These thoughts are what came to mind as I listened to Tamara Taggart’s TEDx talk, ‘Two Conversations That Changed My Life’, a personal and incredibly heart-warming account of two separate conversations that eventually became undeniably inter-woven.

What struck me was her ability to deliver the story with such gentleness and love. There was no hate, only a desire to see change. As I listened, my admiration for her grew – not only for her eloquent conversational style, but also because along the way I was humbled with the reminder that there are areas in life where I can do better. On so many levels, she nails it.

I was inspired to share this video after recently reading stories by 2 Life As A Human authors, Ross Lonergan and Gil Namur. They each talk about experiences in self-discovery and the value of life’s lessons, and both stories leave you feeling good.

Tamara’s story of two conversations also leaves you feeling good, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Let’s help her change the conversation! 

Photo Credit

Thumbnail is a screen capture from the video

Learn More About Tamara Taggart

Visit TED

Teamwork © David de Los Santos

Although I dedicate most of my time to photography, I recently started creating a timelapse series and am appreciative of the overwhelming reception my latest work, A Timelapse of Flowers, is receiving.

The Observer of the Summer Sky © David de Los Santos

The following timelapse took 9 months and 50,000 shots to complete (using only 5,000 shots for the final video). A great amount of research led me to discover that nigella damask, hibiscus, carnations, orchids, dandelions, lillium, daisies, alstroemeria and peonies are among the fastest bloomers.

All Images © David de Los Santos

David de Los Santos Photographer Bio

I am David de los Santos, a Spanish software engineer studying at the Computense University of Madrid, although I also have a little house in Guadalajara, in a small village, where I can enjoy the wildlife and the spectacular landscapes of the region.

Website:  DaviddeLosSan.com

Follow David de Los Santos on: Twitter

  Gangnam Style – the world’s most viewed video sensation

What was the magic formula that made this K-pop video so irresistible around the world – with viewers that don’t even speak a word of Korean? We can safely assume this song would never have penetrated non-Korean markets without the captivating, absurdly addictive imagery accompanying that catchy beat, and those unforgettable horsey dance moves. But there’s more to it than that; this video is so extra enjoyable because it pokes fun at some of the tropes (e.g. consumerism, materialism, and sexism) that permeate so much of contemporary popular music – humor that most viewers can recognize and appreciate – not to mention the satirical commentary on Korean society that gets lost in translation. With unprecedented room to experiment and access to so many different viewers, Psy and others show us that music videos have found a new calling on the Internet – a postmodern medium that lends itself so easily to cheeky, self-reflexive, ironic content. Enter the satirical, funny, music video.

I’m On A Boat – possibly the best song ever about being on a boat

To a casual listener, satirical songs often sound a lot like any other mainstream song; they might be catchy, danceable, radio-friendly, easy to sing along to, and occasionally auto-tuned as hell. If you don’t pay close attention to the lyrics (or if you do, but miss the joke), the songs can easily masquerade as something created by any other popular musician or rapper. They’re often designed this way because part of the fun comes in mocking the characteristics of the musical genre itself, in addition to the tongue-in-cheek social commentary and humor found in the lyrics and music video footage. For example, Lonely Island’s I’m On a Boat, which ridicules extravagant rap culture (and those who have bling versus those who don’t), had quite the impact on fans and industry alike. The song was actually nominated for a Grammy – not for a comedy award, but in a “real music” category: Rap/Sung Collaboration (they understandably lost to Jay-Z and Kanye West).

The music video is one tool that helps satirical artists and musical comedians visualize their humor, making it more accessible, more memorable, and even funnier than the song by itself. The Fox, one of the biggest viral hits of the past year, and one of the most viewed videos on YouTube with 430 million views, does just that. The team behind this hilarious and weirdly addictive musical phenomenon is Ylvis, a Norwegian comedy act and variety show (Tonight With Ylvis) performed by brothers Vegard and Bård Ylvisåker. They wrote a song that is literally about animal sounds and a mythical tribute to the [previously] unsung mysteries of the fox, which doesn’t have a classic storybook sound of its own. The professionally produced video features furries socializing at a party, a laser-light dance act in the forest, a CGI fox bouncing around and chanting, and the Ylvisåker brothers’ moodily pondering over the truth of the fox’s sound.

