Tag: YouTube

Confessions: 1MillionDance Studio

Jeannie Marie Leave a comment

I have a confession to make. Really, I owe it to you. There’s something I’ve never told you.

I love dance.

That’s right. I love dance. It’s something I’ve never said before, and yet it’s true.

Now, to be quite honest, I’m not a dancer. I took ballet and tap when I was little, but I never continued. I danced when I was in theatre, but beyond being able to do a jazz square, I was never anything special.

No, I don’t love dancing, though I will admit it is quite fun. That’s not what I mean.

I love watching people dance. It’s something I’ve always enjoyed. My mom used to take me to the Nutcracker every year, and I think I saw the Jon M. Chu and Adam Sevani dance battle at least fifty times. Of course, I’m pretty picky about what I watch – I prefer hip-hop and modern forms to other classic types of dance, and I love a good jazz square (everyone loves a good jazz square). Which is why, when I found 1MillionDance, I knew immediately I’d love it.

I don’t think it’s a secret anymore that I like listening to music in other languages, and though most of their videos feature American music, I found 1MillionDance through their videos featuring Korean hip-hop songs. However, as I scrolled down the list of videos, I was surprised (and excited) by the variety of genres they danced to, with, yes, lots of hip-hop.

I marathoned the videos (and still do…whoops, sorry homework, you’re going to have to wait) and slowly realized I hadn’t watched this kind of dance, pure dance, no singing *cough* kpop *cough* in a really long time.

Which is why I want to share some of my personal favorites with you, to show that no, I haven’t forgotten about dance about an art form. Dance is beautiful, amazing, and expressive. Although I have no talent for it, I still empathize with dancers, even if I don’t know how to move and control my body as they do.

So, in no particular order, my favorite dances from 1MillionDance Studio in Seoul, and also why I love the dance so much.

Note: the dances feature multiple dancers doing the same choreography, learned that day (so there’s bound to be mistakes – nobody is perfect). The first dancer in the center is always the choreographer, with other highly proficient dancers or other choreographers sometimes joining.

Junsun Yoo is hands down my favorite choreographer for 1Million. His dances are always on point, and this one in particular blew me away. For starters, this is one of my all time favorite songs, and it’s not your typical dance song either. Sure, it has a really strong beat, but it’s not a hip-hop song, and yet the moves are so on point – the hand move for the bell is my favorite. Overall, this video is in my top 5 favorites from this channel.

If Junsun is my favorite choreographer, Bongyoung Park comes in a very very very close second. It was a hard to choose which one of his videos to post (His Maroon 5 dance is freaking amazing – warning, strong language in the song), but this one is hands down the most lively and fun. Bongyoung’s expressions throughout the dance also completely add to the dance, though the other dancers who don’t do expressions are also fantastic. Also in my top five favorite dances (which, by the way, these aren’t – just five I think you should watch).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llTlfJcdZEQ

To slow things down a bit, this is also one of my favorite dances. I love this video too, not just because Eunho is a very compelling dancer, and has freaking amazing body control, but because his dance can be transformed in so many different ways by the students. He performs alone, but two groups do it as a couple dance – and it works fantastically. But it also works in a larger group as well, towards the middle of the video. I especially love too how this dance tells more of a story. Warning – strong language in the song.

Lest you think this channel features only male choreographers, here’s Sori Na with a legit amazing dance. I love her too not just because she’s a fantastic choreographer, but because she doesn’t shy away from songs like these. Yes, girl power is super awesome, and dancing to female-oriented or created songs is super empowering. But dancing to something you love that might be considered traditionally male is also empowering, especially for me. Not to mention she just oozes swag. How can you not love her?

And last, but certainly not least, May J Lee creates an addictive dance to an already addictive song. Everyone knows it, yes, and it plays everywhere – I’m personally not a huge fan of this song. But honestly, her choreography is so on point that I’ve actually started to somewhat like the song due to how many times I’ve watched this video. Not to mention that I want to do the choreography every time I hear this song now. Watch for cameos from Bongyoung, from earlier, and also Koosung Jung, a fellow choreographer who’s also in The Hills video.

Go watch some of 1Million’s other videos, because they’re all fantastic, and who knows, if you’re a dancer and you’re in Seoul and you drop by, maybe you’ll be in one of their videos someday.

