Video StudentGuy: Recent Episodes
Paul Lyzun
Once a week I report on the lessons learned as a student in the Digital Filmmaking program at the Center for Digital Imaging Arts (CDIA) at Boston University. I review my classes, talk about relevant technology news and emerging trends in the motion graphics field. If I have time I’ll include Interviews with students, instructors, professional filmmakers and creators of the technology we know and love.
An update on this podcast and news about a new podcast that's in the works. See the show notes on the main blog.
Episode 7 in this series about producing audio and video interviews is about things to do immediately after the interivew is finished. See shownotes and hear the episode on the main site.
Up to this point in this series on interviewing for Storytelling I've focused on the preparing for the interview from the interviewer and Subject's perspective. In this episode the focus is on the productiong team on the other side of the lights. You'll find more show notes and the interview on the main site, videostudentguy.com.
Here is episode #5 in my series on journalistic interviewing for film, audio or print. For a change, I want to present the experience from the interviewee's perspective. Show notes and podcast are also available on the Main site.
What considerations does the Interviewer need to make once the day of the interview arrives. Listen to the podcast and read the show notes on the main site,
These questions are for researching events for stories through individuals who have direct experience.
You'll find the show notes, links and the podcast on the main blog.
Here's November's review of photographs. You can find this audio and the slideshow on the blog or here at Flickr.
Click here for the link to the main blog for the show notes for this and other episodes. Here are the links for the Flickr sets I've mentioned in this episode.
Septtember 2013 Slideshow set
- http://www.flickr.com/photos/videostudentguy/sets/72157636440247403/
Clouds and Light set
- http://www.flickr.com/photos/videostudentguy/sets/72157636440013356/
Green leaves set
- http://www.flickr.com/photos/videostudentguy/sets/72157636440257784/
More photos to show for my year long project of shooting everyday. See show notes and images on the main blog
Here's a critique of the images I shot for the month of July 2013. Show notes and link to images are on the main blog.
45 photographs taken during the month of June. More information and show notes on the main blog.
One or a few images a day that I shot throughout the month of May. Also a little commentary on the images in the podcast and some opionions about how we approach photographry. See the show notes and links to the images at the main blog.
See the show notes on the videostudentguy.com blog. I've included a little clarification about the idea of perception over conceptual seeing as it relates to photography.
In which i relate the various tools and windy path I've taken in my own online journey. I talk about the major online platforms I've used, changes I've made over the years and why I made them so that you can make your own choices. You'll find the links and shownotes at the main blog, videostudentguy.com
A monthly sampling of images I have shot throughout the month as exercises in learning how to see more clearly and create images that are authentic. Show notes and links mentioned in this episode are on the main Podcast page. If you just want to see the images, and I can appreciate that, you'll find the images here on Flickr.
In this introduction to the series I will be covering the dynamic relationship between you and your interview subject and then run down the 9 episodes that comprise this series:
- PreProduction or Planning
- Asking the Right Questions
- Managing your Subject during the Interview
- Interview Production Issues
- Post Production Concerns
- Lighting: Found and Made
- Capturing the best Audio
- Finding and using B-roll
- Question Expert: John Sawatsky
Show notes and links
I've got a new DSLR full of buttons and jacks so I'm commited to shooting something every day. Every month I'll put up a set on my Flickr site featuring one image from each day. Ill provide some commentary for each photo in the podcast. These are not meant to represent the best of each day, or the best I can do, rather some thought or lesson I learned from the shoot. Check out the show notes on the blog.
The origin of this show is the result reading this post by photographer Eric Kim about the process of running an online critique, such as they have on Flickr and elsewhere. In this show I use his post as a starting point and looke at ways of running a critique face to face with individuals or groups the benefit both sides.
Futher show notes and transcript are on the blog.
Here is a brief summary of the past five years of the show, with links to episodes that I think reflect the spirt of the time.
The Early Years Jan 2007 - April 2008 (Episodes 1 thru 86) #1 Looking for learning
- I’ve already spent a year planning my first day of school at CDIA and here are the reasons why.
#6 Wk1 – Working with the DVX100
- The early, heady days of information overload. Geek out!
#36 Wk26 – Production Audio
- Another technical introduction to recording technology and some nitty gritty details on how to respectfully place the lav mic on a person’s body
#71 Wk51 On Location
- In the middle of shooting a short project with actors, directors and crew, oh my!
The Crucible May - September 2008 (Episodes 87- 115) #87 Wk63 Shooting
- Work begins on my final film. I can’t look!
#106 Rough Screening
- Criticism and pressure don’t mix well
#114 Panic on Day Zero
- Meeting the deadline.
Before the Fall October 2008 - January 2009 (Episodes 116 - 123) #121 Ruff Cutz Film Conference
- Showing my wares
#122 Thoughts while I edit
- More navel gazing
The Wilderness Years February 2009 - October 2011 (Episodes 124 - 169) #130 Catching the Big Fish
- After things are finished, I quiet down and reflect, I realize how much of filmmaking is a mind game. Direct David Lynch’s book is good food for thought
#132 Handmade Film Screening
- 100 plus people show up to see my film and ask me questions afterward
#147 Job Fair
- I went to a job fair
#162 Say yes
- Attitude and grit
#163 Video in a Day
- On location at Plimoth Plantations
One step forward, two steps back October 2011 - November 2012 (Episodes 170 - 227) #170 NaPodPoMo starts today - #199
- National Podcast Post Month where you commit to posting a show a day. Just to shake out my complacency
#205 Richard Harrington – From Still to Motion
- A recorded presentation by Richard Harrington about his book on the DSLR Video workflow
#212 Blink – Book review and editing advice
- Review of an excellent book about learning and creativity
#213 Privacy, Anonymity and Success
- How to be your own superhero
Arrival December 2012 - January 2013 (Episodes 228 - 241) #230 Milestone
- Looking back and moving forward
#235 DSLR Video: Interview with Howard Phillips
- A very rich conversation with an entertaining and experienced cinematographer about the role DSLRs can play in filmmaking
#240 Trying to get the feeling
- Coming out of the brain fog
The year is done and the future looks bright. Read the show notes and the transcript to this show
Many years down the Twitter road and I'm still without any motivation to tweet. I picked up some encouraging information at a recent THATCamp in Providence last week that I hope will get me on the right track. Check out the show notes.
In this second installment of my interview with Susan Murphy, we talk exclusvely about PAB, the annual New Media event that takes place every year in June in Ottawa Canada. It's not merely about media, it's more fundamental, focusing on ideas and the power of storytelling. If you missed the last episode, check out the first part of the interview, where we talk about creativity and Susan's experience attending Creator Camp a little over a year ago in Ottawa.
You will find a full set of show notes and links on the Video StudentGuy blog.
This is the last year for PAB and while you can search on the site for posts about my experiences attending years poast, there's no substitute for being there. This is your last chance.
It takes place June 8-11 but there's still time to register. I liviein southern New England and it's a good 8 hours or so to get there, but It's more than worth the time and effort.
Susan Murphy is my guest for a conversation about how unconferences, particularly Creator Camp, can provide a lot of professional, personal and fun experiences whether you're into social media or no. Full show notes and links at the main site, Video StudentGuy dot com
Howard Phillips is an accomplished cinematographer, filmmaker, media technologist and teacher. I met Howard when I was a student in the Filmmaking program at Boston University' CDIA where he was Associate Director of the program. Over the years I have relied on him for his clear and deep knowledge of film history and technology as well as his insights into the future of filmmaking.
You will find show notes and links on the main blog.
This episode is the Q&A that followed Dr. Bob Arnot speaking at Rule Camera in late February about being an independent multimedia journaliist. read the previous post for more information about Rule Camera and links to Dr. Bob's work.
if you're an aspiring filmmaker or journalist you'll find a lot of interesting information on how to chart your own course in the choppy waves of new media distiribution. He's very pragmatic, but also very hopeful and I really enjoyed the diverse range of questions that were asked. To his credit, he didn't skip a beat and was always ready with an answer.
You can reach me via email or leave a comment on the blog
If you know anything about Dr. Bob Arnot you know if from his role as chief medical correspondent for CBS news in years past. Since I haven't watched TV through the airwaves for two or three years I didn't know he had moved on. You can find out more about Dr. Bob on YouTube. He's also on MOJO HD TV as Dr. Danger.
Dr. Bob is an entertaining, electric personality with lots of stories to tell and you won't find anthing less in the appearance he made recently at Rule Camera in Boston MA. Thanks to Rule for bringing Dr. Bob to Boston and for allowing me to post this recording. Check out their Vimeo Learning Lab Series where they post recordings of all their evening and daytime training events. The video recording of this event should appear online in a few days.
He spoke almost two hours in front of a packed house and spent more time following that speaking to individuals. I have broken this recording into two sections. The first one is his presentation and the second one is a slightly longer Q&A
One production note, I am starting to post audio as AAC files, which should play nice on any modern player. If you have a problem please do two things:
- Load it into iTunes, it will work there
- Let me know you're having a problem. Maybe this is a mistake.
You can reach via email or leave a comment on the main site.
Shownotes and comments here.
This video tutorial covers the Camera Raw tools that affect the luminance of images such as Fill Light, Contrast and Brightness.
Show notes and blog are on the official VideoStudntGuy blog
In today's show I'm talking about history and storytelling, a topic that was prompted by a fun podcast I just discovered, Today in Canadian History and also because this weekend PAB (Podcasters Across Borders - shhh!) is taking place in Ottawa Canada.
There may still be time to purchase tickets.
History is storytelling on a grand scale, but it's also very personal because of the way we take it to heart and wrap our lives around it. The more I understand the role of stories in our lives, the more excited I become about the creative possibilities that are open to me. And a lot of what I've learned about storytelling has been gained from attending PAB.
PAB is all about storytelling and though I won't be there this year I wish everyone the best time and I offer this post as a companion piece. My way of taking part and making a connection.
Salute
I'm making the slides and audio for people who prefer listening instead to watching.
Show notes and comments here.
A quick overview of the consistent thread that runs through the dreams in my life and where it has taken me.
Getting what you want comes down to knowing what you want and knowing who you are.
A quick ramble about listening to PAB 2010 sessions and the way in which other people's ideas spark new, different and sometimes fresh ideas in your own head.
One of the presenters I mention, Adam Gratrix references Alan Moore in his presentation and here's an extended piece written by Moore on the idea of Artist as Magician.
I'm clearing out my mental attic, trying find the meaning and purpose at the bottom of the pile.
Today's show is about Bob Goyetche and Mark Blevis' creative invention of CreatorCamp and Jennifer Navarrete's recent podcasts on creating your own unconference. An event with a focus on interdiciplinary creative learning using the unconference template.
I've got a lot to say, but I'm making it all. If you want the real details got to the CreatorCamp wiki for the December 8th show in Ottawa Canada. This is going to change everything!
Here's a list of the blogs and podcasts I refer to in the show. Check out the shownotes on this post at Videostudentguy.com for more details.
Jennifer Navarrete's blog
http://jennifernavarrete.com/
Jennifer's blog post about the changing landscape of unconferences
http://jennifernavarrete.com/blogging/and-thats-all-i-have-to-say-about-that/
Jennifer's NaPodPoMo podcast series about how to put on an unconference
http://www.cinchcast.com/epodcaster
Canadian Podcast Buffet's Podcast #168 Who Saved Civilization
http://www.canadianpodcastbuffet.ca/?p=528
Mark Blevis
http://www.markblevis.com/
Bob Goyetche
http://www.bobgoyetche.com/
Day 15 of National Podcast Post Month.
In this show I talk about the variety of ways lighting contributes to the character and the story of your video.
Minimal editing on this episode, sorry, but I ran out of time. Check out the blog for more information about the various colors of light and how to use them in a shoot.
In this show I review three movies that are an excellent resource on learning about using lights in filmmaking for anyone regardless of their skills or experience.
PODCAST PRODCUTION NOTE: I have finally aquired a domain and am also publishing this show on a self hosted WordPress site at videostudentguy.com.
If you're subscribing to this podcast through iTunes nothing has changed, but going forward, all show notes and additional information, such as embedded video, images and blogs not related to specific podcast episodes will appear only at the videostudentguy.com address. I will continue to use Libsyn, they've been a great host, there just won't be much information attached to the posts.
Here's the feed to the new blog:
http://www.videostudentguy.com/?feed=rss2
A recent performance by Michael J. Fox promoted me to think about how important are the choices that you make while you're filming are to the story you're telling. Even simple things, like changing the frame once or twice can make all the difference.
Links:
Michael J. Fox
UCONN Jorgensen Theater
Francis A. Schaeffer
No Little People
Aside from the misleading title, I'm quite serious about creating stories that leave an impact. Just one individual who is changed is a positive, constructive thing.
Election day rant aside, I'm sure everyone of the producers of those political ads feel they're trying to the same. But that frame of mind is just the point I'm making. To create something that has legs that can exist beyond a specific moment or action in time is an essential element of art.
Honestly, just trying to explain this idea tires me, it seems like arguing in a circle. Enough of this, I hope you find some meaning in what I have to say.
Here are links to some of the pictures I talk about in this episode:
Charles IV And His Family
Clothed Maja
Nude Maja
Execution of the defenders of Madrid
Saturn devouring his sons
Review of a couple Wordpress books
- Jennifer Navarrette
- Using Wordpress by Tris Hussey
- Headfirst Wordpress by Jeff Siarto
- Essential ActionScript 3.0 by Colin Moock
Phonetically based audio search tool. Works with Final Cut Pro.
Check out the site for video tutorials.
Reflections on a recent job interview on the need to keep my portfolio up-to-date and relevant to my career goals.
At Podcamp New Hampshire I attended several interesting sessions and one of them was Walter Elly's talk on Foursquare, a location based social media tool. It opened my eyes to the amazing opportunities that phones with GPS provide to both businesses and the average person. I think it's another remarkable enabling, leveling technology. I don't know if there's a video opportunity here, but I'm betting there has to be.
Do you know of any ways that video fits in this new media space?
Last night I attended a combined Final Cut Pro user group and Avid user group meeting at WGBH in Boston. There were many great presenters as is usually the case, but here I present a brief presentation by Wes Plate of Automatic Duck. He's giving a demo of a couple of his company's FCP plugins that allow the editor to transfer whole sequences flawlessly between FCP & Avid.
If you want to see more go to the Automatic Duck Site and in particular, check out this demo of the products in action. Great stuff, Thanks for making the trip out from Seattle Wes.
At Podcamp New hampshire a few weeks ago I spoke with Sarah Cortes, a creative Technology Consultant in Boston, about her recent experience at Givecamp held earlier this at the MS NERD Center in Cambridge Massachusetts. I had never heard of this unconference and if you're unfamiliar with it as well she does a great job distilling it down to it's essential value.
My computer has serious illnesses and while it's in good hands at the Apple clinic I thought this was a good opportunity to talk about ways of preparing for the inevitable separation between you and your data.
Election day at last.
The long national nightmare of political campaign commercials can finally end. For now....
The first day in a month of daily episodes, all ad hoc and little editing. Well, somewhere between a little and a lot.
The goal here, for me at least, is to get out of my rut and be as spontaneous as possible. Let's just say that my goal is to end the month producing shows along the lines of Al Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon, cleaning out the jewelry displays and tossing everything in a bag.
Let me know.
Download the slides I used for yesterday's presentation on Screencasting at Podcampt Connecticut in New Haven. You can see the show notes at my blogger site.
In the last post I attached a PDF of the slides I used for a presentation on Screencasting I delivered a few weeks ago at Podcamp Boston. In this episode I've embedded a screencast that I made from the slides and the audio I recorded during that session. I've also included just the audio, which is part of the Video StudentGuy feed and will show up on iTunes if you're a subscriber.
Chapters & Timecode:
00:00 Preface
03:50 Introduction
13:53 What is Screencasting
15:45 How to do it
21:20 Workflow
29:00 Tools
31:35 Screencast Demo
41:30 Screenflow and Captivate
44:25 Online Screencasting Software
49:10 Other Editing Tools
55:08 Suggestions from the audience
57:20 Closing thoughts
The screencast was just too large to host on my Libsyn.com account. I don't know if I'll be doing enough of these to justify upgrading my account, so in the short term I'm going to look at TubeMogul and Blip.tv as a no cost solution. I'll let you know how that turns out.
You can view the source video and also download a copy of the file here at Vimeo.
I'm going to upload an updated version of this screecast in a week's time following a presentation I'll be making in New Haven at Podcamp Connecticut. And again, a week later following a third presentation at Podcamp New Hampshire.
If your interested in screencasting I promise to make it worth your while to watch the next two screencasts because I plan to include some, maybe lots of new material. I'll note in the Chapters & Timecode section if there's new material.
Last weekend I attended Podcamp Boston 5. It was a great experience meeting new people invovled in new media. You should really attend a podcamp, or any unconference that caters to your particular profession or interest. Why isn't there a videocamp?
Yes, there were some video presentations, but only on a basic, video blogger level. I myself presented a session on screencasting, the first time I've ever done that. It was presentation rough and somewhat chaotic, which is what I expected and overall I had a great time.
I recorded that session, but I'm still editing it. I want to combine it with the the slides I used and insert a brief screencasting demo. I hope to have that completed and posted here in the coming week.
My main reason for getting this post out without a show is so I could include a download to the slides for the benefit of those attending the session and anyone else who is interested in screencasting. If you do download it, I hope you'll check this site again for the screencast, I'm sure you'll get more out of the slides that way. At least you can use the links I've included in the slides.
I've converted the slide presentation into PDF format so everyone can view it. You can download it either by clicking on the icon to the left of the title of this post, or click here. This file will appear in the iTunes feed.
Thanks for being patient, I'll talk to you later.
Paul
Here's a short explanation of the past three months Projects
- I finished a corporate promotional video for an integrated circuit manufacturer in Massachusetts. I partnered with Lou Goodman and we worked together shooting and editing the video. And I completed a 30 second commercial for the living history museum, Plimoth Plantation.
- Even as I continue to look for a full time video gig I'm still volunteering my time to shoot and edit video for my former school, Boston University Center for Digital Imaging Arts
Plans
Everything always takes more time that you think
- but I'm committed to learning how to maximize Worpress so I can transfer the Video StudentGuy site over to a self hosted Wordpress site with it's own domain. I want to develop a daily blog, add a number of interactive features and introduce video and still images.
- Once I've got that nailed, I'll move on to producing a portfolio site
- I continue to do audio production for another Podcast - The Post Movie Show
- I'm working on a series of screencasts demonstrating how to edit in FCP using mostly keyboard commands.
- I hope to turn my experiences into a presentation at some of the podcamps I've listed below.
Events
- PAB10 Ottawa - great show and great people. What can you say about those Canadians except they're so nice!
- DSLR video events through Avid, Rule and FCPUG. Lots of buzz about that I need to spend a show talking about that.
Podcamps Boston, NH, CT and Montreal in September and October
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Montreal - Sept 11 & 12
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Boston - Sept 25 & 26
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Connecticut - October 16
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New Hampshire - October 23 & 24
I'll be attending an introduction to Wordpress workshop at the Microsoft NERD Center in Boston Monday August 30.
- It's closed, but there's a presentation later that evening also at the NERD, courtesy of the Boston Wordpress Meetup Group on how to insert video into Wordpress
Here are some thoughts I had following a business workshop for artists a month ago.
There are links to come, be patient.
Organizing your media
Consistent, uncluttered, organization of media that would allow you to return to the project 3 years later and find everything even though you've completely forgotten everything about the job. Although I didn't refer to organization of files on the desktop level, I strongly suggest that you organize all your media in the same hierarchical fashion both in your editing software and your computer's hard drive.
Something else I didn't mention it in the show which I will have to discuss it at length in a later show is that a very important part of organization occurs on the other end of of production, when you're done: consolidation.
Consolidation is the process of saving out the project and all the pieces of media that was used in the projects - in one folder. This is done once you are finished and you're preparing to archive everything and take it offline.
Someday you're going to want to re-edit this video, include it in your reel, or a compilation, or just find a piece of footage that you used and consolidation is a critical, time saving process you can use to do that.
At the time I recorded this show there were two great new media events taking place in the middle of June. That has changed. Podcamp New Hampshire 2010 was scheduled to take place the weekend of June 20, Father's day weekend, but it has now rescheduled to a yet to be determined date in October. What a pain that decision must have been to the promoters. It's still a great event to keep on your radar and you should seriously consider this once the new date is finalized.
That leaves Podcast's Across Borders 2010, formerly held in Kingston Ontario, now relocated to Ottawa Ontario, June 18, 19 and 20. Bob Goyetche and Mark Blevis are the promoters of this even and you can find out more about them at Canadian Podcast Buffet. You can check out shows I've done in the past for both Podcamp NH 2009 and PAB 2009.
By the way, Podcamps take place throughout America and around the world and they're great places to meet helpful, knowledgeable creative people interested in media, social networking and online branding. You can check out the Podcamp.org site for listings of shows in your neck of the woods. Remember, Podcamps are networking seminar events where everyone, including you, is the teacher. Most of these events don't even charge a fee to attend. Don't let the price fool you though, these are top notch gatherings that will help you connect with the top thinkers in the social media and networking world.
The remainder of the show is about self promotion - your own self promotion. After attending a day long workshop about business strategies for the artist, sponsored by the Connecticut Commission for the Arts I came away a number great ideas to consider. I'll talk about the sessions I attended in another show. There were three separate seminars presented in Connecticut this past spring and you can hear the recordings online on their site. Recordings of sessions from the May 1st event I attended have not been uploaded yet, so keep checking.
In the remainder of the show I talked about the power of talking about your plans with other people and how that helps shape and propel your vision. Making your dreams come true is also a creative act and it begins when you speaking them out loud.
In a recent episode of Spark, the CBC Radio and podcast show, Nora Young talked with Anand Giridharadas (14:59-24:25) about the nature and perils of personal branding. It's part of a larger show about about online identities and as always the people at Spark do a great job bringing insight into the way technology is effecting our busy lives daily.
As is often the case, the segment on personal branding made me think about my own difficulties realizing my online brand and the difficulties that content producers have being their own marketers. Because of the "always on", "global nature" of online branding the burden of time to position yourself for success is greater than in the physical world. Or maybe it's just a perceived burden. That's the question I have.
Now that a lot of the content we produce, whether it's books, illustrations, animations, video or music, podcasts and other audio, is online, how much additional time can we, as producers afford to devote to marketing ourselves?
I'm trying, but I still feel like I'm just getting out of the gate. How are you using your precious free time to promote yourself online?
Other links:
Dan Schawbell - Me 2.0
http://personalbrandingbook.com/
Krop - Online portfolio site
http://www.krop.com/creativedatabase/
A Day in the Life of Plimoth Plantations
Hey, it's been a while. I should have gotten this out a few weeks ago but I"ve been running flat out. I think that's a sign of success of some kind. I'm not certain.I'm working on a number of different video projects in various stages of production, doing the video production internship at CDIA and producing another podcast each week, The Post-Movie Podcast.
On Monday January 25, from 10:30am to 8:00pm I started and finished a short video of a day in the life of Plimoth Plantation.
I believe the real lessons I've gained from this experience are the things the director and I did right. Creating a finished video in one day is not an ideal job by any stretch of the imagination, although I had a lot of fun - you can't approach a project like this without a sense of adventure and a come-what-may attitude.
Producing this video does force you to focus on the bare essentials and requires that you be very prepared before you begin. Storyboard or shot list was essential. Script or story also had to be nailed down ahead of time as well. All of that lead to a focused shoot and really really spare coverage. We were constantly moving, dodging the rain, shooting about 8 or 9 locations, none of which I had previously seen. Being mentally prepared and trusting your equipment is also critical.
My point is, none of the things I've just mentioned are unusual requirements for any video you need to produce. A situation such as this only demonstrates how critical they are to keep on schedule.
The deadline was real because we needed to post it to a TV station's site before midnight in order for it to be considered for inclusion in a future broadcast of a Boston show, Chronicle.
On Thursday February 18 Chronicle did a best of submissions from January 25 and I was told, thought I didn't see it firsthand, that this video did show. Good exposure for Plimoth Plantations, I don't know how much bragging rights there is in it for me. But I'm happy.
I hope you enjoy it. If you'd like any further information about the production process, let me know.
Hey I need some Help!
I've got a number of ideas for shows coming up and one of them is figuring out rates for freelance videography. I can tell you information on the web is skimpy and I'm not getting a lot of feedback from the few people I know who are doing this, just generalizations.
Could I ask you to email me at videostudentguy.gmail.com with your ideas, or experience you've had pricing jobs? I'd appreciate also if you told me what kind of video is was, such as corporate, non profit, weddings or other social events. Also any anecdotes about difficulties you had justifying your rates. In the current economy I hear that a lot of the suppositions regarding what people are willing to pay has changed drastically from just a year ago.
