The End

The final project/final screening for 6x1 was one of the most enjoyable experiences of the entire semester. Getting to see the films outside of the room in Kennan Hall was a great experience because it really brought meaning to the rough theater article we had read earlier in the semester. The screen was made from a shower curtain, and we were all just hanging out in Andre’s back yard while watching the films that we had created in just forty-eight hours with no video or film cameras. It was definitely one of the most memorable experiences of my film studies education so far.

Seeing what everybody came up with for their video race videos was really entertaining. There were so many great stories that came out of the mystery prop of the sidewalk chalk Easter eggs that I had not even thought of before viewing the films that night. Seeing all of the different mediums used was also very enlightening because they seemed to match up with the different film concepts really well.

The fact that this project had to be done individually and without the aid of a partner was challenging and rewarding at the same time. It made the forty-eight hour time limit that much more constraining and it forced me to think under pressure with a lot of other deadlines looming around the corner. At the same time, these constraints forced me to be creative and come up with some kind of concept that could be created within the time frame while still being entertaining and thought provoking. However, there was no need for the video to make sense or be driven by any kind of narrative, so that was one element that actually allowed for me to be slightly at ease and just try to think outside of the box, which is not something that I am usually good at.

So, in order to come up with a concept, I came up with a list of ideas for what the egg could represent or what it could be doing within the span of this short film that I had to make. This was a lot easier said than done, since my creativity seemed to be stifled by lack of sleep and energy. However, as the lack of sleep and thinking forged on, I came up with a list and started to film the egg in different scenarios throughout my apartment before sitting down to edit. When I did the first cut, I hated it, so I decided to scrap that entire idea and come up with something else.

It was during that time that I spotted a toy chicken that had come with a pack of bubble gum eggs that I had purchased during the Easter holiday season at Wal-Mart. What I wanted to do was create a terrorizing character out of the toy chicken while making the egg almost look like a victim without any actual attack or violence taking place. It would just be cut together in a way with a sound loop to make it appear as though the plastic chicken was a threatening figure.

Seeing it on screen gave me ideas for how I could improve on that concept, but for a film made in forty-eight hours with the video mode on my digital camera, it turned out pretty well, as far as I was concerned. Everybody’s turned out really well, actually. I think this was a great way to end the semester for 6x1 because it really allowed for all of our creativity to be wrapped up in one final film while giving us a place to vent our frustrations about upcoming finals and just giving us a place to escape to while trying to avoid any upcoming finals that we might not be prepared for.

Week Fourteen: One Minute Film Concepts

So many projects and one minute film concepts have been covered in class so far that it is difficult to think up other projects that could be done. One suggestion I have is to just draw out other projects.

For instance, the found footage projects that we did for our last project could be broken down into two separate projects. One could be a culture jamming piece, either with specific subjects or subjects that the students have to come up with, and the other could be a recontextualization of having to pull two or more different things together to make a commentary on something else, sort of like myself and others did with cutting old movies/cartoons to old public service announcements. I think breaking it up into two separate projects would not only allow for more emphasis on found footage films and provide more time to look at said films, but I think it could also explain the ideas and differences between the two types more clearly than they were explained in our semester of class.

Another idea could be to have a random product/business/something of the sort be the subject of a one minute commercial. Many commercials on television today are really thirty second to one minute long stories about something going on that ends up involving the product in some way, shape, or form. You could come up with the story for the product to follow, or you could have students come up with the idea after you assign them the products, but I think it would be really interesting to see what students come up with, since so many of the commercials today are pretty “out there” ideas.

Even though animation was touched on in the first project of the semester, I think more emphasis on it would make the course a little more interesting. The only drawing on film that we did was for the first project, and the only animation we did was for one hundred frames within that project, so I think it would be interesting to maybe animate an entire one minute film over the course of the semester and have them air at the final screenings, kind of an accumulation of feelings, ideas, or something of the sort over the span of the entire course.

One idea that I think would be really interesting would be to have some sort of stock script, kind of like 201 used to have the stock storyline with the pie stealing. This could either be one minute of action, one minute of dialogue, or just a page description of something and they have to act it out within a minute, either within a one shot, continuous take like we did with the Bolex cameras, or they have to edit down what they have to one minute to make a coherent story within a one minute time period. Obviously, the story would have to be fairly concise, or each group could be given a page of a four to five page script, depending on how large the class is, and they have to film one minute of the film, and then all of the parts can be added together on screening day, and they can see how their entire five minute film turned out. That could be a really interesting way to make a 6x1 short film.

