Milk and Honey

I write articles for Milk and Honey media.

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I have always been a fan of stop motion animation and when I was told that video CVs are a good way to get employers attentions I thought I would experiment with my own Stop motion CV.

Click here to view the finished product.

90s TV

Another article I wrote for Milk and Honey.

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Anyone who watched TV in the 90s know that some of the best shows were created in this decade, I am a 90s child so I might be a little bias. But no one can argue that the 90s did not produce some of the most iconic and defining shows in television history... because it did.

So here are my 5 most defining moments in 90s TV.

5. Before modern mystical shows like the Vampire Diaries and Supernatural or films such as Harry Potter and the Twilight Saga kick-ass girls dominated the small screen. The 90s gave us Sabrina the teenage witch, The Halliwell sisters (Charmed) and Buffy all of which created a new generation of strong, independent, vampire slaying, demon busting women. Talk about girl power.

4. Now this is story all about how my life got twisted upside down…Recognise this tune? Well not one teen living in the 90s wasn’t able to sing the catchy lyrics to one of the most significant and iconic shows on 90s television, The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air. It also created something defining in itself – The Carlton dance! Following its success the 90s spawned an array of humorous teen sitcoms such as Sister Sister, Kenan and Kel, California Dreams and Saved by the Bell to name a few. These shows remain enduring classics of 90s television comedy.

3. Following on from the teen theme of the 90s, Teen dramas also established themselves as a defining genre of the 90s. Perhaps two of the most influential shows would be Beverly Hills 90210 which was so popular that it has made a come back in the 21^st Century with an all new ridiculously rich cast full of a life of drama. Secondly, who can forget the small town of Capeside with the Joey, Pacey and Dawson’s love triangle in Dawson’s Creek. These shows have gone on to make way for modern teen dramas such as One Tree Hill. The teen drama has gone on to become one of the most popular genres on modern day television.

2. If we are talking defining moment we can not forget to mention the longest running sitcom of all time, The Simpsons. Despite the fact Homer, Marge, Lisa, Bart and Maggie haven’t aged since their first episode, dedicated fans are still tuning in after a commendable 21 years on the small screen.

1. Anyone who has not seen or heard of Friends must have been living under a rock in the last decade or two. Friends is undoubtedly the most defining show of the 90s. Not only did it introduce us to some of the funniest and most lovable characters of the small screen TV but it also dominated our TV screens, magazine covers and Google searches from 1994 to 2004, that’s 10 whole years. Even 7 years after its final episode Friends remains a popular classic on television screens across the world.

KKhurana

British Cinema

I have recently started to write for an online entertainment website so I will be posting the content and links to my writing. Click here to go to the website or read below.

In the last two decades British cinema has gone from strength to strength. Not only have British films thrived in the UK box office but they have also taken the foreign movie market by storm. In addition to this, British actors have also put themselves on the global map and have become worldwide superstars. So why has British cinema become appealing for this generation? Here are 5 reasons why we love British cinema.

5. THE ROYAL FAMILY

We Britons thrive on a tale about our British legacy, hence the string of successful movies about the Royal family in cinema over the last couple of years. Not only are we proud of our British heritage but many countries envy our modern monarchy which has lead to a keen interest in the Royal family. Viewers have been captivated by the modern royals such as William and Kate but movies audiences have loved delving into tales about the British monarchy in films such as; The Queen, Elizabeth and The Kings Speech.

4. BRITISH NOVEL ADAPTATIONS

British book to film adaptations have proven to be a great hit with cinema audience worldwide. Classics such as Pride and Prejudice and Oliver Twist have produced great period films. But it is perhaps more modern novels such as Bridget Jones Diary that have captivated British audiences. The Harry Potter franchise alone has proved a humongous hit in the UK and overseas making global stars out of many previously unknown British actors and actresses. Many successful movies in the past decade have been taken from great British novels, such as Lord of the rings, The Lion, the witch and the wardrobe and more recently One day.