 

 

Bold Folds: The Art of Origami

camsterdam Leave a comment

Autumn is in the air. In the tap-tapping of boots on pavement; in the crackle of falling leaves; in the rumbling roar of maize-wearing Wolverines. Trees hang heavy with apples, ripe for picking. Coffeehouses waft invitations of pumpkin spice and cinnamon out into the streets. And then, there’s the chill – a blessing and curse at the same time. Some days are energetic. Grab a scarf and a walking companion and the cold disappears. But other days are drizzly, gray, and frankly, a bit seasonally depressing. When days like those hit, why not grab some perfectly patterned square bits of paper and fold away the stress of classes and decorate your room at the same time?

This past summer, while at home rummaging around the craft closet for school supplies, I came across an old packet of Origami paper and felt my childhood flash back. The hours I could spend, practicing patience, dedicating a long-attention span to folding and unfolding paper, to licking and nursing the cuts on my fingers. The pleasure of creating a menagerie of cranes, penguins, dragons, rabbits, fish, foxes, elephants, (but mostly cranes), and set them up on the table before me. Made from my own hand.

I remembered reading the children’s book, “Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes” by Eleanor Coerr, for a first grade book report project. An inspirational book, indeed, that makes you want to go out and make something, do something, to put a smile on someone else’s face. My mom and I had toiled away to make a crane for each student in the class, and it was all worth the effort.

With such good memories folded neatly in my brain, I decided to bring the packet of multi-colored pre-cut squares with me to college this year. Every once in a while, I take out a sheet, put on a YouTube tutorial video, and focus on the folds – a great distraction from homework.

The word ‘origami’ comes from the Japanese ‘ori’ meaning folding and ‘kami’ which means paper. The art of paper folding is mostly credited to the sixth-century Japanese monks who created simple, religious designs for Shinto ceremonies. Paper folding spread around the world, to Spain, the Middle East, Britain and the US, and continues to be a flourishing art form today.

One of the great marvels of origami is that all it requires is one piece of square paper. Pre-cut squares, some plain-colored, some patterned, can be bought at craft and stationery shops for $1-4, depending on the paper count. Not too crippling an expense when you consider that no glue, scissors or tape are necessary! Ingenuity and patience is all that’s needed, that and some good, clear instructions.

Most origami packs come with some poorly drawn step-by-step instructions. But, we’re in the digital age and can and should take advantage of YouTube videos (it’s loaded with them!) and dedicated websites like origami-instructions.com and origami.me. The trick is to master a few basic folds (inside and outside reverse, the petal fold, the valley and mountain fold) and a couple of bases (bird base, diamond base, kite base) and then a world of paper folding will, dare I say it, unfold for you. Soon you will be surrounded by ninja stars, hopping frogs and lotus flowers.

The great thing is that origami can be as private as you want it to be. No one has to know if your rabbit looks more like an earless rat. The art is in the doing and the concentration, the manual labor, the effort. Frustration and mistakes may come, but that’s all part of the art process. Of course, once you’ve mastered the crane, you will always have a party trick up your sleeve. A paper napkin can, with a bit of dexterity, be transformed into a thing of wonder! Your friends’ jaws will drop as you crease and sculpt and reveal a creature whose wings flap when they tug its tail.

And who knows? One day, you could be like Florigami founder and origami artist, Floriane Toultou!

Floriane Toultou’s “Silver Unicorn” (via goodstuffhappenedtoday)

So let the scarves, the autumn days, and your stress unfold – and indulge yourself in a little bit of paper magic. You’ll be glad you did!

Miranda Sings: Alter Egos and Women in Comedy

Jeannie Marie Leave a comment

In case you hadn’t noticed, I love Jimmy Fallon, and during midterms week I may have slightly overdosed on YouTube videos during study breaks…or instead of study breaks. Oops.

But no, I’m not going to talk about Jimmy Fallon yet again, he was merely the mechanism for how I found out about my current topic.

Sasha Fierce. Lemony Snicket. Gorillaz.

What do all three of these things have in common? It’s not music, because Lemony Snicket isn’t a musician, he’s an author. At first glance, it may not be obvious, but when you think about it, they all do have something in common.

They are all alter egos. Think back to when you were a kid, reading A Series of Unfortunate Events (or, if you’re like me, you were probably reading them in the recent rather than distant past). Do you remember how the mystery about who Lemony Snicket actually is intrigued you? Do you remember wondering if this was actually a true story because the narrator was so convincing?

I don’t know what it is about alter egos, but they always seem to fascinate me, especially when they reach a certain level of dedication. When I met “Lemony Snicket,” or rather Daniel Handler, I was fascinated by his willingness to play with this alter ego to entertain all of the kids sitting in front of him on the carpet of the library we were in. And I was thrilled when I walked up to have my book signed by him, only to get witty sarcasm and a note in my book that said “Jeannie! Hi! How are you? Me, too.” Alter egos are simply fascinating to me.