Let me know.
I thought I would give you an update on my busy schedule. In last weeks, last year's show I give you a list of things that I learned last year that were important to me, to my work and my career in digital video.
How busy I currently am is directly related to degree to which I'm engaged with other people. In other words networking. I don't have time to go into great detail, but I try to make the point that you won't get very far in meeting your goals if you don't say yes to people who ask for help, even if means getting little or no money in return.
Also, I want to plug a podcast I started producing - recording and editing, back in late November. The Post Movie Show is a conversation among Boston film critics about movies. I like it, not so much because I want to know about the movies, though they do cover a wide range of films, because I appreciate their insights into what makes a movie a good movie to watch. This isn't a show about the latest coolest movie - opinions run high and are often hotly debated, but if you interested in listening to informed opions in humorous doses, I think you'll like it a lot.
I've got some end of the year reflections in this show. I've had a busy year, full of a variety of different jobs. I've learneda number of things that are important to keep in mind for anyone who is looking to enter the video production playground.
Even if you're already looking, as I am, I hope you can use some of these personal insights to keep yourself moving ahead. Here's a list as a reminder, but listen to the show:
• Let time do the heaving lifting
• Work for free, but not for nothing
• Life is not a zero sum game
• Be bold
• Surround yourself with motivated people
• Network, a lot
• Say yes first
• Persevere
• Be positive about things you can't control
• Know your value
• Learning is cumulative
• Share your goals with others
• Ask for help
• Learn to trust yourself
• Don't compare yourself to other people
• Define success for yourself
I've been busy over the holidays producing a new podcast. It's called the Post-Movie Podcast and it's a conversation between two film reviewers on recent films. Radical right?
I've also have a lot of irons in the fire production-wise and I hope to tell you more about it in upcoming shows. I'm going to be busy for a while.
Black Friday is the mega shopping day in the United States, the day after Thanksgiving day. Stores open at 4am, even earlier and there are lines and crowds of people hours before the stores open.
The sound is a little poor, but hopefully this explains why I missed posting for a couple days.
On my way home in the rain on Thanksgiving eve I stopped in at the local turnpike service center and spoke my mind.
You get what you pay for and tnstaafl (there's no such thing as a free lunch)
If you want to put your video on the web and you don't know a lick about website creation, look into Wordpress.
Producing media and distributing it online requires a platform that provides a base from you can attract interest and develop a community. I think its fair to say that self promotion on the internet is not a common skill set of most production oriented media producers. One of the best ways to step into this critical space and feel as though you have some control over the process is to produce a blog using Wordpress.
Wordpress is one of many different blogging software platforms, such as Typepad, Blogger and Drupal, however I think it is the best combination of flexibility, power and accessibility for non web developers. There's a tremendous amount of learning resources for the uninitiated, with tutorials for the beginner at Wordpress.org and online in general. Even easier, you can go to Wordpress.com, create an account and start blogging in 10 minutes. There is even a video channel, Wordpress.TV that offers up a hefty dose of information for newbies.
There are meetups that take place all over the country, all over the world! I just found a Wordpress meetup in Boston that I'll be attending next month. Last month there was presentation by Adam Wood on how to customize a theme called Atahualpa which you can follow here. I found an interesting review of Thesis, another popular theme, containing lots of information about how a good theme simplifies blogging.
The really valuable thing about Wordpress is that is is more than just a blogging tool. It's a content management system (CMS) the organizes your content, tracks your marketing efforts and does other things CMS software does.
Finally you can attend, for next to nothing, Wordpress Camps all over the country. I just found one will be in Boston, close to where I live, in January. Even if you can't attend one, or you want to know what kind of sessions occur you can check out past unconferences online. A recent Wordpress Camp in Phoenix has some video of some their sessions, including how to put video online. Last week, about 700 attended WP Camp New York City and going by the list of sessions it must have been amazing.
I have a few thoughts I want to share, somewhat motivated by an article I read on TalentZoo, a hub for people who work in the Advertising field.
Knowledge of who you are and how to promote your value to clients are important factors in creating and sustaining a successful business.
Handmade in America
Producing a podcast includes creating a destination. There are lots of things to consider if you want to create a community around your content and demonstrate to potential sponsors you can keep them around.
Hosting sites:
- Camtasia' s Screencast.com
- Libsyn.com
- Blip.tv
- Vimeo.com
- BlueHost
A loose review of an event I attended this evening focusing on the launch of Avid Media Composer 4.0, Avid's mainstream digital video editing tool. At two thousand plus dollars it's not for everyone. But for anyone interested in a career in video and especially feature motion picture editing, it's the gorilla in the living-room.
A lot of technical stuff was presented but I've chosen to talk about a few features that I thought were particularly interesting and useful, including an open plug-in format that allows Avid to ingest media directly from AVC, P2, SxS and other solid state camera media cards without converting it to the Avid MXF file format - saving time and space on your drive.
Media Composer now allows you to store files it's using anywhere on your computer, but there are risks involved. The tracking feature allows you to stabilize the picture on the frame and it automatically resizes the image so it completely fills the width of the frame. The remarkable thing about this stabilization tracking feature is that instead of the standard practice of using one or several bright spots in the frame as reference points for holding the image in the same location, it uses the entire screen. This is better because, depending on the footage, reference point objects, usually very bright points of lights, like reflections off shiny objects, can be blocked from view during capture. Not a problem now.
The last new feature I mention is the ability to place clips on the same timeline with different frame rates. Something Apple has been able to do for a number of years. Avid says it does the conversion in realtime, faster and with better results than Final Cut Pro. There's certainly enough settings to adjust to make it so. Providing you have the time and money to figure it out.
I have overcome and more than happy to tell you about it. The DVD portion of this project I'm working on has come to a close and you can reap the fruit of my head-banging efforts in this post about DVD Studio Pro.
Not definitive by any means, but there are a few problems you could learn to sidestep if you're interested in learning.
I'm busy, I only noticed I hadn't taken care of feeding this podcast when I looked at the time and it reminded me I haven't done a thing for the show. That's how busy is.
Maybe when I'm done tomorrow I can put things in perspective. Right now I'll make another cup of tea and keep my frustration to myself.
In case you didn't know, you should get a library card. It's free, you can get just about any book, magazine, movie and lots of other stuff. If you're a student you could probably get books from outside your school delivered right to your room.
Okay, right to your dorm room is stretching it a little, but still, almost.
Controlling this wild magic
File compression. It's the last thing you do at the end of the project, but it should be among the top things to consider and settle with your client before you begin. Otherwise, things could be very dark indeed.
Reflections on the cost of war from newspapers, podcasts, twitter and magazines. Check out the link to the November 11th post No Mood Swing and listen to Valerie read the Toronto Star article about the Boys of Major Street.
- No Mood Swing Remembrance Day Post
- Newsweek - Could have won
- Newsweek - Beware Revisionism - John Kerry
- John Kerry Swift boat controversy
Review of the Sony XDCAM EX-1
Ergonomics, slow motion and media
I recorded the review of this camera before I began the One a Day series and I'm not going to hold on to it until December. Since making this recording I've been able to use this camera several times and it's been a real pleasure.
It's well designed and I believe that's
why it hasn't been difficult to learn how to use it. The media is easy
to use, really not that much different from the P2, but it feels more
comfortable to work with. I mentioned the Hoodman in this episode as a low cost replacement for the SxS from Sony. Kensington also has a low cost alternative you should look into.
* CDIA
* Over/Under crank (slow motion)
* Keystone Cops
* Creative Cow Pros and Cons between P2 and SxS
* Wikipedia article on HDV and different screen resolutions
* Thorough review of the EX-1
One Thought leads to another.
Clear Blue Skies - CSN
George Carlin - Ecology: The Planet is Fine
Patty Duke in the Miracle Worker
Helen Keller - Social Activist turned lap dog
I attended an Boston Avid User Group meeting which was held at WGBH in Boston. The speaker, Steve Audette is a veteran producer and editor on programs such as Nova and Frontline. He is an excellent entertaining and informative presenter with a lot of valuable insights into editing
Conversations That Matter
Handmade in America
Session:
* Wordpress
* Boston Wordpress Meetup Group
* Boston Wordcamp January 2010
Session:
Social Media Levels the Media Distribution Field
Presenters:
* Amy Greenlaw
* Leslie Poston
* FilmPop
Example of artist who has successfully promoted herself through social media:
* Imogene Heap
Social Media resources for independent filmmakers:
* KickStarter
* Chip in
* Indie GoGo
* openIndie.com
Podcamp NH 2010 June or July
Podcamp NH 09
Location:
New Hampton School
Distributed video production podcast:
Spidcast
Session:
Brandcasting
Dan Freund
Podcamp NH 09
http://podcamp.uptownuncorked.com/blog/
Spidcast
http://spidcast.com/
Dan Freund
http://kinneyhill.com/v4/
Spontaneity, serendipity and simplicity.
Today I'm beginning an experiment simply because I was challenged by a podcast. Listening to Description: Valerie in Toronto, a podcaster I met at Podcaster's Across Borders, held in Kingston this past June. I learned about a challenge to podcasters called National Podcaster's Post Month, where people are encouraged to post their podcast every day through November and keep it under 10 minutes.
I don't know what the other restrictions for posting are, but it doesn't matter because it's November 6 and I'm posting on my host not theirs, so I can do what I want.
But it's not simply because of Valerie's post that I'm choosing this challenge. I picked up a book recently by Chris Orwig, a photographer and teacher, which I mistakenly referred to as Visual Photography, a bit redundant that, right? It's called Visual Poetry and his premise is seeking ways to reinvigorate, inspire and step outside your creative routine. Take some risks.
So talking without the intention of editing, without even a clear idea of what I plan to say is a big risk for me and I'll post as consistently as I can, each day from this point forward until my I reach the limit on my server or I can't take it anymore. I don't even think I'll write these long show notes. I'll just try to keep everything to a minimum. Just the links maybe, like CBC Radio Spark Episode 90.
I'm using the last show as a starting point for this show, about an idea I want to put out there for helping students learn how to better produce content and how to produce better content. I believe school is the place where this learning can and should take place, but it's success depends on how well it's presented and maintained. You'll have to listen to learn more.
At the end I give a brief review of two books, Here Comes Everybody, by Clay Shirky and The Rise of the Creative Class, by Richard Florida. They're not light reading but I think each one has something important to say about how the internet is changing the way we produce media.
This show is about two experiences that were bouncing around in my head and collided. First, a podcast about technology and second,, conversations with educators lead me to consider the necessity of providing some kind of multimedia literacy as part of the higher education experience. Sort of like directed play in the schoolyard to avoid bullying.
My thought is not only how to produce content that hits the intended mark, but also present the impact and responsibilities, both personally and to others that being a broadcasting entails.
There was a time when it was rare and seemingly ridiculous to require students to attend schools with a computer. Not so ridiculous now. I think the time is coming to accept the responsibilities that private broadcaster carries. I don't have any solutions to offer, but I think we should be thinking about this.
Here are some links to people and places mentioned in the show.
- Adam Weiss
- On The Log # 73 & 74
- Adam Engst
- Tidbits
- Podcamp Boston 4
- Podcamp.org
Listening to this show and trying to reach from what I know to what the least informed person knows is very difficult. It's hard to record a session of me talking off the cuff, just using notes, because I end up using a lot of shorthand without explain things. I need a glossary.
I don't have one, but I have included some brief explanations of some of the video codewords I've mentioned in passing, in this show. If you follow the links you'll find more thorough descriptions. It can get pretty thick, but it really helps to know these things.
This episode begins with a recent revelation about my goals and future direction as a filmmaking professional. I've also included details I've gleaned from blogs, podcasts and presentations at a recent meeting of the Boston FCP User's Group.
This has been a busy summer of media events. I've attended Podcamp Boston 4, Podcaster's Across Borders in Kingston Ontario, the Boston Media Makers get together which meets in Jamaica Plains the first Sunday of every month and the annual Avid Summer BBQ.
I wanted to attend Podcamp Montreal, which takes place in a couple weeks, but I think I need to stay at home. There is also a Podcamp New Hampshire, taking place in Portsmouth in November.
It was at the Boston Final Cut Pro User's group that took place in August that I saw Philip Hodgetts present an overview of new features for FCP7. I've also included information I've gleaned from Apple's FCS site and the Digital Production Buzz. You can also find video tutorials online that demonstrate what the new features are in all applications within the suite.
One of the warm up presentations that I thought was particularly noteworthy was for Mocha for FCP from Imagineer Systems. Check out the link above for videos that explain image tracking and rotoscoping in a way that will quickly make sense. Here's my abbreviated version:
Imagine you're seeing a movie and there's a scene at a football stadium. There's a huge video screen that shows instant replays and and short commercials. The people who made that movie didn't record the information on that screen when they shot the footage of the stadium, they inserted their own footage on the screen in the editing suite. Maybe an advertisement for a product that they're getting paid to place in the movie.
In a still image you can select the space inside the frame of the jumbotron and remove it and insert what ever image you choose. In a moving image, the shape of the screen and position of the screen in the frame is changing in every frame if the camera is moving.
You accomplish this difficult task by marking places in the frame that are always visible (bright white points usually) and then making sure they remain in place as the camera pans across or zooms out. Now that you've got the location of the anchor points, you create a mask that fits inside the screen area of the jumbotron and then make sure that mask is linked to those anchor points that are being tracked. That is called rotoscoping. Then you drop in your video and make it look like it was always there.
For sure, that's a gross simplification, but I hope it gets the idea across.
The new version of the Final Cut Suite (no number, should be #3 tho) include new feature updates for all the produces (except for DVD Studio Pro), but Philip was there to cover just Final Cut Pro 7.
Because I clumsily referred to ProRez 422 in passing, give me a moment to explain what an intermediate codec is and what 422 color space and 4444 refers to.
A color space is the limited range of color that can be viewed from the entire spectrum of color. Humans can see a wide swath of color between ultra violet and infra red (violet to red). Some insects and animals can see beyond that range. Mechanical devices, like monitors and cameras and capture and display color in a variety color spaces depending on type of color space. HSB (Hue Saturation and Brightness) is one space, RGB (Red, Green and Blue) is another.
Video cameras generally use a color space called YCC, which is roughly RGB. The Y is the luma quality and the two Cs are the chroma, or color qualities. Those are the three values in a camera that shoots 4.2.2.
Our eyes are more sensitive to luma than chroma, so in a 4.2.2 color space there's twice as much luma, or light, as there is color. Web and DVD video use a 4.2.0 space and the DV standard uses 4.1.1.
Think of the 3 areas of information captured by a 4.2.2 camera as distinct channels of light or color. Like channels in photoshop. There is 4th channel of visual information which cameras won't capture because it is created in post production, the alpha channel.
Alpha channels are used in Photoshop, After Effects and Final Cut Pro are an additional layer of information that can be used to remove areas of the frame so that something else can be seen through it. Or it can act as a selection area of a moving object in the frame so an effect or filter can be applied to it.
Hold that thought for a moment and let me move on to a codec. Among other things, it's a software program that compresses a moving digital image. There are a variety of codecs that compress video as a camera records it, and decompresses it as a DVD player plays it. It's a lossy process, which means digital information is lost when it's compressed. The greater compression, the more minutes of video can be shushed into a gigabyte of storage space.
Still with me?
There are a lot of codecs out there and the variety is necessary because of how you're using them. Camera codecs need to compress data a certain way to retain the most information to fit on the storage medium, tape, drive or solid state card. Cameras are capturing video for one purpose only, to store it. You aren't using it, cutting it into pieces, so it can squeeze it really tight.
Cutting video in a codec designed for camera capture, particularly HDV, is not a pleasure to cut. It's doable, but has problems that I'm not going to get into. If you're producing a feature length movie or TV video you want to work in a codec that will give you more freedom to edit. That's what an intermediate codec is.
One codec for capture, another for playback (sometimes the same one) and one in-between for the edit. Prorez is an intermediate codec.
You capture the video from the camera as you do normally, then select the footage in FCP and then convert it to a Prorez codec.
Hang in there, I'm coming to the end.
When you convert footage captured by a camera using a codec using the 4.1.1 or 4.2.0 color space to, say, Prorez 4.2.2, does that mean you're getting a better quality out of the footage you shot?
No!
Footage captured in every DV or HDV camera is being compressed on the fly using whatever color space the camera uses. That compress, being lossy discards anything that doesn't fit. So when you convert it to a high resolution color space, it's got a bunch space it isn't using. When you shake it, you can hear it rattle.
So why would you convert it to the 4.2.2 space, or for that matter, 4.4.4?
One reason is these other codecs have other characters that make it more efficient for your editing software to edit, render and export the video. More importantly though, and this IS the reason you would use Prorez 4x4 (4.4.4.4) is that anything else you add, a still image, motions graphics from After Effects or Motion, or 3D animation from Maya or 3D Studio Max will be added at their full, mostly likely higher color and image resolution.
These additional elements, even something as simple as title text have to be massaged by various filters and often moved in and out of other programs to make them feel like they're as real as the realness of the video footage. Have a space that allows you to work with the maximum amount of resolution of color and pixel depth offers the kind of control the people with the big bucks are looking for.
You and I are just lucky that we don't have to have big bucks to get into this party.
As hard as that was to read, and I congratulate you if you got this far, it was no picnic figuring how to say it. And be careful, don't use this in your research paper.
I'm not going to put links to all this stuff. I've put out the bare bones. If you need to know more you can look it up for yourself.
I hope it's been useful.
You can find pricing for educational software at Journey Ed and Academic Superstore. I've used them both and they're fast.
Mike Jones at Digital Basin has a good review of the suite upgrade, including what's missing. And check out the Film School Drinking game which I found in the same article. It's an education in itself.
Finally, if you're on the fence about getting the Snow Leopard update, Leo Laporte and his gang of usual suspects provide a definitve thrashing of the pros and cons in #156 of Macbreak Weekly.
This week's show is the second part of my thoughts about craft and art, this show focusing more art.
Right off the bat let me confess that not once did I get the title of the book by John Carrey that I keep refering to, which is What Good are the Arts. Terrible oversight on my part and while there is no defense let me repeat that the book and it's correct name is less important to my remarks than the thoughts and ideas that were spurred by it. With that in mind, here's a link to The Craftsman by Richard Sennett. I think it has a lot to say about methods of producing quality work for anyone, including filmmakers.
The great thing about having all these diverse sources of information and opinion is not so much the opportunity to learn as it is the ideas and where they take me, and the things I think and believe.
I generally find that I come to understand what I think and believe by saying it out loud, either to myself, to others or to you in this time shifted fashion. There's a monitor in my head as the words come out that evaluate the rightness of what I'm saying against what I think. Sometimes when they are at odds I find that what I have said is more true to what I believe than what I was actually thinking. The sense of smell and taste comes to mind as a comparable experience. Often they are very different experiences and one or the other will become the defining sensation.
So despite how dense, or confusing this all may sound, I found it necessary to work it out, out loud and as I say in the end, I have a better understanding of how I think and feel on this subject, for the present time.
But I feel a need to say these things not only to clarify my own thoughts, but because this is an important issue we all have to face and settle for our own selves. Everyone in the world is a creator and the more culture and technology enables anyone to share to larger groups of people, the more the question of craft versus art comes back at us.
Speaking of which, I'm currently reading a fascinating book, Here comes Everyone by Clay Shirky. It addresses the impact of social media on creativity and the changes it has had and will continue to have in the future. You should read it.
Finally, as I was putting together the links for this post I came across a comment (goodreads.com) from a reader of John Carrey's book who was disappointed that they didn't finish the book with clearer understanding of what art is. Diana commented that his definition of a work of art is 'anything that anyone has ever considered a work of art'. She goes on to say, "In other words anything, and correspondingly, nothing" A few more thoughtful reviews are found on the Times Online, Denis Dutton Online and The Reason Online.
This perspective, which is the cultural norm, that calling something art acts as a qualifier, sieve, gate and value judgment. Defining art is like separating the sheep from the goats. Not only does this approach lead to fruitless and unending debate, I think it's destructive and wrong.
I couldn't find a way to artfully add a couple links into the show notes, so I'll just list them here:
The Emoti-Chair
CBC Spark episode # 71 about the Emoti-Chair
Here's the transcript of the show, it may or may not help.
Let me know what you think.
Hi, and welcome to the Video StudentGuy show, the weekly journal of a video student. I'm the guy, Paul Lyzun.
This is the second part to a show I posted a few weeks ago, Show #128, which was about Craft. In this show I'm gong to be talking a little bit more about art and some more about craft,
I began that show by talking about the path you might follow to make a film. I just wanted to sum it up in a tight little package, from my own narrow little perspective.
Along the way I got lost talking about craftsmanship. I don't apologize for wandering off the path, craftsmanship is the subject of my recent film. Craftsmanship is integral to filmmaking, and for myself, the duality of Craft and Art has been a lifelong tug of war.
I think I did a passing fair explanation of what I felt craft was, and by implication, what it's value is. I'll work hard not to go over the same ground in this episode. Let me just mention one more time how much I enjoyed the book, The Craftsman, by Richard Sennett, and if you are at all interested, as I am, in the meaning of art and craft, particularly what it means in your creative process, I strongly recommend you find a copy and read it a couple times.
The last two things I mentioned in episode #128 that leads into today's portion of the conversation are that art, or better and broader yet, creative expression, is a form of communication, and the other is the question and the book that bears the name, What is Art Good For, by John Carey.
Let me start with the idea that I got form the book, which is what good is art for? Let me start with the idea that was spawned by the book, which is, what is art good for?
The first thing I'm going to do is dispense with the word Art – it's a loaded word meaning everything and nothing. Just trying to narrow it's definition would take more time than it's worth.
I'm going to use "it" in exchange for Art and you can assume when I say "it", I'm saying Art.
I want to start off that way because it eliminates preconceived ideas of creativity. It eliminates pictures of what is not art and removes the risk of applying taste and prejudice (same thing? you decide) to the topic.
That frees me up for a few minutes to look at the question itself, which is really very telling.
To rephrase the question, "what is it good for" is a universal and a common, commonly asked question. It places the focus on the practical and pragmatic. Things exist because they perform a function. In a Darwinian sense, you could say things exist because they're food for something else, or are means of avoiding being food. Every detail in the construction and appearance of everything has a purpose. I believe that's true whether you believe in a higher power or the evolutionary process, or both. This isn't about who's responsible, this is about dealing with the way things are.
So, asking what is it good for implies there must be a purpose, that things exist for a reason. As I just describe, I concede they do exist for a reason.
Imagine that I made something. At a very minimalist level it is good for being the result of an effort of realizing an idea in the real world, the world outside our minds. We're thinking things all the time. Making stuff up that never was, and is not. But when someone takes an idea and makes it, physically, it becomes separate from the maker, beyond their control.
Now, why would anyone want to do that? Well, perhaps to get a more concrete grasp of this idea, Looking at it externally allows me to refine it's nature until it matches my expectations OR it changes the way I think.
Once I put an idea in the physical world, my mind isn't solely in control of it's idenity. The world that we both occupy now has some claim to it's meaning and in the process I can change as well as it can.
The thing I made changes me.
THAT, is the real power of creativity!
Being able to change yourself.
That makes it worth the effort alone, just to experience change in how I perceive the world I live in.
But it doesn't end with communicating with the world separate from myself. When I put it out there in a world of other individuals I open it and myself up to further change through the reactions of other people and how they view themselves and the world, the same world I live in objectively, but not subjectively.
It's a means of expressing a human experience and a means of sharing a human experience
Sounds complicated eh?
Well, getting back to the main question, what is it good for?
It's good for changing myself, changing other people – changing the world.
What is it again?
It is art, it is creativity, it is human expression, it is communication.
Everything changes all the time. Scale isn't the issue. We are bombarded, shot through every iota of a moment with information that changes our world view and I'm guessing here, but I wouldn't be surprised if someone told me we don't register most of it.
So the volume and the scale, it doesn't matter very much. Everything changes, all the time. You can't take it all in.
That's why we're all different right, we are the sum of what we choose to perceive.
Now, lets get a little more concrete. I want to talk about the book "What is Art Good For? by John Carey.
Because once we get past the abstract, fundamental view I've just presented, things get immediately sticky and oh so thick. Watch out that you don't loose a shoe in the mud.
I have not read this book, I'll tell you right up front and as long as I'm being honest I'll say that in all likelihood I won't.
I think I would enjoy his writing and find I would agree with a lot of what he has to say. I just don't have the time or inclination. I'm not saying this a means of passing judgement on his book, it's just a matter of personal bandwidth.
By all accounts John Carey is a good writer and very convincing in his arguments. He is witty, intelligent and dead on in his ability to deconstruct and lay bare the self serving mystification of the art establishment. His books are a pleasure to read. One author thought he was just a little too forgiving in his appraisal of the one medium he feels is superior, but overall, he thinks that it's a good book.
