Author: celizalde23

This is my Final Project link.

I decided to go for the Google Slide presentation in a similar way to the Twine choosing method. I gave some of the same options to the original story I made for the Hypermedia project. At the end I decided to take out some options of the story because it felt overwhelming having so many options to choose from. 

I was able to create/draw the illustrations and gifs in my presentation in a pixel art style. This was my decision because I wanted an RPG game feeling. Also, I wanted to have more freedom decorating my story game, that is why I decided to go for Google Slides. The options to choose a path will appear as an animation option from the presentation. That is why to follow the story without any interruptions from jumping ahead, just click anywhere to continue, and when the options appear you should choose one to continue the story. I recommend not clicking anywhere else when these options appear because it will make the presentation move forward, which will be confusing because the slides are in a weird order that can only work if clicking the options.

I’m not a DTC major, but I was able to get the results that I wanted for this project.

I’m not sure if we were supposed to post our final project draft, but I’ll post it just in case. I will be using my Hypermedia project: Twine Link

I haven’t edited it because I’m planning on making it a Google slides presentation story with choices and images. I felt like I would have a lot of freedom using google slides to have a “game” feeling to my story. I’m not used to Twine, which made it difficult for me to do more things in my Hypermedia project.

I’m planning on drawing my characters and settings and I recently started doing these slide, so I don’t have many right now. I’ll share a screenshot of my google slides so that you can see what is what I want to do with my project.

I might change some parts of my story, but I’m still not sure what I want to change or add.

My plan for my final project is to use my hypermedia project and make it more detailed. My idea is to have illustrations for my story and maybe edit some parts that I feel might need more work. I’ll be using Twine for the final project, but if I manage to find a better way to tell my story, then I won’t use Twine. I do want to create my own illustrations using Procreate, or maybe use Shake Art Deluxe to make my illustrations look like they are animations (shaking art). 

The idea of my story is to create a story around a Homing Pigeon sending messages/letters during war time in a fantasy world. It was inspired by the pigeon stories from WWI and WWII. The pigeon (the player) can choose their path and what to do during such situations during war. 

The class modules that I will use for this project are visual narrative and hypermedia.

Hello! This is my Hyper Media Project

I haven’t played many video games, but I have watched other people stream their gameplays. One of those games that caught my attention was Undertale, an indie video game with an innovative story that allows the player to have choices that will impact the game’s outcome. The storytelling and the characters are memorable, especially when there are multiple endings. The story follows a human child that falls into an underground world, a place full of monsters that were sealed underground away from human society. Is the player’s choice to decide if they want to fight the monsters or become friends with them. The gameplay uses the character’s soul to fight those monsters, the player needs to avoid the enemy’s attacks and decide if they want to fight or spare them.

The interactions between the player and the characters can become either comedic or horrible, especially if the player decides to fight the monsters. There are also puzzles in the game that you need to solve to be able to get through. What amazed me about this game was that saving, loading, and resetting are both game and story mechanics. Which makes the story more interesting.

Not only is the story engaging, but it has many secrets that the player will have to figure out along the way. The character designs are unique to each character, which can be memorable to the player. The design goes well with their personalities, and even though these characters don’t have voice acting, the sounds that are used to imitate their voice is a lovely touch.

I decided to discuss Bing Xu’s work. This is an interesting story that is being told with icons, which tells the story of someone’s day routine. This story was easy to follow, these icons are able to describe sounds, movements, emotions, thoughts, and smells. This story can be relatable to many people that have a similar daily routine. Icons do what writing can’t, they can be readable to a lot of people around the world. Writing can be expressed in one language, but if you want someone from the other side of the world to read a work, you have to translate the story into that language. But icons and signs don’t need translation, they can be easily figured out by many around the world. 

I’m sure I can implement icons and indexes in my own project, I just have to figure out where I want them to be. Just like my visual narrative work, I was able to use some icons and emotions without any text. Which worked to describe what my characters wanted to say without saying a word. I’m still debating about my final project and what I want it to be about. Symbols, indexes, and icons are an easy way to tell the audience things happening in your story without using any dialog, which can make it easier for me to express things without adding that dialog. Experimenting with these three will be my next step to see if I want to implement it to my final project.