Overall, I think a lot of the projects that we have done this semester are kind of crucial to the idea of the class as a whole. We really touched all of the experimental film bases, in a way, with brief glimpses into all of the different categories that each project dealt with, and our range was so extensive that I am not really sure what else could be done.

Week Thirteen: Making Films Without a Video Camera

Making a film without the use of a film or video camera seems like one of those tasks that can be filed under the category of things that cannot be done. However, upon further inspection and with more creative thought and ingenuity, one can come up with many ways to make a film that do not require the use of a film camera.

One way could be by using a digital still camera. Not only do they have the ability to take still images, but most have a video setting. Secondly, a cell phone camera could be used much like a digital still camera could be, but the quality between the two would be slightly different. Third, a web cam could be used. Another way to make a film without the use of a camera would be to scan images with a scanner and edit the images into a film timeline with a computer and editing software, much like a still image film would be. One could even draw animations by hand or with the help of a computer and create an animated film that would not require a camera at all. Printing on film with the use of a computer printer is another way to go about filmmaking. A film could even be made by pulling pieces of other films together and editing them in such a way to tell a narrative story or to make a statement, such as culture jamming or doing found footage films like our next project will be.

Using different mediums would clearly result in different results:

· A digital still camera would be useful if a low visual quality would help the film creatively and the ability of the film to communicate the intended story. The video taken on a digital still camera would be short segments, or at least it is on my digital camera, so it would not allow for long takes. Therefore, the cuts would be very abrupt and jarring, depending on how they were edited together and that could allow for effective use in action movies or low quality horror movies where quick shifts in narrative would be helpful. Using the digital still feature of the camera would create a dreamlike world, almost fantasy like, and could create a world of a drug addict as seen through his/her eyes while under the effects of drugs, with all of the choppy movements and whatnot.

· Cellular phone image quality, both still and video, can vary drastically depending on the quality of the cell phone itself and what the phone was meant to do. Some phones are meant to be media phones while others are intended to just be used for calls and maybe for checking e-mails. However, most cell phones with digital cameras built in have video cameras and onboard microphones built in as well. I think a cell phone would be very effective in filming some kind of mockumentary/scripted documentary such as Cloverfield or something similar where a character or group of characters must go on a journey and are left to use what resources they have for communication.

· Webcam video quality has come a long way from when it first began. Some webcams have such great quality that they look like inexpensive video camera quality, as far as visuals go. Using a webcam would be most effective in a setting where the story allows for the use of cameras. Maybe a kidnapping where the two parties involved, the kidnappers and the cops/family waiting to pay ransom/etc. communicate through computers. Either that, or it could be a situation where a film is done as a serial type of deal where segments are posted online and eventually the full story is revealed, much like old stories used to be when they were printed in newspapers or told on radios.

· Scanning images onto a computer and editing them together to make a movie would really only be effective if the filmmaker is trying to create some kind of fantasy world or is just trying to make an experimental film that does not necessarily require a clear narrative storyline, simply because the variations in how the images look, whether distorted or out of focus or completely clear, when scanned into the computer could vary so greatly.

· Making an animated film by drawing on paper and scanning the images in or just drawing in a computer program that allows for it would probably only be the most effective for a story that could be told in the manner of a cartoon, either adult or childlike. Some kind of fantasy world or just a story where the characters did not need to resemble perfect human beings but could allow for a stretch of the imagination.

· Printing on film would really only be a technique used in an experimental film setting because so much is left to chance as the film runs through the printer that it would be difficult to try to control the dots of ink enough to actual create a real story.

· Lastly, a found footage film would be best for communicating some kind of commentary on some aspect of society, whether it be a positive or a negative commentary. The quality would probably be better than most other methods, depending on where the footage is captured or taken from, but it would limit the type of story that could be told based on the availability of clips and film segments.

So, clearly, it is not impossible to make a film without a film or video camera, but it really is only effective depending on the type of film being made.