The Fox (What Does The Fox Say?) – unlocking one of the greatest mysteries of our time

So what makes this silly video pure satirical genius? Well, the whole thing was meant as a joke to use on their talk show but it completely backfired. The Ylvisåker brothers intended the music video to be a flop in the US, but it propelled them to overnight worldwide success instead. The irony of this situation is in the unexpected popularity of a video that was designed to fail. Perhaps millions of viewers just have bad taste, or maybe Ylvis tapped into an important question regarding nostalgic childhood fantasies and re-creating those enchanting questions we cynically give up on with age, that resonated with fans. (What does the fox say, anyway?)

In addition to often being funny, satire music has a unique ability to probe those deeper questions about life, bringing an extra layer of self-reflexive pleasure to the listening experience. The artists behind these videos, such as Jon Lajoie, The Lonely Island, “Weird Al” Yankovic, Bart Baker, and others, who are usually comedians first and musicians second, have a knack for exploiting the framework of music consumption by poking holes in our everyday lived experience and question the power structures we often take for granted. Lajoie is a master of tackling topics that cause viewers to question their role in a consumerist society. He struck a chord with internet audiences in Everyday Normal Guy, one of his earliest and most successful videos to this day, where he adapts rap formula to hit an unconventional topic for rap music: mundanity. It’s refreshing to hear a song about real, boring life, when most pop music is often so glamorous and escapist.

Everyday Normal Guy – because being boring is not a crime

Videos go viral because they hook their viewers with something special that makes them worth sharing. Satire music videos surprise us and entertain us, while at the same time creating a space for self-reflective dialogue, and artists are eager to capitalize on the power of satire. Thus, the line between comedic music (jokes told through song) and mainstream music trying to be funny is increasingly blurred. It’s no coincidence then that at least a few of the most viewed videos on YouTube incorporate satire to some extent, such as Gangnam Style, The Fox, and Macklemore & Ryan Lewis’s Thrift Shop, which satirizes typical rap and different cultural subgroups (namely vintage-wearing white hipsters who ball like club-hopping gangstas) and raises questions about consumerism (why do we brag about spending so much or so little). The rise of satirical music videos both as a comedian-driven genre and as a cheeky addition to “mainstream” music are a sign of the times and viewer demand for extra layers of pleasure and reflection in the media they consume: the clever, alongside the ridiculous.

Photo Credit
Screen Cap from Gangnam Style
Screen Cap from The Fox

Guest Author Bio

Jessica Lindal and Hingman Leung
We are a comedy music-loving duo currently studying public culture for our Master of Arts program at Royal Roads University, Victoria, BC, Canada. By day, Hingman Leung is professional paper pusher in Ottawa and Jessica Lindal is an exchange student wrangler in Calgary.

For more satirical musical fun, check out our piece on 5 Hilarious Hit Songs That Stick It To The Man

Follow us: Jessica on Twitter | Hingman on Twitter

Follow this series as we explore the wild within ourselves and the outer edges of our planet and how these two landscapes can be fused through experience and expression.  The Art of Wild will immerse you into the common language of experience, a way of perceiving and preserving the world.  

Image Credits

Thumbnail – Screen Cap From Video

Lindsay Marie Stewart Artist Bio

Lindsay Marie Stewart produces non-fiction documentaries emerging from both ethnographic fieldwork and journalism. Her goal is to engage various audiences across different cultural settings and harness perspectives drawn from the arts, the human sciences, and the humanities. Most recently, Lindsay has been recognized for her work with the 2013 Public Ethnography Award for the multi-award winning documentary, A Hand To Stand. It is the first film of seven within the Natural Connections Project, a multi-media series showcasing Indigenous schools using innovative teaching and learning practices to engage students across the country. 

