Tuesday 17 November 2009

Steve 'ESPO' Powers




Stephen J Powers is a New York City artist who at one time wrote graffiti in Philadelphia and New York under the name ESPO ("Exterior Surface Painting Outreach"). He was most well known during the late 1990s for his conceptual pieces as well as his role as the editor and publisher of On the Go Magazine. ESPO's work often blurred the lines between illegal and legal. Pieces like "Greetings from ESPOLand" utilized the style of the Asbury Park Billboards and appeared to be a legitimate billboard. On January 4, 1997 ESPO began his most ambitious non-commissioned art. He painted on storefront grates in Fort Greene, Bedford-Stuyvesant, TriBeCa and the South Bronx, covering the entire grate with white or silver paint and writing his name over it. Powers painted in daylight, wearing street clothes; he told the New York Times in 1999 that when passerby asked what he was doing he would tell them, "I'm with Exterior Surface Painting Outreach, and I'm cleaning up this gate"; the official-sounding name was enough to ward most people off. Powers targeted shops that appeared to be out of business and grates that were already heavily vandalized, describing his graffiti as a public service. In 1999 he said that he had painted around 70 grates. Powers is from Philadelphia's Overbook neighborhood; he graduated from Robert E Lamberton High School in 1987 and took classes at the University of Arts. He moved to New York in 1995.

In December 1999 Powers was arrested for vandalism after he participated in a protest conceived by Joey Skaggs,against Rudolph Giuliani's attempt to shut down the controversial art show at the Brooklyn Museum, "Sensations”; he charged that the arrest was politically motivated. A New York Times editorial criticized the Giuliani administration for its secrecy in the case, but dismissed Powers as "a noodge and self-promoter, one of those deliberately annoying characters whom most of us could do without." The Village Voice was similarly critical, describing Powers as an egotistical, careerist "celebrity offender"; the author writes, "in the graffiti world...many consider Powers a media-fed simulation of the Real Thing." Charged with six counts of criminal mischief e eventually accepted a plea bargain and performed five days of community service.

Powers stated in 2000 that he had given up graffiti. His work has been shown at the Venice and Liverpool Biennials, as well as numerous shows at New York City's Deitch Gallery. In 2003, Powers designed the artwork for Tommy Guerrero’s third studio album Soul Food Taqueria and performed voice overs for the international television series Kung Faux seen in over 150 countries around the world. His first solo museum exhibition was in the fall of 2007, at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Powers has done many projects at Coney Island In 2005 he curated "The Dreamland Artists Club" a project in which professional artists helped Coney Island merchants by repainting their signs. In 2008 he created a waterboarding-themed installation there. His studio art currently sells for as much as $20,000. He is the author of a book on graffiti's history, "The Art of Getting Over," published by St. Martins Press in 1999, as well as the graphic novel, First and Fifteenth: Pop Art Short Stories, Villard Press, 2005. He has also designed clothing for Marc Eco, Nike and Calvin Klein

Powers was a Fulbright scholar in 2007. He used the grant to create murals in Dublin and Belfast's Shankhill area, with the assistance of local teenagers. His work in Belfast was inspired by the area's Political Murals; Powers told the New York Times that he was "taking the form of the murals, which are insanely powerful for all the wrong reasons, and trying to retain some of the power and use it in a really good way.”

Friday 13 November 2009

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? (i.e. of film openings)


This is our contact sheet for our opening sequence. The first frame is of our main title. We decided to have the main title at this point as it enters dramatically. This is because the music changes and gets louder, also the picture changes from black to the panning shot. We chose the title ‘Retribution’ meaning “punishment that is considered to be morally right and fully deserved”. This title would be typical of an action thriller.


The second frame we chose is of the setting. It is a fade between the building and the skyline panning shot. It has an urban feel and suggest industrial trading. The purpose of the the purpose of the building is to show that the opening is set in a run down, secluded area. These types of shots are typical of openings as they put the audience in the right frame of mind for the film.