Week Twelve: Rough Filmmaking, the "Rough Theater" of the Next Generation

Though I had already read, analyzed, and commented on Brooks’ article about the “rough theater,” I had not actually applied it to the class as a whole. This class, 6x1, has been experimental in many ways, just as “rough theater” would be. When I first read the article, I did not connect it to the class, but after the discussion in class on Monday, it clearly does apply to the class in very important ways. For one, just like “rough theater” would insert jokes depending on the audience or the location where the play is being performed, films made on campus at UNCW would have inside jokes that only students at UNCW or in Wilmington in general would understand. In 6x1, doing one minute films can sometimes limit the narrative ability of a film to tell a story, but the idea behind the class is that the experience of making the film creates the story, and like the rough theater, it is more of a personal connection to the film and being able to laugh at things that happened behind the scenes rather than what is actually taking place on screen. It is more of an interactive experience with the film.

In the same way that shows deemed “rough theater” shows would use flour to whiten faces to show emotions such as fear, we have to use the props that we have available to us, as well. Not many of us can afford to go out and spend hundreds of dollars on props, so we use what we have on hand. For instance, in the one shot that my group did, we bought books from our apartments/homes to choose from, we used a cell phone that we had, a portable radio/mp3 player that we had, and just wore street clothes. Not only did it save us money and time, but it allowed us to establish the characters in the one minute films by what they were doing instead of creating distinguishable looks for them. In the forty eight hour movie race, we are going to have to create a one minute film without using a standard video camera while still having to incorporate a mystery prop that we will not find out the identity of until right before the race begins.

Though it may be deemed “rough” filmmaking, it is no less worthy of being called filmmaking than a Hollywood production would be. It is simply a way of being creative and using the medium in an almost more organic way. It is simply more gritty and hands on, not less worthy of being called a film. At the same time, it is getting back to the basics of film before there were big budgets and super high tech equipment, which is similar to how “rough theater” got back to the basics of theater by simply engaging the audience and adapting the story to fit wherever they might be performing instead of making the performance all about spectacle. It is just truer to the art form.

At the same time, people sometimes forget that films do not have to be created for a general audience. Really, they do not have to be created for any audience at all. Films can be created simply for the entertainment of the filmmakers involved with the film or simply for the entertainment of filmmakers in general. Films made during one’s childhood with a simple camera and little to know editing might not be entertaining to anyone outside of the family, but that does not take away the fact that it is a form of movie making.

It really goes back to the simple saying that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Filmmaking, or appreciating film, is really left up to the eyes that are viewing a film. There does not always have to be a set audience, the film does not always have to be pretty, polished, and completely professional looking to be appreciated, and it is not always about “getting it right.” Sometimes experimenting and just having fun with the medium can bring about the best results, just as “rough theater,” as it was adapted for individual audiences, brought about the best results in a given venue.

Week Eleven: "On the Rights of the Molotov Man"

“On the Rights of the Molotov Man,” an article by Joy Garnett and Susan Meiselas is a very interesting article in that it takes a look at how contextualizing and decontextualizing images can have an effect on their meaning and their representation of the subject included in the photo or image itself. However, I found the copyright infringement aspect of the article to be kind of ridiculous. While I understand that it had been Susan Meiselas original image, taken for a specific reason and with a specific purpose in mind, it was clear to me, from reading Joy Garnett’s portion of the article, that she had not created her painting with any intention of infringing upon Susan’s copyright. Getting the lawyer involved seemed to be going a little far. While I understand that it is important for an artist to protect their work and their creations, I also think the whole idea of copyright has been taken to the point of extremes in the art world, and in other areas of art more so than in the actual graphic arts, and it has gotten to the point where the phrase copyright infringement does not even carry as much weight as it used to.

However, the one part of the article that I found to be incredibly interesting was how artists online around the world stood up and fought for Joy Garnett’s right to use the image in her painting, since she had clearly not intended to infringe on anyone’s copyright by using it. She had simply found it in an internet search and felt inspired. Seeing that kind of backing from an online community is not all that surprising from me, since I, myself, take part in some online discussion communities for the arts and various things, but it was interesting to see how the story got twisted as it was translated from language to language. I think that is one thing that is universally understood… that language barriers can sometimes make things worse without intending to. For instance, the Chinese thought that Pepsi was suing Joy Garnett by the time the news got to them, and eventually, the whole thing was blown way out of proportion.

