Tempus ALIGN Ukraina site visits - Taras Shevchenko Kyiv

Monday the 13th and Tuesday 14th of June saw us conducting Tempus ALIGN site visits in Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Two programmes 'Business Informatics' and 'Sociology' were peer reviewed, again from a developmental rather than an accreditation perspective. Thanks to our great friends and colleagues Vladimir Zaslavsky and Olga Yamkova for looking after us during our Kyiv stay! And thanks to all the members of our Kyiv peer review panel - especially Nikita, Andrei, Anatoli as well as our core panel Stefania, Liza Sozinova and I, once again expertly chaired by Paul Hyland!

Taras Shevchenko National University is uniquely placed to take advantage of the international and mobility opportunities which will be presented over the coming years as education in Ukraina moves towards closer alignment with Europe's Bologna Process.

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - concrete

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - gable wall in the city

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - village museum

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - village museum - Tsymbaly musician

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - village museum - Hyland masters the Tsymbaly

Taras Shevchenko's house interior - village museum

Taras Shevchenko's house interior

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - village museum - Vlodimir and Iryna

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - village museum - picnic

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - lunchtime

Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv - fog

National Ballet Kyiv

National Ballet - orchestra pit

National Ballet - Petro

Other Animation Manifestos...

Thinking on from last week's Symposium discussion with John Parry on 'A Manifesto for Animated Filmmakers in the 21st Century', Donald Taylor Black has asked about other 'animation manifestos'. I responded immediately that most animators don't feel compelled to consider their practice identity in terms of manifesto creation, so animation manifestos are rare. Svankmajer's 1999 'Decalogues' is already quoted in my dissertation draft, but a cursory google search throws up a selection of other animation manifestos...

Walt Disney's 1995 8-page 'letter to himself' (actually a letter to Chouinard's Don Graham) lays out the fundamentals for 2D classically drawn animation pedagogy - how to teach animators to draw better, to analyse action systematically and to build comedy into animation performance. A seminal document, even if Uncle Walt can be forgiven for universally describing animators as 'men'.

Walt image from lettersofnote.com

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2010/06/how-to-train-animator-by-walt-disney.html

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A very different approach fro 1960's Japan 'The Three-Person Animation Manifesto: Toward the Creation of New Images' By Kuri Yoji, Manabe Hiroshi, and Yanagihara Ryohei. 'New processes and technologies must go hand in hand with new modes of consciousness. Therein lies the path to the creation of truly new images.'

http://post.at.moma.org/sources/3/publications/72

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Skip forward to Kyiv in 1986, where Aleksandr Tatarskiy wrote his 6,800 word 'Making Animation' manifesto.

Tatarskiy quotes pedagogue M. Gurevich in the journal "Children's Literature" [Detskaya literatura],  "...in today's production of animation a strange, yet characteristic trait is readily noticeable: a gaping chasm between the forays of select seekers and the routine production of most others, between the flood and the works which are marked with the stamp of individuality." Tatarskiy is very much arguing for the 'select seekers'. "Animated filmmaking is practically the first art form which is encountered by a child." He also points out some of the parallel track 'siloing' which has always formed the environment through which animation and animators must navigate... "but here's the tragedy: our animation, on one hand, and artistic criticism, pedagogy, psychology and sociology, on the other, seem to move through completely different spacetime boundaries, and they never meet..."

Igor Kovalyov and Aleksandr Tatarskiy from niffiwan

http://niffiwan.livejournal.com/9422.html

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And from Stuttgart two years ago (April 2013), a manifesto arguing that German commissioning bodies (especially broadcasters) to be clear and transparent in relation to budgets, programming and commissioning. This manifesto also calls for support for feature animation as a form, for adult animation and the maintenance of 'a diversity of cultural identity.'

http://www.ag-animationsfilm.com/stuttgart-manifesto-english-version/

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And finally, Svankmajer's 1999 'Decalogues', including...