These hyperlink story games have interesting stories, but not all three follow the same format. For example, the hyperlink game How to Rob a Bank does not have many interactions for story options, it only goes to the next part with not much to choose from. It can be boring for some people because of the lack of interaction with the story. While the hyperlink game With Those We Love Alive has a deep story that you can interact with. It has many options to explore this game’s world and have a better feeling of what is around the audience. The other one, My Boyfriend Came Back From the War, does have reactions and other options, but is not as intricate as the one made by Porpentine. The part that I enjoyed in My Boyfriend Came Back From the War: the images, because they can be a good thing to have in a story, especially for the audience so they can have an idea of what something looks like without having to add a lot of descriptions in the story. 

Is important to have a good plot to engage the audience so that they can continue clicking into the story. But there might be cases where you might not need a good plot to make the audience get interested in the story. If you can get their curiosity with a mysterious story, or even a funny one, a plot might work but it depends if the author decides to do something different.  

This is my Visual Narrative

An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

Both film and short story follow the same story. Of course there are some differences between the two that can only be done in certain ways because of the different media used. 

For example, the film was able to show human expressions and actions, setting and environment, something that in writing can be done, but will likely make the writing longer trying to explain everything. Of course, sound is something that differs from writing. You can hear the voice of the main character when he calls out to his wife, or his last sigh when he is hung. The sound of the swirling water, the birds, the guns, all of that makes the film a different experience from reading. The film did not need a narrator to explain what was going on through the main character’s mind, the camera angles and the actors expressions and movements were enough to explain what was going through his head.

For the writing there is more information given about the character Peyton Farquhar and how he ended up being hung. The film did not give any background story for this character, it only showed his family. The writing was able to explain things that the film did not, the audience might have to figure it out by themselves. 

The pacing is different in both medias. The short story can have a slow or a fast pace, it depends on the reader and how they want to process the story. The writing does not feel slow, it feels right for me to be able to read and understand what is going on in the story. The film feels slow in comparison to the short story. The video is about 23 minutes long, and it took me less than that to read the short story. I noticed the film’s pace was slow because the camera was showing the environment around the character. It gave a vast image of what this setting looks like so that we can follow the main character through his journey back home, which ended up only being the character’s imagination.

It is interesting how different both media can be, you can do things to one that can’t do to the other, which makes it fascinating.

Diagramatic Narrative Slideshow

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This is a story of someone being afraid of being alone when it’s dark outside. The character is trying to get to her car as fast as possible to feel safe when turning on her car lights. I decided to not include images of the character arriving safe to the car so that the viewers can interpret any possible endings. Did she arrive safely? Was she being followed by someone or something? Is this character not making it to safety? 

I decided to take some of the photos while moving fast so that I could get a sense of movement and rush from the character. The transition I used for this story is action-to-action, following how the character is walking out of a building and proceeds to fast walk (or run) to get to her car. And at the end it feels like a subject-to-subject transition because I’m letting the viewer create a posible situation and ending for the girl that is alone out in the dark.

Classical Aristotelian 3-part Structure:

 A fantasy world, where different creatures live together and have their own rules. There is a community of Fairies that call themselves the “Children of Earth.” They have very strict rules about interacting with outsiders, anyone who isn’t a fairy (animal or plant) is considered not a“Child of Earth.” It is believed that if the fairies have contact with the outsiders they will “contaminate” their bodies, which will damage the purity of Earth. Aniela, one of the few fairies that is training to become a “Child of Earth,” is assigned to take care of one of the many forests in the Fairy community. This one is next to a human village that is isolated from the rest of the human cities.

She encountered humans throughout her training, but she avoided them and never made any close contact. However, she is intrigued by the way they live, their customs, and how they interact with each other. One day there was pure silence coming from the human village, which was rare. Aniela, intrigued, enters the village, she looks everywhere but no humans on sight. That is when, without even noticing, a human child holds her hand. In the moment of panic, she gets paralyzed, knowing perfectly that she has been contaminated by a human. In that moment she stops and analyzes the situation, no one else is there, just the two of them. The child is pale and dirty, which makes Aniela feel concerned about this child’s safety. 