Though the whole situation did become blown out of proportion, I think that the online support that Garnett received for her painting had a lot to do with Meiselas having her lawyers back off and not going after the licensing fees. There would have been so many backlashes, that at the time, it probably didn’t seem worth pursuing. Even though she did give up on the legal pursuit, I’m glad that this article gave her the opportunity to voice her opinion and give the real background of the “Molotov Man.” His story is fascinating, and it was crazy to see how many different groups had used his image. Pablo Arauz, better known as the “Molotov Man,” had his image spread on flyers for various political parties, had his image put on match books, had his image painted on walls, and all the while, he was raising a family and taking care of the lumber company that he owned. It was not until 1990 that Susan Meiselas even knew the name of the man in the picture she had taken that had caused so much uproar… such a riot, in fact.

I think the most important question raised by this article was brought up by one of the online posters in response to the controversy and battle over copyright and rights in general between Joy Garnett and Susan Meiselas. “Who owns the rights to this man’s struggle?” Neither Garnett or Meiselas knew this man personally, other than Meiselas having witnessed him throwing the Molotov cocktail long enough to snap the photo that would bring her into the spotlight, but nowhere in the article did it mention asking Pablo Arauz’s permission to reproduce images of his likeness. It just seemed like such a trivial matter to me. It wasn’t a battle over art for art’s sake. It was a battle over rights, and ultimately over money for Susan Meiselas, and that kind of goes against everything that the image itself represented, as Arauz fought for political beliefs and freedom from a regime he didn’t believe in. Overall, I just felt like the article raised a lot of interesting questions about art and copyright as it relates to both 2-D and 3-D art.

Week Ten: Brook, "The Rough Theater"

Though the excerpt from the Brook article, “The Rough Theater,” was fairly brief, it contained a lot of interesting information. I had never really thought about the architecture of theater before the article brought up many very interesting points. For instance, a rough theater can be more engaging than a clean cut, incredibly stylized theater performance/showing. While this seems like common sense after thinking about it, I had never really considered that to be true. Raw performances just seem to have more character overall. There is more of a chance for audience interaction with the performers because there is no expectation or uncomfortable urge to sit still and just “enjoy the show” in silence because of clean, seemingly perfect surroundings. In posh, sophisticated settings, audience-performer interaction during a show would be seen as inappropriate and rude, at least in most settings, but if a show is designed to be rather crude and simple, as far as style goes, and the theater itself is more homey and inviting, then a whole new atmosphere opens up and allows for an entirely different viewing experience. Beauty really is in the eye of the beholder in this sense, since all of it is merely based on opinions rather than fact.

Brook also brings up an interesting point in the article when there is a reference to prisoners in San Quentin being able to appreciate something as sophisticated as Waiting for Godot from their confinements in prison simply because it is constructed in a more simplified form. If those same prisoners were to go to a fancy, upper class theater in London, England, to see that show or a show of a similar style, then they would be completely lost because it would not be spoken in a language that they could understand, even if it was actually spoken in English. There are so many different levels of the English language that even people who speak the same language can come face to face with a language barrier of sorts.

One of the most interesting aspects of the article is how Brook discusses ways of simplifying stories to get the same effect. In a time where spectacle is more important to the Hollywood blockbuster than story is, for the most part, it was nice to see an analytical mind thinking about ways to simplify theater and get back to basics, in a way. Using flour to show someone white with fear is almost ingenious these days, since it is not even thought about with the use of makeup or even color alteration in post production with computers and other technologies.

Lastly, Brook discusses the idea of viewing shows outside of normal viewing areas as being more enriching than going to the theater or something of the sort. Though Brook is talking more about live theater than movie going, I can relate to what is being said. Outdoor theater allows for more interaction, and incorporating local jokes or slang phrases that more people would relate to is a great way of connecting with the audience. Personally, I think that going to film viewings that take place outdoors or in a setting other than a movie theater, such as a film screening with a projector and a white sheet in some guy’s garage, are more enjoyable at times than just going to see the run of the mill Hollywood blockbuster in a seat with a cup holder in the armrest and sticky candy on the floors. It allows for a nice break from reality in a visual sense, and it’s just a way to get outside of the realm of normalcy for a little while. Overall, it just creates an entirely new viewing experience all together, and I think that was the point that Brook tried to make in “The Rough Theater.”