I've read a number of reviews and I've put a couple links on the blog page if you'd like to read them as well. After several different articles read, I feel I can made some generalizations (obviously without having read the book) and offer this simple, perhaps unfair generalization.
He says that the art culture is pompous and hypocritical
and that greatest art is literature.
See the time I saved you!?
The primary reason I'm discussing it here is to present an alternative view to his perception that all other creative works are subordinate to literature. And since I haven't read his book I'm not going to indict him personally, he may very well feel misunderstood on that count, I just want to use his premise as a jumping off point for this idea of a hierarchy in value to art – that there's always a pecking order.
The more we embrace technology in our lives, the further we become removed from our origins, the places and things that have shaped us as human beings over our time here on earth. Despite the pervasiveness of the technology surrounding us today, it still doesn't have the same impact on the way we think act and feel as "natural" environmental shapers.
So, we've surrounded ourselves with an environment of our own making – which is alien to us in a historically cultural sense. Plastic, steel concrete – they register in our higher functioning brain, but not in our unconscious mind, which got us by for hundreds of thousands of years before we began collecting together to build farms, towns and cities.
The invention of writing and the ability to read has had a profound impact on our culture, both as a means of advancing it, and archiving it. Certainly our success in living in an artificial environment is due mainly in part to reading and writing. But whatever we've read, whatever has been written, is a memory that connects us to a real experience of something we've felt, touched, smelled, seen and heard at an earlier time. I believe these senses are more immediate and transfer information to our brains in a more visceral and direct way. And yet, the further we move into the future, the less exposure we have to these sense touchstones. It's sort of like living without knowing what the midnight sky looks like without light pollution.
How much are we really missing? How much are we really separated from the past, from the real world in terms of the artificial world that we've created for ourselves?
Well, if you're honest, you know you can't beat a tornado. The best you can do is hunker down with Auntie Em. And how different is that from hiding from a tiger in a cave.
Of course it can be rightly said that writing presents information in an organized manner. After all, how valuable can art be that slips by your conscious understanding and sits like undigested meat in your colon until it finally integrates into your body you're not even aware of the cause of any change that's taken place? Or that change has taken place.
Actually, I think change that occurs without knowing is an an awesome power.
So think about music, the texture of a basket or the smell of a leather coat. It's a message organized in a different way. Nonlinear, holistic.
And you could say that writing has achieved a greater cumulative scale in meaning than any other media, but I reject the importance of volume and scale, in favor of the specific impact a creative work can have on an individual.
Let me use a specific instance to clarify what I mean about this unique effect that non verbal art can have on different individuals.
About communication through the other senses
Spark #71
http://www.cbc.ca/spark/2009/03/episode-71-march-25-28-2009/
I listened to a show called Spark . It's from CBC Radio in Canada. It's a great show. Each show has several stories of different length about current and bleeding edge technology and how it's transforming people's lives. I like it mainly because, although it's all about technology, it dares to find ways in which technology is changing the way we live – as we're living it. Right now! That, is cool.
One of the stories in a recent episode, episode number 71, was a conversation about the creation of an emoti-chair, a device which produces electrical impulses, tiny shocks, that are triggered by the sounds in music.
When you sit in this chair it actually – it can actually feel like something is touching you. The creators of this technology have developed a new form of expression based on the sense of touch.It has begun to morph quickly. One example is that deaf people can sense music in a greater dimension.
Someone who was deaf described how at a party everyone who couldn't hear would hear the music through feeling the vibrations, barefoot, through the wooden floors. The difference with the emoti-chair is that each instrument creates a different sensation. Instead of all of the music coming through as one vibration, you had different vibrations at different locations on the chair, which of course affected different parts of your body. For each instrument. This mechanism allowed a deaf person the ability to experience music through assimilating multiple layers of sensation, in this case tactile, which mirrored closely the manner in which a hearing person experienced music through their ears.
Another person, one without hearing limitations found that the emotional impact of the music was intensified with the combination of the sensations that were generated by the emoti-chair. It literally brought her to tears in a way the music did not.
Finally, a musician who was composing music for the chair found that he was able to elevate the effect that the chair on the senses, not by writing a great song, but writing the music based on the sensations produced by sitting in the chair.
So the chair itself was his feedback loop, not his ears.
Is this any less the impact that literature has? Is the argument that literature is more powerful as a single force and to the greatest number of people because of it's ability to cross reference itself and establish a more cohesive, inter-referential whole? Is it because it's easier to document and catalog it's impact that sets it apart in value from all other forms? Is it the consistency of the media over generations that makes it easier to judge?
Okay, this is where you're saying, well Paul, you should just read the book and find out. Find out why he thinks that way!
Well, my point at it's very heart is that any creative expression has to be judged on it's own and by an individual.
So, the first point is that there's all this bogus mysticism about art, and it's being propped up by museums, and art collectors, and art speculators and so forth. That has, for generations and hundreds of years even, affected the way we perceive art. Remember, there was a time when art and craft were one thing. They were just simply creative expressions. At least in western culture, it wasn't until the Renaissance that they sort of split apart. And so there was a humbler form of creativity, and a higher form of creativity.
But, that was just simply a societal choice. Up to that point people didn't make that distinction and there was no need to make that distinction. And I believe very much that that was generated by money.
If people valued it and therefore they had to identify that it had a special, unique value, that set it apart. Supply and demand so to speak.
So however powerful any work of art can be, I just don't believe that there is a greatest hits of art. There is great art, there is universal art, but I think it's important to value work based on a personal level.
Just as one's knowledge and understanding of math and science is easier to measure compared to the arts in general, like in SAT scores, so society believes that's the better organized the information is, the better it represents a higher intelligence.
After all, isn't that how we were able to create a sophisticated culture? And I'm not saying that we can throw that away, but I think that it would be good to embraced that disorganized, holistic, intuitive aspect of ourselves just as much. This is what we're starving [for], currently, in our culture
So the idea of having the ability to quantify and
categorize and hierarchize and organize art - that makes it much easier
sort-of-like to build a mountain of blocks and then see which comes
upon top.
Is that the reason literature achieves greater significance over the other arts?
I'm not going to enter into that argument. I can only say that measuring the value of something through the volume of it's impact is dehumanizing. Creativity is expressed on a personal level and impressed on individuals in the same way. Hundreds of people can view a painting at a museum in a single day. Thousands of people can hear a musical performance at one time in a concert. Millions of people can watch a movie on TV simultaneously. But every person internalizes that experience on a personal level.
Painting, music, literature, origami, everything touches everyone of us in a different way at different times and while you generalize about the critical defining characteristics of one medium, you also lose a lot in the streamlining process. And in that process you disenfranchise a lot of people from a lot of creativity.
It's not just about what you see and identify as art, it's what you allow yourself to believe what you can do, as far as art. And if you think that knitting is secondary to some other art form, then you're always going to feel like a second class citizen of art. Of creativity, forget the art word.
[Streamlining, simplifying art is a form of marketing. For money, for ideology, take your pick. The honest reaction of an individual to a single creative expression cannot be calculated, summed and expressed in anything more than a gross generalization that distorts its value.]
But I'm not interested in changing the world on this point. For myself, I feel that holding this thought, this consideration, as I create, will help me keep my balance against any outside pressure of generalized, common knowledge, wisdom and understanding.
Well, now that that's over I don't think I enjoyed it very much at all. How about you? It was hard work and I don't think it makes any difference.
Well, maybe a little difference. Now that I've written this down and thought about it, I have a better idea of what I think I think, and I can consider whether it makes sense or not. I don't know about you.
After I wrote all this that I just told you, I had some other thoughts and I decided that, instead of integrating them, I'd just simply leave them as a footnote at the end .
I think the reason I'm going on and on about the idea of craft and art is this (and remember when I say art, I mean an expression of creativity and a desire to communicate):
Art with a capital A, as I've tried to identify earlier, creates a sense of heightened expectations. Somedays you don't feel inspired, you're glad you can drag your sad butt out of bed and put your shoes on the right feet.
Days like that can make you wonder if you should even put in the time. Everyone has days like that and you can't control when they happen. Frankly, I don't want to live with the weight of expectations about what I'm going to do or how well I'm going to do it, while I'm in the middle of my work. I don't want to be distracted, I want the creativity to flow out of me without any speedbumps.
That's the feeling I want, regardless of how useful, attractive or successful is the thing I end up creating. When I'm in that frame of mind, what I make is almost always good and whether it's what I want or not, it leaves me feeling good about the work and myself. And that just perpetuates more creativity.
[So I think all the talk about art is an after the fact thing. It's hindsight. Who knows how many trials, experiments or dead ends any creative person has to pass through before the finished work of art is delivered. No one wants to know, no one cares. So why do people who are making the thing itself have to think about it.]
I know, there's all kind of situations where you have to keep your eye on the deadline, measure the work you're doing against the anticipated product, keeping customers happy, keeping the business flowing.
I'm not saying you can dispense with all those voices, I only want to provide a little breathing room so we can create and build, At the same time I'm also listening to myself think, I can watch myself work, think about what I'm doing and have enough presence of mind to evaluate it, or re-evaluate it and then proceed forward to the next step.
When the focus is on craft you can have that kind of internal conversation, just you and the thing you're creating. And you can feel good about what you're doing, because you can see how you're doing.
Immediate feedback loop.
//
There's something about big people and little people when it comes to creative endeavors and I don't like the mentality that we qualify the creative value of something based on it's ROI. Yeah, we got a great economic steamroller of a system, but when I make things, I'm answering a need that places money below first place.
I'm not saying that we can live in a world where doesn't money matter, only that we should choose to live in a world where it matters a lot less than it does.
//
If you're still listening, I applaud your fortitude. Thanks for letting me talk this thing out. I think next week I'll do a short show about something superficial.
I've got links on the blog to the various podcasts, or books that I've talked about. Take a look at videostudentguy@libsyn.com. You can also leave a comment or a criticism at the website. Or you can send me an email at videostudentguy@gmail.com.
Despite how I may come off, I am interested in what you think, even if we disagree. In fact, I reserve the right to disagree with myself sometime in the future.
I'm Paul, the videostudentguy, thanks for listening,
I'll talk to you later,
in the meantime, be creative.
Bye
What's in this show:
I'm going to talk mostly about some of the events at PAB 09 in Kingston. It's been a month and I'm just now getting my thoughts down. My apologies to Bob and Mark, the show's promoters, and thanks guys, for once again producing a first class happening.
First I have some updates about my computer. Then, after I give you a quick reminder of what PAB is all about, I talk about Jowie Taylor and the Six String Nation Guitar. Check out the site, it's full of really interesting stories that I can talk about only in passing. Better yet, if you can attend an event where Jowi Taylor speaks(his schedule is right on the homepage) about this remarkable artifact, you should attend and get your picture taken holding it.
As a counterpoint to Jowi's story I discuss some sobering and pragmatic information presented by Chris Penn of the Financial Aid Podcast and Marketing over Coffee. This guy's good!
All this leads me to talking about identity, personal and national, and the power of the stories that people tell…
I'm serious about my offer to interview any Canadian expatriate, or emigrant to Canada. Send me an email at videostudentguy@gmail.com and we can talk via skype. It's easy!
Oh, if you can help me understand what to do with Twitter (@bermamot), I'd be very grateful.
This is a long show, about 45 minutes so I've listed the time-code for the sections so that if you want to get on to another subject you can scrub your way forward.
00:16 Introduction
06:47 What is PAB?
08:55 Jowi Taylor and 6 String Nation Guitar
25:04 Chris Penn
32:14 Networking 101
33:41 Social Media History
35:51 Personal History
37:29 Call to Action
40:42 Good Intentions
45:46 Close
Talking about hardware problems with my car, my own mental wiring and my laptop, leading up to attending Podcaster's across Borders in Kingston Ontario. I made it there an back, but I'll have to give you the high points in the next show.
Check out these shows,
* On the Log - Episode 68: The Sound Between the Notes
* DicksnJanes #202: postPABblab
* Being Buff # 36, Jowi Taylor PAB2009 Keynote: How a guitar brought a nation together
* Canadian Podcast Buffet will be uploading recordings of the sessions throughout the summer
Also, google PAB09. Every attendee who writes a blog or posts a podcast/vidcast will put this tag in their RSS fee.
In the process of troubleshooting problems with my laptop, using tools such as Techtool Pro, Carbon Copy Cloner and and Apple Disk Utility, the drive and the motherboard failed and an emergency trip to the Apple Store Genius Bar resulted in it being pronounced DOA.
All that I can do at this point is offer some cautionary advice on how to prepare, and deal with the inevitable computer meltdown.
Finally I go over some of the critical features I'm looking for in my next laptop.
Corrections:
- I made an error in describing the pixel dimension of the MacBook Pro 15" laptop. It is 1440x900, which is identical to the highest resolution on my PowerBook 1.67 Ghz 17" laptop.
- Also I was wrong about the price difference. There is only a $200 price difference, not $400.
- Finally, the factory warranty is one year and you can purchase AppleCare, an extended warranty for a maximum of 3 years (not 4 years). A real bargain at $350. It covers any defective parts and service to replace them.
- There are two graphics cards in both the 15" and 17' which have 2.8Ghz processors, and they function the same. There are other, slower processor 15" MacBook Pros and their hardware configurations are very different.
Here's the primary differences between the two laptops as far as I can determine right now.
15" 17"
• Cost Difference $200 less
• Two video cards Yes Yes
• Drive 500 Gig 500 Gig
• Card Slots SD ExpressCard/34
• Display Good Larger, HiRez
• Battery 7 hours 8 hours
The 17" is a good deal for the extra $200, no question about that.
In this show you can hear a recent screening of the film, Handmade in America at the Community School of the Arts in Mansfield CT.
Heather Bunnell, the Arts Coordinator of the school and Susan Gerr, one of the potters featured in my film, start off the show with introductions, as do I, to a crowd of of over 100 people.
I don't include the recording of people watching the film, but you can view the complete 20 minute film at Vimeo using the password: lorezfile.
The remainder of the show is a Q&A with the audience.
This show is a summing up of my recent experience interning at a documentary film production house as a production assistant. It was a good sized business, about 20 to 30 people, depending on the business climate. I didn't really comment about this in the show, but now, during this economic pit we're in, now has been a very good time to observe how a business like this functions.
Filmmaking may or may not be recession proof, but there's no question this time around a lot of money has dried up. I saw a lot of resourcefulness at work.
If you listen to this show I hope you'll get an idea of what an internship can offer you beyond your formal education. I also talk about some valuable lessons I learned and generalized how to go about getting what you want from this learning experience.
I have no doubts that internships aren't about the money, the time you spend or the sacrifices you make. In a nutshell about temporarily living the life you think you want. You can't see more than a small part of it, but it's a lot more than you see any other way. In the end the value you get out of it rests entirely on your effort to learn what you want.
Oh, an one correction, there is no such thing as JUST an assistant.
In the beginning of the show I mentioned I was interviewed by John Meadows for his show On the Log and we discussed the future of filmmaking. The show, Lights Camera and Interaction was broken into Part 1 and Part 2.
And I'm serious about the offer of interviewing you over Skype. If you would like to be on this show and you think you have something interesting, even half interesting, to say about filmmaking, video production, editing, motion graphics, even internship, let me know by leaving a comment here on the blog or emailing me.
I've just finished a book by David Lynch, writer and directory of many movies, including Eraserhead, Dune and Twin Peaks. Catching the Big Fish is a the author's reflections on how he has and others can find ideas, big ideas through TM, Transcendental Meditation.
But the book isn't about the workings of TM, it's about his experiences as a filmmaker trying to solve puzzles as he worked on his films.
It's a quick read and has a lot of interesting reflections in it. You won't find a lot of practical information, but you will get a glimpse of the man and the way he thinks, and what he thinks about storytelling.
I hadn't finished reading the book before I recorded this episode so I didn't get to mention that he spends a few pages talking about digital video and it's impact on him and the Hollywood film industry. I'm always interested to learn how established filmmakers view this new technology and his response is blunt and pragmatic.
Here are a few links to comments I made about another filmmaker who writes and is written about, Walter Murch. He wrote a great book about editing, In the Blink of an Eye. He was the subject of another book I highly recommend called, The Conversations: Walter Murch and the Art of Editing Film. Finally, though I haven't read it yet, I would suggest you look at, Behind the Seen: How Walter Murch Edited Cold Mountain Using Apple's Final Cut Pro and What This Means for Cinema, it's a little dated, written in 2004, but between the history and biography I'm certain it's an interesting read.
Leave a me a comment or send me an an email
Towards the end of last year I had so many things to do I switched from a weekly to a bi-weekly show. I thought I could switch back, but I still don't have enough time, so for the foreseeable future I'll work hard to get one out every two weeks.
This week is kind of short, but a lot has been happening. Following a screening of my film a couple weeks ago I got an invite to a local radio to talk about the film and pottery. I was joined by Linda Gerr of Birch Mountain Pottery, who is one of the subjects in my documentary.
By the way, send me an email and ask me for a link to the full film and I'll be glad to send it to you.There's a link in the show a one or two episodes back if you thinking looking for it is easier.'
The radio call letters are WILI, you can find the link to the audio online here (posted April 23) or you can link directly to the audio file. Watch out, it's a Windows Media file.
Bill Meems left a comment on show #86, which was about the National Association of Broadcaster's show in Las Vega that I attended and commented on this time last year. Thanks Bill. I mentioned the Digital Production Buzz show as a source of news about industry announcements during the event. I've gone for the past two years and enjoyed it a great deal, but I'm glad for the chance to take a year off.
I wanted to spend time this show talking about why I want to be a filmmaker, really, why I feel compelled to make things. I know I've covered this ground before, but I'm talking specifically about my experience as a film maker producing Handmade in America, and what it's taught me.
Unfortunately I got lost talking about the ideas behind the movie and had to stop in the middle. And I didn't intend to give a review of a The Craftsman, by Richard Sennett, but that's what I ended up doing. It's a great book for anyone who struggles with the reasons why we like to making things with our hands and served as a rudder for my vision while I worked on the film.
Most of the show is leading to a showdown between the concepts of Craft and Art.. There's a recorded conversation online with Richard Sennett and Eva Hoffman discussing how the romanticization of Art, and Craft blunts the impact of these things in our lives. It's a great discussion, but I bring it up because it refers to John Carey's book, What Good are the Arts. Although I mention it only in passing, I promise to elaborate further in the next episode and where I will in fact bring the dynamic of Craft and Art into harmony.
I have certainly been very busy, and certainly not with preparing podcasts, but that's about to change soon.
I have finally put up a gallery page on the website with production stills. The interface still needs a little neatening up, but it's working. I also found IE on PCs don't work well with the copy of the trailer that I had linked it to (it wasn't playing, it would load, but it wouldn't play.!) Rather than figure it out I loaded a new one and it seems to work. Let me know if I'm still wrong.
This show is a 15 minute ramble about things I'm doing as an intern. As you know I'm working as a production assistant at a documentary production company for a few months and I'm trying to make sense of the experience.
I think part of the problem is that I've worked in the same company for 10 years and I'm being throttled by change, down to the elementary level. That changes how you look at and think about everything. But I'm getting better. That or I'm numb.
I also have a screening at a local community center Friday April 10th. Here's a copy of the announcement (warning, it's a PDF) and if you're in the area and would like to come by - do so. And come up and talk to me to let me know you did.
For everyone else, I am ready to release the film, at least in a limited way. You can find the film here and the password is lorezfile. It's twenty minutes long and may take a while to load depending on your connection. If I already have your email address I'll be sending you an email with the same information.
If you have any feedback, good or bad, leave a comment here or on the Vimeo site.
Finally, there's going to be a local screening of the film at the Community School for the Arts on April 10. This is on the old UConn campus in Storrs Connecticut at 7:30. There is no charge, but if you can bring a baked food item that would be great. Download the flyer, which is a pdf file.
I am starting a 3 month internship this week. I'll be a production assistant at a production company in Boston, so there'll be a lot to say about that in the next few months.
The big news is that I finally have enough of a website of the film to put online. Still rough and incomplete, it felt good to put it out there, sort of draw a line in the sand.
You can find it at handmadeinamerida.us, there were no more.com's available. Send me any suggestions, really, I'm not looking for congrats here, I think it's very rough and really only in phase one. Still I would like to know if there are things I can do to make it easier to use, or I've overlooked some content I should be displaying.
It's tricky because it's not just a website, it's a website for a movie, so if it doesn't pique your interest, or satisfy it, it's not working.
There's a trailer you can watch on the Trailer page. If you're really fast it will load slowly. I'm going to be recompressing the file and uploading it to Vimeo, the hosting site I"m using, then updating the link in the next few days.
By the way, if you're curious about that process, let me know, I can spend a show talking about that too.
In this week's show I talk with Jamie Meltzer, filmmaking instructor at Stanford University. Stanford has a separate film program for documentary filmmaking and Jamie was generous with his time to tell all about it.
Stanford University Documentary Film Program
I'm still in a bunker state of mind.
This show a little catch up on the state of the film.
- How I approached creating the trailer
- Vimeo vs YouTube
- Compression artifacts, Macroblocks, compression noise
- Building a website for the film and I'm using Blue Host
I leave you with a little ramble about being done vs being finished.
Hi there, Happy New Year.
I've been hunkering down in the editing bunker through the holidays and came up long enough to leave you this note and the latest show.
My film is done. It's called Handmade in America. I'll be posting it online later this month and when I do I'll let you know now you can watch it.
I was thinking about the nature of social media and spoke about that a little bit in the show. I also wanted to let you know about a website and a podcast you should check out if you're interested learning how to make money through online distribution of your media, specifically audio and video podcasts.
Here's the links for things I mentioned in the show.
* Episode 119 of This Week in Media
* Susan Bratton - DishyMix
* Association for Downloadable Media
* Pairing Sponsors with Podcasts
* Podcast Standards for Advertisers
* Keith Burtis Interview on Social Media CPB # 125
Here are a few thoughts that have been distracting me as I hunker down and edit my film.
In case I didn't go into enough detail in the show, or worse, if all that detail confused you, let me explain a couple things.
In one segment I'm talking about the "Fishbowl" of podcasting. It's a term that has the same currency among podcasters as kleenex has within the general public. With podcasters, the fishbowl syndrome means we have created a world that is not only unique, but separated from most people. Information gets in, but nothing is getting out. And because it's comfortable there's a risk no one inside the fishbowl will make an effort do something about it. This is the same experience every avid hobbiest has, the difference is that podcasters, participating in a "social" media, where communication means community and community building, there is an evangelical weight on their shoulders.
Another term used a lot, ad nauseam really, is "monetization" which I'm not sure is a real word. Apple's dictionary doesn't recognize it. Monetization's intended meaning within the podcasting/social networking community is the process of converting you podcast/social media into a money making machine. Essentially turning your hobby into a job. That sounds like a terrible idea when you put it like that.
What makes some people roll their eyes when they hear it is that the constant request for "how to" monetize is becoming a cliche. There are a lot of facets to podcasting, and monetization is a valid piece. But it's importance is often/sometimes inflated beyond it's real stature in this emerging medium. And, I have come to believe that the fact that the con people feel this way, and the pro people continually request "how to" points to the fact that no one knows how to.
It's like the get-rich-quick telethons on weekend and early morning TV. Never the same guys, always a different method.
Links mentioned in this show:
* Avid
* Canadian Podcast Buffet
* Audacity
* Bob Goyetche
* Mark Blevis
* Phillip Pullman
* Daemons
* Eh
* Hollywood Podcast
* PAB - Tim Coyne
* VSG Tim Coyne Interview
I recently attended a filmmaker's conference that included screenings of independent films. My film was included and while that was gratifying, I found the real value was attending the filmmaker's panels and viewing other people's reactions to my and other people's films. I picked up a lot of valuable information about ways to navigate the independent filmmaking process and I've included highlights in this show.
I am preparing a number of changes on this site and an upcoming video podcast, as well as completing my film, so, from now on for an indefinite period of time, I'm going to post shows twice a month instead of every week. Once I get a few new projects running I'll return to a weekly show.
Here are the links to people and sites I"ve mentioned in the show.
Ruff Cutz Film Conference
Jim Jermanok - Producer, Writer, Director
Steven Jermanok - Writer
Dale Carnegie - How to make friends and influence people
Michael Corrente - Federal Hill
Ed Sanchez - Blair Witch Project
Michael Phillips - Academy Award winning Producer
Patrick Smith - Animator
The most recent episode of This Week in Media, #115 has some interesting comments about Twitter's impact on Brand marketing. TWIM is a great show if you want to understand the developing space of new media. Comments starting at about 47 minutes made me realize how important it is for marketers to stay on top of every kind of marketing, especially social networking apps like Twitter.
