Investigation Blog Post 1

To start of my investigation for my film I started of by writing down time periods I wanted to take inspiration from, art pieces I liked, and places I could film. My idea is to have a pair of friends to be brought back in time to different situations in which they learn how each place women had to act and dress. The places that would be visited is time periods like ancient times, Victorian and more. The places could change depending on the costuming I have or how many people I could get to be in the film. Due to the limitations of Covid I will be making these time periods more fantasy so that way if it cant be exactly like a certain decade then modern things could be in that place. The film could be a group of women dressed in period pieces while in the modern to or in each time period themselves. The film will use time travel as a method to show these different time pieces or just a showing of examples in history. 

Artist Inspiration:

An artist I was inspired by is George Fredric Watts. I was most inspired by several paintings he did of Ellen terry. They met in 1963 and he painted her and her sister creating the art piece The Sisters. When I was researching art for my project I saw these art pieces and I thought they where very beautiful pieces of art and I thought that they gave women a sort of empowerment especially the painting here Ellen is wearing a knights outfit. The point of this film to reflect on how women had to act and dress in different times. Here are a few art pieces by him of Ellen:

George Watts; Top Left: Watchman, What of the Night? | Right: Choosing | Bottom Left: The Sisters.

Another artist I was inspired by was Julia Margret Cameron, she is known for her soft-focus close-ups of famous Victorian men and for illustrative images depicting characters from mythology, Christianity, and literature. She has been credited with producing the first close-ups in the history of the medium. Initially this was a hobby for her at first but then she turned it into her job for some time and she photographed a lot of people and even Charles Darwin. Women were not allowed to have jobs and Julia created a sort of job for herself and people loved her photographs. Here are some examples of  her photos: 

Julia Cameron; Top: The Rosebud Garden of Girls | Bottom Left: Annie, My First Success | Bottom Right: Charles Darwin

For more of a fantasy history I chose directors/artists Tim Burton and Jim Henson. I like Tim Burton because of his more gothic and whimsical films and art while Jim Henson is more fantasy and practical effects. I've always loved Tim Burton moves as a kid and still love them. Jim Henson created one of my favorite movies, Labyrinth and also created the world of The Dark Crystal. I've chosen both of them for this inspiration since I've always liked there work and between a gothic and fantasy inspiration the film i'm making could show good things but also some more worse things that have happened over time. Here are a few examples of their art/films:

Tim Burton; Top: is Jack Skellington | Bottom left to right: Emily and Victor, Edward Scissorhands, The Mad hatter.

Jim Henson; Top left to right: The Dark Crystal Age of Renaissance, Labyrinth, The Dark Crystal | Bottom: Jim Henson and The Muppets

Experimentation: I work at Spirit Halloween and while I've worked I have walked around the store to see where everything is and while I look around I take inspiration from the different costumes. On one wall of my work we have all the period pieces. Every time I go past them I think about different costumes and ideas do for my film. I've done research on history for classes and also for fun. I've done a lot of research on Victorian time to since i was going to do a Victorian themed room, I didn't end up doing it but know that benefits me for this film. For the film I've looked over doing lighter and darker colors and I decided I would do more darker colors while viewing history and then more brighter colors when you're in modern times. The Top is the lighter theme and the bottom is the darker theme.

Reflection: Overall  I think I gathered a good amount of information for my film. I’ve researched different artists and color schemes. This week I made a list of ideas for what locations I could film at, people I could ask to be in the film, different costumes I needed. For this film I’ll be looking more at actual events in history than more of fantasy history, but there will be elements of fantasy with time travel and going through the decades with clothes and learning about history.