Alien (1979) and Prometheus (2012) Comparison

Alien (1979) and Prometheus (2012) Comparison Introduction In this essay I will compare the visual effects of two movies an older movie and It ´s prequel. As a fan of sci-fi movies, for this writing I decided to compare Alien (1979) and its prequel Prometheus (2012). The Prometheus movie was nominated for an Academy award for visual effects in 2013 whereas Alien won an Academy award for visual effects in 1980. Many scenes in this first movie were so good that they had appeared in Prometheus too. Even the trailer consists of the same scenes. Moreover the plot of the both movies in general is about crew on a space towing vessel. They end up on a distant moon then the crew realize that they are not alone on the spaceship when an alien stowaway is on the board. 1. Alien 1979 Director: Ridley Scott Visual effects supervisor: Brian Johnson What worked best on visual effects for this movie are mostly modellers and prop makers. Models of the ship were very detailed and huge, for example the largest one Nostromo was 17 feet long. The team couldn ´t use the cutting edge technology of motion control to capture the seventeen-foot model of Nostromo   because the budget did not allow the time for shooting stop-motion. This led the special effects team to develop a camera that moved slowly on a drive mechanism. Furthermore, shots of Nostromos were mostly close ups. Interior sets of a spaceship were all connected and real so actors felt like they are in a real place. For the xenomorph they created a suit and found a slander tall man who wore it. He had to attend thaichi lessons because of the moves. The head of the xenomorph had mechanical parts and was made out of car parts, silicone and jelly for spit. The designer of the xenomorph and its previous stages ( facehugger and   chestburster ) and ship was H. R. Giger. There are only a few shots of the alien in the movie because Ridley wanted to create fear in a viewer, many times using dark places so viewer would not know where the alien is and what to expect. These are the most famous scenes: chestbuster scene A chest which was fake was used for John Hurts character Kane for the scene. It appeared as if Hurts neck was connected to the fake chest when He was underneath the table. The director tried to make the scene very much authentic and one of the steps was to use real organs which were bought from a butcher shop and were stuffed in the fake chest cavity. Another idea was to use hoses to help pump and spray the blood as the creature would explode from the chest. The actors were not told about all the actions that would take place and they definitely did not expect to be sprayed with blood as the alien creature arose. facehugger scene The Facehugger as seen in the opened egg are bits of cow innards and probably other animals. The tail of the Facehugger is an intestine and a blast of air is being pumped through it. The Facehugger dissection scene involved raw oysters in a plastic mold of the creature. Revelation of Ash scene In the scene where Ash is revealed to be a robot and has his head knocked off,   they   created a puppet of the Ashs torso and upper body which was operated from underneath by a small puppeteer.   The following scene of the surviving crew interacting with Ashs remains used both his actor, kneeling under the table with his head coming up through a hole cut in its top, and an animatronic head, made using a face cast of   Ash ´s actor. Unfortunately, the whipped latex made the head shrank as it was drying and therefore, the final item bore little resemblance to the real Holm. Ash ´s inner workings and fluids were made of   milk, caviar, pasta and glass marbles. Personally I didnt notice that the fake head is smaller than the actor ´s and I think that this shot was made really realistic. 2. Prometheus 2012 Director: Ridley Scott Visual effects supervisor: Richard Stammers Ridley created many elements and shots similar to ones in the Alien movie such as space suits, similar ship design, kept the original look of alien ship, the space jockey, similar interior of the ship, basic elements like hypersleep chamber, medical scanner, strong female leading role, breakfast scene, in alien the on-board ship computer is called mother and in promeheus they call it maam. There is also a humanoid robot on the board. Environment A lot of the final environment work is a combination of real photography and 3d set extensions. Real aerial plates are pictures of Iceland and Wadi Rum. Ridley wanted the amazing landscape feel believable. They analyzed the area using Google Maps and DEM satellite maps which give displacements, they put that into Maya and combined all that information and built up a rough 20 mile landscape. The pinnacles on the ground were taken from real rock in Iceland. They scanned and textured the shot and from that created CG variations. They used a program to randomly scatter them across the landscape based on manually painted intensity maps.   NASA helped with recreation of the environment by providing photos of ice being expulsed into the atmosphere of Saturns moon Enceladus and information about the potential look of different exo-planets. For the sandstorm in the movie they used Flowline to simulate natural looking pluming dust, then their own volumetric tool for visualizing and Renderman rendering.   In comparison in the original Alien the ship was covered in darkness and a storm with zero visibility. The set was created from motorcycle parts and matte paintings. Pretty much all of the sets in Prometheus were built practically and also modelled in 3D. And that includes the weird caverns and chambers on the moon, as well as the interiors of the ship Prometheus. Concept artists firstly built up sets in 3D so they would know right off the bat that it was achievable. Surgery scene I think this scene is somehow an recreation of the chestbuster scene from Alien but this time it is even more disturbing than the one from alien because Dr. Shaw finds out that she is infected and pregnant and has no choice but to perform a C-section on herself using the MedPod. The Med Pod was built and function in real life to make this scene looks realistic. Actress was filming this scene for 4 days then creature was added in post-production. They had to cover her belly with tracking markers as they had to matchmove as closely as possible to make the effect work in physical space. Conclusion In general, I really like both movies the making of them but also the plot. I highly appreciate that Ridley Scott in Prometheus stuck with creating real scene sets and did not just leave everything on post-production. The real sets added the feeling of realism into the movie also the fact that they cooperated with NASA in the effort of creating realistic environment.   Regarding to the Alien movie I really like the ideas that they came up with such as   camera on mechanism to create slow motion footage, using of real animal viscera to make creatures look real and disgusting and I highly admire the work of one of my favourite artist   H. R. Giger   in creating designs for the movie. I think I would be able to achieve some shots in the Alien but also in the Prometheus. In the Alien movie there are many shots in which mechanical parts had to be   included for instance   like in chestbuster   scene they had to create a pump for exploding of the chest so these kind of shots would be hard for me to achieve if I had to create them using the same technique but I would be able to create a model of the Nostromo and also the facehugger model .   Prometheus also used real size models but there was also SGI included. In order to SGI I think I would be able to create an eviroment like 3D set extensions ( create ground extension and 3d pinnacles and texture them). After all I think that both of these movies are made   really good, they have the same scary, mysterious feeling , the same visual look and   creative ideas were included not to mention the amazing plot. Bibliography Seymour, M. (2012). Prometheus: rebuilding hallowed vfx space. [online] fxguide. Available at: https://www.fxguide.com/featured/prometheus-rebuilding-hallowed-vfx-space/ [Accessed 8 Jan. 2017]. Anders, C. (2012). Cite a Website Cite This For Me. [online] Io9.gizmodo.com. Available at: http://io9.gizmodo.com/5917639/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-the-design-of-prometheus [Accessed 8 Jan. 2017]. Watkins, A. (2014). Behind-the-Scenes: Making of the Chestburster scene from Alien. [online] Cinemablography. Available at: http://www.cinemablography.org/blog/behind-the-scenes-making-of-the-chestburster-scene-from-alien [Accessed 8 Jan. 2017].   Ash. [online] avp.wikia. Available at: http://avp.wikia.com/wiki/Ash [Accessed 8 Jan. 2017]. Jacob, J. (2016). The Making of Alien Documentary. [image] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaHjNWzn73k [Accessed 8 Jan. 2017].