Which is why, when I first saw Miranda Sings playing pictionary on Jimmy Fallon, I became mildly obsessed with her.

The skit is hilarious, but where Jerry Seinfeld and Martin Short were obviously making jokes, Miranda was not. She was withdrawn, and yet I found her the best part of the skit. Instantly I looked her up on YouTube where most of her audience comes from. I scrolled through the videos and though I didn’t automatically realize it, I intuitively knew that this wasn’t a real girl, this was a character and there was a “real” Miranda somewhere.

But I couldn’t find her real YouTube. If you’re familiar with the way YouTube famous people promote themselves, you’ll know that typically the YouTuber will have the “famous” channel, the channel for skits and parodies and music videos, and then will have a separate channel for behind the scenes content as well as personal vlogs for those who are interested. This is meant to separate the two “lives” of the YouTuber in a way that TV and film rarely does – it separates the creator from the creation, pulling the curtain back and showing the audience that yes, these are real people rather than just funny script writers/actors. So as I scrolled through Miranda’s videos, I tried to find a link in the description for the real Miranda channel, the one that isn’t playing to the camera. There was none.

I tried the website, figuring in some small part there had to be a note that said “Miranda Sings is the creation of Miranda Smith, an actress from Atlanta, Georgia” or whatever. There was none. Her entire YouTube channel was completely in character, and her bio was simply her character talking about herself (like she does on YouTube). There wasn’t even a hint for who she was.

This intrigued me further. It’s one thing to have an alter ego, like Sasha Fierce. But there wasn’t a whole lot of mystery; Beyonce was still Beyonce, and she just became Sasha for a short time. Miranda, on the other hand, seemed to do everything in character, purposefully keeping her true identity a secret.

imagetall01

Unfortunately, after about five more minutes of searching, I typed “Miranda Sings” into Google and one of the suggestions read “Miranda Sings real name” and the first result that came back was a video by Colleen Ballinger entitled “Becoming Miranda Sings.”

As you can probably guess, this cracked the code, although I still found her video to be hilarious as she still keeps the character a mystery. Colleen in the beginning claims her and Miranda are “good friends” and once she “becomes” Miranda Sings, she says “Colleen who was in the beginning of this video with me will be in my shows with me,” referring to the Colleen/Miranda comedy tours she takes.

The mystery was solved, and I began watching Colleen’s videos, finding her to be a lot more tolerable than the…um…special Miranda.

And yet, I’m still willing to believe in the mystery behind the ego. I know who she is now, but that doesn’t ruin Miranda’s videos for me. In fact…it makes me like her more.

As I was watching Miranda videos, looking at comments on the Jimmy Fallon video (Miranda’s first big television debut), and thinking about her “acting” with Jerry Seinfeld, I not only gained respect for her as an actress/comedian, but also started thinking more about comedy than I ever had before.

I knew that comedians like Tina Fey and Amy Poehler often talked about the gender inequality in television and media as a whole, but I never stopped to think about women in comedy because I never wanted to be in comedy. But as I thought about it, I realized that the majority of famous stand-up comedians are male, and here I’m talking about stand-up as a genre rather than stand up as a gateway to acting in comedy. When Amanda Seales went on CNN to slam some dude about catcalling, I looked up her YouTube channel and watched her hilarious stand-up. And that’s the only female stand-up comedian I think I’ve ever watched. Ever. Maybe this isn’t telling because I don’t really watch stand-up ever, but when I think about stand-up Bryan Reagan, Louis C.K., and Dane Cook come to mind, rather than Margaret Cho (bless her) or Sarah Silverman.

I know I talk about female equality a lot in my blogs, but it’s only because I’m not only passionate about it but I also see women disproportionately represented in the arts. Like I said, I’ve never wanted to be a comedian, but I have huge respect for them, especially the ladies of SNL (you kill it Leslie Jones), so seeing a young comedian like Colleen makes me so incredibly happy. It’s also interesting that she isn’t doing stand-up (though that could be part of her live show line up), and to me, her character work would shine somewhere like SNL. However, for now, I think she’s happy with YouTube.

 

Come At Me, Patriarchy

Jeannie Marie 4 Comments

So, I’m on Youtube. I’m getting ready to watch some sort of video, possibly even just listen to a song while I’m doing my homework, heck, I don’t remember. But of course there was an Ad blocking my way.