Remember there is only one form of ‘poetry’. The opposite of poetry is professional expertise. 

Surrender to your obsessions. There is nothing better.

Use animation as a magical operation. Animation isn’t about making inanimate objects move, it is about bringing them to life.

Keep exchanging dreams for reality and vice versa. There are no logical transitions.

The deeper you enter into the fantastic story the more realistic you need to be in the detail.

Imagination is subversive, because it puts the possible against the real. That’s why you should always use your wildest imagination.

Always pick themes that you feel ambivalent about. This ambivalence has to be strong (deep) enough so you can walk on its edge and not fall to either side or even both at the same time.

Cultivate your creativity as a form of self-therapy. Such an anti-aesthetic attitude brings creativity closer towards the gates to freedom. If there is any purpose at all in creativity it is that it liberates us.

Always put the continuity of your inner vision or psychological automatism before an idea. An idea, even the greatest one, shouldn’t ever be a sole motivation for wanting to make a film.

And Svankmajer's parting suggestion is that such 'rules' are there to be broken, with perhaps one exception...

Never subordinate your personal creativity to anything but freedom.

https://www.closeupfilmcentre.com/vertigo_magazine/volume-3-issue-1-spring-2006/decalogue/​ 

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I could also quote our friends and IADT graduate Eamonn O' Neill from his April 2014 IADT AnimSoc talk... Perhaps not quite a manifesto, but still some key human and animation learnings for us all!

99.9% of engineers do NOT make guitar pedals...

Be transparent (be open and honest with people)... (this actually comes from Eimhin)

It HAS to be human!

Make rules, set boundaries and start thinking about your work... Rules shouldn't be arbitrary, they should be based on the emotional intent of your film...

Just because you can, doesn't mean you should... Be economic.

Have BALLS - be scared - safe is boring.

Personal is universal! The more personal it is, the more universal it is.

Make work and show people. (get it out there, you don't know who's watching)

from eamonnoneill.ie

You get the work that you DO!

BAD experiences are STILL experiences.

There's politics and bullshit EVERYWHERE!

The grass is not always greener.

Reach out, ask questions, be a sponge.

You make your own luck (good luck follows hard work, work hard and get lucky)...

Learn always, because skills are brillz...

GO for stuff, you have nothing to lose!

It's okay NOT to know!

Don't plateau (just keep moving forward, keep trying to progress)

Say thanks - don't be a dick to people, there's enough dickheads EVERYWHERE!

http://quindpdp.blogspot.ie/2014/04/eamonn-o-neill-iadt-animsoc.html

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My Research MA Symposium! Success!

Thanks to ALL the participants in yesterday's morning symposium for my research MA! Special thanks to John Parry MA RCA for delivering a probing and provocative keynote speech - your hard work was really appreciated John! 'animism' and 'confidence' were two central themes for me!

The discussion afterwards (on 'A Manifesto for Animated Filmmakers in the 21st Century') was extremely valuable and lucrative, clarifying and 'framing' many of my research findings and discoveries and posing questions and threads for future exploration. Some really considered, heart-felt contributions to the debate! We started the manifesto ideas with Laura's proposal of 'failure' and ended with Michael Algar's telling and decisive 'so what?' observation about 'disruptive change'.

DQ, Donald, John Parry and Elaine

Thanks again to Elaine Sisson, Donald Taylor Black, John Parry, Andrew Power, Marion Palmer, Mark Riordan, Brendan Rooney, Derek Laffan, Katy Goodhue, Michael Algar, Steve Woods, Laura Venables. Also DL832 Animation 3rd years Fiona, Eleanor, Ruth, Caoimhe, Fionn, Laura, Laura Jask, Morwenna, Kayleigh, Komila, Glen, Sean and Sophie. If I've forgotten anyone (or if I don't know your name) apologies and thanks!