Week Seven: Double Time

Week seven of class brought about a double dose of 6x1 action. Not only did we meet in class on Monday morning, but we had a film shoot on Saturday that was fairly educational as well. The focus of the week was the one shot that we would be filming on Saturday using the Bolex film cameras provided for us by the school. With only one complete wind worth of film at our disposal, the class was broken up into groups and instructed to come up with a complete idea or action that could take place in front of the lens for one minute while the camera filmed at twelve frames per second before the film was developed, projected and recorded onto a mini DV, and then taken into Final Cut to be slowed down and have a soundtrack added.

While trying to come up with an action to take place in one minute in front of a camera when no dialogue is required sounds like an easy enough task, it actually proved to be quite difficult. Half of Monday’s class was devoted to our groups having time to get together to come up with a concept that would give us some kind of starting point when we showed up to film on Saturday afternoon. My group came up with an initial idea fairly quickly: we would follow one object around as it is passed amongst a group of random people. The next task was coming up with an object and a group of people doing distinct actions that would show up on film without the use of dialogue or actual sound recorded from the shoot.

Our object turned out to be a book. On shooting day, we decided to use On the Road by Jack Kerouac, which seemed oddly appropriate given the journey that the book itself was about to embark upon. Shooting day turned out to be the most interesting day, though. No amount of planning can completely prepare you for what lies ahead. Even though we were broken up into groups, we were teamed with one other group so that we could act as production assistants and actors during their shoots.

It was probably the first and only time that I will have to help remove and replace a balloon head on an actor in the middle of the film, but it was definitely a lot of fun and incredibly creative. After about forty minutes of trying to get the choreography down, since this was to be one seamless take in one shot, we finally got the shot done and it ended up looking really great when it was projected on screen. The balloon head popping was probably my favorite part, and I cannot wait to see what it looks like when it is actually slowed down.

The shoot for my group went by without many problems. It turned out to be a fairly simple concept, once we found the perfect spot to shoot in beneath the clock tower in front of Randall Library. With a path blocked out from one bench to another, then to a picnic table, and back to the original bench, we wound the crank on the Bolex camera and started filming… only to have the camera stop filming at fifty seconds when we needed fifty-six seconds of footage to work with. So, we re-cranked the camera and filmed the last shot over again. When our one shot was projected onto the screen, I was really pleased with the final result, even in the negative form it looked great. I cannot wait to see it edited with a soundtrack, as well as everyone else’s. They should be very entertaining.

Week Six: The Thad Povey Experience

After viewing the second Thad Povey and the Scratch Film Junkies piece, “St. Louise,” I was not all that surprised to find that my initial reaction and viewing experiences were incredibly different from my reaction and viewing experience with the first piece, “To the Beat.” In “To the Beat,” the music almost took me out of the experience of seeing the film, and I had an overall feeling of just being bombarded with color and images that really did not make any sense whatsoever. It just felt like a bunch of images had been put together to music and put on a reel to be viewed. However, with “St. Louise,” which I looked up online and watched for a second time, it was a completely new experience.

Overall, I appreciated this film a lot more. The experience of going through the various processes we had done in class and experimented with on our own, such as bleaching, scratching, painting, and magazine transfers, really added a new layer of appreciation. The narrative structure of the film was no longer the most important to me. I could recognize the various techniques, such as the very controlled scratching used to create not only animations but actual figures such as arrows, faces, and other objects. The flow of the film seemed much more evident to me, as well.

The way Thad Povey and the Scratch Film Junkies incorporate all of the different mediums and techniques of experimental filmmaking was fascinating to me. I mean, with the film that I made with my partner, we combined certain techniques that we thought would work together, and it turned out okay in the end, but the movement of colors, the animations incorporated within the film, and the shift from one segment of the film to the other was really smooth. Everything looked as though it had been methodically put into place with every part having its own intent and purpose.

One part of the film that really stood out to me was the inking, painting, and scratching over the already developed footage. That has quickly become one of my favorite techniques to view in a film such as this. I just enjoy the aesthetic of the different layers and the effect that the scratching can portray over the image to cause various emotions to be experienced.