Daisy Whitney - New Media Minute
Motrin Commercial Flak - Forbes
It took a lot of time to complete this show. I changed the format, just this once, to the AAC Enhanced format, so that I can include pictures and links. I have also made the pictures available online. I'm using Photobucket, instead of Flickr, because I was having serious problems loading the files. I've never seemed to have much success using Flickr. You can search for them under the heading, Sheep and Wool NY08.
You can view the pictures and listen to the audio through iTunes or on an iPod. I don't intend to distribute this show as an MP3 file unless I get some requests.
This is just an experiment at trying to tell a story, in this case about my trip to the Rhinebeck Sheep and Wool Festival a few weeks ago in October. It was a combination holiday and location scouting trip. I'm planning on extending ideas I presented in my student film about crafts and craftspeople into a regular video cast and I wanted to learn more about the fiber arts.
It was a pleasant event, don't know if I would need to return next year, thought there is an additional day decidcated to interantional fiber vendors, that would be interesting.
It's worth commenting on the amount of effort required to create this show. I'm not complaining, it's just amazing how much work it takes to proof files and use the right ones in the chapter markings. I think it would have been better to just put the images on Flickr and left this as a simple MP3 file.
But then, it wouldn't have been the same product.
All told, it was fun and interesting to make, but I'd have to do a lot more preparation to make this fit into my regular workflow so I wouldn't miss a weekly deadline.
Now that I'm not reporting on weekily events such as classes or assignments at my school, CDIA, I have to create content on my own. It's liberating, but it also places more demands on my resources and time. I can see there has to be more planning into the future so I can have three or more shows in the can to compensate for times when I don't finish a project on time.
Learning.
It's been a while and I've been working, I really have, and it's going to be great, you're really going to love it.
Give me a few more days.
You're beautiful, thanks.
I've been spending most of my free time completing the transcription process. This is critical for me to figure out what remains to be shot in order to complete my film, as well as speed up the editing process.
Transcribing is boring, tedious work and there's not a lot of stuff I can say about it, though I try my best. I've tried to speed things up by using transcription software. I started out with iListen from MacSpeech and then, when they came out with Dictate I switched to that, Dictate uses a vastly improved software translation engine that was licensed from Dragon Naturally Speaking on the Windows platform. I think I will have to look into using Dragon on my next project and see if that tops them all.
I've also been using my time to talk with instructors and get critiques on how well my film works. I know it needs improvment. I've spoken to a number of film faculty at CDIA. It's interesting to see how each person views the essentials of filmmaking.
One instructor, who is not a documentarian, emphasized the story elements and how the story is presented. Franco Sacchi, our resident documentary filmmaker was all over the structure of the film and how to use visuals to connect the ideas. I have another critique coming up soon with an instructor who is a strong editing and sound person, so it will be interesting to see how he views the needs of my film.
It's been a couple weeks since graduation, so I've decided to catch you up with my plans for the coming year. I've got some additional podcasts in the works as well as ideas for this show. you can look forward to more interviews in the near future.
This is an unusually long show and I'm loading a lot of news on the front end, so if you want to skip that, jump to 10:40 where I start my eval of Avid.
My film, Handmade in America is still in process. I'm screening it with a number of people at school over the next few weeks, to find out how I can make a good film look and play better. I'm conscious that meeting the graduation deadline required me to skimp on some quality features, and while I don't want to dedicate the rest of my life to this story, I do want to look back on it knowing I did the best I could given my current abilities. I already see the need to do some pick-up shooting.
Even though I'm out of school, CDIA has a very open approach towards it's alumni, encouraging continuing connections and mentoring between former students and faculty.
I can spend a lot of time validating the time I spent in school, learning this craft, but I'll put that off for another time. I do want to bring to your attention a series of articles by Mike Jones of Digital Basin about whether it's worth your money to go film school at all. His first post was dated Monday Sept. 08, 2008 and continued for 4 more posts up to Wednesday Sep 17, 2008.
In the show, I mention a video host called Vimeo that I'm considering using to post screencasts. Blip TV is similar one that comes to mind. Anyone had experience with either of those, or recommendations of others?
And as far as a host for future sites and blogs, I've committed to BlueHost, a name I've heard other podcasters refer to positively. I've looked at a lot of different hosts, read comparative reviews and I feel that, at least on the basic level, they're more or less the same in terms of features offered. So, in the absence of any clear direction, I'm going with what's appeared on my radar.
Check out the Ruff Cutz Film Festival. I submitted and have recently been added to the films screened at this event, taking place at the Center for Digital Imaging Arts at Boston University in Waltham Massachusetts, in the middle of November. I don't know much except that CDIA is a sponsor, they're encouraging films that are rough, which mine is, and it's inexpensive to enter. I'll be there and let you know about it.
The remainder of the show is spent sharing my thoughts about the pros and cons about using Avid.
Bear in mind, I'm approaching this from a beginner's perspective. As far as I'm concerned, I'm standing on the edge of the learning prairie, the mountains are nowhere in sight and I have no idea if I'll reach the sea on the other side.
So a lot of my concerns and ideas are limited by my exposure and use of this program. I don't think this negates the usefulness of what I've got to say though. I think this program is really, really weak for the beginning user. There was a time when the only way you could learn this software was from the cocoon of the production company that had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars for each Avid workstation. Anyone who was chosen to learn this tool had the benefit of a seasoned professional editor, as well as their own years as assistant editors, watching in the shadows.
Experiences like that can still be had, but they aren't the norm anymore. At the midpoint on the user curve are people such as myself, people who want to produce their own independent films with a small team of people. Bootstrap filmmaking. This is where Final Cut Pro and Premiere have taken the lead and Avid is lagging behind. I think Avid has a lot to offer today's independent filmmaker, but I think they're shutting people out by raising the learning bar too high at the point of entry.
I'm going to check out the book by Diana Weynand, Final Cut Pro for Avid Editors. I haven't been able to find any books for people who use Final Cut Pro and want to use what they know to learn Avid, but I have found a few sites. Avid's site has video tutorials geared towards FCP users, Editing Organazized has a useful blog post about how specific editing actions are invoked in either program, Final Cut Pro to Avid and the Avid Community site also has tips and tutorials.
I'm committed to this course regardless of wolves, snowstorms or bandits, so any helping hand you can lend would be kindly appreciated. Thankye.
Day Zero - Project Due
It's fitting that this show, which is about the final day of my film project for the Film program at CDIA at Boston University ends with a lot of energy and emotion, because, up 'til now I've been holding it in, quite well I think.
I wouldn't say I lost it, but it was close, it was more like clawing my way back onto the cliff edge that I was sliding off. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
I only want to say that over these past 4 weeks the excitement and fun of editing and completing a film has completely leached away to frustration, stomach gnawing stress and all other kinds of unpleasant feelings due to having too much to do in way too little time. In the end I have to confess to dreaming too big.
I'm not apologizing for that, nothing I've experienced so far will change that about myself, but I have learned that I never want to do a film this way again. We'll see if I can hold true to that promise.
Today was a race against time, right up to the wire to complete color correction and titles - how many times have I talked about getting those two things done.
I seem to have gotten on a rag about various features of Avid, GUI in general, but Titles really took me for a beating. In the end I had to bail on using titles in Avid and did something quickly in Final Cut Pro. Don't do this at home, it's very, very painful and time consuming. Bringing an exported Quicktime file from Avid into FCP requires that you render the entire timeline and the titles will have to rendered each time you tweak them. But it was necessary to meet the deadline. I would be better to know how to use the tools within Avid. I'll let you know how difficult that really is in the next few weeks, once my head clears and I can approach learning it with a little more time.
I also plan to do a review of working in Avid, talking about the pros and cons. I know that most people listening are not using Avid, maybe not even using Final Cut Pro, but it is an industry standard tool, for the present, and I would like to give the benefit of my experience, as painful as it sometimes has been, so that you know where it sits in the pantheon of NLE gods.
Day 2 & 1
As a result of excellent feedback from Linda, my wife, I've made some significant changes to the order in which speakers are introduced. I had begun with discrete, self contained blocks, where an individual presents themselves. Of course I intended to mix individual's comments together where they touched on the same topic as the film progressed, but it was made clear to me through Linda's perspective that I could begin that earlier, so there wasn't an obvious transition from one person speaking at a time to many people speaking.
It was a real structural problem for me and I'm grateful for the insight she provided. You know, I know what I want to do and could have acted alone, but I had nagging doubts that my perspective was too inside, too familiar to be trusted as far as how much I could ask the audience to accept as they were introduced to the film's characters and ideas. Things such as the pacing, I'm using a lot of rapid cuts. It really pays to have someone you can trust who can offer concise, intelligent comments.
Day 1 ends and I still don't have the film transfered to tape. I spent a number of hours but between working with HD footage in Avid and moving it to HDV tape, or SD for that matter, there were lots of unresolved problems. And I lost a lot of editing time in the process.
Not that this isn't my own fault for starting late in the first place.
I mention a number of suggestions made by one of my constant instructors, Howard Phillips, for enhancing the movement of the story and I did a poor job of explaining J & L cuts, so follow the link to find out a little bit more. I've added them throughout the film to ease the audience from one cut to another. It's a subtle thing. The difference it makes is not so much what it adds, so much as what it removes, which is often an abrupt, gawky cut between two speakers, or scenes.
Another point I missed in the excitement of reciting my day, is that the 90 second segment where I introduce a new character and I thought I was going to have to scrap it because I didn't have B-roll to cover several jump cuts. I forgot to mention the solution, which was to use dip-to-color between the cuts. It's only a second where the clip fades in, then out to black, but it heals the jump cut wound quite nicely.
Now, I know how to do this and had used it sparingly in other parts of the film, but I thought it was too much in your face, it would be too jarring to the viewer if I did it several times within 90 seconds. I was assured by people whose opinions matter that it was fine and acceptable. I don't know if they meant in general, or under the circumstances of the looming deadline, but I gladly accepted it like a get out of jail card. We'll see how people react at the screening.
Days 5, 4 & 3
Still working on the rough cut, focusing on story pacing, removing things that take you out of the story.
I'm reflecting a lot on the meaning of craft, the subject of my film, and being as tired as I am I'm afraid I'm not completing whole thoughts. I'm gaining spontaneity at the price of coherency when I'm not reading off a script. You tell me if it's worth it!
About five and a half minutes into the show I'm trying to make a point about the life craftspeople try to lead and I'm using a sports competition metaphor and it utterly fails. What I'm trying to say in this instance is that the measure of success is the process of work and learning they're engaged in, their life's journey, not a specific accomplishment or feat.
Trust is a perennial issue for me, and exercising trust in the audience is what I need to do as I continue this edit. Just as Jay Moonah said At Podcaster's Across Borders this past June, the content is the audience. They create meaning out of the context of their experiences, in this case, watching this film when it's done. Learning to trust that people are paying attention and pulling all the disparate pieces and ideas within the film to create a whole that leads them to… what, my way of thinking.
No, this film is not like driving cattle through a narrow, fenced in path (don't know the name of the path, sorry), but I do hope that it will direct people to think about specific ideas with new understanding. Providing some understanding, that's sufficient for me.
Day 7 & 6
Originally I thought I'd name this show Recognizing Mortality. I've heard that if you want people to find your posts you need to give them names that reflect the general nature of your content. I thought that fit because editing requires you to face the death of so many things, ideas, hopes, illusions, favorite bits, not to mention your own inflated ego. However, oblique, inside-joke titles, while clever, don't have much value if no one gets them, or listens. So I decided to change the title to something that at least will show up in a search on film or editing. Am I selling out my art for convention or monetary sake?
I don't know if Holistic Film Editing is any better, but I think it's appropriate because in this show I'm all about working the entire story on one timeline, making sure everything works together. There I go repeating myself. Forgive me if it seems like I'm continuously in search of what I mean, but, well, I am.
One of the requirements for graduation, besides finishing this film, is to give up a minute of the film, uncompressed, that will be shown during graduation. It's a great idea, but I begrudge every distraction at this point in time. My film is very rough still, so I had to pick a minute of footage and clean up the audio, do a little color correction and make sure i t was coherent before I could export it. Fortunately I had a segment that I had already done some finessing. Still, a distraction.
Right now I'm taking the segments I've created and place them in order on the timeline so they work as a whole. That involves making changes at the beginnings and endings of each, so there's a comfortable, natural transition in terms of ideas. This is pretty tricky and I'm finding that, where it's difficult to accomplish that, I may have to choose to radically change one segment or the other to make the transition coherent. Either that, or I need to add more footage to make the transition, or lead-in make sense. And you know, by transition, I don't mean a transition effect, I mean adding clips that allow the viewer to make the leap from one idea to the next.
Here's a couple lessons that I've been learning during the past few days while editing. I'm pointing them out here because doing the edit is where they've become real. All the preparation, classroom instruction, friendly advice wasn't enough to take this to heart. Editing, especially against a tight deadline is what has really brought it home to me.
- Try not to edit with blinders, you have to always keep your eyes open to the entire story, not just individual segments
- Getting feedback early and often helps a lot. Early because it's then that you can afford, ego-wise, to surrender ill conceived ideas that are apparent to others, but hidden from you.
- Trust the intelligence of the audience. Once they are engaged in the ideas you're presenting, they will be able to follow on their own, they don't necessarily have to be lead to conclusions.
Day 8
Over the past year I have been trying, without success to figure out how to use a calibrated monitor to display video coming out of the computer, as I color correct. Today we had a color correction class for Final Cut Pro, something that was arranged outside of the program, based on specific requests from our class. I think that speaks volumes about how flexible and generous the school and the instructors are towards meeting the needs of students.
Anyway, I'm going to create a screen cast, post it on YouTube and you can link to it to see how it's done.
The unfortunate thing is that you can' display HD footage through an SD monitor. So there you are, I have HD footage and I can't monitor my color correction, I have to go solely by the scopes, the Waveform or RGB Parade monitor, VectorScope and Histogram. Of course the trick is making sure you're viewing your results on a calibrated monitor.
Of course, that's not nothing, it counts for 90% of the way home, but that last 10% is the difference between a vacant stare and a smile.
I've used a monitor for color correction on SD footage shot for a Practicum film back in May. (Show 91) It made a big difference, not only in terms of quality, but also in building my confidence in my own color correction technique.
Howard Phillips, a frequent instructor screened my latest revision and gave me a very good critique. There's so little time, so every intelligent comment is greatly appreciated. The big problem is that I'm making the same point over and over again. I couldn't see it myself, but once the scales were removed from my eyes it was embarrassing how obvious it was. That's half the value of having others review your film. And getting that input before you're too attached to the cut is the other half.
A really long, typical, frantic day
Arrive early at school to pick up equipment and I trigger the alarm
Once back at work I quickly set up for the shoot at 1:00, so the shoot in short order, quickly tear it down and capture it before I run off to school to return the equipment
I'm trying to squeeze in a little editing and hand off copies of a rough cut and end up wasting most of my time.
Really, the day is an example of how lack of time leads you into making stupid mistakes that waste more time.
After wrapping up the day I include a few comments about coping with the stress and allowing the film to work itself out in the moments between getting things done.
Countdown to final project delivery. Days 11 & 10.
A lot of hand wringing, but there's hope too!
Day 14 Editing
Day 13 Shooting
Day 12 Driving home through heavy, sticky traffic
I'm still pulling together the entire story of my film, still in rough cut mode. I'm just beginning to set boundaries and eliminating individuals wholesale, because the film isn't long enough to include more than a certain number of faces and voices. I don't know what that number is, but I've already eliminated 1 of 4 key interviews I did with potters. I found that when I introduced each person at the beginning of the film, one individual didn't fit. It was an odd experience that I had never had before and I it hit me like a vague itch as I was assembling the cut. It was completely apparent when I saw it full blown, along with my class, during the screening I reported on a few episodes ago.
It's one of those gut feelings you need to cultivate. As painful as these choices are, I know that hanging on to scenes, footage or characters that don't move the story ahead is like driving full speed ahead into a mud-hole. And nobody wants that.
Wise or not, I chose to give up a night I would otherwise be editing, in order to attend a series of talks at school by professional editors and filmmakers. Jay Rose was one of the highlights, as was Michael Phillips of Avid. The main message was geared towards the younger students, about finding your way into the media business, even if it means being a coffee toting intern. The critical thing to achieve is contacts and develop a set of work references that will lead you to your ultimate goal.
Five speakers, they all said the same thing: Be persistent and persevere.
The next day I used my evening to take some hirez stills at Sawmill Pottery, Dot Burnworth's studio. I have great interview footage of Dot, but I had to leave early the day of the shoot and got very little B-roll, particularly of her work.
One of things I realize I must, must, must do going forward, whenever I finish a shoot, is right away, within 24 hours at the most, review the footage. I didn't and a lot of time passed before I reviewed it. When I did and realized I had little to no B-roll (poor planning and poor execution) and by then it was too late to arrange a 2nd shoot. The best I could do was take digital stills and use them in a pan and zoom effect. I haven't tried this in HD before, so I will have to see how well it works. It better work, because I'm counting on B-roll to hide a lot of jump cuts.
Day 16 & 15
I'm quite busy using all available time editing my film. My podcasting solution is to record summaries every couple days and posting them. I'm counting down the days until I have to hand in the project and this show is the second one in the series, days 16 and 15.
Even with this clever idea I still am a little pokey posting these as I still don't have much free time to edit and even write this meager blog post. The days I'm talking about are not in sync with reality, which I think would be much more dramatic, but since I'm not getting paid to do this and my paying job doesn't subsidize my podcast, I'll cut myself some slack. Once the deadline passes and I can walk out my front door and see that big yellow circle in the sky, I'll have time to post them in short order AND finish that symphony I've always wanted to write.
How is it I have time to write this now you say? Well, here's an Avid life lesson. I'm using a G4 Mac, about 1.67 megahertz, 2 gig of RAM and a fast 500 gig Firewire 800 external drive. I'm using Avid Media Composer two. It does the job well enough, I've only been cutting up to now, but I'm dreading working with effects.
Whenever you connect your connect the drive with your media and project file infromation into another computer, Avid will reindex you media when it is launched. Sometimes, like on an Intel Mac Pro workstation with a fast SATA drive, memory, processor etc., it can index pretty fast and only keep you waiting a few minutes. Sometimes more. On a computer like mine, a lot, lot more.
I don't know what I did, since I didn't disconnect my drive and launch my project off another system, but after a taking a couple hours for lunch I turned the drive back on, relaunched Avid and voila, indexing. As long as it takes to write this, maybe post this.
Just be careful to budget time for this kind timewasting, and keep the mylanta at hand.
In this show I'm reviewing the our class screening. There were 4 films shown. Two are essentially done, one is a narrative, excellent, another is a trailer for a documentary, also very very good. One class member was MIA, turns out he never got the date for the screening. His film, a narrative, is pretty much done as well. The other person in the class showed a portion of her film, which is being edited by another class member and plans to show a trailer at graduation.
My film was not complete, I had put together about 70% of it, no really, more like half of it. Still it was 20 minutes long. I'll explain why in the show, no need to get into it here. I got a lot of constructive feedback and was raring to dig in the next day, but it didn't work out that way.
You'll have to forgive Day 15's segment. I've tried a number of things in Soundtrack to help it out, but I couldn't combat distortion which is due to wind on the mic. I argued with myself to take it out completely, but, for the sake of documenting my progress, I left it in.
Subclipping is a necessary part of organizing your project, creating structure. Doing that will allow you to rip through your media as you pull the story together. With the deadline I have, about 3 weeks when I recorded this show, what I feel I really need to do is begin editing, but that would be disastrous and lead to chaos with the amount of footage I have to work with.
Editing
I'm using Avid over FCP. I've chosen to use Avid for this project even though I have more experience using FCP. I've discovered a few drawbacks that could negatively affect meeting the deadline.
Finally I have begun editing the footage, starting with discrete topics, keeping a general story order in my head. I find this process works for me. Once I got enough footage cut together I moved the contents of these sequences into a single timeline sequence to see how well everything pulled together to tell a cohesive story. It's still incomplete, but I'm very encouraged.
21 days left.
I've used my time during the past week transcribing all the interviews I recorded using a tool called MacSpeech Dictate. It does a good job of converting the spoken word to text. It's a new program that uses the dictation software engine developed by the people who created Dragon Naturally Speaking, a PC only program.
It took me a week, but I was able to do it during my hour plus commute. I still have to go back and review the text and correct any errors.
The best part of all of this is that I'm reacquainting myself with the words of my interviewees and I've fallen back in love with my story and my film. I don't know where I went, but I'm back.
So the next step is to subclip the footage based on topic and then I can use that to build my story.
Well, at last, the final week of classes. I talk about compression in DVD Studio Pro and Color Correction in Avid, including some suggestions for improvement on the DVD authoring class.
I'm finally out of my lethargic funk too. I have 30 days to complete the edit, pick up a couple shots and finish the film. I'm way behind, so I'm making plans and thinking focused.
I attended the Sunday sessions of Podcamp Boston 3, which was held at the beautiful Harvard Medical School conference center. I met a lot of generous, interesting people and really put the work in networking. There were a lot of presentations, about 4 or 5 every hour, about 5 times during the day, but I spent more time talking to people outside of these sessions.
One of the cool features of this conference was something called a BrainTorrent, which was a beautiful oval room full of tables with name tents on them, each one with a different topic or concept and anyone was welcome to sit down and join the conversation. That's where I met Mary Anne Davis and Guido Stein. Mary Anne is a potter and Guido is a knitter and we got into a conversation about social media and craft and before you know it, I was recording it.
My own feelings about the even were very positive. I'm so happy I met as many people as I did. More people than I can remember and credit. Meeting Keith Burtis was very fortunate. His live woodworking video cast is very cool and I'm looking forward to conversations with him about the production aspects of creating video shows.
I'm always impressed by the number of people who blog but aren't yet podcasting who attend these shows. It's a good sign that the events don't put off an exclusive feeling and it's healthy to talk to people who are just as passionate about new media but aren't in the podcasting fish bowl. Sharon Couto is one blogger who attended the event with an eye on moving into Podcasting.
I moved into a new media space that I hadn't intended to become involved in, at the encouragement of Mary Anne. I now have a Twitter account, the user name is Bermamot. I haven't posted anything, anything at all since Sunday. I'm a busy guy, but I'll give it a chance. There are definitely two camps, people who are infatuated with Twitter or microblogging, and people (and one of them) who don't see the sense at all and don't have any time for it. I feel as though I'm standing at the door to the Twilight Zone.
Finally let me mention a cool site I saw at a BrainTorrent table. I'm going to use it when I set up my upcoming website. It's a program that analyzes your website for Search Engine Optimization - SEO. It explains what each suggestion means and it appears very thorough. It's free at websitegrader.com. Thanks to Mike Volpe from Hubspot.com for coming to the conference and showing it off.
2nd week of the last module in the Filmmaking program at the Center for Digital Imaging Arts at Boston University.
We're going through the Apple Pro Training series book, DVD Studio Pro 4. It's an excellent book, all the books in the series are great tutorials and are a good introduction to the Pro Tools suite. They lead you through a series of projects focusing on different parts of the authoring process, using media from professional projects.
It's interesting stuff, but we're all a bit tired and looking forward to being done in a week.
Welcome to the longest show I've posted to date. On average these shows run about 15 minutes and when they've gone over 3o minutes I tend to break them into parts. The main reason for the length, which is about 52 minutes, is the inclusion of multiple comments and excerpts from presentations from PAB. My main goal here is to give you a sense of the event, which is quite unique among conferences. But the downside is how much time it adds to the show. And editing multiple interviews complicates the production process. Even up to the last few hours before posting I found some errors that required me to rerecord some sections. Most of the changes are changes in attributions, another time sink in production, which I got wrong on the first recording pass.
I'm satisfied with the final show, even though it's long. If it's a bother, let me know, I'm compressing it down as much as I can. In the future, I'm thinking about using Apple's AAC format, which makes mp3 files smaller but retains higher quality. It also allows me to bookmark and add graphics, but, as far as I know, AAC files only play on iTunes and iPods and I don't want to exclude any listeners. Any thoughts?
Because I am including a number of voices besides my own I've added a note at the bottom of the blog that indicates the type of Creative Commons license I'm using, which is attribution, non-commercial, share alike. I'll talk a little more about CC in a future show, right now understand that you can use all or part of this show as long as you include the name of the speaker and where the audio came from. You can't sell it and if you include any part of it in your own podcast you are bound by the same license. Thanks to Connie Crosby for pointing me the the right direction on this topic, for some reason I find the legal aspects of publishing baffling.
This show is about my experience at Podcaster's Across Borders and begins with my personal thoughts about the event. Halfway through I have some excerpts of presentations and some brief commentary on what I took away from the experience and then I finish with a series of interviews I recorded at the end of the weekend as the room slowly emptied. It was a great experience and I've put in a lot of effort trying to put into words what it all meant, because, as I try to explain, PAB wasn't your regular new media conference. Lots of people were trying to figure it out besides me. Check out the comments on David Peralty's blog and you'll see a wide range of reactions.
