Story, Worlds, and Speculative Design Lab

Annie Wang Author

08/04/2020 Added

101 Plays

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Music: Acid Trumpet Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

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[00:00:04.500]Greetings from Omaha, Nebraska!
[00:00:07.110]I'm Annie.
[00:00:08.080]I'm a junior Emerging Media Arts major
[00:00:09.967]emphasizing in Cinematic Arts
[00:00:11.597]and Sonic Arts.
[00:00:12.477]And so, it was in this moment that Annie
[00:00:14.677]ran out of salvageable footage,
[00:00:16.547]as there is a reason why she likes to
[00:00:18.529]exist behind the camera and not in front
[00:00:20.549]of it—she literally cannot recite lines in
[00:00:22.959]front of a camera to save her life.
[00:00:25.053]Also this:
[00:00:27.237]– Achoo!
[00:00:28.484]Bless you!
[00:00:29.474]– Achoo!
[00:00:30.254]Bless you. That was quite loud.
[00:00:33.734]I’m sure that means that he can hear me.
[00:00:36.511]What do I do with my arms?
[00:00:37.844]I don’t know what to do with my arms.
[00:00:39.604][loud airplane noises]
[00:00:46.244]Airplane.
[00:00:48.167][airplane noises continue]
[00:00:51.107]It’s why we don’t film outside.
[00:00:53.403]Anyway, let’s get going.
[00:00:55.431]This summer, I participated in the
[00:00:57.076]Story, Worlds, and Speculative Design Lab
[00:00:59.211]led by Professor Ash Smith.
[00:01:01.235]I worked alongside my classmates
[00:01:02.985]Ally Hall and Parker Reil, and
[00:01:04.595]we also collaborated with filmmaker
[00:01:06.302]Raber Umphenour.
[00:01:07.903]The project centered around Ash’s existing
[00:01:10.013]concept, Southern Devices.
[00:01:11.883]Southern Devices focuses on the
[00:01:13.653]relationship between humans, computers,
[00:01:15.813]and the environment, specifically within
[00:01:17.933]the context of the Southern United States.
[00:01:21.187]My work this summer consisted of a
[00:01:22.913]combination of research and creating
[00:01:24.633]narratives. We researched different topics
[00:01:26.723]related to the South in preparation for
[00:01:28.913]working with existing footage. Reading
[00:01:31.603]up on topics like the Waffle House index
[00:01:33.663]and the restaurant chain’s emergency
[00:01:35.557]plans, for example, gave us a place to
[00:01:37.490]start when coming up with stories.
[00:01:40.403]Since Parker, Ally, and I have a
[00:01:41.993]background in film production, our
[00:01:43.633]weekly assignments were video projects.
[00:01:45.533]Before we started our assignments,
[00:01:47.004]we watched a lot of experimental
[00:01:48.196]films to get a sense of the style
[00:01:49.666]that Southern Devices was going for.
[00:01:52.754]My initial film followed a pretty open
[00:01:54.604]ended prompt and focused on themes of
[00:01:56.364]emotional resiliency, catharsis, and
[00:01:58.303]routine. I filmed everything on my own
[00:02:00.613]with my phone and this weird
[00:02:02.340]phone stand.
[00:02:03.960]Here’s a short snippet.
[00:02:06.303][music]
[00:03:00.675]As we moved further along, we were
[00:03:02.605]eventually given footage to work with.
[00:03:04.455]Another film I wrote and edited was told
[00:03:06.481]from the point of view of artificial
[00:03:08.241]intelligence delivering a radio show for
[00:03:09.986]humans. It was inspired by a lot of
[00:03:12.377]feelings I sensed from people during
[00:03:14.253]the pandemic. I wanted to write a
[00:03:16.133]comforting piece about artificial
[00:03:17.583]intelligence since I was so used to it
[00:03:19.533]being represented in a dystopic context.
[00:03:21.859]Here’s a short snippet.
[00:03:23.024][robot voice]
[00:03:23.760]The universe has her arms outstretched,
[00:03:25.736]limbs extending farther and farther
[00:03:28.602]each day.
[00:03:31.950]But your body is a
[00:03:33.330]container of a galaxy.
[00:03:34.950]Your cells regenerate at an
[00:03:36.680]astronomical pace.
[00:03:38.538]The synapses in your brain fire like a sky
[00:03:41.358]full of shooting stars.
[00:04:20.820]The last assignment we did required us
[00:04:22.690]to work from a script written by Ash, and
[00:04:24.638]we cut together the provided footage and
[00:04:26.418]excerpts as we saw fit to construct our
[00:04:28.308]own interpretation. I wanted to push the
[00:04:30.538]message of the impact of humans on the
[00:04:32.418]environment and technology. The dystopian
[00:04:34.778]connotations and fear of technology stem
[00:04:36.788]from human behavior. For every example of
[00:04:38.848]threatening technology, there is a human
[00:04:40.808]behind it that designed and enabled it.
[00:04:43.573]Here's a short snippet.
[00:04:45.645]I worked hard to rid my dialect to
[00:04:47.612]blend in, to disappear.
[00:04:49.601]I dance with a drone, and it dances
[00:04:51.250]with me. Sees me.
[00:04:54.575]Someone labels. Tracks my motions,
[00:04:56.775]my gestures, my curves.
[00:04:58.949]Just like I did once to the architecture
[00:05:00.948]now, it does it to me.
[00:05:02.947]It wants to know me to classify me,
[00:05:04.846]to put me in a larger database of
[00:05:06.508]information, to store me forever,
[00:05:08.441]to sell to me, to predict my behavior, to
[00:05:11.143]police me before I commit the crime.
[00:05:16.039]Southern is a geographical location,
[00:05:18.699]a culture, an attitude, a feeling, a
[00:05:21.005]longing, a place that I needed to get away
[00:05:23.328]from as a kid but now realize that I need
[00:05:26.143]to learn from it more than ever.
[00:05:29.017]Hopefully, the idea is that our work will
[00:05:31.007]be incorporated in some way in the final
[00:05:32.927]public display of the project. I’m excited
[00:05:34.947]to see where it ends up.
[00:05:36.147]Anyway, that was my summer UCARE
[00:05:37.797]experience! I’ve been doing a lot of
[00:05:39.717]editing all summer, and I hope to do more
[00:05:41.717]narrative and experimental filmmaking
[00:05:43.557]projects in the near future.
[00:05:45.157]Thanks for watching!

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Story, Worlds, and Speculative Design Lab

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