Another week bites the dust.

Another week down and November is upon us. Last week’s class was another “low key” one but still interesting as always as we got to see the other animations completed as well as some cool screenings.

I thought the animations were cool. The Adventures of Noodleman reminded me of a claymation video game, Frogger meets Clayfighter kinda. The music was cool, nice selection of Rage Against The Garden’s (or Audioslave as their known by most) only decent song. The colors looked a lot better after some post-production. I remember it looking darker when first shown to the class but the colors looked crisp in the final product.

The fishtank animation (I forget the name) was cool as well. I thought the sound added a lot to it, especially when we were inside the tank and the “radio” noise was cut out completely. Narratively, I think it could’ve been editing more storylike, but it did have a Tarantino-type order to it. I really enjoyed the “room” setup with the Larry Bird baseball card being used as a poster, very creative.

As far as last week’s class screenings, I really enjoyed One Nation Under Tommy. When I was a kid, I always liked playing telephone in class because the outcome would always be nothing like the original saying. Of course, I was the prankster that always blatantly changed words around to ensure that it was never the same as the beginning. I’d never thought of how to translate that game into film though but ONUT was a great example of doing exactly that. I felt like maybe the first couple filmmakers/writers ruined the whole thing but that really made it all better and funnier in the end. The variations of the national anthem were great and somehow it made its way into all of them, I’m pretty sure. I think my favorite interpretation was the last one that was put together basically of some rough sketches to say the least. If I would’ve originally known I was remaking a Tommy Hilfigur commercial (which none of them did), I would’ve easily just drawn some crude drawings and say ‘To Hell with this!” Maybe in a film class, a project like this would be fun to do throughout the semester.

With this newly assigned rhythmic editing project on our hands, I’m excited about it. I’m really hoping to incorporate some type of self-made music or at least a beat so the editing rhythm will definitely be seen and heard. I haven’t discussed too much with my partner about what aspect of our lives we want to film of each other but I have some ideas for myself. As for tomorrow, I’m ready to see some works in-progress of the rayograms and am hoping for some cool stuff.

Happy Halloween.

Week 11... already?

Greetings, internet. As we move into week 11 (it feels like the semester just started, doesn't it?), I'm already looking forward to our next assignment, the rhythmic editing. Not really knowing what all it is, it sounds fun on paper. All that really comes to mind is some of the rhythmic sequences in Requiem for a Dream or the "Cool beans" sequence in Hot Rod, for those of you who got a chance to see that gem in theatres.
I've also been thinking about the 48-hour race and what I'm going to do, what I will film with, and who I may want to use as actors. I really don’t want to go too far in pre-production because the mystery prop may not fit in with what I want to do. My plan is to wait it out for about another month before I start to focus solely on that project. The challenge is going to be fun though, I can sense it.
In Experimental film, we also have an Installation piece due that final night and, from what we've discussed so far, our group should definitely rock the place and/or cause some very confused/sensory overloaded brain cells. Just so everyone's prepared...

6 x Fun

Who knew having class on Saturday could be so much fun? This past week's classes were fun to say the very least as we got to see some final animations and also complete a one-day shoot with a Bolex. Though we only got to watch two of the four animations(one which was our group's), I liked how they turned out. For the Army vs. Bear animation, the metal soundtrack worked well with the violent, warlike images presented onscreen. With the music, the bear looked like he was in the middle of a mosh pit, wiping people out with his feathers of fire. That was a good call on whoever’s part by choosing to use orange, yellow, and red feathers to simulate a huge flame. It looked really cool in the animation.

Going into Saturday’s one shot, our group really didn’t have a solid idea written on paper, but rather a few ideas that could or could not work. After viewing some of last year’s one shots, we knew we had to come up with something better. John mentioned that he had a doorway dolly to use and of course Angie and I have some interesting props/costumes of our own. The shooting went well once we had an idea to go with. Our location wasn’t far but since we used mostly trees, its almost hard to tell that we used UNCW campus. Our plot was simple: a tracking shot of a musical dance fest complete with a crazy full-grown leprechaun man dancing and clicking his heels around. Though it may not the most narrative piece, the visuals looked really unique and the exposure was nice. A lot more will come together with sound and editing.

I was also impressed with the other groups projects too and even got to participate in two more shots. The collaboration between groups was amazing and everyone seemed interested in helping each other out, both production wise and creatively. Colin, Matt, Martin, and Skip’s shot was something straight out of a Spike Jonze or Michel Gondry video. Definitely cannot wait to see the final product. School on a Saturday has never been so fun.