If you're just interested in the excerpts I've got the timecode listed below. In addition, all the presentations will be posted at Podcaster's Across Borders throughout the summer. Subscribe!
I've also listed the names and URLs of all the people mentioned or heard in this show. Some have podcasts, some blogs and some are thinking about it.
If there was any message or call to action people took away from the event (and there was plenty) one of the most important was find your voice and share it. I second that.
Contents:
* 00:27 - About me and the show
* 06:45 - Tim Coyne presentation
* 09:56 - Tim Coyne interview
* 16:51 - Tod Maffin presentation
* 20:50 - Jay Moonah's presentation
* 26:46 - Me trying to make sense of Marshal McLuhan
* 33:51 - Chris Brogan's Jolt
* 41:30 - Attendee final comments
* 50:11 - Closing remarks
Links:
* New Media Expo
* Podcamp Boston 3
* Bob Goyetche
* Mark Blevis
* Marshall McLuhan
* Maslow Hierarchy of Needs
* This Week in Media #98
* Mitch Joel - 6 Pixels of Separation
Conference attendees and presenters who have kindly allowed me to record and post their comments in this show:
* Tim Coyne - Hollywood Podcast
* Tod Maffin
* Jay Moonah - Media Driving
* Chris Brogan
* Whitney Hoffman - The LD Podcast
* Connie Crosby
* Dave Fleet - davefleet.com
* Bill Deys - The Country Music Cast
* Murray McGregor
* Francis Wooby - Wooby Communications
Another new module and the final one of this Program. This week plus two more and I will be done with school, but not with my film. Finishing the film will be my priority once school is finished. It's sort of like graduating and then having to go to summer school, or cleaning up after the prom. Or something.
There's no time to rest though, until I finish my film my stomach is going to be churning and adrenaline is going to be pumping.
This final class is shoe horning in two ideas, DVD Authoring and Color Correction. We're using Apple's DVD Studio Pro for the authoring and we're looking at color correction in Avid, which has superior tools for the job over Final Cut Pro. Not so Color, Apples newest tool in the Final Cut Suite. I address them all in this show, including reasons why Color, which is the deepest and richest of the three tools for professional color correction, should not be the first thing you reach for when you correct color. Take a look at the T L Cooper Eclipse, an expensive sophisticated keyboard/input device that allows you maximize the color correction workflow. There's a great review of using this tool at Ken Stone's site. In the show I refer to Pitch Black, Titanic and the Lord of the Rings series are good examples of using color throughout a film to evoke place, mood and time.
Macaela Vandermost is the instructor for this module. She introduced the idea of color correction at the beginning of the class, because we're going to be spending a full day on Saturday, the last day of the class, learning about color correcting in Avid. A lot of people in class felt they should get an overview of color correction in FCP and she kindly obliged. Color Correction is a difficult concept to grasp and it's even harder to do well, so getting an introduction at the beginning of the class and then more in depth instruction at the end should make it easier to get it.
We spent the entire class Tuesday looking at color correction and Thursday we did a quick run through of using DVD Studio Pro 4 to author a DVD. Classes for the remaining module will go into depth on the critical aspects of authoring, such as compression, creating menu navigation and menu graphics and developing an efficient workflow.
There's an interesting event coming up towards the end of this month in Boston. Podcamp Boston 3 takes place July 19th and 20th. You can get directions and other information, including a list of sessions that will take place through the links I've provided here.
I attended this event last year, and I talked about it in episode #56. The conference founders, Chris Penn and Chris Brogan, both attended Podcasters Across Borders last weekend and I was fortunate enough to interview Chris Brogan and asked him to weight the advantages of each.
I was fortunate enough to interview Chris Brogan for a few minutes between sessions at Podcasters Across Borders and asked him to comment on the two events.
I hope you get a better sense of both events through my comments and Chris' interview. There was only a few minutes to chat between some sessions, so our conversation was rushed. I think you'll find if you attend Podcamp Boston 3 that there will more time and space for conversations and meeting new people.
I want to say thanks to Chris for talking with me. I know he's going to be at Podcamp and I hope you'll be there too.
Vacation week coming up. That means time to edit my final project. Woo hoo
Since I took off the last days of this class I got an F. But, but once I hand in the assignments it will be turned into a pass. If I do a really good I may get a high pass, or, gulp, a very high pass. Lots of motivation there.
There's 4 weeks left to the end of class. I'm going to miss it once it's gone. I am looking forward to finishing my film without the distraction of class attendance and assignments. I guess you could say I've already checked out.
Once again I'm talking about Podcasters Across Borders without providing any clips from the interviews I recorded. Coming up, I promise. Check out and sign up for Podcamp Boston 3 if you're in the area. Take a look at the sessions being offered. It's just a good, only different.
Speaking of good conversation in a hallway, I end the show with some perspective I got from Federico about the whole point of this filmmaking program, which is getting a job being a filmmaker.
This was a familiar message, but I saw something new that I hadn't before. I got it that I don't need to treat this like the last film I will ever make. It won't be if I end up using it to get a job making the next film. People are going to recognize, regardless how much time and attention I lavish on this project, the essential value I add to the filmmaking process. If they are professional they'll filter out the flaws and see the potential. Its hard to have that much faith in yourself, or other people.
But I don't want to leave you on a downer man. Right now I'm excited about editing my film and I'll probably be at school as often as I have been, so I can concentrate - and knowledgeable people will be available to help me see a clear path to the finish. Just like in production, you don't make a film with just one person.
This is a very short show because I recorded it as I was exiting the house on my way to Podcaster's Across Borders in Kingston, Ontario Canada. It was a great weekend of of learning and conversations with a lot of really interesting people. As I was getting the links for the previous episode I noticed that Podcamp Boston 3 is in a few weeks. I was caught completely off guard. Last year it took place at the end of December, so barely 6 months has passed. During PAB, I was fortunate enough to interview Chris Brogan, one of the cofounders of Podcamp and a key organizer of Podcamp Boston. Look for the interview in an upcoming show and seriously consider attending the event on July 19 and 20 (Saturday and Sunday).
Catching up with past classes, this week is the 2nd week of the Post Audio module. With a little help from instructor Doug Plante, I finally understand the process of spotting and scoring.
Spotting is the process of identifying the location of music along the timeline that would help support or anticipate the mood you want a scene or action to convey.
Scoring is using the spot marks and comments to place music along the timeline that fits the moods you want to support.
I'm surprised how my view of the edit of the film I used changed as I went through this process of spotting. Looking at the film, which I had created in a previous module, I was surprised to discover the moods it presented were not what I had originally intended. It's an interesting way to look at familiar footage with more objective eyes.
Of course, you don't make changes once someone begins scoring a film. You score a film, that is it's locked down, editing is completed, so that the editor won't make changes that would require the music director to completely rewrite the score. After all, the score is tied directly to the timeline.. Change the film - change the music.
Oh well.
Been at PAB, expected to have posted this and the next show before I left. No time, as usual.
This episode and the next was in the can and waiting for post before I left for Canada last week. I thought about post dating these episodes, but that seems a little dishonest.
Podcaster's Across Borders was a great event, met a bunch of people and got a lot of ideas to chew on. It wasn't a technical conference, it was more about networking and idea sharing. I've never been to the Portable Media Expo, now called New Media Expo, which will be out in California later this summer, August 14, but I have been to Podcamp in Boston.
All three events are different in how they approach social media and there's something valuable to be learned from attending all of them. Podcamp and PAB are within driving distance, but California is too far for me to travel this year. I would say that PAB was the most informal. The schedule was packed though and most conversations I had were short and had to be followed up at the end of the day's sessions.
Give me a few days and I'll have a post up for that, along with some brief interviews I recorded.
Talking about whining. What do you want from me? Well, that's the question this time around.
I would like to know how real I should be reporting the student experience; it's not just the subject matter in class. I believe that how you cope with the demands of school will tell you how you will deal with the pressures of production work in the real world. Just another undocumented learning opportunity in the curriculum of life.
I've reached the point where I have enough material to begin editing and begin shaping the story of my film. I've got a lot of work ahead of me with almost 300 gigs of video, about 12 hours of footage. Organizing this much footage is going to be critical in order to meet the September deadline for the final cut.
Over the past week I had the following shoots and classes:
- Two days shooting a Raku firing
- Shooting B-roll at Sturbridge Village
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Interviewing Dot Burnworth at Sawmill Pottery
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The class this week was the beginning of Post Production Audio
- We're going to score music for a film we've already created
- Using sound effects and foley on a commercial
- Using the audio tools in Avid and FCP
- Outputting the audio form a film to OMF for editing in a dedicated audio application, like Pro Tools.
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The physics of audio, including the inverse square law
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Last day of the week I met with and interviewed Ron Sbardella, a veteran potter of 25 years.
I'm attending a new media conference called Podcasters Across Borders in Kingston, Ontario Canada this weekend. There's going to be lots of interesting people to meet and things to hear and learn. There's not much else in this show except my expectations.
I created this episode so that I could pare it down to under 3 minutes and submit it to the PAB site as a teaser for this show. They're taking audio submissions from attendees that represent their own show. I figured I would just use the opportunity to talk about my expectations of the event, how I feel about the potential of new media and tie in what my show is about.
It is an interesting experience cutting down something to meet a another purpose - sort of like creating a trailer of a movie.
Take a look at the teaser page and listen to my audio and compare it to this show. And listen to the other shows, there's a lot of great entertainment and information represented on that page.
I'll give you updates when I get back next week and hopefully include some interviews.
Continuing shooting.
A Raku firing class with Susan Gerr of Birch Mountain Pottery, Old Sturbridge Village, a recreation of a New England village in Sturbridge MA and another potter, Dot Burnworth at Sawmill Pottery. This puts me over the hump as far as enough video to begin editing.
Check out the Digital Production Buzz episode for May 22 and listen to the first interview of Norman Hollyn, an editor and teacher at USC, he has a lot of interesting comments on learning how to edit. At 11:50 or so into the podcast he makes a comment that strikes me as both simple and profound when it comes to summing up the message of a film when you begin editing.
I've updated the show listing on this show's duplicate blog, videostudentguy@blogspot.com and I will continue to keep it updated until I can wrestle RSS to the ground and combine both feeds into one.
Lots of shoots this week, follow the links below to see who I've been talking to.
Huntington Theater
Cornwall Bridge Pottery - Todd Piker
Paradise CIty Art Festival
Debbie Miller Designs
JAK Designs - Jennifer Armstrong / Tanya Alsberg at Paradise City
Kelly O'Briant at Paradise City
Linda Huey
Birch Mountain Pottery - Susan Gerr
Color Correction tips, SSNSC Practicum and shooting the She Loves You promo video at the Huntington Theater
List of links to subjects mentioned in this show:
South Shore Natural Science Center
Huntington Theater - She Loves Me
Links in this Show:
Birch Mountain Pottery - Mug Day
Old Sturbridge Village
Fort Point Art Walk
South Shore Natural Science Center
Huntington Theater
Huntington Theater - She Loves Me
Gabrielle Schaffner
Linda Huey
Avid ScriptSync
I'm discontinuing posting on the Blogger site. It's just a duplicate of the Libsyn site and that seems to have the most traffic. I'll leave a note with a link to the Libsyn site.
I lost data because of a damaged drive, which I hadn't backed up. Don't do this at home okay?
At the same time I was digesting this trauma I was conflicted over which camera I should use which CDIA loans out. You can try to follow my various colliding trains of thought that led to the ultimate decision. I did decide, but the real issue isn't the camera, so much as it is trying to grasp the phantom of security when it comes to assuring I will always have a camera to shoot with when I need it.
It appears that getting comfortable with insecurity is the lesson of the week.
Just to make sure I learned my lesson I had to shoot an open house at Birch Mountain Pottery and I hoped to interview some of the customers. It makes my stomach ache to have to ask complete strangers to sign a release form and talk to me on camera. I managed to walk through that fire, thanks to Susan, her family and everyone who attended. I don't see the fizzy feeling is going to go away over time. Man up, right?
Nikki Bramley is our instructor for this module. She was assistant editor on The Price of Sugar and has a lot of experience editing in both FCP and Avid.
I spent this week trying to nail down my workflow with Avid Media Composer and P2 media There was a problem bring in the media. It comes down to a very specific workflow.
I also had technical problems working with Avid due to the presence of the unsupported versions of QuickTime and the Mac OS. She provided me with a table that contains all the versions of Avid, Quicktime and the OS and what works with what.
When you're working on a production system don't update iTunes, it automatically loads the most current version of Quicktime.
You can find information on the Avid forums at Avid, Creative COW and the LA Final Cut Pro User Group
I'm behind on defining a narrative arc. Nikki gave me some suggestions such as creating little scenes or stories within your story. I mentioned that in a recent episode. She encouraged me to imagine and write down what they might be before I arrive at a location.
I took a day off of everything and joined my wife in seeing a knitting superstar speak at the Calvin Theater in Northahmpton MA. Her name is Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, otherwise known at the Yarn Harlot. She was very funny and uplifting. Do a search for her name and Northampton and you'll find dozens of blogs that documented the experience.
Once I got back from NAB I got a little sleep, did a little non-film garden work and learned the value of the Assistant Director. It's their job to budget time and and make sure everyone is on schedule.
During a recent night shoot I got some ideas about budgeting time on the set. You need to respect the needs of other people, set a stop time and stick to it and be prepared to stop even when you're not ready. You can't push people to work beyond their limits and not pay a higher price later on.
On Wednesday, the last day of seminars at NAB I attended a series of classes on Flash Video as well as an introduction to the Adobe Media Player. You should google the AMP because I believe it has significant implications to independent content producers.
Thursday was the last day of the exhibition and I chose to look at prosumer cameras from JVC, Canon, Panasonic and Sony in order to see what the state of the art is for filmmakers such as myself and what the future might hold.
There's also been an interesting back and forth between myself and Mike Jones in the comments section of episode # 84 about new codecs and cameras and the larger picture of how to evaluate and choose the right camera for you needs. You'll see a counterpoint on this subject between Mike and a reader on his blog.
I have to confess that after an entire day looking and handling cameras from the above mentioned 4 manufacturers the most important thing I leaned is that I barely have a clue as to what the determining factors of an effective video camera. The debate rages on without a clear winner and I'm just beginning to realize I what it is I need to know.
Here are the classes I've attended over the last 3 Days
Sunday Classes
Keyframing in Avid
Understanding Podcast Metrics
Long Form editing in Avid (Documentary Production)
Main Title Design for Film and Video (in After Effects)
Mastering Media Management for Avid Editors
Monday Classes
Emerging Web 2.0 Technologies
(walked the show, saw Panasonic)
Broadcast Worfkow on Avid (Documentary Production again)
Tuesday Classes
In Depth PS CS3 for Video
In Depth Color Correction in Avid
Looked at XD Cam at Sony
Blender at Lowell - blenderlights.com
Color Correction and Avid Production. Lots of on lighting in earlier classes
I'm just giving a quick overview of my state of mind and the classes and show booths I've seen. I've included a superficial comparison between Sony's XD CAM and Panasonics HVX200 and newer HPX 170 (arriving sometime in the summer) Also info about the new AVC Panasonic.
Please excuse the pops, I chose not to rerecord so I could get this out quickly.
The week before I took off for Vegas and NAB, I got in some shooting, in particular on my documentary.
I began my film project by shooting two interviews, one at the Wesleyan Potters, a craft coop and the other of a professional potter at Birch Mountain Pottery.
Both shoots gave me trouble with the lighting, but overall I got a lot of good footage and excellent sound bites.
I also dedicated my weekend to handling the lighting on a classmates film, John.
In this show I'm talking about the classes I attended and some general commentary about Las Vegas.
Here are the sessions I sat in on, check out the full schedule
Friday Seminars
Fast Start with Apple Color
Digital Video Production: Lighting
Saturday Seminars
Practical Triming for FCP
How to build a blog to support your podcast
Making a living off of your podcast
Under Podcast Metrics
Effective Documentary Production
I thought I'd pass on a few notes and travel tips as I make my way to Las Vegas for NAB.
Lots of episodes this week and not a lot of time to write notes.
In this show I run down the film project status of each person in class. I also managed to get in two days of shooting for my own film and I try to describe the lighting work I did over the weekend for John's film.
Projects are accelerating
A classmate, John is in the lead with his film project. He has a shoot on the weekend and I'm handling the lights.
We've done a lot of planning, but due to unknown space restrictions, and a lot of unknown unknowns, we're going to have to play it by ear as far as framing and lighting are concerned. There's going to be lots of communication back and forth between the DP and lighting
Tuesday we discussed our shooting schedules in class. I'm scheduled to shoot Thursday and Friday. What a relief to have something to shoot before I go to Las Vegas.
One week left, let me know what you would like me to report about NAB
Lots of activity this week, but little to do with my own film project. Almost all my attention was devoted to Directions, the annual networking event sponsored by my company. I spent four days shooting interview spots of about 30 people. Add to that a lighting gig I'm doing for John's film. John is a classmate, we've worked together on a couple of class projects in the past. He's way ahead of the curve as far as film projects. He's already rounded up his cast, location, got the crew and is shooting throughout April beginning the first weekend of the month.
Somehow I've become the lighting guy. I did a significant light role in our last class project, the Killer, I obsessed about the lighting for the Directions promotional interviews and the video I just shot at the event. That's only because I felt it was a really weak facet of my skill set. Now I think I'd like to work with the camera.
I'll have time to work with the camera on my own project. I'm anxious about getting some footage shot before leaving for Las Vegas. NAB is putting a huge who in my schedule as far as shooting is concerned. I'd feel better taking off the time knowing that I've begun. With all the distractions and obligations it's difficult to get started, but it's harder on my stomach if I don't.
NAB is beginning next week. The exhibition begins Monday April 14 and the seminars start the Friday before. Let me know if you want me to check out specific vendors and you're interested in learning more about a particular technology.
Whether to use the Canon XH-A1 or the Panasonic DVX200 is more than just HDV versus HD, or tape versus P2 solid state. It comes down to what you know, and I know the Panasonic better than the Canon. Brand wise, I'm all over Canon. The first film SLR I purchased with my own money was a Canon FTb. Tough as a tank; I loved that camera.
It's just that I believe that it's easier to create when the tools being used are transparent, that is, they're so familiar that they're effortless to use, acting as an extension of your body. At this point I can't say this is true for any video camera I've used, but the Panasonic is the closest. In the show I give a little detail on the advantages it has over the Canon.
One of them is the ability to shoot in true slow motion. I've put some examples on my YouTube page of slow motion and accelerated motion footage and as well as a video demonstrating rack focus.
We've spent a lot of time in class reviewing the data forms we need to fill out to create our production book. The book, which is a collection of forms signed, lists of names and shots, drawings, sketches and other information that represents the roadmap to our final destination, the finished film. It's a work in progress, but we do have to something to show before the end of the module.
Don't forget to send me questions you want answered while I'm at NAB, the National Association of Broadcasters conference, coming up in mid April. I'm available for meetups if you're in Las Vegas at the same time.
In this show, proposal creation and the review process, developing your pitch and getting started.
I forgot to mention a conversation we had during class about the documentary - narrative continuum, so let me talk about it now.. We looked a a variety of documentaries that range from straight talking head to what appears to be a narrative feature.
Errol Morris has long used the technique of dramatizing reality in order to advance his narrative arc. It's very different from something like the History channel where they dramatize a scene within a documentary. And of course there are a lot of feature films that try very hard to represent an event as meticulously and accurately as possible, not only in the look and feel, but also in staying very close to documented record. Zodiac is a good example of that. Certainly there are fictional elements, but the story revolves around the written record of the events as they happened. As a result it has more of a fictionalized documentary feel to it
There is a divisive sentiment in filmmaking, as there seems to be in all things where people get passionate, of choosing sides over either/or - better/worse. Either you are a narrative sell out feature filmmaker, or a libertarian socially conscious documentarian.
Of course there is a middle ground, and it isn't a separated from either extreme . There are documentaries that have strong narrative arcs and there are narrative films that have a cinema verité character.
The reality is that there is no best, truest form of filmmaking; you choose to do what you like. Cinematic storytelling is a continuum. How you tell a story, either through fiction or documentary is a matter of degree. Each has components of the other and the polar opposites are just in a different location along the same path.
To me, that means I can at least mentally escape the label of being one kind of filmmaker and be free to tell a story in the way that best suits it.
Lots of loose tangents of thought this week. I'm continuing the refining process for my documentary proposal. We didn't spend much time talking about scriptwriting since it was covered in previous modules. You can review previous episodes for more information about that practice. Check out the Grim Reader podcast (be aware that this link will open iTunes) for quick, but insightful advice about preparing your script.
Here a link once more to some video that I produced on my company's website.
Some of the topics this week are about creating a proposal; a written document that describes the film's goals and outlines production responsibilities. Others topics are more personal, illuminative. Such as,
You, the client and the film - always choose the film first. There's always going to be conflict, and the client is going to think they can add just one more thing, or they'll insist you act on a really bad idea. Instead of coming back with what you, IYHO as a "professional" would do and further alienate the relationship, take the middle ground. Come in on the side of the film. When you advocate what's best for the film, you demonstrate that you care about the product. That gains you a lot of respect and keeps the focus off what individuals want.
I've included some ideas about interviewing people. Lots of places on the web give advice about interviewing people. I like to listen to podcasts on the subject, they give me insight into different approaches and as well as something to compare my own skills against.
Relax and ask a lot of questions. Listen to the person and instead of running down a bullet list of unrelated questions. Tie each answer to the following question, or ask them a question that expands what they're saying. Find subtle ways to direct the speaker along paths you want to explore, so it feels as though they are a part of the conversation.
It continues to surprise me how willing people can be to talk if you demonstrate you're interested.
A brief note about the minimum for producing video for the web. Don't go too bare bones in production or post if it's going to reflect poorly on the client.
Finally, I'm going to NAB. It's a great training conference and a chance to see the latest and greatest hardware and software for digital film and video. I'd love to meet up, if anyone listening is going to be there. If you're not, you can send in requests for information I can report on. Let me know either way.
I posted a couple shows last year, #21 and #22. I plan on posting a show each day this year.
Once again I'm starting another module. This one is called Cinematic Storytelling and its about using visuals to tell the story. The final product for this class is either a script, if we're creating a narrative film, or a documentary proposal.
I just got a Zoom H4 and I have few things to say about it. I'm using it for the next few episodes, so you can expect me to update my impressions.
We've learned some important details about the requirements for our final project. More importantly the class is given a couple of writing exercises that, for me at least, releases me from writer's block. It all comes down to collecting ideas and then refining them until they're in sharp focus.
Grammar Girl has a great episode on writing tips and dealing with writer's block. Check out episode 56. I like this show because it's interesting and practical. I learn a lot about writing clearly and it's pretty painless.
I also heard on a recent episode of Digital Production Buzz a link to an HD Production Workflow Tips. This is a great show to listen to if you want to know what other people are doing in digital video production right now. I haven't had a chance to review the tips yet, but the guy who produced it sounded experienced and knowledgeable.
Strapped onto a log, riding the sluice of learning
Check out the links to some interviews and B-roll I produced for a conference put on by the company I work for. It may not look like a lot, but I did it all on my own and it represents most of my life during January. It feels so good when it stops.
I recorded this episode in pieces at different times. Once I met the deadline for my day job I was freed up to complete The Killer edit. At the end of the show I talk about the critique and the different ways other people in the class approached their edit of the story.
I wanted to recommend student screenings to anyone interested in learning more about filmmaking. Your response to the weaknesses of the film provides good insight into what you already know about filmmaking. They're a good source of insight into potential errors and oversights when producing your own film. A cautionary resource, particularly for a student filmmaker like you and I.
The entire experience of producing The Killers has given me a lot of thoughts about getting the coverage you need to tell a story. The fastest path to success is planning through preproduction. Pre-visualization tools like storyboards and shot lists are valuable tools as well. It doesn't matter how you do it, what matters is that you create the edit before you begin shooting.
I'm having difficulty hunkering down on the edit for our third major film project which we call The Killer. Ambivalence, apathy and fatigue
I've made some comments about HDV again. Thanks to Mike Jones at Digital Basin for his comments, posted in the show notes of VSG #68 about the viability of editing HDV native in FCP.
I'm realizing the importance of pre prod and especially previz in preparing for shoots. Getting enough coverage is increasingly a concern. We just never seem to get enough. It's not the quantity, but the quality, the number of different types and the exact type. FrameForge 3D is a previz tool that I have and I need to get to know it better.
Take a look at the book, In the Blink of an Eye, by Walter Murch. It's a great read and a good introduction to editing.