Youtube ads are not always a curse to me. Sometimes they’re actual videos, and I like it when they make the “ads” a trailer for a movie. That’s not so bad – it’s not commercialism shoving it’s big ugly face at me in a constant attempt to get me to spend my money on worthless crap. I like movies, and even though they do represent a certain section of commercialism that thrives off of people like me who love to be entertained, I think they still have something to offer.

This, however, was not a movie ad. Darn.

The music started up. It was good music, I noticed. Some pop artist? Maybe. When i jiggled my mouse over the screen, the title came up at the top.

Stuart Weitzman | #ROCKROLLRIDE

Uh…okay. I still have no idea what this is, but hey, still marginally better than a Febreze commercial.

And then I noticed the shots. The angles of the camera. The filters stolen directly from a high schooler’s instagram. This was meant to be “artsy.”

And, of course, objectively I can say that it was creative. It did some cool things with the camera, and the editing was pretty neat with some frame effects. But something was wrong. Oh, so wrong.

The subject of this short film? music video? thing? was in fact two beautiful women. Flowing blonde hair, legs that went on for miles and miles and miles, and some gorgeous trees all around them. Perfect for the film, right?

But instead of presenting these women as women, as people who deserve respect, as people who have opinions and voices and are allowed to think and speak and act however they want – these women were dehumanized. Shots of legs and butts were in front of my screen and I just wanted to go onto the set and yank the camera out of the directors hands and shout YOU ARE RUINING DECADES WORTH OF WOMEN’S RIGHTS. Until the very end of the video I didn’t even get a good look at the faces of these beautiful women. The material itself wasn’t all too bad – it showed the women getting dressed in cute outfits, riding bikes on a trail, driving a flashy cool red car, and, the kicker, riding a motorcycle.

These things in themselves aren’t dehumanizing. Some of them, such as the motorcycle and the expensive car, are things typically attributed to men. But by shooting the women’s butts, by not showing their face, putting an extreme emphasis on their bodies and the way they looked next to these props, it made them seem like objects – like they were just toys that the director was playing with.

You may ask at this moment how this even remotely relates to art. “You’re just an angry feminist ranting about something you happened to come across.” You bet I am. But the fact that the director wanted this to be taken as art, as something to be critically analyzed and thoughtfully considered is a joke. This isn’t art – it’s objectifying women. And what’s worse is that it’s an ad on Youtube, going out to thousands upon millions of people who click on their favorite cat video. This ad-disguised-as-art isn’t art.

It’s a joke. A joke that isn’t funny anymore and needs to end.

For reference, I’m not including a link to the video because I’d rather not promote something that shouldn’t be getting any views at all. Instead, enjoy this lovely video of kittens who love Star Wars a bit too much.

A Talk About Sequel Seasons: VGHS Season 2 Review

Jeannie Marie Leave a comment

So lately I’ve been on a very goal oriented mission to finish all the TV shows that I’ve started this year. Unfortunately, this number is a LOT higher than it should be due to the fact that, well, school. So even though I might have such good intentions, I inevitably end up falling short and dropping off in the middle of a season or even an episode.

This list of shows is including but not limited to: Sherlock season 3, Doctor Who Series 7 (Clara), New Girl season 3 (and finishing Season 1 because I technically never watched all the episodes???), Legend of Korra season 2, and Agents of S.H.E.I.L.D.

Although this list shows how diverse and interesting my TV habits are, there’s something that most of them all have in common – they are all sequels.

And by sequels I don’t mean like a sequel movie, I mean a sequel series. Even though I’ve been waiting months (or even years in the case of Sherlock) to watch these shows, somehow….I just…haven’t.

Previously on the List of Things To Finish was the show Video Game High School Season 2. Last year, while taking flu medicine that wasn’t actually doing anything since my doctor misdiagnosed my infection, I ended up waking up early every day one week and yet not going to class, because, you know, infection. I didn’t miss much since I was in community college at the time, so instead of trying to do work I surfed Netflix for my new obsession.

And, as fate would have it, I stumbled upon Video Game High School, or VGHS. I thought, why not, I’ll give it a try, and ended up marathoning the entire show since Netflix had put each episode into one big movie. Instantly, I loved it. I’m not a gamer, and I’ll never be a gamer, but this show had great characters, interesting plot points, a fantastic, clever, and completely hilarious script, and a huge heart. Yes, VGHS was my new obsession. As you might guess, it’s about a high school that plays video games as its curriculum. The creators, YouTubers who are fairly famous around the internet (heard of Freddie Wong?), made this show both specific in its plot about gaming and yet accessible to anyone such as me who doesn’t even know the first thing about an FPS game.