3. GREAT BRITISH HUMOUR

British comedy has always been considered a hit and miss situation with foreign spectators, but here in the UK audiences thrive on a dose of British sarcasm. Satirical comedies like The Full Monty, Notting Hill, Shaun of the Deadand The Boat that rocked have showcased the finest humour in British film.

2. GRITTY REPRESENTATIONS

Our generation has come to love honest gritty dramas about real life people struggling in multi-cultural Britain. Successful mainstream British movies like East is East, Bullet Boy and Kidulthood deal with issues facing an array of ethnicity in a culturally diverse country. For example films such as Adulthood and Billy Elliot have shown the urban gritty side of Britain in the 21^st century. These movies have appealed to our generation for the sheer fact that they are directly relatable to British audiences of today.

1. ADMIRABLE ACTORS & ACTRESSES

Finally, actors and actresses such as Kate Winslet, Hugh Grant, Keira Knightly, Colin Firth, Helen Mirren, Helena Bonham Carter, Jude Law, Orlando Bloom and Tom Hardy to name a few have brought a great deal attention to the British movie industry. These global superstars have not only supported the British film industry but have gone on to star in some of the most influential British movies of all time.

KKhurana

Pugwash Mag

My article titled 'Culture Clash' has been published in the winter issue (The personal issue) of Pugwash Magazine. Click here to have a read on page 8.

Love and War

These documetary videos are one of my least favourite projects that I have worked on. The process of making them is great but personally I don't find the content very interesting. The images above are taken from a video production project called 'All is fair in love and war'. The story is a little slow at the beginning but if you actually watch the video the whole way through it actually has a great little love story. The other is a 3 minute wonder type video about the mis-interpretation and sterotypes attached to people who are in a big band opposed to a rock band. The videos have been uploaded to YouTube so the quality isn't great but they are watchable!

KKhurana

Click to watch:
All is fair in love and war
3 minute wonder: Big band

Zine

The pictures above are from a university project to produce a zine or flip book related to the creative industries. I chose to produce a zine called StarZine: Light-hearted profiles of the excitingly rich and famous. The general idea was to produce a basic biography/personal profile of an inspirational star in the film industry. My first issue was all about Tim Burton, the zine included a history of his films, an examination of his crazy characters, a feature explaining Who Tim Burton is and some reviews of his best and worst films. I haven't managed to actually produce an online copy yet it has only been printed into a booklet but I hope to get it online soon.

Bruno

Went to see Bruno Mars at Brixton Academy

X-men ♥

The film I can't wait to see this summer is X-men First Class.

Let me first say if you haven't watched the X-men movies I recommend you do. I first watched X-men at school in year 7 or 8. Other than the old superman/superwomen & Batman films and TV shows it was my first real taste of the Superhero genre. The films instantly appealed to me and I even went out and spent my pocket money in HMV buying the VHS (How old does that sound...but its true). I have since purchased the DVDs but I still have my old VHS copies too. X-men, X2, X-Men: The Last Stand and Wolverine, I have watched them all and they are all as good as each other. Personally I find with superhero movies the first film is always my favourite as I like to see how the characters develop from when they first meet and their life before they find out about their superpowers. Having said this I still recommend all four.

The new trailer for the new X-Men: First Class film has just been released and it does look good. The main idea of the film is to explore the history being Magneto and Professor X's friendship and how they discover their powers for the first time. I am not sure about James McAvoy playing a young Professor X but we will just have to wait and see. Also no Wolverine...X-men without Wolverine...can it be done?

I have I have watch nearly all the superhero inspired movies out there including Superman, Batman, Spiderman, The Hulk (Crap) etc. but X-men has always been and stayed my favourite. I hope this one lives up to the hype. So far the trailer looks good so I can't wait till June 3rd 2011 when it is released.

KKhurana

Animation: Romeo and Juliet

These pictures are from my first video production project at university. We were asked to produce a short video about any topic/theme we wanted. I think it was also designed by the lectures as a bonding experience as it was our first chance to meet all our fellow Film, media and entertainment technology students.

