The translation between mediums for artistic and literary works is a difficult transition to make. The formats have different properties and limitations. The transition from a live medium to a medium with permanence is especially difficult in that the work loses the interaction between work and audience. In the YouTube adaptation of David Henry Hwang’s play Yellow Face, the use of the site’s annotations feature changes the theater experience with a different kind of interactivity, uniqueness, and visual composition only possible because of the new medium. Although since replaced with Cards (Statt), the annotations feature of YouTube is a viewable and clickable layer on top of a video to provide information and/or an interactive experience
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A significant portion of these are written entirely in capital letters and all are boxed in vibrant colors. This attracts more attention. The same tactic is often used by sensationalist media for clickbait articles to encourage an audience to engage with the content. Also, as mentioned in the LA Times news article, “[t]here's a lot of direct address to the audience in the play”. These moments are punctuated with the use of annotations as well. Speaking directly to the audience engages them and emphasizes the prominence of whatever the actor is saying. By placing annotations on screen at the same time, the annotations are given an equal importance. This is seen in act one of Yellow Face when David Henry Hwang is addressing the audience about yellow face. The annotations pop up at 6:11 in both top corners in yellow – a very eye-catching color, especially against the dull background. The color also reinforces David’s message against yellow face. As a result, the annotations are prominent and becomes something important in the audience’s …show more content…
The development of YouTube is recent, with the first video released just eight years before Yellow Face. (jawed) This explains a lack of various now standard techniques in Yellow Face when it comes to annotations. This is seen in act two of Yellow Face at timestamp 14:04. Again, two yellow top corner annotations are there with information regarding Wen Ho Lee (This brings up the previous association with racism). However, as the camera moves around, the annotations stay still relative to the frame and clip off the faces of many of the protesters. With better planning, the problem could be
A significant portion of these are written entirely in capital letters and all are boxed in vibrant colors. This attracts more attention. The same tactic is often used by sensationalist media for clickbait articles to encourage an audience to engage with the content. Also, as mentioned in the LA Times news article, “[t]here's a lot of direct address to the audience in the play”. These moments are punctuated with the use of annotations as well. Speaking directly to the audience engages them and emphasizes the prominence of whatever the actor is saying. By placing annotations on screen at the same time, the annotations are given an equal importance. This is seen in act one of Yellow Face when David Henry Hwang is addressing the audience about yellow face. The annotations pop up at 6:11 in both top corners in yellow – a very eye-catching color, especially against the dull background. The color also reinforces David’s message against yellow face. As a result, the annotations are prominent and becomes something important in the audience’s …show more content…
The development of YouTube is recent, with the first video released just eight years before Yellow Face. (jawed) This explains a lack of various now standard techniques in Yellow Face when it comes to annotations. This is seen in act two of Yellow Face at timestamp 14:04. Again, two yellow top corner annotations are there with information regarding Wen Ho Lee (This brings up the previous association with racism). However, as the camera moves around, the annotations stay still relative to the frame and clip off the faces of many of the protesters. With better planning, the problem could be