Also thanks to Aidan Hickey, Edith Pieperhoff, Eimhin Macnamara, Michael Connerty, and Tara Ryan who couldn't make it on the day. And remembering the late Jimmy Murakami who did the first interview for my research - we miss him!

Next, finishing the dissertation and delivering the 30 minute rough-cut of the reflective documentary before the summer - thanks for all the kind comments and suggestions about the documentary slugs I screened yesterday.

I can see light at the end of the tunnel! Thanks to my learning network!

http://www.incite-online.net/jonasmekas.html

Watching More Closely Research Project

An exhausting Tuesday and Wednesday this week in IADT with Kataline Balint (University of Ausburg) and UCD's Brendan Rooney on Kati's 'Watching More Closely' research project. Edited artwork from Kayleigh Scullion (IADT DL832 Animation 3rd Year) into the 'Father and Daughter' film, then tweaked timings and artwork and did some start point video interviews with the team. Kati will test the new versions of the film out on a first sample group in mid-March.

DQ, Brendan, Kati and Kayleigh, IADT 180215

https://uni-augsburg.academia.edu/KatalinB%C3%A1lint

https://www.linkedin.com/in/katalinbalint

Animation At The Cutting Edge - An Alphaville Symposium UCC 150214

Thanks to all at Film Studies in UCC for organising an excellent Alphaville Symposium last Saturday afternoon. Some great presentations, especially Paul Ward's 'Animation as Atavistic Magic' and Helen Haswell from Queen's University on Hand-drawn aesthetics and Affection for the past in Pixar's Pioneering Animation'.

Thanks also to Yuanyuan Chen (UCC) for her presentation on Bu Hua's animation, and for assembling the Bu Hua screening after the presentations.

Some great potential linkages into the future. Excellent!

Paul Ward sets up his 'Animation as Atavistic Magic' presentation

The  Film and Screen Media Auditorium, Windle Building, UCC

http://animationcuttingedge.wordpress.com/programme/

http://www.buhua.com

http://www.buhua.com/flash.html

Tara Ryan's ALIGN thought for the week...

Your Align Learning Outcomes Thought for the Week – Happy New Week, January 27th, 2014.

cartoon
From:  http://www.assuringlearning.com/

  
And for those of you who like words – here are some other thoughts: 

Learning Outcomes, Qualifications Frameworks and Quality Assurance
“It is almost a truism to say that the absorption and application of the concept of learning outcomes is the most recognisable feature of the recent Europe-wide growth in qualifications frameworks. The notion of what a qualification now represents has been fundamentally reoriented in this process – the EQF Recommendation, for example, defines a qualification as the ‘formal outcome of an assessment and validation process which is obtained when a competent body determines that an individual has achieved learning outcomes to given standards’. The architecture of qualification frameworks (level descriptors, individual qualifications descriptors etc.), at the national and European levels, are also invariably constructed as generic or specific statements of learning outcomes (knowledge, skill and competence).

And yet learning outcomes are not the preserve of qualifications frameworks alone.  The use of learning outcomes to define the expectations of learners and workers predates the recent growth in European NQFs by many years; In the context of the development of the Bologna Process, it is noteworthy that it was a group of quality assurance agencies, known collectively as the Joint Quality Initiative, who undertook much of the groundwork in specifying learning outcomes for higher education qualifications. The group’s key output, the so-called ‘Dublin Descriptors’ – generic learning outcomes descriptors for Bachelor, Masters and Doctoral Qualifications – would eventually become the centrepiece of the QF-EHEA.

In tandem with this work, quality assurance agencies also played a key role, through the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education’s (ENQA) development of the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area (ESG), which provided for the development, publication and assessment of explicit intended learning outcomes, as a key element of the internal quality assurance of higher education institutions.

