Akash Rusia T206 Midterm Project 11/12/2010

Akash Rusia T206 Midterm Project 11/12/2010

Akash Rusia T206 Midterm Project 11/12/2010

Akash Rusia T206 Midterm Project 11/12/2010 While coming up with ideas for this project, my attention first turned to color: I knew that it would be a

HUGE deal. The look I wanted to go for had a darker feel mixed with subtle mixtures of warm colors

like red and orange. Truly the song is not happy at all, but at the same time I felt it definitely wasn’t sad.

The word I’d use to describe it would be reflective. The song is really about coming out to become a star,

but still being raw and uncompromising in terms of identity. The darkness is obvious in the song, but the

bright red and orange, I thought, could give it that feel of a strong personality.

Another idea I think has been important in my picture taking is the emphasis on lines and dots. When

annotating the lyrics, I saw words and phrases like “star,” “Broadway lights,” “far away;” I thought a

sense of distance was important to show how far the singer had come. This wasn’t an ordinary transition

described in the song, and I felt like the dots were integral in several pictures- in the first and fourth

pictures even forming a line. The lines in the second picture I loved because they gave a sense of

complexity (there are SO many lines in every which direction).

I started thinking about the project in Indianapolis at my brother’s apartment (which happens to be on the

29th floor); really, it would’ve been stupid if I didn’t take advantage of the sheer magnitude of the lights

the night-time city provides. The main problem was lighting. I thought the picture would be boring

without a model; to use a model, I needed a source of light I could shine to light up the model. This

worked out perfectly as we had about three different lamps lighting my brother’s friend’s face. At that

point, I didn’t really mind that he wasn’t wearing red simply because I thought it would be distracting

from the cool effect of the dots. (PICTURE 3)

Next up, I found this great spot near Ashton and went over with a friend. We did this take in various

positions and finally settled on this one (none of the other ones used the light just the right way). Again, I

wanted the red, but it wouldn’t have fit in (green and red don’t really complement); nevertheless, the

green, rusty texture gives it a certain effect I liked and matched up a lot with the picture I was using as

inspiration for my visual aesthetic (a Fight Club picture). (PICTURE 2)

Finally, I was determined to get the red in and asked my models to make sure they wear red. At the same

time, I scouted a couple locations- one of them was near the Art Museum which I knew had a cool

lighting thing going at night which I could use to flood the picture with some strong red to give it a

glowing personality. Also, street lights provided a perfect source of the dots. The two pictures I ended up

using from that night were amazing and used the color/dots I was looking for (PICTURES 1 and 4)

Reading the lyrics again the following night, I found there was more than a sense of just “making it big,”

more than that there was this sense of staying true to where you come from. I wanted this last picture to

give off a feeling of the slums- there was some random stuff lying around a nearby house that we used. I

fit it in the mise-en-scène by using the red with a rusty darker setting once again. This time, I also

wanted a slight low-angle shot to show kind of that this is still our star, and I didn’t think that would come

through with just the background we had. Still, he had a kind of chilled out expression which I wish I’d

asked him to change.

I’d explain more if I had more space, but I think you get the gist of what I was going for. Ultimately, I’m

happy with my pictures/mise-en-scène and think the lyrics match well with the pictures.

Akash Rusia T206 Midterm Project 11/12/2010

“And could I be a star, Does fame in this game have to change who you are? Or could I be the same one who came from a far-away life, Just to make it in this broadway lights, Now I’m shining in the broad day light, go figure, A slow transition from a lil broke nigga from the Ville, Got a deal, a real life saver, Dreams of being behind a Will like Jada, I chill now, cop a lil ice later, Cole you got the glow like a lil lightsaber”

- J. Cole (from Jay Z’s song, A Star is Born) The visual aesthetic inspiration I used was this promotional picture for Fight Club. I went for it because I felt like the song was all about identity and making sure you remember who you are as you become “a star.” The picture and mes-en-scene gives this feeling of something darker, but NOT sad. It says something to the effect of “this is the real me.” That’s what I was going for.