always loved playing with ball. In Peru, soccer is the sport everyone watches and plays it. This love for soccer brought me here to Huntington University. I am just so thankful to God for giving me the opportunity to do what I love the most, and not only that, but for bringing me to a very pleasant community full of wonderful people. I look forward to make these for four years of my life the best moments and win everything with my team.

Besides soccer, I enjoy playing any other kind of sports. I love watching movies also, such as drama, action, sci-fi, comedy, etc. Feel free to talk to me, I am very open and like meeting new people. We can practice some Spanish too!

This picture is from last year in the yearbook of my school. I had unforgettable experiences there.