Since the adoption of the ESG and QF-EHEA some countries, including for example, Denmark  and Sweden, have introduced formal implementation systems for their higher education qualification frameworks, in which national quality assurance agencies play a central role in evaluating and assessing the outcomes of study programmes. Reflecting a growing awareness of the increasing role of quality agencies as key contributors to NQF implementation, ENQA has also taken the step of organising a number of seminars on the theme of qualifications frameworks and their relationship to quality assurance.  These points are well made in Referencing National Qualifications Levels to the EQF - European Qualifications Framework Series Note 3 (2nd edn., forthcoming 2013).” (Murray, J. 2013)

http://www.eu2013.ie/media/eupresidency/content/documents/QQI-Presidency-Paper-Publication-(12-March).pdf

Quality Assurance in Qualifications Frameworks An issues paper to support the Dublin Conference, organised by Quality and Qualifications Ireland (QQI), on behalf of the Irish Presidency of the European Council, with the support of the European Commission Authored by Dr Jim Murray (Ireland) March 2013

Graduation! Postgraduate Diploma in Learning, Teaching and Assessment!

24th October 2013 in Athlone Institute - the second cohort of LIN Dippers graduate! Great to spend the day with Mick Mc Grath, John Ryan, Anne Marie O' Brien, Carmel Kealey, Nuala Harding and Miriam O' Connor. Sinead Bracken and Marion Palmer were missed by all of us! Great also to meet some of the families, who've been supporting us all for the past few years through our long (but hugely rewarding) LIN teaching and learning journey!

As I said to John Ryan as we sat waiting for the ceremony to commence 'we never thought it would end here'! And our teaching and learning journey doesn't end... Next stop 'The Masters'.

Thanks to all and well done to all!

Mick, John, DQ @back, Anne Marie and Carmel at front

The Three Musketeers

Unlikely Scholar!

LIN Capstone Presentation!

My LIN teaching and learning journey, begun three years ago with the AIT T+L Cert, reaches a significant milestone with Thursday's AIT T+L Capstone presentation. I found the Capstone a very useful and engaging module - far from a formality. The opportunities to map learning gaps and to plan ahead, strategising my professional development, were especially welcome, timely, necessary.

Key learning from the day - Anne Marie O' Brien's 'teaching and learning has been like learning a new language'! Great presentations from all and great to see my buddies Mick Mc Grath and John Ryan! Thanks to Marion Palmer, Nuala Harding, Miriam O' Connor and UCC's Marian Mc Carthy (and Joan Mannion in the background, organising everything)!

The 6 2013 LIN T+L Dippers - Carmel, Anne Marie, John, Sinead, Mick and DQ

The 2013 LIN T+L Capstone staff - Marion, Miriam, Marian and Nuala

AIT Capstone Progress

I've just finished my first draft of my AIT Teaching and Learning Capstone Assignment One - the core of it is around 4,200 words (target was 3,500), and the entire document is over 10,000 words. A very useful reflection on my Teaching and Learning journey from 2010 - my how our ideas have evolved over three short years (seems like a lifetime).

Document needs some drawer time now. I need to focus on my Research Masters.

AIT Capstone - 19th June 2013 - and a revelation!

July - just catching up on blogposts. Back on the 19th of June, we returned to AIT for the 2nd session of the T+L Capstone module. Great session! I feel this module will allow me finally to PLAN my professional development over the next few years.

Whilst doing the Learning Outcome Mapping Exercise for the module, I had something of a revelation, realising that the LIN T+L modules have been a most unusual postgraduate experience, because the learning from the modules has from the outset, plugged straight back into our professional practice to the benefit of our students. Quite unlike most 'normal' postgraduate activity.

10th May - AIT capstone

Friday the 10th of May and the AIT Teaching and Learning Capstone commences! On completion of this, I'll have earned a LIN Postgraduate Diploma in Teaching and Learning, which will allow my progression to Lecturer to finally proceed.

Thanks to Nuala Harding and Marion Palmer for leading the session - some good work done! This is Dave's scary mask from one of the reflective sessions - an expression of your professional practice. (I called it 'a Day in The Life of Dave').

Great to see Mick Mc Grath and John Ryan there! Our joint Teaching and Learning Network continues...