Another element of the film that I, personally, really appreciated and was almost in awe of was how much control they seem to have over the medium, not just with pacing and all of that, but with the actual aesthetics of the film. The inks did not become all muddy and blend together in the parts where two inks were present on the film. In one section, there is black ink, purple ink, and blue ink in vertical strips side by side, and the boundaries between the colors were very sharp and not muddled at all. I am not sure if they just used different kind of inks that would not mix together or what, but I would think that even allowing the different areas to dry before applying the next color would have some overlap. I’m not sure how much taping areas off would help, since some of the lines looked very organic and as if the inks were just kind of co-existing, but it was just really something that stuck out to me and that I would like to look into further.

The only complaint that I had with this film was the final frames, with the figure with the mask buried up to his knees in sand at the beach. I just felt like it was more of a distraction than part of the film itself. Even the credits and the opening sequence in the beginning flowed with the rest of the film, but this one instance of just standard black and white filming with the figure just moving to the music really did not add anything to the film for me. If anything, it took me out of the film and kind of left me confused. I just wasn’t sure if it really served a purpose story wise or aesthetically. I feel as though it was rather unnecessary.

However, I am looking forward to looking into more of the Scratch Film Junkies videos after looking at some of the clips on their website.

Week Five: Stop... in the Name of Animation

Coming into class last Monday, I really was not sure what to expect. My group members and I had talked through e-mails about what objects we were going to bring, so that was not a surprise, but it was the whole idea of stop motion animation using a Super 8 camera that was pretty new to me. However, I had done stop motion animation before. Well, I had done it years ago when I had done a summer session at the School of the Arts in Winston Salem, North Carolina, so it was still pretty unfamiliar territory. The moving of the objects around in the different planes of vision seemed easy enough. After all, it was pretty self-explanatory. You moved one object or all of the objects a fraction of the complete movement, clicked off a few frames, and then repeated the process until the action was complete. Then, it was all repeated for every motion within the scene. That sounds easy enough, right?

Well, that was easy enough. The difficult part was trying to make the objects tell a story like we had seen in previous weeks in the stop motion animation films by Pes. Though there was not always a narrative structure to the films, there was still a clear action taking place, and the movement of the objects, no matter how random they were, made sense. So, with an M&M figurine, two Pez dispensers, a box of candy hearts, a Pokemon figurine, a Donald Duck figurine, a handful of change, an old key, and some dental floss, my group members and I proceded to make a film that made sense. This was easier said than done, but we made it work.

With the Sharpie marker we had, we drew faces on the blank sides of the candy hearts, allowing two different colors to be back up armies for the respective Pez dispensers that would be battling over a key that would lead them to where Donald Duck was being held captive, and we began filming our epic battle scene. Everything went rather smoothly, but the most difficult part was trying to make the Pez that were flying out of the dispensers mouths as ammunition look like they were actually airborne. So, we used thread from another group and held them in midair while they slowly moved across the plane of action, and we just decided to hope that the string would not be noticeable.

The ending of our film was sort of made up as we went along, since we were not sure which side would actually win the battle or if the actual escape of Donald Duck from his barnyard fence prison would actually take place. However, with some quick thinking, we were able to come up with an ending that both made sense and was particularly entertaining, at least to us, so I hope that it turns out okay when we get our film back from the developer.

Overall, the stop motion animation was a lot of fun, and I think my group’s will turn out pretty well. Getting in the editing lab and being able to look at the footage should be interesting, but I am really looking forward to seeing how everybody’s turned out. Not only that, but I am looking forward to seeing how everyone’s elements projects turned out, as well. The final product for my group looked pretty cool. There were parts that I liked and parts that I loved, but overall, I feel that the project itself was a success. I cannot wait to see everybody else’s’. Monday should be pretty interesting.