Doug Plante is instructor for this module, Edit Lab II. He is an ex-Avid employee - Avid is in Tewksbury Massachussets. He is also, according to Howard Phillips, the programs associate director, a FCP god.
This week Doug spoke about the fine points of the rough cut and fine cut
He was all business and was there to see we got to the fine cut done. There's not going to be a lot of instruction in this class. It's all going to come as he works with us individually as we massage our edits.
I had a heck of a time working with Avid, lost a whole class before I moved on to FCP 6. Now I have a problem where I upgraded to 6.02 and the school is at 6.0. and guess what, the file types are not compatible. Can you believe it?
I know, Avid files created between a long list of revisions in that software don't cause a hiccup for Avid users, but FCP apparently is very touchy. But a x.0.2 release? It's enough to make you a hater.
But I don't hate FCP, I just feel I would benefit from continuing using Avid. I know FCP well enough to learn the rest on my own. But Avid, I'm surrounded by Avid gurus and I want to take advantage of that knowledge.
I know I tend to treat this like a dog with a sock monkey, but I once again discuss the archival problems with P2 footage. You can't keep it on the card, it's too expensive. And the life of the solid state card is unknown for long term storage. Drives are a problem for long term storage. What are we going to do once we have to give up tape forever?
Part II of the story of the two weekend shoot of our little film, The Killers. I'm talking about both weekends here, including how much the quality of communication depends on the the amount of time you make for preproduction, my
Communication depends on preproduction likes and dislikes regarding lighting and sound recording on set and a little problem we had with the talent
There is a very odd relationship between the crew and the talent on set. I have a few words to say about actors in general and the difficult but critical role the Assistant Director plays.
Get ready for a slew of episodes this week. I'm finally catching up.
I'd like to thank Mike Jones from Digital Basin for leaving a comment in show #68. Check out his thoughts there and on his site. Also Brian from Galway left a comment in show #69. Thanks for the encouraging words Brian. I'll be around for a while. Let me know what you're doing and interested in doing.
Check out the song on Coverville.com - Itchycoo Park, covered in show #393. It was one of the first two podcasts I subscribed to and continues to be in my top 5.
After a brief rundown of my adventures over two weeks of shooting on location I update you on the type of work that's starting to come to me at my day job. It may be a small dream, but it's my dream all the same to become the video go-to guy at my day job. That's the point of going to school in the first place.
Right now I'm working on a project for both web and tape delivery using video I shot here in Massachusetts and footage shot in other places in the world where the standard broadcast TV format is PAL. Quite an adventure figuring the conversion process for that. Thank God for the internet eh?
I've been very busy this month and it's put me behind a few episodes. They're in the works, so stay tuned.
This week we spent preparing for our first weekend of shooting.
I've got some comments to pass along about how to work with the talent, especially if you're crew. We've also made our lives more difficult by not having put more time into preproduction. Everything is connected, from Producer to production assistant. Things go all bass ackward if you don't communicate .
We're going to be using a Panasonic HVX200, which is an HD camera that has many benefits over the camera we've been using up to now, the Panasonic DVX100.
The first thing is that the menu controls and switches on the outside are mostly the same, so the learning curve is limited to working with the media. The HVX can record to tape, but only standard definition. To record high definition you record to solid state memory cards, called P2 cards. Here are a few reasons on why HD is a better format:
- Images are 2 to 4 times the size of standard definition
- There is more color in the video
- It captures real slow motion and accelerated motion
- The format is easy to transfer to drive, and easy to edit
Disadvantages include:
- You can't capture to both tape and P2 card at the same time
- There is no archival medium in HD, you wipe the card and reuse it after you transfer it to your drive
- The P2 card is expensive
- The life of a P2 card is unknown
- HD footage takes up 2 to 3 times more disk space
In this episode I take a shot at explaining the difference between HD format and HDV format and frankly I don't think I made anything clear. It's useful to know, but not critical, so I'm going to lay it out here. If you need to know more, do some research on your own, otherwise, skip the next three paragraphs.
HD and HDV are capture formats. They're good formats for compressing data so you can fit as much data as possible on what ever medium they require, HD requires P2 cards, HDV can use MiniDV tapes, same as for standard definition. Both HD and HDV record the same resolution, and for all I've been told, the same 4.2.2 color space. Standard definition video records in 4.1.1 color. What qualifies as high end digital video, approaching film quality, is 4.4.4 color. I don't need to explain how it works, it's enough to understand that the capacity to capture all the available color is limited as you move from film, to HD, to SD. By the way, film is a poor second to the color capture capability of our own eyes.
HDV cameras are less expensive than HD cameras for the reasons already mentioned in the advantage list above, real slow motion, etc. HD is easier to edit immediately after capture compared to HDV due to the different compression formats they each use. HDV captures footage in groups of 15 frames, called GOP - Group Of Pictures. The first frame contains all the picture information inside the frame, then each frame following that contains only those pixels that have changed. Take a picture of a wall with HDV and the first frame contains all the info, each of the following frames have no new information and so have no additional data. That keeps the file size down so it will fit on the the tape. If a person or even a fly moves through the frame every frame that records changed information has to record it, because it's not on the first frame. But only the pixels that changed need to be recorded.
And thats fine until you need to edit the video. Then you find you can't cut inside the GOP sections, they're like a single unit. To get past this problem you need to convert the digital video to an intermediate codec that reconstitutes each frame, completely restoring the data to each frame. This of course makes the files larger, but that's the price you pay for editing this format on a digital nonlinear editor like Avid or Final Cut Pro.
Next week we shoot the bar scene Saturday and Sunday.
A brief show this week, describing the many different aspects of filming two scenes. The learning this time around is all hands on. The entire class is working together to shoot two scenes from a script. We've each taken on at least one role, in some cases two. My primary concern is creating the lighting with a secondary responsibility for sound.
Once we determined our roles, we broke into two groups. The technical people: cinematographer, sound and lighting worked together while the producer and director spent their time setting the location, set design and casting.
The cinematographer or director of photography took the lead by creating a shot list or storyboard which came from conversations with the director. Once that was done, sound and light could be configured.
We stumbled a few times, lost some momentum because we didn't really know our jobs well (that's where the learning came in), but we regained our footing and finished the week with some preliminary storyboards, a look at one of the locations and our first casting call.
This week's show is an interview with Aimee Corrigan, the Director of Practicum at the Center for Digital Imaging Arts (CDIA). The Practicum is a unique part of the CDIA learning experience which takes place at the end of each student's course of study.
The Practicum is an opportunity to take part in the production of promotional material in each student's field of study for the benefit of local non profit organizations. This could include a film documenting the services of a refugee support center, complete business websites for organizations or creating a mulitmedia documentary for an innovative after school program using digital photography and recorded music. The 3D program recently created a short for the Dana Farber Institute that explains Cancer to children. Every Practicum offers students the chance to work on a project for a real world client. It's as real as it gets.
Aimee Corrigan is an accomplished photographer and filmmaker. Her photography has been published by BBC Online and Wired Magazine. Her film credits include the recent award winning documentary, "This is Nollywood", and the just completed film "After the Storm", about the the hurricanes of 2005 that ravaged Houston, New Orleans and their impact on the lives of the children in Mississippi.
At the beginning of the week we looked at several movies to better understand how to use the camera to break up dialog and deliver another level of story information.
Despite it's static nature, dialog doesn't have to be a lead weight that kills the momentum of your story. If you shoot it properly, you can actually propel the viewer through multiple layers of information about the characters and the plot without any additional effort required on the part of the audience.
This isn't merely an academic pursuit. In the Killers, our next film project, most of the "action" takes place in a diner where the characters spend most of their time sitting or lying down. Also, we have to show the evolution of the character of Nick, a seemingly minor character, with few lines in the first half of the story, but who becomes the central character by the end.
We review some films, focusing on how to shoot dialog in a static location and keep it interesting. These included clips from Se7en, Jurassic Park, Gladiator, Cape Fear, The Incredibles and American Beauty. All these films involved clever use of camera motion to keep the story moving ahead during a lengthy exposition.
During the last class each person gave a brief explanation of how they would use lights and camera to best present the story in their final project film. In the process I got some valuable feedback about how to set up for different types of interviews, a question I've been looking to answer for a long time.
Work is starting to pile and in the interest of streamlining tasks I'm taking a different a approach to recording this show. For the next few months I'm going to produce a less scripted show and be less picky when I edit. The effect, I hope, will be me sounding more natural even as I eliminate production time. You'll let me know if I sound less intelligible, right? I'm interested in cutting down production time without sacrificing critical quality.
The list of things on my plate are
• increased demand for video in my day job, a big development
• a class project shooting and editing scenes from the Hemingway script, The Killers
• independent, paying projects, outside of school and work, such as the promotional videos Laura and I shoot for the Huntington Theatre - there may be another one I'll be involved in coming in January with another classmate
• and of course my final film project which is a documentary about the life of a professional craftsperson, a potter.
I'll have more to say about my final project in the next show. In this show I continue to talk about using light to control the feeling or mood of a scene that helps to advance the film's story.
Let me know what you think.
This is the first week on the topic of Cinematography. The class is all about controlling light and the camera to create a specific mood or effect. Successful lighting is all about mastery of these two elements in filmmaking. We're going about this by running through tests to see the subtle differences between intensities of lights and how to use camera handling techniques such as tilt, pan, handheld and dolly moves.
I hope the explanation of Key/Film ratio is understandable. Simply put, the key is the brightest light shining on the person, at about 45 degrees to one side of the front, and the fill is positioned on the opposite side of the key also at 45 degrees. Both lights are above eye level.
The key creates a shadow on the far side of someone's face and body and the fill, which is not as bright, lightens the shadow enough to show detail, but not to remove the shadow. You play with how dark you want the shadow to be to create an effect or mood.
I want to note an error I made when I listed F-stops, I listed 1.2, which is an error, it should be 1.4. These are important details.
This episode winds up the last week of the Preproduction module. I think it's the most useful, insightful and humbling set of classes I've experienced so far. Most of the show is centered on what I feel are the five most important things I've learned during this time. They are:
- You need to surrender control of parts of the film project or your finished product will be deficient.
- Filmmaking is a business. Completing a film is not the definition of success, making money on the film is success.
- Plan everything until your fingers bleed, before beginning to film
- Know what everyone does so you can delegate work properly
- Identify your market
On the last point I spend some time talking about a turning point during the last class where, through an open discussion about the status of our final projects, I finally understand who I'm making my film for. This one little piece of information sets me free to explore the possibilities of my subject and at the same time anchors me so that I don't dissipate my energies on too many ideas that go nowhere.
Like I said, a great class.
The second half of the interview with Howard Phillips, Associate Director of the Filmmaking program at CDIA at Boston University. Lots of talk about the role of technology in creating films and CDIA's goal of developing a filmmaking community.
Howard Phillips is the Associate Director of the Filmmaking program at CDIA and has been my instructor in a number of classes, including lighting and Avid. No need really, to introduce him though, he does an excellent job himself in this, part one of the interview. Let me just say that his willingness to participate in this podcast is an extension of his generosity of spirit to all students at CDIA.
In this show you'll hear him talk about his own experiences learning production filmmaking techniques as well as some interesting tangents he's followed that gives him a unique approach to teaching. You'll also hear him explain the ideas and goals behind the curriculum.
I'll post the 2nd half in a few days. In that episode he'll talk about the present state of filmmaking, the role technology plays in the process of realizing your vision and the possibilities that lay in the future.
Another week in PreProduction. We spent a whole class breaking down a script based on the Hemingway short story, The Killers. We analyzed the characters, locations, figured out props, camera and lighting locations. In a future module we're supposed to shoot this script.
I think I've covered this ground already, so I'm passing on those details and keeping this show shorter. I've included some information on how to cast for actors and also explain how everyone communicates with each other, in both preproduction and once the film goes into production.
We're on break over Thanksgiving week, so there won't be journal entry, but I plan to post an interview with Howard Phillips, the Associate Director of the Film program at CDIA. It's pretty long, so I may break it up into two pieces a few days apart.
Things are good with me, how's it with you?
This is the first week of the PreProduction Module. This is the class where we learn how things work, how to really make a film. I know I sound kind of bummed out by all the details raining down on us, but that was me speaking from the gut level. After so many weeks of practical classes, the change to straight classroom instruction was a shock, and the depth of the information was overwhelming. This stuff is dense and deep, but also greatly appreciated.
J.P. Ouellette is our instructor, a director, producer and a great storyteller. His knowledge of the planning process that goes into preparing and shooting a film is outstanding. This is the first time
in the program that we've gotten any amount of this kind of information. At first it seemed formidable, but we're starting to ease into a comfortable learning position. It makes us realize how big a responsibility it is to make a movie. It also makes the process more real and attainable.
PreProduction - What is it? It's all the planning that goes into a movie before you shout action. Budgeting, casting, scheduling, contracts, rentals, location scouting, storyboarding, shot lists and more. It's a lot to get through in 3 weeks, but at our current rate, we'll hear it all.
In episode #41, I listed a number of Screenplay sites Here's two more links with lists of additional sites, TopTenLinks and Lew Hunter. You can learn a lot about scriptwriting by reading scripts. Remember that every type of production, TV, movie and so on, has their own preferred format for scripts, and those are always evolving. It's a good idea, if you write, to check up on blogs that talk about scriptwriting.
Copyright issues are really important and because I'm way out of my depth in this area, I only mention it in passing. You will find a lot of interesting info in David Battino's podcast on public domain music in episode #16 of his podcast at O'Reilly.com. Anyone involved in producing a movie should take the time to learn more about copyright restrictions so you don't end up losing time or money in court.
Production Note - In the beginning I spoke about the audio settings for this and last episode. I also boosted the amplitude to raise the volume of the quieter parts. Thanks to Dennis for helping me understand the compression process. I know it was a struggle, but I did get a lot of what you were saying.
Last class in this module, where we quickly edit the footage we shot the previous Saturday and then review everyone's work in class on Thursday.
Capturing to Avid was a lot of trouble, and this wasn't the first time. You need to pay close attention when you capture to your computer, if you want to share your media and project files with other people.
Despite the fact that this was a great opportunity to look at filmmaking beyond the technical issues, there was barely enough time to take it all in. Some issues remain, such as how a director works with the crew. Everyone felt there wasn't enough time to work with the actors as well, or for discussing our experience in general, during class.
I've tred to explain the reasons I think we're often cramped for time and feel we're not getting all the information we need. The most important reason is that there isn't enough class time in relation to the stuff we have to learn. Even with homework and whatever we can find time to do on our own between classes, there's just not enough time.
This is really a bootcamp. There are a lot of ways you could slice the curriculum to get more time at the expense of other classes, but then where would be be? Think of what you would be missing. As it is, there's a ton of topics we're merely touching on. I'm sure people in 2 and 4 year DAY programs feel as though they're not getting everything they want.
There may be tweaks that can be made to the content of this program, but you have to recognize that how you're learning is tied to the structure of the curriculum. As long as the end goal is to train people who have no experience in filmmaking to get a job in the field in 9 or 18 months, we're going to continue to careen through the material at breakneck speed.
This is what I signed up for and I wouldn't change a thing that would affect the final outcome. All the same, it feels good to complain, once in a while.
This episode of the Video StudentGuy is about the day I spent at Podcamp Boston last Sunday October 28. This is my first time attending a podcamp and I was really looking forward to it. Over all, it was a good experience. I'm sorry I couldn't have attended the previous day, I was in class There were a number of sessions specifically on video casting that I know would have been interesting. To top it off I was really tired, it was a busy busy week on all fronts. I never would have made it through the weekend if I attended both days. Next year I'll be done with school and I'll have a lot more time for user events like this.
By the way, just after I posted this I found this link to a video recorded during lunch, Sunday I guess, from the sound of it. Fool that I am I went to the cafeteria and ate lunch! Anyway, its an ad hoc discussion about the value of the conference as the nature of new media and new media producers matures. I feel very strongly that those of us who are about to launch our careers in video should be up to our armpits in new media. This is our wave. Thanks to Bob Goyetche for recording and posting this video.
On a side note there is a podcasting meetup that takes place monthly in the Boston area. CC Chapman is the contact person for this. It was on hiatus during the summer, but I spoke to him at end of the day Sunday and he said there will be something coming up soon. Like all meetups, its open to anyone, not just people producing podcasts. I hear about them mostly from Mark and Bob on the Canadian Podcast Buffet show, but I don't doubt they're friendly, congenial get-togethers no matter where they occur.
One note about the show, I start out with a rant about the venue, the Boston Convention Center. I've got some pictures I need to put up on Flikr. Obviously it had a significant impact on me, but it doesn't in any significant way detract from the quality of the event, I just tend to notice UI issues and the convention center definitely has a UI problem. If you're not interested in listening to me go on and on about it, just move ahead to 4:18, thats when my review of the sessions I attended begins.
I understand attendance was smaller Sunday than Saturday, and it felt somewhat subdued, so I didn't get a chance to meet a lot of people, but everyone I spoke with was happy to talk and share their ideas and knowledge.
Guido Stein - it's a Purl, man - knitting podcast
Jane Quigley - Digital Grit - exchanged cards, though I don have a card yet
Ben Ortega - Phive Tacos - another card
Faye Anderson - Anderson@Large - Citizen Jouralist - local politics, we had a nice conversation about the role of podcasting in political action
C.C. Chapman - Managing the Gray, Accident Hash - go to guy on the local meetups
Chris Penn - FinancialAid Podcast - cofounder of Podcamp
Chris Brogan - cofounder of Podcamp
Neil Gorman - Broken Toasters, Will Shatner and Podcaster Burnout - here's a link to a similar presentation he made at Podcaster's Across Borders
Beth Lawrence - Grow See This - we had a nice conversation at lunch
Gary Marriott
Grow See This videographer - creativegeniuscollective.com Lead
programmer at cyberwalker.com - he indulged my questions on
videocasting production techniques
Sessions Attended
Recording Remote Interviews - Dan York
Software for recording Skype conversations:
Mac:
* Audio Hijak
* Wiretap Studio
* Conference Recorder 2
* Call Recorder
Windows:
* Hot Recorder
* Pamela 2.0
* Call Burner
* MX Skype Recorder
* SkyLook
* PowerGramo
Both:
* Levelator
Social Media for Business - Isabel Hilborn
Social Networking 101 - Chris Penn
Creating a Great Podcast Listening Experience - Jared Spool
-check out Chris Penn's site to see what I'm talking about.
Podcamp 2 show coming up. Got me to thinking about how to make each show easier for someone to get into if they're listening for the first time.
Actors in the scene we directed and shot are Hannah Barth and Ed Hoopman.
Laura, John and I created a short film based on a scene from The Blue room. The class is about directing actors and I was the director, Laura the DP and John handled the sound. These soft skills are very different feeling from all the technology skills we've been learning. Its spinning around like a child in clockwise fashion, then reversing suddenly to a counter clockwise spin. You feel totally different, dizzy and yes nauseous.
I had a great experience in this new role, but to be honest, I had a lot of problems figuring out exactly what the responsibilities of a director are and how he/she relates to the production crew.
As always, there's never enough time, but in this module it seems everyone was frustrated by the compressed production schedule.
I forgot my pop filter and you're going to hear it. I apologize and promise it won't happen again, I just don't have time rerecord. I've used a limiter and have compressed it a little to save your ears, I hope that does the trick. If you find the popping too annoying, just pass to the next show, though I think it's worth the bother.
The first week of the Directing Actor module. Our instructor, Steven Maler, Creative Director of the Commonwealth Shakespeare Company led us through several exercises that put us in the position of the actor, so we could see first hand what an actor needs from a director to deliver a great performance.
I'm not ready to channel Stanislavski, but I get the point of method acting. Reading scripts in front of the class and improvising dialogs between characters shifted our focus radically from the technical aspects of production and editing. It wasn't that difficult and I think the teacher gets a lot of the credit.
Another new idea we learned was the concept of the beat. Check out the link, I don't know how well I explain it. It's pretty important, both for the actor and director. The point is to know what good directing can accomplish.
The last part of the show I get kind of moody and cow eyed wondering why I bother and what's the use in trying. Somehow, when I think of Jeff Daniels, I feel all better. Let me know what you think
Finally, I'll be joining the seething throng at Podcamp Boston 2 at the Boston Exhibition Center this coming Sunday October 28. I'll be the guy with the Canadian flag bandanna. I hope you check it out.
I'm trying out a new, scaled down intro, whadya think?
Here are a few podcast recommendations in the show:
* Canadian Podcast Buffet
* Coverville
* Macbreak Weekly
Podcamp Boston 2 is taking place Oct 26-28 at Boston Convention Center. Registration is free and there's a lot of seminars presented by regular people who have their own podcasts. During the sessions there's a lot of give and take between the audience and presenter, so everyone has the opportunity to contribute their experiences. I plan to be there on Sunday.
The Avid Edit Lab module finishes this week and I've got the highlights. I also have some comments to make about editing and the rocky road Avid has led me on.
We spent about 4 hours in our Saturday class critiquing the films we handed in. Nothing is ever finished, you just pick a point in time and stop. The critique was great, lots of useful comments and everyone was engaged. Two Film projects and eight people, so there was a lot of variations on how the same problems were solved.
Howard Phillips is out for the next couple weeks, down in Washington, directing the fall program at the new CDIA campus. Good luck everyone. Filling in for Howard is Chris Bowan.
Chris is an Avid editor and has a lot of tips for accelerating the editing workflow. He showed me a lot useful thing using key commands for editing. It can be awkward to use at first, but it makes a big difference in how quickly and smoothly you get things done. Eventually you can work entirely through the keyboard, with your right hand and the mouse in your left hand. Or vice versa, if you're a lefty.
Between learning Avid and editing a dialog centered movie I have a feeling, shared by a few people in class, that this project is much harder. Rather than trying to create a completely finished final cut, I'm spending my time playing with different types of edits. Trying to keep the story moving ahead smoothly. I'm relying on straight cuts, no transitions and looking for shots that lead well into each other. The dialog is controlling what I choose to keep in and out and if it deviates from the script, I'll take that chance.
So I'm not thinking about the finished film, but how I take care of individual aspects of the film. Hopefully that will lead to a good, finished feeling cut. Same results either way, but different methods. I'm hoping that I'll learn more by taking the long road.
I need to investigate storyboarding, it would help me visualize the film better before I begin shooting. It's very easy to overlook crucial takes at certain angles and frames. I believe it would have helped identify how one shot would lead into another. I'm discovering that at certain points in my cut I need a specific view, or angle of one character to help lead into another character's dialog. I can see that what I want isn't there. I would like to know what that would be while I still have the opportunity to shoot it.
I include a brief description of how to prepare still images for use in video. Despite years of trying to understand it, I still get confused when I talk about it. If you take anything useful away from my comments, let it be to do research for your own understanding. here are some links about different types of TV screen resolutions, NTSC (what we use in North America and western South America) PAL and SECAM. You have to be careful of the pixel dimensions of your still image because TV uses rectangular pixels, unlike square pixels that are used for computer displays. Find a good book on Avid too, like the one we use as a manual class.
Show notes are in the lyrics section of the mp3. Drop me a line at videostudentguy.gmail.com.
This week we begin the Avid Edit Lab module, continuing to learn how to use Avid as we cut a movie from footage we shot a month ago. I'm finding it very difficult to get this. I'm looking forward to actually digging into a project where I have to cut it from capture to export. Be forewarned, if you've already got experience with FCP, it's going to complicate your brain learning Avid.
The film we shot for the Huntington Theatre demonstrated to me how awkward the color correction tools in FCP 5 are. I know, they're way better in the next upgrade of the Suite. Apple's Color app is a great deal, amazing deal, but I don't have it yet. I asked Howard, our instructor to show Laura and I how to use the color tools in Avid. Cool, powerful and intuitive, at least to someone who's been color correcting digital photographs for years. You use curves, not levels, not unlike Photoshop, only different. Of course I'm used to thinking in CMYK, from years of prepress work, so I'm sure it will be bumpy ride to the top.
Scouring the web for new podcasts I discovered one on wood fired pottery. Oten Maxwell's podcast, The Firing Log about using a woodfired Anagama kiln, was very entertaining for the long drives home from school and it got me to thinking about the divided lives professional crafts people create for themselves due to their livelihood. They produce one of a kind objects in a mass production world, they use 15th century tools in the 21st century and they work outside the mainstream workplace. How do you live when your focus is high touch in a high tech world. I got to wondering how it looks from their perspective.
Our final project is a 10 minute film, give or take, narrative or documentary, subject of our choosing. It's still early, but I'm going to investigate this a little further, so don't be surprised if you read some comments about frits, fluxes and fettling knives.
I've come to the end of the series of podcasts about the Digital Manifesto that Mike Jones posted on his blog, Digital Basin. That was earlier this summer and I try my best to explain why it's taken me long to post 5 podcasts.