My Animation MOOC Proposal

For my sins, I decided to put together an IADT application to run an animation MOOC - a Massive Open Online Course - with Iversity in Autumn 2013. We're in the public voting phase, up against hundreds of courses from (mainly German) institutes and universities - subjects ranging from international politics to remote sensing for earth observation. A very interesting process whether we succeed or not. Please log on and VOTE for the MOOC to get it through this phase!

https://moocfellowship.org/submissions/animation-beyond-the-bouncing-ball

Animation MOOC Proposal

Finished an application today for a proposed IADT Animation MOOC entitled 'Animation - Beyond The Bouncing Ball'. The proposed MOOC would run on the iversity platform in Autumn 2013. The proposal says...

This MOOC is aimed at the thousands of individuals who’ve done some formal animation education or training, people who’ve been working in specialist areas of the animation industry and those millions of people worldwide who’ve learned their way into some aspect of animation through graphics, design or software.

Because of the specialised nature of animation and graphics industry and education, many people never quite understand how to become an Animation Author. This is especially true today, when internet video and digital technology allow us to reach global audiences – but we need concepts and ideas and we need to understand the responsibilities of broadcast authorship. And it would help if we could appreciate the value of Critical Thinking and Reflective Practice. And we want to have fun along the way! This MOOC will address all of those issues, in a fun and entertaining learning environment.

Proposal video available below... Click on image...

 

Masters by Research Approved!

Friday 19th April! Approval letter arrives from IADT Registrar Marian O' Sullivan - My Research Masters (with practice component) is approved. Starts immediately (before the summer anyhow...)

IADT/UCD Science Research Presentations to WIT

Wednesday 17th April - Thanks to Dominic Mullan for the invite to present my work on RaiseYourIQ's Innovation Voucher and on The current IADT/UCD Science Research Projects. Presentation seemed to go well!

Then up to the Animation studio to present IADT/UCD Science Research Projects to Annie Doona, Bernard Mullarkey and Professor Peter Robertson. All very impressed!

Here's an image of one of the scenes in Eilis Hennessey's 'Friends Fight Stigma' project. Backgroiunds by Rebecca Nalty, characters by Sarah Walsh and Animation by Dee Mc Donnell, Sarah and Jamie Greene.

Flu and Moocs

I had such great intentions for the Easter break and then I was floored by some flu bug, completely flattened, felled to a persistently geriatric state. Two weeks on, and I'm realising that I'm still not recovered from the bout.

In the meantime, some excellent guidance on how best to exploit the wonders and potentials of moocs...

http://ryan2point0.wordpress.com/2013/04/01/10-hot-tips-for-moocers/

Revisiting Practice Research

Revisiting Practice Research Gradcam

21st March, 10.30-4.00pm

What has come to be termed Practice Based Research has been in a feature of third level and research cultures of the last 15 years. Yet it’s emergence has not been a greeted with consensus nor has it been without challenges in both its traction or implementation. Each institutional setting has performed PBR in different ways.  Across many of the institutions involved in Art and Design on the island of Ireland, PBR has been adopted at the PhD level though Level 9 is now a prospect.

In this context, GradCAM with the Learning and Education in Art and Design (LEAD) network are hosting a platform that takes stock of where we are and where we have been with regards to this emergence and its surrounding debate. It will allow for a focused discussion on the nature and problems of conducting PBR in the Creative Arts, Art and Design and Media at this current moment. We are inviting a number of partners and contributors across the network to present position papers on what they understand by PBR or Practice Led Research and all of the permutations in between. However, rather than only leave it at this top level discussion for senior staff and supervisors, we also seek presentations from researchers recently graduated that ground and anchor the actualities of PBR in these institutions.

I like the way the descriptor has refused to describe such research as 'practice based' or 'practice led'. An incredibly interesting discussion and an obvious sense that IADT is trailing far behind in this postgraduate area.