Charlie Don’t Surf: The Clash Protest Imperialism Essay -- Political P

By definition, imperialism is extending a country’s power and influence through diplomacy or military force. That ideology is best exemplified by the Vietnam War because the United States invaded North Vietnam to prevent the dissemination of Communism into South Vietnam, which is ultimately an attempt at exuding power and influence by using military force. The Clash recognized the homogeneity between the American imperialism of the Vietnam war and the forced Westernization of the non-Western world, particularly third world nations; thusly, the band chose the Vietnam War as a backdrop for â€Å"Charlie Don’t Surf† because of it’s relevance to American culture at the time. The Clash released the album Sandinista! in 1980; this album is home to the highly overlooked song â€Å"Charlie Don’t Surf.† The intent of this paper is to analyze the song â€Å"Charlie Don’t Surf† and examine it’s use of historical and cultural compone nts to protest imperialism forced upon third world countries by the United States. This paper will specifically analyze The Clash’s emergence from a tumultuous political climate as well as the decision to title the album Sandinista!. Musical composition and lyrical structure aids in demonstrating the protest of imperialism upon multiple levels and distinguishes the link between the â€Å"Charlie Don’t Surf† and a similar scene in the film Apocalypse Now. Emerging from England’s punk rock scene in 1977, The Clash morphed from traditional punk beginnings into the new wave movement. Described as â€Å"a more genuine, radical, proletarian,† sector of the punk genre, it was evident the band was destined to transcend musical boundaries.1 The Clash’s trademark idiosyncrasy is their layering of cultural remarks with historical relevancy througho... ...rus of â€Å"Charlie Don’t Surf† in the car, or helicopter, does not provide the background knowledge of the songs origins. In a way, without paying attention to the song, it mocks the ability to lose people into the music. Works Cited 1 Moore, Allan F. "Punk Rock." In Grove Music Online: Oxford Music Online.2 Browning, Boo. "The Clash: Another Flash of Lightning." The Washington Post, 1981.3 "The Clash Official Site." http://www.theclash.com/#/about/.4 Cowley, Jason. "The 1980s: 'England Was Convulsed by a Social and Political Revoltion'." Guardian, 2009.5 Ibrahim, Youssef M. "Britain's Economy Is Worsening Despite Mrs. Thatcher's Policies." The New York Times, 1980, 1.6 "Augusto Ceasar Sandino." Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th Edition: 1.7 The Clash. "Charlie Don't Surf." Sandinista! 1980. CD.8 Coppola, Francis Ford. "Apocalypse Now." 153 min, 1979.