 

Lindsay works as the Director of Public Relations for the EMAC (Ethnography.Media.Arts.Culture) Network. She is currently taking her MA in Intercultural & International Communications and has been awarded a BA in Professional Communications and a Photojournalism Associate’s Degree. Her current research collaboration with Dr. Phillip Vannini, the Canada Research Chair in Innovative Learning and Public Ethnography is the six-part film series, The Art Of Wild.

 

Blog / Website: The Art Of Wild

 

Follow Lindsay Stewart on: Twitter | YouTube

If you’re a child of the 80s or 90s, chances are you spent a significant amount of your after-school hours gobbling up the latest chart-topping music videos on MTV. With help from music videos like Michael Jackson’s Thriller (which was recently acknowledged for its pivotal role in American film history), the network played a significant role in changing music video culture – from straight footage of bands singing to the more complex visual dramas we enjoy today. MTV’s legacy was bringing together a perfect storm of visual style, popular music, and youth culture.

And as long as there have been music videos to feed the music industry, there have been satirists eager to make fun of the formulas that have emerged from pop culture, subtly criticizing the social rules that music videos reinforce for consumers. “Weird Al” Yankovic – the undisputed king of parody music – released “Eat It” as a single with accompanying video in 1984, parodying Jackson’s “Beat It” which was released the year before. For the song, Yankovic earned a Grammy Award for Best Comedy Recording. “Weird Al” had managed to stay on top of the genre and make a career out of it, going on to win again in 2004, and nominated an additional seven times, with the most recent nomination being in 2012 for Apocalypse.

“Weird Al” channeling all of our tuna casserole
and boiled chicken childhood fears in Eat It
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcJjMnHoIBI

Why has comedy-satire music video gained such popularity through the MTV generation and onwards to the YouTube generation? By exaggerating pop culture phenomenon and referencing musical and visual formulas that we have grown used to, “Weird Al” has provided us with a new way of looking at ourselves and the strange perceptions that we blindly accept. For example, in White and Nerdy two apparently opposing cultures (nerd culture and rap culture) are cast together to poke fun at our adherence to codes of behaviour.

“Weird Al” in White and Nerdy

These days, the perfect storm of music video culture and its satirists have moved on to the digital age. While we weren’t paying attention, internet killed the video star. YouTube has ridden on the coattails of early internet pioneers like Myspace, and not only changed the way we consume music videos, but has also given another avenue for artists to distribute their craft.

A tongue-in-cheek look at the internet in the context of musicians,
as performed by Evelyn Evelyn, a conjoined twin act by Amanda Palmer and Jason Webley.

While “Weird Al” first popularized the genre of comedy-satire music video, The Lonely Island, a sketch-comedy satire-music group – made up of Akiva Schaffer, Andy Samberg, and Jorma Taccone – has taken over the digital waves. Gaining mainstream popularity thanks to the trio’s multi-year writing gig (and Samberg’s performing stint) on Saturday Night Live, The Lonely Island had formidably expanded the reach of the genre to the mainstream hip hop audience. We have this troupe to thank for their viral hit (before viral was even a thing), Lazy Sunday, an overnight success that had changed the landscape of YouTube forever.

Grantland’s Hyden praised The Lonely Island for their ability to set their social commentary and critique of hip-hop culture within “an affectionate homage that doesn’t threaten to usurp the artists they’re cribbing from.” The power of satire-comedy music videos as demonstrated by The Lonely Island lies in its ability to pleasantly disarm us towards self reflection and critique.

Bootleg video of Lonely Island’s Lazy Sunday
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0J6L55d1Qo

But when it comes to staying power, “Weird Al” is still the reigning champion. Why has “Weird Al” been able to stand the test of time with a thirty year career and an inter-generational fan base? “Weird Al” had shown us that regardless of time period, the combination of comedy, satire, music, and absurd videos keep surprising us and pointing out the ridiculousness of the music industry. It has paved the way for other musical satirist comedians like The Lonely Island and Jon Lajoie in the digital age, amongst scores of amateurs and YouTubers, feeding our appetite for more entertaining mockery.