Week Four: Blackout, Pt. 2

Getting a second chance to work with the rayogram techniques again was really quite nice. Though we were given the options of working on the painting aspects of our films, both me and my partner, Will, decided to stay in the black box so that we could experiment more with the rayograms. This time, instead of just using random items that had been provided for us in class, we actually had some sort of a game plan. We wanted to use different items that could work for various elements of our project, not just focusing on one of the four elements in particular. So, Will got a Ziploc bag full of water to see how the light would reflect off of the water and hopefully produce a wavy effect that would be easily seen when projected onto a screen. We also used the short grain rice again, since we really liked how the light worked with the various overlapping pieces of rice. As we had planned, we also used more tape, tried a different piece of already developed film, and used more hay for an earthy appearance on film, all of which showed up after we developed the film, but some to a lesser extent than others.

Though Andre set up the Caffenol to be experimented with, the image on the film stock did not have as much time to develop, since it took much longer to develop than with the regular Kodak developer. A lot of the groups seemed to be more willing to really experiment with the rayogram process this time around. One group even exposed their film with a flame from a regular lighter instead of using a quick flicker from the overhead lights. Though some of the film strips turned out to be overdeveloped, I think the one my group did turned out pretty well, even if we ended up liking the rayogram from last week even more. We'll probably splice different portions of the two together.

During the lecture portion of class, we learned how to put our film on the reel, and Andre's toilet paper example will probably be stuck in my head for a while. It's hard to forget something like that, but it should definitely be put onto t-shirts, as he suggested. It doesn't sound like it is going to be too difficult to really do, once the process gets started, but it is starting the process that might be a little tricky, since each piece of film needs to be double spliced together before even being put on the reel. Hopefully, it won't turn out to be too arduous a task.

Lastly, the stop motion animation films that we watched from eatpes.com were really quite entertaining and mind blowing in a way. The intricate details and all of the different items that the filmmaker used to represent various pop culture references and whatnot were really well thought out and really creative. The Pac-Man one with the pizza as the game's namesake was probably my favorite, even though the one with the bomb dropping and destroying the city was a really creative and interesting use of popcorn, gift bows, matches, and old toy airplanes. There were just so many items incorporated into the films that I would not have thought to use. They made me really look forward to our super 8 animations that we will be doing next week as my group continues to discuss what items we will be bringing to create our scene.

Week Three: Blackout

I really enjoyed this weeks in-class demonstration of how to create rayograms. The process itself was simple enough, turn off the lights to prevent exposing the film before you are ready to do so, place objects onto film while trying not to kill yourself by tripping over objects in complete darkness, flip lights on and off at lightning speed, and then start the tedious process of developing the film. Wash, rinse, and repeat. No, wait… that’s a different process entirely. Trying to develop the film for just the right amount of time was really tricky, since it was dark and the red light from the safety light did not really show much of what was going on, but for our first try, I think my group’s turned out pretty well.

Will had brought some of these notebook paper hole repair stickers as one of his items for the project, and they produced a really nice effect on the film, especially when some of them were complete circles and others went more at an angle off of the side of the film strip. The strips of film that had already been processed also made a really nice effect when they were placed over the undeveloped film. Our strip of already developed film had bands where the light had been able to get through to our film underneath, and it just looked really neat.

Two things that provided the best look in the experiment were hay, which Will had also brought with him, and the short grained rice that had been provided as an item for the entire class to use. The hay ended up producing a smoky, wispy effect on the film. It was just a really cool texture, overall. It could not really be seen by just looking at the film strip with a little bit of backing light, but when held up to the light, the detail was really noticeable and was really fine. I think the short grained rice had to have been my favorite item overall, though. Depending on how the individual grains fell, little bits of light would fall between the grains, and it ended up producing a really nice texture and overlapping effect on the film.

The glass beads provided for use, both the solid ones and the slightly cracked ones, produced an okay effect with nice curves and crescent moon shapes, but I was kind of expecting more fragmentation of light, which was produced more by the shards of beads than the actual beads themselves. Perhaps that is something that I will play around with more when we are able to do a second film strip.

With what Will and I were able to do with the items last week, I think we have a lot of elements that will incorporate into our film really well, and we both have ideas for other items that could enhance the textural aspect of the film even more, such as more masking tape and other things with faint textures that might be picked up on the film when the light develops it.

Overall, I would have to say that this process has been my favorite one so far. Even though I really enjoyed the magazine transfers, since those could really be manipulated to produce so many different desired effects, I think the actual development process of the rayograms was much more satisfying, and it was much more varied in the kinds of effects that could be produced, whereas with magazine transfers, everything was kind of dependent on whatever kind of magazines happened to be available.

