Based off of a poem of the same name, “A Day In The Lif3” (ADITL) is a digital storytelling experience meant to be a snapshot of R3NYAS’ life and struggles with addiction during 2022. The piece’s purpose is to revisit old graphic design skills, to explore various software, and to effectively story tell using a mix of audial and visual elements. This piece utilized Adobe (Audition, Premiere Pro, After Effects), Canva, and intellectual work from R3NYAS.

The poem from R3NYAS’ unpublished manuscript was recorded on an iPhone 16 Pro and was pushed through Adobe Audition. The audio waves were then adjusted and layered. In order to create a layered effect, the original recording was copied into four tracks: Vocals, The Effects, Distortion, and Background. Each track focused on a different part of the sound.

Vocals: This track was the most vocally prominent. The preset utilized was “Podcast”. The point of this track was the clarify the sound and make the words detectable.

The Effects: This track focused on depth and fullness, and maintained a low volume to extend the softness and delay. Utilizing audio signal processing and acoustics, this track had echo and modulation effects.

Distortion: This effect was achieved by adjusting the audio curve and was meant to give the vocals a mechanical twinge. Prior versions had this track as the most vocally prominent, but after various versions and edits, it was decided that this track will back the Vocals and will focus on extending the theme.

Background: This track was meant to complete the sound. Originally, two stock sound effects were used and meant to mimic the sound of an electronic hum, or lights flickering. Instead, that layer was too quiet and could not be heard through various versions. Adding and looping homemade foley sound recorded for a prior project (silver earrings clanking together), this was combined with the original stock sound effect. The track had added reverb and echo to soften the hum.

The visuals were created using six various tracks and overlays from Adobe After Effects, Adobe Premiere Pro, and a stock image from Canva Pro.

First, the computer’s effects were generated. The computer was sourced as a transparent .png file form Canva Pro’s stock images. The audio waveform effect (the neon inside of the computer) was sourced from an original recording of the poem. The audio spectrum effect (the neon behind the computer) was sourced from the same recording. The audio effect colours were chosen to further the technological theme. The audio waveform was meant to act as a link to personify the computer, and the path was chosen to resemble a mouth. Both effects were exported to Premiere Pro as a dynamic link.

The text was sourced through the auto captioning, and was manually reviewed and edited to resolve any mistakes. The captions inside the computer were auto-captions generated through Adobe Premiere Pro. The title was typed, and utilized the “Crop” effect for the typewriter effect.

The titular and caption font was Engravres MT. The secondary font is Garamond.

“A Day In The Lif3” transcript:

in my endless loneliness i looked to you for love and once upon a time that would’ve been enough. i surrounded myself with technologies, drugs, and sex and while i was all entranced, there still was a disconnect. for how can somebody consistently keep sane when ecstasy is being pumped directly to your brain? i don’t need to eat if i consume digitally but now i’ve become accustomed to isolation habitually. most of my days were filled with masturbating and waiting to get high, or daydreaming as if i lived another life. i dream of the unknown and all of the possibilities that in reality, were complicated and hindered by my personal affinities.

i view the instructions my phone gives and between alarm clocks, calendars, and faulty radio waves, technology controls how i live. i’m tethered to a 280mAh battery with menthol flavoured air, but i’m still underage and need an older man to buy me nicotine (and tell me that he loves me). i entangle myself in academics and i smoke my weed, but i’m so high that i seem to have forgotten the name of my university. and after class i go to my place of employment where i’ve spent two years of friday nights making pizza and trading drugs by the toilet. when the night ends i spend an hour driving back to my apartment that’s unlivable and unsanitary where three unemployed people reside, and outside my door there was just a shooting and someone died (i wish it were me!). my husband posts my vagina online to pay for his portion of rent but who fucking cares because as long as he gives me my bagged medicine, i’ll pretend to consent.

i was desired as a baby and i’m still desired at nineteen, and i do all i can to still be wanted and considered sexy. the digitised space can fill the emptiness only in part but nothing prepares me for the power outage that leaves me without a façade. i call my roommate a lying bitch and we argue about the rent she says that she doesn’t have to pay me because i’m just a coke addict. i want to talk to my husband but he’s too busy throwing our cat against the wall and laughing—who the fuck did i marry and how did these signs get past me? my day begins with smoke and i do nothing but half livings with nonsensical meanings and any hope left has been smothered so i try to end it with an overdose. but it doesn’t work and in my brief moments of clarity, i remember that i’m only nineteen and i mourn for all i’ve lost because this shouldn’t have been my reality.

i often wonder that if i were a different person, would the qualms i have against life get better or worsen? i know that personal satisfaction is objectively unattainable but that self-efficacy could potentially be demonstrated. and yet i still seem to be stuck in the same patterns and entrapments where survival is the only thing that seems to matter. my nihilism is stronger than my laced powder and that type of carelessness leads to soul-destroying encounters. i’ve filled my life with three things to battle the feelings of being lonely to potentially find liberation and meaning. but instead it’s just pitiful attachments to technologies, drugs, and sex with dehumanizing horrors in between.

when will i ever be free?