Now, YouTubers like Hanna Hart are leading the new wave of comedy-satire music videos, and we leave you with this gem.

Oh Internet, a love song by Hanna Hart of My Drunk Kitchen fame

In part two, we’ll take at a look at the mass appeal of satire music including some of the world’s most insanely popular online videos.

Photo Credit
Thumbnail is a Screen Cap from White and Nerdy

Guest Author Bio

Jessica Lindal and Hingman Leung
We are a comedy music-loving duo currently studying public culture for our Master of Arts program at Royal Roads University, Victoria, BC, Canada. By day, Hingman Leung is professional paper pusher in Ottawa and Jessica Lindal is an exchange student wrangler in Calgary.

For more satirical musical fun, check out our piece on 5 Hilarious Hit Songs That Stick It To The Man

Follow us:  Jessica on Twitter | Hingman on Twitter

With these easy accessible video medias, viewers are now able to see live the way I work with tilt & shift lenses, custom made & standard neutral filters.

We are thankful that Life As A Human have accepted our request to show in exclusivity for this spring season our latest short film creation; BURST OF JOY

Photo Credits

All Photographs Are © MALTESTE

MALTESTE Photographer Bio

Born in 1962 (52)

Was drawing before walking

Studied ART for 3 years

Studied 3D Design for one year

Studied Business at University for 3 years (Bachelor)

Started Photography in april 1984 (30 years this month)

Owner & creator of the first Canadian High End Fine Art photography gallery dedicated exclusively to the artwork of MALTESTE.

MALTESTE GALLERY – Montreal, QC

Blog / Website: MALTESTE – In Search of the Sublime

Follow MALTESTE on: Twitter | Facebook | Vimeo

MASTERCLASS available: Please contact MALTESTE at info@malteste.com

MALTESTE GALLERY OLD MONTREAL
370-B Place-Royale
Montreal, QC H2Y 2V1
(514) 824-5144
info@malteste.com
www.malteste.com

Video Transcript:

This little series of ours can’t even begin to cover all the many lessons I learned while writing my fantasy novel Dreamlander. But I think I can say the most dramatic lesson was one so obvious I shouldn’t have had to learn it. And that was, in a nutshell, don’t skip the prep. Now, as someone who wrote a whole book on outlining, you’d probably think outlining would come second nature to me. But this wasn’t always so. Prior to Dreamlander, I had successfully outlined two books. I knew the benefits, I enjoyed the process. But with Dreamlander, I just didn’t do it.

There were a number of reasons for this, the biggest of which was that I was burned out on prep after having to abandon a previously outlined and researched book. I just wanted to dive in and write the darn thing. So I did. And I got stuck because, without an outline, I had no idea where the story was going. So I stopped. I wrote an outline. And then, finally, I started writing again. And—bam!—the difference was incredible.

This whole idea of not skipping prep goes far beyond just outlining—whether that’s your cuppa or not. After my experience with Dreamlander, I certainly believe outlining is the most important part of the prep. But you also have to make time early on for other occasionally unattractive tasks such as research, character interviews, sometimes even a few practice scenes just to figure out the proper POV, tense, voice, and style.

The thing is most of us are writers. So what do we want to do? Write. We don’t want to outline. We don’t want to research. Sometimes we don’t even want to edit. But these are all vital parts of the process. We can write without them. But we’ll never become authors without them. So learn from my mistakes and take the time to do the needed groundwork before you even start that first chapter.

Photo Credit

Thumbnail – Screen Capture From Video

Originally published on Wordplay: Helping Writers Become Authors

Video Transcript:

As we continue with our series about what I learned while writing my fantasy novel Dreamlander, I’d like to devote today’s video to the all-important subject of conflict. I love action stories, so most of my novels lean in that direction. And Dreamlander is no different. It features large-scale Renaissance-esque battles among other things. But the truth is big battles barely scratch the surface of the conflict necessary to make a book work.

Let’s consider the different levels of conflict.

1. First, we have world-ending conflict: evil aliens are about to bomb the living daylights out of humanity. That kind of thing.