At that moment she decided to take care of the human child, she knew that going back will only make things worse, and leaving the child alone will likely not survive. She did not feel remorse, but she questioned her community’s beliefs. Is it okay to let any creature die just because they are not a child of Earth? 

Kishontenketsu 4-part Structure:

A group of students that are about to go on a school field trip that is happening up in the mountains. They are visiting the old city of the Sky. It is said that their ancestors would climb these mountains to pray to their guardian angels so that they can be protected from evil and have great health. We are introduced to Uriel, a student who is introverted but would open up to anyone who wants to become friends with him. A bus is taking them to the city of the Sky.

The students enjoy the view from their seats, many chat, many laugh, just a few feeling dizzy from all the curves. Uriel sits next to the most chatty student of the class, she wouldn’t stop talking about the mountains and the old city to Uriel, who did not mind.

Then an accident was caused by another driver taking over both lanes, which caused the bus driver to try and avoid a crash, and that made the bus tilt and fall close to the edge of a hill. Everyone is panicking from the tilt and the injuries. They evacuate the bus, and at the end Uriel leaves the bus together with the girl who was sitting next to him. That is when the hill starts to crack, which makes the bus and the two of them fall down the hill. Is this the end of both of them? Many were thinking that, but Uriel did not panic. He has a special amulet that he can use to summon a guardian angel to save them. But he did not expect the girl that was falling beside him to be a guardian angel. 

She saved him and stayed on the side of the hill so no one could see them. Angels can take any form. He keeps it a secret and they wait for the rescue team to arrive.

Episodic Structure:

As the Evergreen Kingdom is under attack, everyone evacuates to get shelter from the neighboring kingdoms. 

1. A young knight apprentice (squire) from the Evergreen Kingdom evacuated together with her two friends. Incapable of fighting and using a sword, she fears that they would be attacked by the enemy. They walk through the forest to get to the Floreo Kingdom, where they can be safe from the attacks. In this group, she thinks that her two friends are more capable of fighting than her. 
2. The princess from the Evergreen Kingdom has been evacuated by a special knight from the Floreo Kingdom. This knight is one of the best trained and has the ability to use magic with the help of a flower. They walk through the forest to get as soon as possible to the Floreo Kingdom. The princess is unsure about the idea of going with a knight that’s from another kingdom. It has become a rough situation because the flower won’t stop talking. 
3. A knight from the Evergreen Kingdom and the Templum Kingdom are on their way to track the princess’ location. They have been sent as a backup to help the princess get to safety, but the attacks have made it difficult for them to find her. They are both acquaintances but have no time for chit chat. 

They all meet at some point in the forest on their way to the Floreo Kingdom. That is where they start making plans and strategies to protect the princess, because she is a descendant of the Guardians. 

Surrealism Structure:

This is the story of a young man who can enter people’s dreams to escape from his own nightmares. He prefers to watch other people’s dreams so he won’t have to face his terrible nightmares. As time progresses he starts to see those nightmares become reality, which he can’t escape from. He decides to look for a person whose life isn’t a nightmare to live forever in their dreams. As he encounters a College student who is doing well in life, had a lovely childhood, and a supportive family, he decides to stay in his dreams. At first he experiences beautiful moments from these students, but his decision only made this student’s life a nightmare. As he realizes his mistake, he decides to face those nightmares and accept reality.

Personal Anecdote:

This is the story of a little girl from a small town in central Mexico. She was smart, creative, stubborn, selfish, and extroverted. She would think highly of herself because she was better than all the kinds from this small town. The school only had about 70 students in total, and only 8 students her age. First place in any test, contest, and she would receive diplomas or recognition. Everyone would look up to her and follow her as if she was their leader. How did a little girl manage all of that? How can she decide what everyone will play and where she wants to play that game? She did not care if someone got hit by a soccer ball because she was intruding the soccer field. She did not care if someone wanted to play something else because she was the one to choose the game. One day her bubble popped and that is when she realized the harsh reality, she was not the best of the best because there was a world outside her world. There are others better than her, others who are smarter, who are more creative. That day, she became a new person. She understood that it was not easy to survive outside in the real world.