3D Shoot

The 3D workshop was a lot of fun. The process is so logical - kind of felt dumb for not thinking about that already. But I thought it was really cool how we used to cameras focused on the same image to capture the footage. I had never used After Effects before so I felt quite disoriented just watching Tory try to figure out how to turn the damn thing into 3D. I am interested in editing though so I'd love to become better acquainted with the program in the near future. I consider any day that I get to dance in a Soul Train line to funk classics such as The Brothers Johnson's "Get Da Funk Outta Ma Face" and K.C. & the Sunshine Band's "Boogie Shoes" a good day. I do have some regrets though - upon looking back over the footage I regret not boogieing harder when approaching the camera. I feel that I was giving maybe 70% boogie effort when I should have been giving 110% boogie effort. All in all - I consider the shoot very successful (thank god you helped us figure out the After Effects!). As for the 3D glasses - fucking awesome. I made a slick black framed wayfarer style glasses with white sides (with the customized AB insignia on the sides. I think Tory was a little jealous. Anyway - the surprise work day was awesome and I can't wait to see everyone's found footage projects in class today. I really enjoyed constructing a Jean Claude Van Damme scene with Chris Farley and the Rupert Holmes hit "Escape (The Pina Colada Song)". Truly absurd...

Van Dammage

Mystery Workshop: Forts are the shit

So, last week we had the most awesome class of my college experience. We made a fort! Now personally I've been ranting to my roommates this whole year about building forts. Here has been my central argument: if you were nine years old and you had a house to yourself what would be one of the first things you/I would do in the house is make the most badass fort ever. I loved making forts as a child and have found that I still do. Recently, my girlfriend and I have constructed two separate forts in her Mayfaire apartment. Each fort has consisted of half aerobed walls and half real walls (i.e. walls of the apartment). We thumbtacked tons of sheets to the walls to use as a canopy/roof and of course an aerobed to lay on inside of the fort - duh. I thought we were bringing the sheets into class because we were going to make a rough theatre stage to perform some impromptu performance or what not. I was excited but not near as happy as after we made the fort. I really went to town on helping out with the ampitheatre-like structure of the fort and loved that so many other people were into it as well. I love this class and how creative we get to be - I really do feel like all of these unorthodox methods and new ideas that we've been working with all year are going to help me on my path to becoming a successful and interesting cinematographer.

Rough Theatre

The article on rough theatre that we read for this week was quite brief but it brought up some very good points about formal popular theatre vs. rough theatre. Personally, I am the type of person who is typically drawn to things that are improvised. I have found that even if I am not aware that something is improvised I will be more likely to enjoy it or find it interesting/intriguing. My favorite musical genre is jazz and improvisational rock & roll. I love improvisational music from the likes of John Coltrane and Thelonious Monk all the way to my personal favorite modern-era band, Phish. When it comes to movies and film, I've always been drawn to improvisational comedy like that of my favorite comedy, Anchorman. I used to be an avid painter and thought that was what I was going to do for the rest of my life until I read Andy Warhol's autobiography of the factory and his life during the 1960s. In it he inspired me to convert to film simply because he used film to try to capture authenticity via film. He would turn on the camera, step away, and allow people to just be themselves, to live, to improvise - or he would just point it at something and let that something function as if nothing were filming it (i.e. Empire or Sleep). To me improvisation is living - it is life. Since junior year of high school I've always thought of the process of living life as a very similar process to the way certain jazz or "jam band" songs are performed. It starts out with some kind of structure, whether it be complex or simple, and then it begins to build on that structure with improvisational notes. The improvisation isn't just random notes - they are notes that are reacting to the notes that the others in the band are playing. They are all playing together, having a conversation, reacting to each other, but reacting in context to the original structured piece of music, thus resulting in structured/controlled chaos. The problem with formal theatre to me is that it is way too structured. In a high school theatre production, if someone messes up a line on stage, they normally stutter over their words and repeat the line over or try correcting themselves word for word. The audience most likely does not know your line word for word, so it would be much more natural if they just improvised and applied something that fit the situation in context. Perhaps one of the reasons why actors are so uptight and don't think on their toes to actually act/become the character is because of the formalities of the theatre and dogma of the audience. I understand that a lot of the focus of theatre architecture is behind acoustics and aesthetics. But perhaps the rudimentary components of the rough theatre allows audience and actors to be more relaxed. Perhaps it also allows them to all be more involved in the story and less concerned about formalities of the theatre.

Confusion

I am confused about what we're supposed to blog about this week...