2. Then we have large-scale human conflict, such as war.

And these big conflicts are all fine and good, because they create a framework of high stakes, as well as inherent settings of danger and tension. But these conflicts are never really what a story is about. Books that are about war—such as Mary Johnston’s wonderful Civil War story The Long Roll—become more about the event than the characters. And that’s fine if that’s what you’re wanting to do.

But most stories are going to find their power in something smaller and more intimate: and that is the conflict between characters. So we have several levels of this as well.

3. To begin with, we have the obvious conflict between the protagonist and the antagonist. But why stop there? Why not pour on the conflict?

4. Between the protagonist and his family.

5. The protagonist and his allies.

6. The antagonist and his allies.

Conflict is what makes fiction run. More than that, it’s what makes fiction interesting. Keep the conflict pumping in every scene and don’t forget to vary its intensity (obviously you’re not going to want the conflict between the protagonist and her boyfriend to be at the same level as the aliens vs. the humans). Conflict is what will keep your action popping and your readers hooked.

Photo Credit

Dream Lander Cover – K.M. Weiland – All Rights Reserved

Originally published on Wordplay: Helping Writers Become Authors

We studied the newspapers intently each day, eagerly seeking reassurance, only to grow more alarmed by news of recent developments, and the uneasy relations between the United States and Russia. Then in October, things took a frightening turn. My parents tried to appear calm as we watched the blockade because of the Cuban missiles unfold in vivid black and white, right there before us on the television.

Television added an immediacy that I had never experienced before – these events were live, this was happening now! In school we walked the halls nervously, greeting each other with forced smiles, trying to appear nonchalant. Our teachers were more easily upset than usual.

One day after school, a friend and I were playing outdoors when the cloud filled western sky turned to brilliant pink and red hues – another gorgeous New Mexico sunset. My friend convinced me that the Russians had bombed and that this was the beginning of nuclear fallout. I ran home in a panic, believing that it had happened, and wanting to know – needing to know – what were we supposed to do next? We didn’t have a fallout shelter, so instead of hiding under a desk, should we go in a closet? What could protect us against the rain of nuclear fallout? Were we all about to die?

My parents had to talk with me for quite some time before I began to calm down. No, there hadn’t been a bombing. No, that red sky wasn’t nuclear fallout. I believed them – sort of – but it was a long time after the missiles had been removed before I could really relax. After the events of October 1962, I lived with a gut awareness of how close it had been, and what that would have meant.

Be sure to visit the JFK Library’s interactive documentary website Clouds Over Cuba.

 This post is sponsored by the JFK Library

Video Transcript:

On a personal note, the time has finally come when I can officially announce the release date for my fantasy novel Dreamlander. December 2, 2012, is the big day! Which means I’ll be spending this month celebrating with a special series of video (and text) posts, discussing what I learned during my journey with this book. Today, I want to start off the series by talking about one of our most critical jobs, and that is creating sympathetic characters.

At first glance, this may seem like a no-brainer. After all, most of us write our stories based on our love for the main character. However, as was reinforced to me while writing this book, there are several levels of sympathetic characters. First, we have the characters that just come to life on the page. They’re real, they’re likable, and they’re a joy to write. But then you have the slightly more difficult characters. These are ones that don’t want to talk to the writer. They sulk in corners and just generally make you want to throw your laptop across the room.

If you can’t get at the heart of a character, how can you share that heart with the reader? I’ve found that the key is getting these characters to talk, whether internally or in dialogue, in the first draft itself or in extracurricular interviews. Just let loose on the page. At this point, your first goal is not necessarily to construct a scene, but rather to find two important facets of this character: his greatest need and his greatest fear, which will almost always be what’s keeping him from fulfilling his need.

Keep pushing this character. Keep asking him questions—either personally or through the medium of another character. Initiate conflict, because this is the best way to get a character to show his true colors. But, remember, you also want to make him sympathetic, even within his anger or whatever, which means you need to find the places where he’s hurting and show them to the reader.

Photo Credit

Thumbnail – Screen Capture From Video

Originally published on Wordplay: Helping Writers Become Authors