Throughout the series I've been using his ideas in the Manifesto as a guage to determine how current the curriculum at my school, the CDIA is. It did very well - 9 out of 13. Here are the issues, numbered according to the Manifesto followed by the episode they were reviewed in.
Passed
- 03 Compositing #35
- 04 Distribution w/o hierarchy #37
- 05 Owning the entire filmmaking process #37
- 06 Software agnosticisim #37
- 08 Screen Studies integrated into Production #39
- 09 Succeeding despite obstacles #39
- 10 Promoting the story ahead of production values #39
- 12 Collaborative Learning #44 13 Teacher as Facilitator #44
Not Passed
- 01 Composing Space #35
- 02 Virtual Camera #35
- 07 Immersive Sound #39
- 11 Personal Stories #44
These episodes were different from what I usually post, they involved big ideas and how they fit into the world of filmmaking. Keeping the idea threads connected from one episode to another, particularly when a lot of time passed between was difficult. Time to think and understand seems to be a constant problem for me.
For all the effort, I enjoyed exploring ideas and that took me to unfamiliar territory
Bear in mind, these aren't my ideas, I'm just having fun poking at them.
I thought of a couple of things to add to the manifesto:
- Get Teachers and students to better interact between related/linked fields, such as audio, 3D and fx, even web design. I don't think the fringes of our filmmaking experience should be familiar territory.
- Get more exposure to the supportive technology used for digital distribution.
Collaborative learning tools, such as blogs and wikis have a lot of potential that I hope to explore for sharing ideas and information and for promoting my work.
Towards the end of the episode I talk a little about how all this technology is pushing against the boundaries of a stifling culture of intellectual protectionism. If I sound a little harsh, it's only because I've only recently come to recognize how limiting it is to withhold access to resources that, if they were more available, would result in a great deal more creativity to the benefit of everyone. I'm sure once I get used to it I'll return to lamblike complacency.
I'm running to keep up again. I spent a lot of time recently on a non-class film project for the Huntington Theatre in Boston Mass. We did a promotional film for a play that is running through next week called the 39 Steps, a comedy based on the Alfred Hitchcock spy thriller. It was a lot work in a short time, but I, along with classmate Laura got it in on time and made the client happy, so it was good all round.
This is the end of the Module on the introduction to Avid, but there's another 3 weeks of Avid that follows where we edit our own film. I'm going to spread my comments about Avid over the next few weeks. This week I'll give you a general overview of the program and talk specifically about the user interface and how important it is to organize your files properly in Avid, as opposed to to Final Cut Pro.
We edited the 39 Steps promo in FCP, but it's really difficult to use one program on a job while you're learning a different one in class. There's a lot of lessons we learned, like how difficult it can be for two people to edit one film, dividing up production tasks and working remotely.
I thought you would be interested in the process of setting up for the shoot, so I included that as well as described the equipment we used and why. Towards the end of the podcast I've included a list of things I would do differently, or pay more attention to if we have a chance to do this again, which I believe we will.
Some of the highlights of the post production process was doing color correction, creating and working with a soundtrack and setting the compression values to optimize file quality for posting on Youtube.
I've finally gotten a handle on some of my recording tools, such as the Mbox2 mixer and my condenser mic. I hope you've noticed an improvement in the audio quality. I'm still working on production quality, but I got a helping hand from Erica at CDIA, who helps maintain the audio and classroom maintenance for the Recording arts program at school. She demonstrated that my problems were due to my incompetence and not the equipment manufacturers. She also gave me a quick but thorough tour of Pro Tools. Sometime soon I'll take a few trips into Pro Tools country to record a few episodes.
Another problem I had was the absence of a mic stand and so I made one out of coat hanger and I used the leftover wire to create a pop filter which keeps the mic clean and softens annoying plosives.
This weeks classes continues the module on learning Avid. Since we have already covered Final Cut Pro earlier in the program everyone was wondering how you work the two together in a single workflow. Avid and Apple don't make it easy, but thanks to software plug-ins from Automatic Duck, and a bunch of money, you can make them friends.
I continue the saga of a filmmaking project I'm involved in with classmate Laura creating a promotional video for the Huntington Theater in Boston. We're shooting audience reactions following a performance of the play 39 Steps.
Finally the class gets to attend a screening of the documentary This is Nollywood, produced by some of CDIA's own, Franco Sacchi, Aimee Corrigan as well as renowned National Geographic photographer Robert Caputo. You may not see it in a theater near you, but you'll find it as a DVD online. If you're curious about the exciting filmmaking scene that is developing in West Africa you should check it out.
This is the first week of a new module where we learn how to use Avid Xpress Pro, in preparation for editing the footage we shoot a few weeks ago. Avid doesn't have the mind share among would be filmmakers as Final Cut Pro does, so I spend a little time talking about it's place in the filmmaking world.
It is the premier NLE and there's always talk about how it measures up against FCP, so I've included 1, 2, 3 different articles comparing the two. A very significant difference is that the companies that produce these programs have very different missions. Apple is all about bringing the professional media experience to the consumer, Avid is focused on the production needs of professional media makers thru it's own post production systems and the many companies it has acquired, like M-box, Digidesign and Softimage.
I've got some details about a project I'm involved in along with Laura, who I've worked with in the past on the genetic fingerprint documentary. We're going to shoot audience reaction to the play, The 39 Steps, that will be running at the Huntington Theater during September and October. It's a lot of work in a short time, so it should make for some interesting experiences.
This is the last week of the Film Project II module, which is to say the last week where we can shoot footage that we will edit in 3 weeks.
We don't have anything more we plan to shoot right now, but we may. This week we reviewed our footage and talked about it in light of what we already learned in previous classes and this project. We had problems lighting, but the final footage looked quite good.
There's also information about how to log video, before you capture and I explain how the camera sees compared to how our eyes see.
Next week is another new module where we learn how to use Avid.
This is the last post that where I discuss the 13 proposals in the Filmmaking Manifesto from Mike Jone's blog, Digital Basin from earlier this summer. I've learned a lot, have you? During these episodes I've tried to stay focused on Mike's ideas and how CDIA measures up against it from my narrow perspective as a film student.
I plan one more show on this topic where I talk about what I've learned personally. It's not a recap or summing up, though I will probably spend a few minutes doing discussing just that. What I'd really like to do is reflect on some things that were a little too far off topic to include previously as well as some actions I want to take.
This week I'm going to cover the following items:
* 11 - Creating Personal Stories
* 12 - Collaborative learning
* 13 - Teacher as facilitator
As far as personal stories are concerned, I'll elaborate on the writer's block I've experienced. Happily in the previous post in this podcast I believe I have beaten off. Look at #43 for more details. I haven't read much on how to write, but I was strongly affected by Stephen King's book On Writing and since he's the kind of author you either love or hate, I included two reviews of the book.
I'm very interested in the use of wikis and wikia for collaborative learning. There are applications for business, education, content managment, anything. I cite Podcamp as a place that uses wikis for scheduling presentations. It's anarchic, but in the right situation it can be the right tool. You should listen to Mike's audio presentation on Blogs, Wiki's and the new world order.
On the subject of teaching again, I invoke the words of Kahlil Gibran on children.
This week our team hunkers down and puts in long days of shooting the scene for the second film project. The team consists of Jonathan, Dennis, Mike, John and myself. Despite difficulties, all the effort pays off. I hope I'm not spoiling the suspense for you.
In process of learning my lines and and other performance skills, during an impromptu acting bootcamp, I have a story writing epiphany that releases me from the curse of writer's block.
There are a few technical details I include, such as a production breakdown list, a shot list or storyboard, a master shot, blocking and what is a C47.
I also try to describe the the wonderful feeling that you get after you stop banging your head against a wall, also known as success.
Finally there's a fair bit of talk about the satisfaction that comes from working as a team. I admit that my description is a little over the top, particularly where I invoke a few lines from Shakespeare's St Crispen's day speech as delivered by Henry V. But I do mean it. I love that speech by the way. There's a particularly poignant performance in the Danny Devito film Renaissance Man, it's worth checking out.
All told, it was a week of hard effort, valuable insight and worthwhile achievement.
Drop me a line at videostudentguy@gmail.com or leave a comment. In any event, thanks for stopping by.
Very short post this week. We're preparing ourselves for a multimodule film project.
This week we're choosing our script and team members. Have to shoot the script and show some footage in another two weeks. Following that we're learning how to edit in Avid, then another three weeks of editing.
This episode is all about Saturday's class where we diagram the movie Manhunter, by Michael Mann. This is the precursor to the Silence of the Lambs, and Hannibal Lektor is just as scary in this even though he is a minor character.
Using scripts of The Village, by M. Night Shyamalan and Heat, also by Michael Mann, we looked at how to do the formatting. Writing the content of a movie is a whole other matter which we didn't get into. The first step in the door is the actual format of the script. People are very particular that it look a certain way, all the letters are crossed and dotted, headings are just so. Also I pass along some tips for things to avoid when writing for visualization.
Here is a list of items for formatting the page:
* Location
* Action Block
* Character Name
* Parenthetical
* Dialog
* Transitions
Lots of software you can use, Final Draft we're using in class, Movie Magic Screenwriter is another app available. Demos are available. There's a free, opensource screenwriting software called Celtx that I have downloaded, but haven't really looked at.
Books are available, but looking at scripts, which you can download from IMSDB, SciFi Movie Page, Simply Scripts and the Weekly Script. A couple online magazines are Script and Creative Screenwriting.
Due to a change in the curriculum at CDIA, this module was broken into two parts, the first two were about production audio, this one is called, well, you can see what it's called in the title, and it's about film studies, history and what we call film grammar, which is the construction of the story through camera frame, sound, editing and everything else that goes into creating a film.
There's a great deal that we covered, but of course I'm going to talk about all the interesting things. Genres are discussed briefly, we review some films, such as Manhunter that demonstrate how to build suspense, not as easy as you think.
For some reason I use an analogy of Impressionism vs Jackson Pollock and then from there move into the horror genre, specifically zombie movies such as Night of the Living Dead, Shaun of the Dead and 28 Days Later.
There's a number of guidelines for judging the value of such movies as Heat and Memento like intention, 30 degree and 180 degree rule, misdirection and the concept of filmmaker as Auteur.
For a number of reasons I've divided the week into two episodes. The next one will be about screenwriting and how important the formatting of the document is.
This week is another installment of my review of CDIA, the school where I'm enrolled as a film student, where I'm grading the film program using the points presented in a filmmaking manifesto written by blogger and educator, Mike Jones, who writes the Digital Basin. By the way, Mike is in Australia and I make reference in the podcast to a presentation he delivered on Sound and Space at the University of New South Wales. I'm afraid it came out as South Wales, and I don't want you looking for Mike in Great Britain.
Here are the topics for this week:
• Multi-channel and Spatial sound
• Screen studies
• Working with clearly defined obstructions
• Working Lo-Fi but High-Concept
These episodes are independent of my weekly journal and it's been exhausting and enjoyable putting out two each week. There's one more post about the Manifesto and then I'll do a follow up show with my personal thoughts about this topic and how it's impacted doing this podcast.
Do some reading on Neil Postman, he has lots of food for thought.
This week we focus on using the wireless mic and placing the mic so that it is hidden. How to work with people so you can do your job efficiently and professionally.
The big shoot in Thursday's class involved running multiple mics through separate mixers to 3 cameras. It was a real pressure cooker. Impressions were mixed, but I think we learned a great deal about our deficiencies in this area.
Begin prepared and displaying confidence are key assets of sound production people. There's a lot to think about and nothing can be overlooked.
This episode is the second in a series about the current state of filmmaking education, specifically certain concepts which are already a part of the filmmaking landscape, but which are not on the map of most schools.
I'm using Mike Jones' Filmmaking Manifesto as the model for measuring how well schools are keeping current with evolving trends in the real world. Specifically, I'm using the school I'm attending, Center for Digital Imagining Arts at Boson University as a stand in for every school.
Check out Mike's blog, Digital Basin, for lots information about a wide range of topics regarding the production filmmaking world. You should check out the Manifesto on his site, since I'm not going through it in as much detail as him. He also has a number of mp3 files of presentations he's made on subjects covered in the Manifesto.
Finally, check out the comment he left following the previous podcast.
Production
note: I'm aware that there is a distinct difference between my
introductory section commenting on the last episode and the remainder
of the podcast covering the three points below.
4-Multi-platform scalable delivery
5-Ownership of end to end process
6-Software Agnosticism and independent skills
Obviously I recorded them at different times using different devices, different locations. A professional, or even someone relatively knowledge about in audio post production would be able to reconcile the tool and hide, or at least equalize the different sounds. That's not me, not right now. I don't even have the time to rerecord this and post it in time, so I'm settling for the fact that you can at least hear what I'm saying.
I make a few passing comments regarding Danny Kaye, Kahlil Gibran and The Prophet in order to make a point or two, Doesn't that combination make you even a little curious?
Production audio, hands on, boot camp like. Lots of opportunity to run and trip, and learn.
Frank DeAngelis is the instructor. Providing us with real world experience with a run and gun edge. Just another example of the variety of resources the school provides for our benefit.
So relieved, I'm really tapped, energy wise. Not afraid to work at learning, but between stress and tight deadlines I needed to use a different part of my brain. It was like someone knew we needed a breather.
In this module we get practical information about handling equipment, bringing to the set what you need to get the job done and working with what you got (not always the same) to get the job done. Often during class we came up short when we went through the kits. Something was missing, batteries, clips, connectors were bad. The motto of the class was "pack your own parachute" because if you only find out on set that something is missing, it's too late and no one gets the blame but you.
The focus was on using a boom and wireless mics (Sennheiser eW100 G2 wireless) and a mixer (Sound Devices 320) to control the audio from 3 sources going into the camera.
Another mantra was"treat the equipment with respect". As students it's easy to treat any of the equipment as casually as Stretch Armstrong, but you have to remember to develop good habits now, because there’s more important things to do when preparing for a paying gig than cursing yourself for breaking a wire connection or dropping a wireless transmitter, for the fifth time. How often do you expect you'll get rehired.
I don’t mean to sound like your mom, but you know, students are the worst and it gets old faster than finding your roommate's underwear in the freezer, again.
For those of you interested or with enough patience I've added a little detail about how a mixer fits in the production workflow, what it's used for, how it operates. I've tried my best to simplify things, it's still a very involved process.
I recently discovered a blog about filmmaking and filmmaking education called Digital Basin. The author, Mike Jones has written a number of posts about 13 issues that he feels are critical to the success of a film student in today's world, but which aren't getting the attention they deserve in the curriculum at most film schools. He calls it his Filmmaking Manifesto.
Read the posts, he makes a lot of valid points. I've always felt that CDIA was quite progressive and I thought it would be interesting to measure my school using his ruler.
I'm not interested in bashing the school, or promoting anyone’s agenda, but I feel his blogs have given me an external perspective on how well CDIA is preparing me for my future.
I'll continue my weekly journal shows, these will run alongside as a special topic.
I hope your find the ideas interesting and more importantly, it gives you your own ideas.
Submit a comment or drop me a line at videostudentguy@gmail.com
This week it all ends, at least for the current film project. I'm talking about last minute deadlines and the mixed feelings that result. There's always some vague unsatisfied feeling when you finish an all consuming project, as this one was. For me, I'm so glad to get this off my back, but also I realize that even though my mind an nerves are refilling with a sense of ease, there's still a sense of lack. Just putting a name to it is difficult, I still can't articulate it.
I know that I'm looking for a response, feedback, realization, something that I wasn't looking for when I started. Not affirmation, not the satisfaction of a job well done. All those things are welcome, for sure. I think it has something to do with purpose. Either the purpose of this project wasn't realized in the finished project, or it was too small a goal.
I'm just going to sound stupid trying to figure this out in a blog, so just leave it at this, that gnawing unfulfilled feeling you get when you're full, but you're still hungry.
So this episode is about meeting the deadline, the client meeting and review of the finished project. I add a little commentary at the end about gleaning meaning out of the experience.
Lastly I add a brief how to regarding multi-track audio editing between FCP and Soundtrack.
Below are the steps I go through in the podcast:
Select the File menu
Select Send To
Soundtrack Pro Multitrack Project
Make sure both options, Open in Sountrack Pro Multitrack Editor and Include Background Video are checked and click Save.
When you work with the audio in Soundtrack you’re going to be shuffling files between the two programs quite often, so I like to name my files to indicate what program they were saved from and what program they’re to be editing in. So when I export it from FCP I might call it FilmName, then add from Final Cut Pro to Soundtrack Pro. I usually abbreviate it, like FCP-SP, or simply F-S. Exporting it from Soundtrack Pro to FCP would be the reverse, FilmName S-F.
Following the export, Soundtrack Pro launches and opens the file in the Multitrack view. The stereo track from Final Cut displays as a single track in Soundtrack Pro. In Soundtrack Pro you can add additional tracks, such as sound effects, loops and other dialog.
By default there’s only one track for audio. You can add more tracks by right clicking in an audio track and selecting Insert Track Before, or After.
Add your audio and then Export the file, it’s an audio file, it has a .aif extension. Choose File/Export/Export Mix.
Import the audio file into Final cut. It appears as a single track.
Place in the video sequence. If you want to edit it, right click on the audio track and choose Open in Editor.
Soundtrack Pro comes to the front and tells you that the aif file is linked to a .stmp file, a Soundtrack project and asks you if you want to open the audio file or the project file.
Choose the project file to edit the individual tracks
The file opens with each audio element in independent tracks.
Make further changes to the different tracks, or add new tracks, then, as before, Choose File/Export/Export Mix and save it with the name you saved it as in the previous export, it supplies the same name by default.
When you go back to FCP you’ll see the changes are updated.
In this manner you can work between the two programs to keep you audio modifications in sync and still be able to work with each track separately. Without having to deal with a large number of separate tracks in FCP.
I've played around with a different recording device, the Mbox 2 plus a Sennheiser mic. I think the quality is vastly improved, but now I have to deal with keeping my head in one position so that you don't get dizzy listening to my voice move back and forth. Isn't learning fun?
This week is the middle of the module on creating a non-fiction 2 minute film. I've tried to describe how we organized ourselves, developed the story and set up the shots. I think the biggest issue during our shoot was the pressure of trying to get the shooting done in time. Also still a big concern is the confidence of knowing how much coverage was necessary. Our footage ratio was 1:25, which is 25 minutes of footage for every minute of the final cut. I think that's acceptable.
The best part is how well we all worked together. It was a real pleasure to be part of a focused, dynamic team. Considering how little time we had, it was a necessity.
I'm back after a week on the road and on vacation.
In the musing department I reflect briefly on the differences between the highways in the US and Canada and the filmic charms of upstate New York.
It's the beginning of a new module, this time I'm working with some guys on a 2 minute film that would be used as a warm up for a live presenter. The client is a film distribution company called Enterprise Media. You can see more examples of what we're trying to accomplish at John Cleese's video training site. There's 3 weeks to complete this, so there's lots to cover in a short amount of time.
Not in this episode, but coming soon, I'm going to talk about a site that has sparked my imagination and prompted me to create a series podcasts about the future of filmmaking education. Mike J0nes at Digital Basin created a manifesto for filmmaking educators a few weeks ago. I thought he was on target regarding the changes that dynamic media schools will have to make in order to adequately prepare their students for the rapidly evolving media production marketplace. I've always considered CDIA to be in the lead of adopting new technology, with a healthy sense of pragmatism, so I was interested in how my school measured up to Mike's idea's. Take a look at his manifesto and stay tuned, the series begins in a few weeks.
I'm on vacation, talk to you in a week.
Still fuzzy sounding in the background, I gotta get a new mic.
condita , succurro , eruditio
Lots of last minute editing to reach Thursday's deadline. In the end, as is always the case, I had to stop before I was satisfied. I will continue to edit and incorporate the comments gleaned from the critique.
I've definitely learned to give myself more time for editing, video doesn't edit itself. And don't put it off, things come up that steal your time, use every spare minute you can. Do I sound spastic? Editing, I've learned, can do that to you.
But the critique was great. We saw everything everyone had to show. Not everyone delivered both the profile and the how to. I just squeezed by with a rough cut of the profile. I'll talk about a bunch about things I've learned form editing and the critique.
Finally, following a listener's email I've decided to tear the veil and give up a little information about myself.
Crunch Time
I've been really busy editing stories to meet a deadline so I've got a short episode this time.
Just an update on the editing process - things that can go wrong and ways to cope with stress, or not, you can decide if I'm coping well.
We're going to use iDVD for final output so I've listed all the steps for exporting from FCP and creating a finished DVD in iDVD.
Next week I'll give you the highlights from the final critique.
Episode 28 begins with comments from episode 27 regarding the idea of context
I offer my Ballpark view philosophy and consider some ideas for adding variety to the podcast thru
* Interviews
* Editorials
Audio Mixer
We get a quick introduction to the audio mixer in FCP including how to
organize the tracks in the mixer environment without changing the order of the audio tracks in the timeline
recording on the fly mixing changes using keyframes
adding Audio Mixer buttons to the timeline
axporting audio to Pro Tools and Soundtrack Pro
Firewire Firewire Firewire
I note a couple pitfalls to avoid when dealing with external drives
No USB capture in FCP
Reformat your drive when you get it out of the box
* Use the Disk Utility in Applications/Utilities
* It's simple and fast
Finally, I mention visiting the Bison and Alpaca ranches of New England for some B-roll
I've included some musings on taking time to think and putting things in context.
Check out this book by Edward Dmytryk, On Film Editing
I've included some musings on taking time to think and putting things in context.
Despite my interest in putting things in a thoughtful way, I manage to run through a bunch of processes like a kid running through the woods during a thunderstorm. So I quickly explain how to, among other things, different kinds of cuts, using the motion feature in FCP, working with filters and compositing.
Most of the week was spent editing a rough cut of our projects. We have to get them done in 3 weeks. In-between editing Federico likes to show us some student films and discuss how successful they are. That's been really instructive.
Continuing with the Final Cut module, for the second week
I was looking for some new production video and audio podcasts on iTunes and was reading the comments when I got curious about this podcast's page. I checked it out and was surprised that there was a comment. The writer was very generous and encouraging and indicated that while he hoped one day he would be able to do some filmmaking, this podcast gave him a look inside the process of learning filmmaking. Just one comment, but I was both humbled and gratified. It doesn't take a lot of encouragement to lift your spirits.
I haven't done much since I began to promote the podcast and I know of several things I could do. Frankly getting an episode out each week is often a struggle in time and effort. I have yet to check my stats on Libsyn, my hosting site, to see what, if any number of downloads there have been. Occasionally I check the blogs to see if there are any comments and even rarely do I check my email. I think that's the least I could do. Already I'm making myself busy. I'll do better, I promise.
This definitely points out my main goal though, which is to create a journal of my school experience, regardless of anyone else's participation. I don't mean I don't give a damn if no one listens to this podcast, or sends me comments and emails. I've already said how good an experience that is. I mean that my primary motivation, apart from any other consideration, is to create the podcast consistently through the end of my program at CDIA and in the process incorporate the best production values that I can. I don't know how much time I could devote to developing a community, no matter how small, of people interested in talking about my experiences in school, or theirs for that matter, unless it were to happen. I do know that I can learn a lot from creating this podcast and using it to reflect on what I discover each week at school. I'm just as glad that other people can do the same.
More stuff about Final Cut Pro editing strategies. Placing shortcuts to menu commands using the Button Bars in the top of every window pane, Timeline, Browser, Viewer etc. Option-J brings up the Button command lists, Option-H brings up the virtual keyboard that displays all the command key combinations. Rendering, which applies a special effect to a selected clip and then writes a file that stores that effect, can be a big time saver, and at the same time a disk hog. You'll need to remove these files from time to time. The wise thing to do is to delete them within Final Cut Pro, as opposed to deleting them from the Finder, otherwise you could get headaches from persistent alerts that media files are missing. Use Command-R to generate a render.
By the way, I'll always refer to the Apple Command key as the Command key, not the Apple key as I hear it often referred to in class and by other students. Maybe it's just old school, but I can't think of it as anything else.
As far as transitions are concerned, there are four which are recommended for their consistently effective impact:
* A Straight Cut
* dissolve
* Fade to black
* Dip to Color
Finally I discuss a variety of export options, depending on the medium you're sending you film to. Most importantly, from an archival standpoint, send your film to tape (DV tape on your camcorder). Also I mention exporting using Current Settings, Flash for web and Audio to OMF.
Thursday night was the Practicum showing. Student projects that created products in their media for local non profit organizations under the direction of a professional filmmaker. Great professional looking work.
Finally I mention a recent episode of This Week in Media, show # 53, Learning to Learn. TWIM is produced by Pixecorps.tv. I listen to this podcast weekly, very new media oriented with an emphasis on filmmaking issues. This one is about learning strategies for professionals that help you keep current.
