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If you can't send a message in one hundred-and-forty characters it probably isn't worth sending. Excuse me while I write an essay on this topic.

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Powerpuff Girls!

The most vivid childhood show I remember was the PowerPuff girls.

Feminist, catchy, and with some of the most creative villains I've ever seen! How can you say no?

Early Film

The first film I remember viewing (though it certainly wasn't the first) was The Jungle Book.


Masterly crafted, filled with classic Disney characters, classic Disney story, and classic Disney racism. Good times.

Baby Films

Trailers were originally meant to advertise films. But more and more, trailers are becoming well composed. They have their own beginning, rising actions, climax, heroes, etc.. The lines start to blend between film and the trailer for that film. Especially with the unfortunate trend of showing "the best parts" becoming more and more prevalent.


Take a look a few of these.


Super 8: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfdYeGAjQH4


Super: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctcURFb7XE4&feature=player_embedded


Four Lions: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ew-SrlQ9tlI


Video games have the trend of making trailers that don't show footage from the game at all. Instead, they use pre-rendered (out of game) footage to lure in potential buyers. But sometimes, you get some really beautiful and unique trailers.


Dante's Inferno: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rbeAGdYk_0


<Warning graphic trailer involving children and zombies. 18+ only>


This Dead Island trailer is especially poignant. There is hardly any actual game footage, and the game hasn't even finished development, but the moment I saw this, I was sold. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZqrG1bdGtg


With the budget for most of these trailers in the millions, are they really just advertising? Film takes many forms, and maybe the one we least expect is right in front of us.

Video of Japan Earth Breaking

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LPGzzaSsbU

This is surreal, and without the reach of modern communications, we would not get a chance to witness this.

Japan Before/After

An excellent article by ABC News showing the before and after of some areas destroyed by the earthquake and subsequent tsunami.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/events/japan-quake-2011/beforeafter.htm

The article contains still images of residential and industrial areas before the waves of water destroyed them, and uses a plug-in of some sort that allows the viewer to control how much of the image is pre-disaster. It creates a feeling of interactivity and brings additional empathy to an already terrible event.

Dangerous Rhetoric Enabling

One of the more interesting side effects of the digital age is the increases in political advertisements. Anybody with enough time and some photoshop skills can whip up a campaign poster. Through in some Windows Movie Maker and you got yourself a TV-ready advertisement.

Along with self-promotion and easier distribution comes the attack advertisements. With ridiculously fast information dispersal, any fact can be twisted and manipulated into a video, slapped on the advertising circuit, and be live within a few hours.

Take this ad for example.

Pretty shady of that politician right?

Well, not really. His aide made a phone call while in the town car they were riding in. The number for the sex line is only a few digits away from the Department of Criminal Justice's. The call was terminated in under 60 seconds, and the DoCJ was called a few minutes later.

Nonetheless, the attack ad was run, and technically, everything the ad talks about is true, so it wasn't slanderous. This ad ran on local television stations. Broadcast television is typically targeted towards a lower class market, and in this case, hopefully a market that won't bother fact checking their political ads.