Animation completed

On Friday, Angie and I completed the sound portion of our animation assignment. Using only our stop motion footage and some of Andre's cooler footage, we were able to get a good video that didn't make much narrative sense but seems to match up well. For our soundtrack, we used a track that I made using my dm2. Although I made it without even thinking about our animation, it seems to match the theme and action of our sequence almost too well. We went with a space theme mainly because of the Star Trek action figures used and also the randomness occurring that would only occur in space (if anywhere).


Watch it here or wait til Thursday.

Reaction to Assignment 6

In response to our newly assigned 48 hour film race, I'm nothing but excited about the whole experience. I like the whole idea of limiting what we can/can’t use to film footage on. Now it’s time to see who’s creative and not who has the best equipment/access to equipment. Also I like the idea of a mystery prop to endure no one will get too far ahead of everyone else. I also liked being put under a time limit because its only under pressure that my brain starts to get kicking.
After just completing a self portrait project where I used footage taken from my digital still camera, I'm pretty confident that my camera will work more than fine to film my subjects with. That's a good thing too because my cell phone camera is pretty horrible. Being the only camera I really have, my Kodak has taken some great shots and some okay video, so this won’t be an exception.
Also, I’m looking forward to the final viewing of everyone’s projects. It’ll be the end of the semester and everyone will in a good mood, having a good time. Last year’s end-of-semester 201 project viewing was a lot of fun and I didn’t really know a lot of people then. This year, I’ve met a lot of new and cool people and think my film and editing skills have definitely improved enough to produce a good quality video, even if the film’s quality itself is somewhat lacking.

Thoughts On, Week Off

Even though last week's class was (in Andre's words) "low key", I had a good time with the viewings and thought they were really interesting. Starting with Monster Road, I really was inspired by Bruce Bickford's claymation creations. Its amazing to see an older fellow with a childlike imagination and also fascination with his creatures. After seeing our group animation, it was hard for me to imagine the planning and time consumed making an animation as elaborate as Bickford's. What really struck me was the fact he stated that he didn't plan them out, instead just made up the plot as he went along. I admit, during the animation project we did the same thing, it just wasn't as elaborate and polished.
The second viewing, Fridays at the Farm, was also extremely cool as it was all still photos and had to do with self-farming. I thought Hoffmann's whole still documentary was very inspiring, both film-wise and nutritionally. As a vegetarian myself, I really dug the whole veggie farm and how it was run naturally. The techniques used in the community farm were very cool and it was good to see his children growing up healthy in modern day America. Cinematicly, It was almost hard to believe that the entire project was completely stills, around twenty thousand to be exact. At times, it seemed like the stills were creating movement and that must've been hard to accomplish. Taking 201 at UNCW made me really appreciate anyone who can accomplish movement with nothing but still photos. I also thought that the still photography was appropriate for the film because it gave it a very scrapbook feel to it with dialogue included. Many of the photos were perfect and in ultra high quality which definitely helped. The use of timelapse several times also demonstrated the time and effort both the project and the farm must've took to make a good final product.

Chion Reading Thoughts

Preparing for last week's class, I read over the Chion article; however, we ran out of class time to discuss it. So I decided to look over it once more and use it blogwise.

First of all, one of the first things I learned in Intro to Film was the fact that it was sound that makes shots flow seemingly invisibly, and if it wasn’t for sound, editing would be much more blatant. My professor that year put on a clip from the film, Seven, and we watched it on mute, only paying attention to shots. The first thing I noticed was the number of cuts that I hadn’t really paid attention to before. I even began to count cuts and realized how much more edits there really were. Then, we watched the same clip, only with sound, and it was a whole different experience. In the Chion reading, this is the first concept he discusses.

Next, I really liked the factors of temporalization that Chion discussed, specifically how predicable a sound can/can’t be to create different effects. In Experimental Film, we just created soundtracks that were anything but predictable and then had to place images to synch with the sounds. The effect all the final products had was almost completely disorienting at times and also made the sounds and pictures seem as if they were meant to be. This just goes to show that the relationship of the two can be used to modify or oppose one another.

Since the sound experience early on in my film studies to the experimental project recently completed, I’ve questioned why films are still sometimes referred to as motion pictures and movies, when sound is the glue that holds the moving images together. Without it, we’d be lost and focused to much on the different shots, rather than the story itself.