Leave a comment or send me an email.
This is the first week of the Final Cut Pro module. Tuesday night was a special topic class, separate form the module.
Our speaker was Robert Patton Spruill, director of Squeeze and a documentary on Public Enemy which is in final production.
He brought some fresh perspective on how to live your life as an independent filmmaker. I also appreciated his perspective on the program at CDIA versus, Emerson College, where he teaches as well.
Federico Muchnik, the video program director is our instructor for the Final Cut Pro module. He has an easygoing style that he uses effectively to cut through all the mucky details and focuses specifically on the need-to-know stuff for filmmakers. We're covering a lot of ground in a short time, the point is that we'll do the real learning once we start cutting. I cover the things I think are most important to the editing workflow.
Somehow I got into a rant about archiving files. It's definitely something you need to consider before you get to far into a project. Finally I bring up an important point about capturing video. Don't capture video to an external drive connected via USB. Just don't.
After a review of our footage from last week's shoot we returned to New
Hampshire and spent the morning at the Jackson Estuarine Lab. We filmed
the steps that will ultimately be a movie on how to make a genetic
fingerprint.
This module has been an excellent learning opportunity.
I have learned to check equipment before I leave the equipment room, to
make a shooting list before going on locaiton and most importantly, I
learned a valuable lesson about setting the white balance on a DVX100.
Finally I end with an insider's description of the Pixelcorps. This is an online community that serves video professionals through training, mentoring and job postings. There's a summer special of $50 for 3 months membership. It's a good deal.
Go to Pixelcorp.tv for a good source for production video podcasts.
Our team chose to shoot both projects at the same location. In the How To, our guest biologist, Steve, who works at the Jackson Estuarine Laboratory, demonstrates how to devine the genetic fingerprint of bacteria The profile is on the very same lab which monitors marine biology on the coast of New Hampshire.
We had a number of temporary setbacks because we didn't check our equipment but we end up with quite a bit of usable footage.
I'm still recording using the built-in mic on my Mac Powerbook. I've discovered you can do some decent audio correction using the Channel EQ. I'll talk about that in the next post.
This episode includes a wrap up of NAB. I focus on Apple and Adobe's new products and a little bit about the Red Camera.
Although I didn't attend the first week of the new Module, "Film Project 1", I lay out the details: get coverage for two 5 minute videos, one demonstrating how to do something, the other is a profile of an individual.
Check out these podcasts that provided a lot of live coverage of the NAB event: This Week in Media, FX Podcast and Digital Production Buzz.
There's lots of training on Flash video, HD cameras and workflow, Audio production, compression and color correction in FCP. I'll give you the highlights.
Of course theres classes on After Effects, 3D software, Adobe suite, Final Cut Pro suite, Avid, HD DVD production. There's tons of stuff to learn and hard choices to make.
Once the exhibition show opened on Monday April 15 I fought the crowds to find out stuff about Apple and Adobes new offerings. I've got a little news, more to come in the next episode.
The night before I took off for Las Vegas, which I know you're really tired of hearing about. I promise. I'll stop mentioning that soon. Anyway, on Wednesday April 11 I joined some of my classmates for a screening at Brandeis University by Errol Morris of a work in progress film about Abu Graib. He showed pieces of the film, rough cuts, talked briefly about the genesis of the project and that because of previous visits to the campus, felt the University community would have provide some valuable feedback to what he presented.
He was a quiet unassuming personality who took his work seriously, but in a self deprecating way. I was surprised by his demeanor. Considering the seriousness of the works I've seen, not everything certainly, I expected him to be more severe. Not complaining. Really, it's one of the reasons I attended.
There were a lot of interesting questions about the source material, how it was available, how he got the people who took the photos to be interviewed and whether they were being honest or trying to cast themselves as victims.
He made it clear that this was not an anti governement movie, but that it was about the banality of war, and the sheer stupidity. It was grim viewing, but also breathtakingly absorbing. He said it should be coming out later this year. Watch for it.
Another show recorded at Logan Airport, complete with guest ambient speakers. Any suggestions on how to eliminate them would be greatly appreciated. By the way, I did finally get to Vegas, about 1am local time. I got to my room and collapsed at 3:30. Maybe I'll fill you in on my exciting trip in another episode. I was very happy to stop.
So this episode covers Tuesday nights class. Howard Phillips, who taught a previous class on lighting, filled in for Franco who was out sick. We reviewed some video people shot the previous week using the camera handheld. As I mention in the podcast I appreciate having multiple teachers in a single class, although not at the expense of the health of anyone. Even if they recover information or techniques, I feel I can benefit from their differing experiences and perspectives.
Currently I'm attending seminars. I'll be posting episodes shortly. The trade show hasn't started yet. I'm really loving all the information. There are about 8 different tracks on video production, software and hardware and I can only choose one at a time. Come Monday I'll have to skip some classes altogether to see the booths on the floor. And it's a big floor.
Following right on the heels of this post is one about a screening I attended of a work in progress by Errol Morris, the guy who produced The Fog of War and other great documentaries. Coming right up.
You going to hear the cuts in this episode. I recorded this podcast from Logan Airport in Boston, waiting for my plane to Las Vegas. Lots of background noise. There just doesn't seem to be quiet rooms at this airport. I thought the Men's room would be a little obvious. I'm also editing in Adobe Audition instead of Soundtrack pro and Garageband, so the production values are going to suffer from my limited experience with that program. I think it's quite the capable piece of software, I'm just unfamiliar with it.
We watched the first 15 minutes of an excellent documentary called Children Underground, by Edet Belzberg about the lives of a group of children who live in the subways of Bucharest Roumania. From that we took a number of lessons about shooting cinema verite with a handheld camera.
The assignment for the class was to take multiple shots of an individual working at a computer. All different angles and perspectives, from above, over the shoulder, in front, close-ups of hands on keyboards and mouse, the monitor, the desk, etc. It was all about coverage, getting every shot you could need to demonstrate the detailed actions of someone working on a computer, probably with the intention of using it as B-roll for a voice-over, or over dubbed interview. Shooting handheld for even 15 minutes is very fatiguing.
We didn't get time to look at the video, but we did discuss our experiences while we were waiting for everyone to get back. In the next week we'll review them and take on another assignment.
In the meantime I'm still waiting for the plane. Heavy winds in Nevada they say.
The ummm, ah episode. I'm trying really hard to streamline and shorten the production process for podcasting. That means working off of short notes, instead of a finished script and not spending so much time editing, removing annoying ahs and spaces. And as much as I've tried, I've still spent too much time editing the audio. I can't stand listening to me stumbling along, why should you. Still it's a little rougher that usual. Let me know what you think.
This episode includes notes about a documentary preview, So Much | So Fast, and Q&A with the filmmaker, Steven Asher. His comments on how to make a living as a documentary filmmaker were interesting.
Thursday and Saturday we prepared and shot an interview which I describe as well as give up some pointers on how to conduct an interview.
Finally I talk about the RED One camera. It's the one to watch at NAB this year.
Another quick set of notes for this podcast.
This week begins the class on documentary and interview. This podcast is only about Tuesday night's class. I'm going to put out a second podcast covering Thursday nights special topic where we screen a just released documentary and get to question the filmmaker, and then Saturday's class where we set up lighting for an interview and then interview someone we don't know.
I also take the time to bleed all the humor out of David Brenner's jokes with my sad delivery
I discuss the sad lot of Julie Amero
Check out Errol Morris' films, and the commercials on his site. He's the one who did the original Apple ads about switchers.
Just a brief note, hopefully I can update the show notes on the blog soon. This podcast closes the last classes of the Filmmaking Fundamentals module. I also give a run down of things to see at the National Association of Broadcaster's show in Las Vegas, coming up in April.
I'll see you there.
I'm talking about a variety of shoots this week. We're shooting an action scene using a dolly and shooting a dialog scene with a variety of OTS (over the shoulder) angles, including dirty and clean singles. Once all the camera work is done we'll be editing it into rough cuts next week.
I also discuss a number of Filmmaking events taking place in the next couple months. In Boston the Independent Film Festival will be taking place, April 25 - 30. They're looking for volunteers. Another film festival is online, called the One Minute Film Festival.
The 48 hour film project is closed in Boston, but it's a wicked cool event you should look into to get a complete tour of the video production experience.
I will be attending NAB mid April and while I talk a little bit about the things I plan to see and learn at the show, including training by FMC, I'll talk about at more length in the next podcast.
Some of the updated announcements I expect to see are Adobe CS and Production suite, Apple FCP and an update to Avid for the Mac/Intel processor.
Red camera is going to make a big noise with a demonstration and possibly a limited sale of it's new camera that shoots 4k video.
Creating a Short Narrative
This module is all about putting into action what we've been taught to date about light, camera work and sound. After a brief introduction by our instructor Tom Robothan we were thrust into the preproduction process. Our goal was to shoot five scenes from interviews to action and dialog and then cut it together.
It's an excellent example of the team-orientated learning that is a big part of CDIA's curriculum. This week is all about planning and next week we'll do the bulk of the shooting. The last week is for editing.
I'm way behind so I'm posting this fast and short. This show is less than 5 minutes long.
This week we finished the lighting module. We did an exercise with 3 point lighting on 2 people and another exercise outside using daylight and reflectors.
Saturday and Sunday I shot video of a reception and awards ceremony at Brandeis University for their annual film festival, Sundeis.
Here are some links mentioned in the audio:
Matters of Light and Depth
American Film Institute
Vision of Light
Cinematographer's Style
All That Jazz
Roy Scheider
Practical Lighting
Tuesday night's class began with how to set up 3 Point lighting, the classic TV news lighting. 3 point lighting consists of the main light, Key; secondary light, Fill; Backlight or Kicker, which separates the subject from the background and Background light.
3 points of light, 4 lights, an amazing paradox. I describe our efforts setting up the scene. By the way, I mistakenly used the term "baffle" when referring to a fabric grid we use on the Rifa to direct light forward. I don't know what it is called and I couldn't find it on the Lowel site.
Thursday night we used the same lighting techniques to recreate a night scene and I include pointers on how to do that.
Podcasts for filmmakers
Finally, I introduce a new segment, reviewing podcasts that I feel are valuable learning tools for anyone interested in working in the motion graphics field. Tonight I'm profiling the VFX Show. Mentioned briefly is episode 5 where the hosts talk about their favorite DVD extras that include helpful movies on production techniques.
Take a look at DVD Breakdown for reviews of DVDs and descriptions of the extras. I also mentioned a book by Robert Rodriquez, the guy who gave us El Mariachi and Spy Kids. It's called Rebel without a Crew.
Chapter Titles
00:07 This Week
00:45 3 Point Lighting
01:53 Key
02:18 Fill
03:29 Backlight
04:00 Kicker
05:19 Background
06:55 Exercise: News Lighting
08:54 Night Light
12:22 Exercise: Night Lighting
14:07 What is Podcasting?
18:07 The VFX Show
22:49 DVD Extras
25:25 Close
This is a special mid week episode of the Video StudentGuy podcast. Thursday night we had a special topic presentation by Franco Sacchi, a filmmaker and instructor at CDIA. He presented his documentary, American Eunuch, as an example of how to create a documentary.
The class covered every step of the production process beginning with finding the idea, preproduction, the shoot, post and promotion. Check out IFP.org for help marketing your film.
Franco briefly referred to the Long Tail marketing concept which I try to explain in a nutshell. This was a term popularized by Chris Anderson of Wired and he went on to write a book about it as well. He also has a blog on it. I believe this business model has significant impact on all content producers and will continue to gain mind-share over the next several years.
Everything about the film should be rolled up into a website for promotional purposes. Include budget, proposal and treatment to demonstrate your organizational skills. You should contrast the earlier American Eunuch site to the more current This is Nollywood website to see how he is using the web to create buzz about his movies. Nollywood is a documentary about the growing film industry in Nigeria. That film is currently in post.
Towards the end of the show I present a few of my thoughts about the movie. Keep in mind I only saw a portion of the film. All the same I give it a thumbs up. I close out with some production notes about this podcast.
Chapter Titles
00:08 This Week
01:25 Franco Sacchi
01:50 Costs
03:44 Find the story
06:31 Preproduction
07:41 The Shoot
08:43 Post
10:03 Promotion
11:40 The Long Tail
13:36 Websites
15:23 Film Commentary
18:10 Close - Production Notes
Light up everybody
In this episode there's a lot of information about the character of light and lighting hardware. To our eyes light is white, but light is always changing color and knowing how to describe it and measure it is very important to filmmaking.
Measuring light
Two ways of measuring light is CRI, the Color Rendering Index and the Kelvin color temperature. CRI measures the strength of light and how consistent it is. CRI values are on each piece of professional lighting equipment and the best piece of information you can learn is to never buy a lamp that has a CRI below 90%. You can find useful information about CRI on GE's site, including graphs displaying the color consistency.
Kelvin measures the color of light. The two lights used most frequently in filmmaking are tungsten and daylight. Tungsten, which is a red/orange color, is about 3200 degrees Kelvin, Daylight, which is bluish is about 5600 degrees Kelvin. These values are not heat temperatures, they measure color in a range from black on the low end to white on the high end.
Light kits
There are three different sets of lights we use at school. Arri are tungsten lights and they use Fresnel lenses, Lowell are also Tungsten lights and Kino lights are fluorescent lights that are color accurate to either daylight or tungsten. The key thing is to not trust your eyes or the LCD on the camera, trust the monitor.
You can control the light by adding on elements such as barn doors, scrims, gels, gobos and diffusers.
Handling electricity
WARNING WILL ROBINSON: Be very very careful when dealing with electricity and make sure you understand how to handle lights before using them. I'm giving you a brief overview, don't rely on what I say alone.
I do my best to explain about calculating the load your lights are putting on your electrical system. Watts, Amps and Volts are the three variables. You get to do the math everytime you set up lights so that you never blow out the circuit.
Watts / Volts = Amps
Amps x Volts = Watts
Lighten up
Finally, a little more information about matching the color of lights. Don't be so precise, Leave a little room for variation in color within a scene. As long as it matches your intentions, bear in mind that in the real world, we're looking at multiple colored light sources all the time and don't think anything of it.
Chapter times
00:08 This week
012:9 Lighting terminology
02:48 The color of light
03:51 CRI
05:42 Kelvin color temperature
06:40 Light kits
08:41 Scrims, gels, barn doors
11:22 Changing color with gels
13:20 Electricity
16:57 Cookies and gobos
18:10 Don't try to match exactly
20:34 close
The Sound and the Frustration
This is the last week for the Camera and Sound module. The class broke up into 2 teams of 5 and continued to use the boom mic and lavalier mic. Tuesday we recorded an interview, and a narrative short on Thursday. I spend a few moments explaining the advantages of a Boom over a lav mic.
We're also using a sound mixer which provides more control than is available through the camera alone. I explain why it is both simple and hard
We experienced difficulties working with the audio that put us under a lot of pressure to meet our end of class deadline. The big lesson is that no matter what the source of your equipment, it makes sense and can really save your butt if you check the working status before you begin setting up the shot.
Of course all the preparation in the world won't save you if you don't pay attention to details. Despite my best efforts to avoid problems, by coming into class an hour early to prep the equipment, I still managed to miss the fact that the video gain was turned on through our entire shoot.
"Wakey, wakey" as a friend used to say.
We worked up a short story that we would shoot as an in-camera edit, where each scene is shot in one take, as it occurs in the story. Each shot is filmed so that the end and beginning fit in with the next and previous shot. No extra footage because you aren't editing it in the computer, it's all in the camera. It took a lot of planning and discussion to shoot, but it was fun and it worked out rather well. It helped that it was a simple story and it was short, only 3 minutes long.
On the last day of the class we were introduced to optical stabilization, which makes shooting hand held practical. We didn't get a chance to use it this week, so I'll talk about it in a future episode.
I also discuss the need to develop a process for double checking, not only the working status of equipment, but also the settings on the equipment.
Howard Phillips, the associate director of the Film program will be teaching the next module on lighting, which begins next week.
Chapter times
00:07 Last week recap
00:54 This week
01:19 Boom vs Lav mic
03:24 Reel to reel memories
04:20 Mixer revealed
05:18 Production problems
07:08 Shooting In-Camera edit
07:52 Deciding on a story
08:26 The other team's story
09:21 Our shoot
10:17 Critique of video
11:16 Optical stabilization
12:06 Composition concerns
12:46 Checklists
13:40 Editorial: Order order
15:30 Close
We shot a little video, experimenting with the various controls of the camera and framing techniques. During critiques Greg referred to framing conventions as the Grammar of Cinema. Every shot serves a purpose in advancing the story. The composition of the shot communicates on an unconscious and emotional level, as well as visually. During each critique he would use the rule of thirds to identify the impact of the scene visually.
He referred to a book on cinematic grammar, Shot by Shot. If I get my hands this book I'll write a brief review.
The rule of thirds is a way of composing your scene and arranging the relationship between subjects and subject and the background. It is used in all areas of design. Here's a link to a site that has a good explanation from a photographer's point of view, but applies to cinema as well.
Saturday was the first all day class and it was all about recording audio. We used a number of different microphones and looked at ways to control sound that you don't want to record.
Chapter Titles
00:07 This week
00:27 PreRoll Checklist
00:57 Time Code is tricky
01:59 Critique
02:40 Rule of thirds
04:49 Grammar of cinema
05:22 DVX100 complaint
06:46 Recording audio
07:44 Testing different mics in an interview
10:08 Hierarchy of microphones
11:14 Controlling sound
12:24 Learning highlights
13:56 Close
I'm posting a really brief show note so I can get this out the door. I should have posted this Monday. If I have the time I'll revise it this weekend.
Week 1: Getting familiar with the hardware
The next three weeks the class will be covering how to setup and use essential camera and sound equipment. This week we set up tripods, calibrated the monitor, adjusted the frame rate and set the white balance on the DVX100.
Next week we finish the Preroll checklist and shoot some video.
Here is a link to a pdf of the manual for the DVX100.
I had to hunt to find this. Despite the fact that it's a common occurrence, I always find it amazing when manufacturers bury their most useful and sought after information. Sure, choke me with 4 color slicks that convey almost no useful information, but hide what I really need. Sometimes it seems web sites are nothing more than the web equivalent of a phone system where you spend half an hour on hold just so you can be rewarded with a dropped line.
Making meaning
This is an honest effort on my part to talk about the process of creating work that says what you mean, or to put it another way, keeping your work within the boundaries you've set according to your personal values and goals.
The book that sparked this introspective podcast is Darkroom to Digital, by Eddie Ephraums. The supplied link takes you to the Amazon page. Eddie's home page is still under construction.
I spend a few moments talking about Socrates and his statement "the unexamined life is not worth living" because it encapsulates the need of the creative individual, if not every individual, to consider the meaning and purpose of their life. You can read a concise summary of his trial here.
On page 26 Eddie’s book I look at 5 questions he asks himself as an artist, to clarify his goals. I highly recommend it, regardless of what medium you work in. His writing style is straight forward and concise. It’s the kind of writing that brings new understanding each time you read them.
Taking chances
I feel like I'm still getting my bearings creating this podcast. I also feel that perhaps it was premature to wander away from concrete and technical matters, such as production issues and class schedules. And yet, I've also made a commitment to myself to experiment and take risks. That includes embracing the sure possibility of failure.
A couple of quotes I often think of regarding failure are "if you're going to fail, fail boldly" and the other is "It isn't the falling down and failing that is the problem, it is the falling down and not getting up". I could do a podcast on interviews with people on failure, how they cope with it, what it means to them, failures that have shaped their lives. Not a bad idea.
Introspection and soul searching are going to occur from time to time throughout this podcast as I try to figure the meaning of what people are telling me and whether it's something I can, or should integrate into my own life.
Chapter Times
Discovering Meaning in your work :12
Darkroom to Digital - about the book :52
The unexamined life 2:19
5 guides for creativity 3:57
5 guides quote 4:36
What I'm saying, what are people hearing 4:55
Developing your vision 8:04
Sharing your vision 8:26
Avoiding sidetracks 9:47
Closing remarks 11:11
Next week 12:55
Production Notes
I was having some problems with the audio going into the red in Garageband. I didn't see any distortion in Soundtrack, but it was hitting 0db continuously. I used the Levelator from Gigavox media to see if it made a difference. The audio sounded fuller and I can see it made changes, but it was still running too hot. I looked at the modified audio in Soundtrack and the levels looked fine. Maybe there's a setting in Garageband that's off.
I'm going to trust Soundtrack, and by extension Levelator and put the podcast out as it is. Let me know if you think the levels are still too high. If anyone has any experience with Levelator let me know how it's treating you. I don't want to rely on a black box, I want to know how to control audio in a program like Soundtrack Pro or Pro Tools. Right now, I'm going to be satisfied knowing I'm not blowing out anyone's eardrums.
Send comments or emails.
The first half of the show I'm recapping the reasons why I'm taking the classes at the CDIA, the 2nd part I go over what I want to accomplish professionally.
Chapter Times
Review of personal goals :20
The joy of learning 2:14
Exploring ideas 2:41
Challenging my limitations 4:48
Networking 5:44
Being open to alternate visions 6:51
Using video for learning 7:48
Video as entertainment 10:21
Working on a team 12:03
What's ahead 12:29
There's a number of ways you can hear this episode. You can listen to it through a Flash player on the host site or subscribe to it using the RSS feed. I will be registering it on the directories, including iTunes, over the next couple days.
This very lengthy episode has me reviewing most, but not all the classes I'll be taking at the Center for Digital Imaging Arts. I discuss my expectations as well as what my personal interests. In a nutshell I'm looking forward to everything.
My gung ho attitude is due to my expectation that I will never get another opportunity to attend classes in such a lengthy, structured manner. I believe in lifelong learning, but that constitutes fitting the learning in between large chunks of life. For the next 18 months that equation will be reversed, where, wherever I can help it, the classes take precedence.
I've done my homework, checked out the school, the instructors, the program, the content of the classes, interviewed students, clocked the commute, calculated how many hours of sleep a week I can live on. Now it's up to me.
I don't believe in passive learning. I intend to dig into this experience with my nails. I know what I want to know, in a vague sort of way. I also know I need to be paying attention so that when something unexpected comes at me I can get a piece of it as well. If I'm not satisfied when I'm finished, it will be my own fault.
Chapter times
Introduction :10
1 Fundamentals :59
2 Camera & Lighting 1:19
4 Project 1 6:15
5 Editing 1 6:51
6 Editing Lab 7:48
7 Documentary Camera 8:21
8 Interview 10:26
9 Editing II 12:16
10 Directing Documentary 12:57
13 Directing Drama 13:39
14 Preproduction 13:56
15 Cinematography 14:18
16 Locations 14:36
18 Final Production 15:09
25 Workshops 16:23
26 Final Cut Pro 17:34
27 Practicum 18:01
Close 20:16
You can leave comments on the blog or send me email. Show notes are also in lyrics section of the .mp3
In this episode I go into some depth about the things I want this show to be about: production video software and hardware, production workflows, video editing and distribution, reviews of the classes, the school, the workshops and visiting artists.
Yeah, I've got dreams as big as the sky, but there's a lot of time to cover all this stuff, maybe. Boiled down to it's tar-like essence I would like to extend my classroom experience into this podcast. I want to let you know what I'm learning, how it's helping me create a better podcast and ultimately become a better video producer.
Chapter times
Podcast goals 1:21
Audio 1:40
Avid 2:20
Managing my time 3:38
Applications of Video 4:24
Topics of discussion 5:58
Interviews 7:53
Production Skills 9:20
Workflow and problem solving 11:34
Podcast schedule 12:10
Combining different media 13:02
Distribution 13:34
Community 14:53
Advertising 16:33
Close 17:54
Enhancing this podcast 18:27
In this first podcast I talk about what led me to think about production video and how I discovered the Center for Digital Imaging Arts at Boston University.
There's a little bit about me, my video class experience at Clark University and how I have been using video. Finally, I describe who I think might be interested in listening, or at the very least, who I think I may be talking to.
Chapter times
About the show :07
About me :30
About the Center for Digital Imaging Arts (CDIA) 1:02
Previous classes in video editing 1:51
The impact of Final Cut Pro on professional video 2:42
CDIA culture and programs 3:37
Who should listen to this podcast 5:49
Close 9:03
The first 5 episodes of this podcast, that I post over the next two weeks, will cover different aspects of being a video student, such as the school, the classes in the program and personal goals.
Once my classes begin January 23, 2007, I'll deliver this podcast on a weekly basis. Initially you'll hear me talking about what's being covered in class and my impressions of the school. As time passes and I get my act together, I'd like to include interviews with other students, instructors and visiting artists at the school. I also hope to include comments and interviews with people in similar programs at other schools.
Please submit your comments here or send me an email.