The unit really helped us to develop our camera, editing and production planning skills. The whole project had a much more professional and sophisticated feel to other video production work I had done before. We were required to complete pre-production paperwork such as a full script, storyboards, camera logs, location checklists, release forms etc.

We used a Sony DCR-TRV 950E camera to film and the whole video took about two days in total to film as finding stairs in our university building that people weren't constantly walking up and down was a difficult task. We has a few actors (AKA: people passing by our shoot) to talk a little at the beginning of the video but the video mainly concentrated on the love story of blu-tac/play-dough characters Romeo and Juliet. (As show in the pictures below)

I volunteered to make the little blu-tac / Play-dough people although I did regret it afterwards. They were not as easy as they look to make. The light blue figure stuck together well but the play-dough characters constantly fell apart. We even attempted dying some blu-tac so that we could get pink blu-tac but the colour didn't come out very well. It all worked out in the end and we used the blu-tac figure to play Romeo and the pink play-dough figure to play Juliet.

We got a first for the whole project. We were really pleased as doing stop motion animation was a big risk, especially as none of us had ever done any animation work prior to this project but luckily it turned out great and we definitely had the most unique and original idea in my opinion. Unfortunately I have lost the disk with the final outcome on which is really annoying as I really enjoyed the process of making the short video and would have liked to keep a copy.

Photo dress ♥

Just looking at the pictures in the Spring 2011 H&M magazine and found this Photograph dress.

Black-Net

Me (left) and Kimberley selling the Black-net at the Portsmouth student swag market.

Fil-Med

Last year Portmouth University decided to hold the first ever media student conference, Fil-Med - 'For the students, by the students'. I was part of the Design and advertising team. the image above is the initial vision we had for the poster campaign. My drawing isn't great but you get the gist. The image on the right is the final poster, I think the final poster is very accurate to our vision for the poster.

The Creative Process

These pictures are from a first year university project called creative processes. We were required to express

our creativity though a self-portrait. The purpose of the finished product was to inform the viewer about who I am. I didn't really like the idea of having to take pictures of myself so I just took one picture and used the same image to experiment throughout the whole of my journal. I used Photoshop to experiment with layering and took some pop art type inspiration from Lichtenstein, but in the end I opted for my own line drawing.

I printed a picture out a picture of myself and then with a fine black marker I drew over my features. I then framed the picture in the middle of the page and drew around my face. I included images of things that related specifically to me such as my iPod with the song I was listening to while working. I included my digital Canon IXUS5C camera which I brought in my first year of A-level and still use now. My favourite film, my student ID card, a logo of Quorn (I am a vegetarian and couldn't live without Quorn), a flag and Sikh symbol, my old Nokia phone and a clapper board. I then cut it out and tried to create a 3D effect by sticking it onto some black card with thick double sided tape. The finished outcome looks better than I predicted and I still have it hanging up in my bedroom.

KKhurana

Make it Rain

To start of this blog I thought I would upload images and videos from my previous practical creative. I found some pictures of a video shoot I did for my A-level work. We had to create a music video for any song we wanted. We contacted some unsigned bands and these guys got back to us. Eskimo Brit (I think they broke up after this video...haha...not our fault). They had a small online following on MySpace and the song we chose was called 'Make it rain'. We had a two day video shoot. Day one was to film the band paying and performing and day two we filmed the paint scenes shown in the pictures above. This video was my first experience of editing any video and I really enjoyed it...for a long while after I was interested in having a career in editing...but as always I changed my mind after a while... Click on this link to see the completed video...Even though it was done nearly 4 years now I am still proud of it as it will always be my first proper video editing experience.

Typography

This project was all about experimenting with interpretive type and message. The photos are taken from my sketchbook journal for this unit and some of the ideas I came up with. This project made me realise that I really like the creative aspect of putting a journal together and documenting the process and development of a project.

Doodle Days

Andy meets Kruger...

Pictures from final year Photography project at college. The style of photography I was inspired by is Andy Warhol meets Barbara Kruger.