beN . laM . juN . biN: February 2009

Yeah, the first best movie I watched in 2009!

I prefer because it's actually a 'documentary' instead of 'love story'..

The documentary of Indian lifestyle, or to be more specific, there are groups of people who live hard & struggling to survive, not only India! It's every corner around the world.. that we rarely aware of.

The film has brought this 'slumdog scenes' up cautiously, with great visual & cinematography impact. Plus the soundtrack is really awesome! that spark out the entire film.

The opening chase scene is one of my favorite!

Well, honestly I like the 1st half more than the 2nd half- I find the part after they grew up & how difficult they got together- the 'love story' part is over 'Hollywood'.. but Definitely exclude the Bollywood group dance at the last scene! Love it~

There are 3 questions from this film.. (what I think)

Many answer are actually hidden in our daily life, but if there's no 'question', something would never be the 'answer'... Most of the time things don't go exactly ABCD 4 choices. Yes, instance culture is.
Is capitalism the savior of slumdog? Who don't want to be millionaire? No, it's not capitalism & it never be. Not communism either.
Eco crisis? Yea, people worry about losing their job, being laid off, house gone etc.. but look at those who stay beside the junk yard.. Yes, we always work hard in order to survive, but stop complaining when you loss something that you thought you're deserved for it.

No idea of what I'm talking about? Go watch it! A film that you must watch this year!

& I don't know why the trailer editted with The Ting Tings, one of the album that I listening lately. It's good as well~

It's always fun to learn philosophy, I love philosophy, never feel bored in learning it. However, it's really tough & not right for me to apply any philosophies into my work, my artwork, as an artist.

I've been struggling to do so..

For the sake of the requirement of my The Art & Ideology of 20th Century class assignment, I did it. & I got grade A for it.

Feel free to read what I wrote, it's FUN!

This project was done few years ago, from modeling to animation, rendering & compositing. The main theme of this project was to animate a character walk up to the staircase & make a turn. Rather than this, we were allowed to add anything with our creativity to make the work more interesting. Based on the things I have added, back now I realized that it can be fit into Foucault’s ideology, “The Death of Man”.

Firstly, my main character was a robot who has the image of Man, yet the behaviors of Man. It walked up to the stair, along the path & make a turn; just like how’s a human walk. As you can see, it actually walk in a odd way, or you might felt it behave so deadly, repeating the same walking distance & poses. All these were to pointed to us, the Man- we walk, we make life everyday but somehow we live deadly as we repeating certain activities’ that we never realize. Furthermore, what we’re doing/have done might look odd to other living things.

How about the world? The world I created is not exactly the real world we live. The stair wasn’t built based on a solid ground. The ‘motorbike looks alike’ vehicle was floating. These is the world that has no gravity apply, everything was floating as in a vacuum space. But how did they move like they have weight, as in under the condition of gravity? It’s technology that make it happened. The robot be able to walk as it’s constrained by the gravity, the vehicle has the ability to control its own gravity, so that it remained at the same position without floating around. They have the power to control the level of gravity. What I tried to imply is, human & his technology has come to the stage that they be able to take over the power of gravity, or in other words, they be able to control over the nature power. Human and his machines are so strong that they can do almost everything.

The enhancement: you might also realized that my robot character walked, turned, stopped, got up to the vehicle & drove away. This continuous actions showed the character seems to has its own thoughts and decision to make, it know to stop before it got up to the vehicle, yet it know how to got up to the vehicle more than just walk and turn. Moreover, it know to control the vehicle and drove it away. All these were tried to enhance what’s the robot character be able to do. The vehicle as well as the ‘gravity control machine’ was fully designed and in charged by the robot- the Man has great ability to control the nature through technology. And why the robot be able to do all these sort of things? It’s because the robot had been pre-programmed to accomplished the entire actions, which this lead us to the next main point I going to tell.

According to Foucault, the Man would be vanished as his definition of Man: the concept & study of Man that built since late 18th century (one of the Anthropology representative, Immanuel Kant), would be disappeared as well as Nietzsche‘s ‘the Dead of God’. The study of Human- Anthropology has been the main stream of learning in late 18th century. The results of studied Human as the center of all subjects has built the foundation of epistemology of that time. However, Foucault thought this main stream of study and concept would be passed and disappeared, which cause the corruption of epistemology that built based on it, his Death of Man.

The pre-programmed of the robot to do the whole actions refer to the main stream: study on Human. The death of Man is just like the pre-programmed, if the formula has removed or the system has crashed, the robot will stop functioning, or even worse, lost control. Secondly, the technology & machines equal to the study, researches that had been done during late 18th century & so on. The development that had been invented to build the foundation, & later it became a main stream, formed the system, utilized the formula/date & designed the program. Remember the enhancement part I mentioned as well, the character got up to the vehicle & drove it away, to emphasize the greatness achievement that had been done so far. Lastly and again, the robot refer to us, the Man, we invented it, we developed it & we just followed it. Robot do what it has been programmed to do; we live based on what we have. If the program removed, we loss what we owned; how is the robot going to move, based on what we continue to live? Of cause Foucault has the answer for this from our class Module 5.

In conclusion, if I’m allowed to, if I’m qualified enough, my work could criticized on Foucault’s Death of Man as well. Personally I would think that Foucault’s idea was based on certain phenomenon & parts of history activities & studies but not exactly from the origin of human being. How I implied this in my animation? Here’s the answer, the robot moved what it had been designed. It learned the code, understood the data, but it never know who invented it. Just like us, we learned great philosophy, the history, the study of Man, but we never understand the origin the Man, as in who created it, who is the creator. We live like the robot, whether there’s dead of God or death of Man.

I don't know why I need to define my work with any philosophies. I'm just an artist. It's really too much for me. But it's good for me to learn this, do something I'm not willing to do! It's so challenging! You should try it next time.

However, it's still good to study philosophy. Why? because it make you realized something, something about the world, what's going behind all the phenomenons? But 1 thing you should keep in mind, philosophy is just a study, from how's Man observed + analyzed + experiments from the nature, the culture, the behavior of Man. It's not the Absolute Truth!

So what is the Absolute Truth? Do you think there's existence of Absolute Truth? if there is, what is it? Do you have the answer? Have you think about the answer ever?

Yes, I do. The God I believe, Christianity is.

Ok, enough for all the words. Here's I present you my works! My animation.. that I did in year 2005, Character Animation 1 class that taught by Aik Sern..

My first time in doing 3d character animation, walkcycle, snappy, & weight lifting..
IT's SO FUN! haah~