So when I found out that there was a Kickstarter to fund a season 2, I was absolutely pumped. And, since I’m on this new finishing things streak, I decided to finish season 2 which had come out in early September.

While the characters are still the same, and still dynamic in their progression, and the script was both funny and witty, I was…dissatisfied with the end product. Majorly disappointed would actually be more accurate. I can’t say I didn’t like it, because I did enjoy watching the episodes, but it lost something this season.

Instead of sticking with the previous format of a show with a continuous plot that culminated to an exciting (and epic) finale, the creators opted to be more fluid with the layout of season 2. Each episode does build on the next, but in very small ways. There was no overarching theme or plot, and for the most part each problem presented was resolved within the episode, leaving the next one to pick up a new one. To me, it was Video Game Sitcom, not Video Game High School. The writing and characters are much more interesting, diverse, and funny than a sitcom, but the layout and plot were just so blah. I kept expecting something to pick up, especially since two great plot points were introduced at the very beginning in the first episode. However not one but both of these opportunities were wasted, and the season finale was so unsatisfying that I couldn’t believe that it was actually over. The creators even used a cliffhanger to draw in audiences (and give them an incentive to crowdsource their season 3 efforts), and honestly, I’m just disappointed.

Honestly, I mostly wanted to use this post this week to vent about my frustrations. There were so many good things about season 2 that I’m just really surprised that I’m so unsatisfied. But the sad thing is, there’s really nothing I can do. I’m not sure if I want a season 3 so that Freddie Wong and co. can redeem themselves, or if I just want to rewatch the golden entertainment that is VGHS. Either way, I’m coming to find out that sequel seasons can be amazing (Sherlock) – or they can be massive letdowns.

The Indispensability of My Art

Jeannie Marie 1 Comment

Your art assignment, should you choose to accept, is one that I guarantee will be filled with adventure, intrigue, and quite a lot of laughter.

Since The Art Assignment premiered on YouTube in February, it has become a massive success. Hosted by curator Sarah Green (and wife of novelist John Green of The Fault in Our Stars fame, aka that guy I won’t shut up about), this show is a visual embodiment of what Arts at Michigan strives to be. The Art Assignment, Arts at Michigan. Seems like a perfect match.

But what IS The Art Assignment? Well, there is no concrete definition provided, but in general it’s a show where different artists are interviewed and share their stories, which ends up in a place where the artist engages and challenges the viewer to an assignment – possibly relating to art, possibly challenging them to redefine their meaning of art, but always pushing the viewer to really examine art and what it means to them.

While there are currently three Art Assignments on YouTube, the third one released only a couple of weeks ago struck a unique chord in me. The artist featured in this episode is Toyin Odutola, a woman living in New York that creates beautiful, textured portraits, often self-portraits that constantly define and redefine not only her visual image but the image she has within her.

And while I have yet to do an Art Assignment, Toyin’s challenge to create a gif of something indispensable to you sounds like a great place to start.

I like Toyin’s assignment the most because of its reflective nature. It asks the viewer to look at themselves and really figure out what is indispensable to them – something that I can honestly say no YouTube video has ever done to me. And even more amazing is the portrayal. For Toyin, it was her hands, and in a beautiful selection of frames she drew her hand clenching and unclenching, and even in that small motion I was fascinated at what her hands had birthed – a representation of herself that was true and vulnerable and yet gave her power in strength in its creation.

It makes me envious in the best way possible. I hope, even though I’m not that kind of artist, that someday I can think complexly about myself and those around me in order to create something groundbreaking, such as her art.

Honestly, I have to admit, this is not my usual coherent blog post and more a jumbled mess of words about how complex and fascinating art – in its grandest venn diagram – is, but if you get anything out of it, it’s that you should take some time out of your day and do The Art Assignment, even if it’s just thinking about what you would do if you were brave enough to bare your soul in a 24-frame gif. Think about what you define art as, and how you can continuously redefine it every day of your life – because that changing nature of art is what makes it art. And yet, art will always be an extension of you, and that paradox is what makes The Art Assignment so impactful.

What is blackness? It’s whatever I make it. What is being a woman? It’s whatever I make it. And that’s the beauty of being an image maker, you can do whatever you want, you can create whatever you want, and it’s all in the realm of how, you know how vivid and how like broad your imagination is – Toyin Odutola