Well I have spent the last few hours running tests for sound files on blog posts with the highly speculative topic of "Misdirection" a post some of you may have tried to click on to find it absent from the blog. Now I have either planned something entirely clever by creating a post called "Misdirection" which goes nowhere or I have something more elaborate and liken to a particular theme I wish to demonstrate to everyone...
Its option B in case you were wondering...
Now first let me explain what Misdirection is to those that do not know. It is actually a magicians tool. The Magician shows you something in one hand sparkly or captivating so that you do not notice what he is doing with his other hand (in most cases the real trick or slight of hand).
Sergio Della Sala of "Tall Tales about the Mind and brain: Separating Fact from Fiction" observes:
"At the basis of every magic trick, for example, there is the ability of the performer in controlling the attention of the audience. This is what is usually termed "misdirection", and it consists essentially in directing the attention of the spectator towards non significant aspects of the performance, distracting it from the relevant ones..." (2007 : 36)What this basically means in our case is we need to show our audience a character, a personality so fixating that they don't realise what is going on behind him... Something people will only notice with repeat viewings to let out that ever dignified "ahhh I get it!" For this I conducted a small experiment myself in my own home with people that I had at hand...
I did not tell them what I was doing or what they should be looking out for, I was vague, saying it was just a shape test and I wanted to know what they thought of it. I played the 10 second video once and got them to report to me what they saw... Which consisted of the primary research at the bottom of this post.
The video (shown above) was a crude rendering of 7 or so different shapes most of them the same. The camera however was not focusing on all of them... a bright red shiny blinn playing the role I envision for Charles. The grey shapes reflect objects in the environment. From showing these to my family people could not get past the red shape... why? because it sticks out... it is shiny... it is the focal point of the video. Is it because it morphs? Maybe... but for whatever reason we are inclined to pay more attention to the most visually stimulating object on screen...
This means that our background and props are in fact the relevant aspects of the performance . Charles even though he is shiny and pretty is not... Please watch the video yourselves and post feedback, tell me what you saw... who knows maybe you will notice something they didn't ;) But most importantly be honest here... you guys should be at an advantage if you have read this post... My family came in knowing nothing, as any unsuspecting audience should.
This fills me with comfort knowing that the ordinary person will not notice this the first time round, having to go back a second time to notice it which have been the exact conversations we have been in with Alan these past few weeks...
Primary Research - Misdirection
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Subject 2 - Early Teens - Female
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Subject 3 - Mid to Late 60s - Female
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Subject 4 - Early 40s - Male
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Subject 5 - Late 60s - Female
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Well I think that concludes this little post which has been a nightmare in the making I don't mind saying. Whod have thought sound files would be such a nightmare to embed. Please take a run at the video and see if you notice anything about it the first watch. You will probably get it after subsequent watches but try and go in with an empty mind... You will be surprised what you may find out...
BTW. The research tapes have had talk of the Misdirection stripped from them so you are gonna have to figure this out yourselves :P
Tah tah!!
xXStItChXx
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