Moral Relativism vs. Moral Objectivism

Moral relativism is a philosophical doctrine which claims that moral or ethical theses do not reveal unqualified and complete moral truths (Pojman, 1998). However, it formulates claims comparative to social, historical, and cultural, or individual preferences. Moreover, moral relativism recommends that no particular standard or criterion exists by which to evaluate and analyze the truthfulness of a certain ethical thesis. Relativistic standpoints repeatedly see moral values as valid only within definite cultural limitations or in the framework of personal preferences. An intense relativist stance might imply that assessing the moral or ethical decisions or acts of other individuals or group of individuals does not contain any value, still most relativists bring forward a more inadequate account of the theory. On the other hand, moral relativism is most commonly mistake as correspondence to moral pluralism/value pluralism. Moral pluralism recognizes the co-existence of contrasting and divergent ideas and practices yet it does not entail yielding them the same authority. Moral relativism, quite the opposite, argues that differing moral standpoints do not contain truth-value. At the same time, it suggests that no ideal standard of reference that is available by which to evaluate them (Pojman, 1998). History traces relativist principles and doctrines more than some thousand years ago. The claim by Protagoras that man is the measure of all things marks a premature philosophical antecedent to modern relativism (Pojman, 1998). Furthermore, Herodotus, a Greek historian, viewed that every society looks upon its own belief system and means of performing their functions as the finest, in comparison to that of others. Though different prehistoric philosophers also inquired the concept of a universal and unconditional standard of morality, Herodotus argument on moral relativism remains as the most fundamental idea of moral relativism. In the medieval age of moral philosophy, Thomas Aquinas defines moral philosophy as the collection or collections of ideas and claims which, as values and guidelines of action, identify the types of preferred action that are justly intellectual and rational for human persons and society (Pojman, 1998). It is a basically realistic philosophy of values which motivate individuals towards human fulfillment so that better-off state of affairs is mutually represented and practicable by means of the actions that equally evident and put up the superiorities of moral fiber conventionally labeled as virtues. Aquinas argument about moral is not really confined with his prior conceptualization of the idea of virtue – that is acquired through regular practice or by habit. For him, moral law is not a mere product of habituation. As explained above, his idea of moral law is linked with the concept of rationality or reason. A human person regards an action as morally right not because it is habitually observed or performed but because it comes within rational analysis of that individual. In the contemporary period, Ruth Benedict, an anthropologist, opines that morality differs in every society which is evidently framed on the idea of moral relativism (Pojman, 1998). Benedict argues that there is no such thing as moral values but only customs and traditions. She admits that each society has its own customary practices that are justified simply because they are part of the tradition exclusive to that society. For Benedict, morals obtain their values based on how individuals see certain acts and behaviors as beneficial to their society. And such is what she called as the standard of moral goodness. Now, such morally good action is deemed to perform habitually to maintain the advantages brought about by such morally good actions. In effect, being morally good and habitually performance of an action subsist together as the society upholds their own moral law. References: Pojman, L. (1998). Moral Philosophy: A Reader (2nd ed.). Hackett Publishing Company.

Book Burning in Nazi Germany - 1237 Words

Book burning is the ceremonial destruction of books or any other written works by fire. And it is done in public. Also it is a representation of censorship. The drive behind such acts can either be political, cultural, or religious resistance to the material in question. The purpose of the Nazi book burning was to destroy all ideologies that were considered to be un-German. In 1933, university students were on a mission to cleanse Germany of Jewish intellectual ideas (Fishburn, 2007). They believe that the book burning would keep the German literature and language from external influences. The majority of the books that Jewish authors wrote were burnt during that era. In 1933, a branch of the Student Union of German universities initiated a campaign against actions that could be considered to undermine the German spirit. This campaign was to reach its epitome with fire cleansing. The branches of the union would host Nazi speakers in gatherings and also disseminate articles to the g eneral public. The union also released a thesis that was directly responsible for sparking the book burning that took place in Wartburg festival. The thesis demanded that in the fight to eliminate un-German influences within the country; the universities would be the focal points of German Nationalism (Fishburn, 2007). Students who participated in the campaign alleged it was in response to actions taken by the Jews in order to be little German culture and values. In a ritualisticShow MoreRelatedEssay on Nazi Book Burning858 Words   |  4 PagesHeinrich Heine wrote, â€Å"Where they burn books, they will also ultimately burn people (â€Å"Holocaust History†). These chilling words not only forecasted the events to come, but also went up in flames in Germany during the Nazi book burning. Throughout Germany on May 10, 1933, thousands of people came out to witness these horrid events. 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