The third frame is to represent our costumes and props. It is of the petrol being poured over the hostage character. It shows the murderer character in a suit costume and the gerry can which is being used to poor petrol on the victim. We put our murderer character in a suit as it makes him look more important and higher up to the hostage. It is also a typical thing for openings to do because it helps the audience to understand who is who.


The fourth frame is to show our font. The font that we chose was called ‘Dirty Ego’. We found it on www.dafont.com. We chose this font because the style of the font looks rough, dirty and it has a stencil like appearance.


The fifth is to show genre and how our opening suggests it. We used this frame as it shows the genre well because it includes the violence and crime with the bat and also the different characters. We were aiming for a british crime/thriller so this frame is a good representation of this genre.


The sixth frame we used is to show how our opening sets up the story for the rest of the film. This frame has the character lighting a stick which he then throws onto the petrol which gives the impression of setting the hostage on fire. In this shot you don’t actually see the fire being lit but you hear the stick being thrown onto the petrol soaked ground. The way which this holds the suspense and ends on a cliff hanger is typical of our genre because it gets the viewer excited.


Our seventh frame is to illustrate how the characters are introduced. We think this frame does this well as it shows the hostage in the background as well as the other character in the foreground.


The eighth frame is of a shadow of the hostage being hit with a bat. This is to show our ideas for camera work. This is one of the shots that we are most pleased with as it is a less common shot and is more imaginative. We used a shadow because it keeps the mystery and doesn’t show the characters faces. This is to build up more tension and atmosphere. It is typical of openings to not give too much away as this can make the rest of the film boring.


Our final frame is a close up of the petrol being poured on the hostage. We chose this frame to represent special effects as the petrol in the shot is actually just water. We only used live action effects in our opening. This is typical of british crime films as guns etc. do not appear in real british crime.


2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?


i chose the hit-man from the film "hit-man" as the two characters are similar. there job is to kill and they both wear the same "uniform". they both wear suits which hides there job as people who wear suits are generally businessmen. they both seek revenge for something in our film you do not know.

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?

4. Who would be the audience for your media product?


this is harry, he is a man in his twenties. he has a 9 to 5 job that he feels it is at a dead end. he needs excitement in his life and he turns to film to escape from reality. he likes action films with crime, violence and a degree of drugs. he has never witnessed these things in reality so by watching films he feels part of the action. harry has a nice sized flat that he shares, wears nice clothes. even though his job is boring it is paid above average. he has a large DVD collection and has the latest games for his console. he has a nice car with all the latest tune pumping out of his 16ch speakers. he spends his money on what ever he wants.

5. How did you attract/address your audience?

this is our opening with anitation

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?



Tuesday 10 November 2009

7. Looking back at your preliminary task (the continuity editing task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

Looking back at your preliminary task (the continuity editing task), what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to full product?

While doing the preliminary task we learnt a lot about the different camera and editing techniques. We have tried to use these properly and efficiently in our production. However in our opening we didn’t have any dialog so it was not necessary to use these techniques. Our opening was more about establishing a location and creating the right atmosphere for the rest of the film.

Film category


What does the ‘15’ symbol mean?

No-one under 15 is allowed to see a ‘15’ film at the cinema or buy/rent a ‘15’ rated DVD or video game. Parents are warned that ‘15’ rated works are not suitable for children under 15 years of age.



after reading the BBFC's categories of film age rating we think our film "Retribution" is a 15. There is a scene of moderate violence but it is shown in a suggestive was and not direct. the film could have swearing later in the film as the characters are "common" and gangsters. the category description of 15 rating fits to our interpretation of the rest of the film.

Wednesday 4 November 2009

Creative Risk

The risk that we took was our shot of the shadow when the hostage gets hit with a bat.
We noticed the shadow when we were filming the normal shot and though it would look good. The risk was that we didn't know how people would interpret it and that it might not be clear enough. It paid off because it defiantly helped keep the feeling of mystery and everyone that we showed it to knew it was a guy getting hit with a bat.

If we were going to do it again we would light it better so that the shadow is more prominent.