Very rarely does one get to experience a lot on the first day of a class other than a syllabus overview. However, this was one of few classes I've had where we jumped into the learning fun on day one (I'm a poet and I don't realize it). Having never dealt with film other than disposable cameras, I was really surprised to actually get my hands on actually film... and then get to scratch, color, and alter it Brakhage-style. My film had what looked like a still picture of a landscape, complete with a few bare trees and a hay barrel. What I didn't realize at the time was that the picture was slowly moving as if the camera was a car traveling down a country road. I also didn't realize how many frames you have to scratch to see a visible change for only a few seconds. After scratching out the same tree for a good 20 frames or so, I thought for sure, there'd be no tree left; however, I was proved wrong when I was able to view it via projection and the tree was only gone for maybe 2 seconds at most. Still a great learning process though that made me appreciate the work of Stan Brakhage even more than I already did. I think if he used some of the improv music like the Scratch Film Junkies, it'd add another level to his work, but its still pretty inspiring to me regardless.
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