Week Two: Stan Brakhage

I found the story about Pathé and Mèliés to be very entertaining. Just thinking back on the history of the motion picture and imagining two of the big names in film history sitting around and experiencing as innovative as moving pictures for the first time is really entertaining to me, and endearing in a way. To think that those “masters,” as they are sometimes referred to now, were just as new to the medium as film students who might be taking this course and other courses is also really encouraging. Though a lot of the techniques and a lot of the terminology might not make complete sense to us as of right now, we still have to experience all of this in order to have the chance to one day be referred to as a master of film.

In the early portion of the article we had to read on Stan Brakhage and his techniques, it felt a little terminology heavy. There were definitions given left and right, and though some of them were necessary, at times, it felt as though most of them were self-explanatory. However, it was interesting to have Brakhage’s take on things as simple as loading a projector and splicing film, both things that we had done in class prior to reading the article. Many of the techniques he discussed for “roughing up” film or creating certain effects were things that I would like to try at one point.

For instance, he discussed the fact that glue or splicing tape would create unique and sometimes bizarre crystallization patterns when heated with an iron. I had never really thought about the idea of heating things up to get a crystallization effect, but I also hadn’t thought of using Nu-Skin, either. That had always been strictly for medical use in my mind. It was nice to see encouragement to do, or at least try, anything once to see how it works with film. If it fails, then it might look terrible, but if you don’t try it at all, then you could be missing out on something that could create an awesome effect when projected onto a screen.

One line in particular that really stuck out to me and made me laugh was, “If I make a collage film which can’t be printed or projected at all, then it is, after all, more of a necklace or wall decoration than a film.” Sure, the humor itself is funny, but at the same time, it is incredibly true. If you can’t project a film, then nobody will be able to see it, so really, it isn’t a film at all, other than the fact that it is on film stock of some sort. It really just made me keep in mind the idea that “gunking up” the sprocket holes or something like that with the films we’re working on now could prevent them from ever being shown at all, inevitably making them nothing more than “a necklace or wall decoration.”

Overall, I found the article to be very insightful, especially with the project that we're currently working on for class. The techniques Brakhage discusses will also come in handy with future projects as well, if a need for experimental techniques ever arises. He seemed to be very generous with his knowledge in the area, which was extensive, and he had good ideas for cheap ways of experimenting (such as buying an old 8mm camera and using any film you could find that would fit the camera to play around with different lighting techniques).

Though the magazine transfers that we did in class last Monday seemed simple enough and were fairly fun to do, by combining the process with other techniques that Brakhage discussed and other techniques that we will learn in class, I think a lot of interesting things could be done with the films we create in class.

Week One: What Does It All Mean?!

During the first segment of "To the Beat," the red images in the mid-ground with the black background and the almost neon light look moving along to the beat of the music kind of reminded me of an abstract look at city life in a large, industrialized city, with the moving vertical lines going across the screen at varying rates and in varying numbers almost looking like pedestrians at a crosswalk or something like that. It was hectic, congested, and got my pulse going a little faster like life in a quickly moving city would.

However, as the beat continued on and the images began to change, it was more and more difficult to really understand what was going on in the film, and this really forced me to pay more attention to the image itself and just let the background music be just that, background noise. Surprisingly, there were a lot of elements included in "To the Beat" other than just painting and scratching, which I had expected since it was going to be our focus for that particular class period.

There were images of people at different stages in life doing different things, and then, once again, my brain tried to analyze all of the different colors, images, and all of the other elements to try to make sense of what was going on in the film. The narrative filmmaker inside of me wanted to make the images I had been seeing into some kind of story or linear progression, which I often find myself trying to do with most narrative films as I visualize how the story falls together.

When the fractured phrase, "This Not Mean A Thing," flashed up on the screen in the final frames of the short, right before the end credits, I realized that my brain had been putting far too much thought into trying to analyze the clip instead of just appreciating it for what it was. Overall, I had enjoyed the aesthetic experience provided by the clip, and I thought that the colors and images worked well with the soundtrack, even if I had spent a good portion of the time trying to piece together a story or explanation that may or may not have been there.