Image curiosity of pictures.funnyjunksite.com/.../ brain-drain/
Thursday, April 22, 2010
10 revalations
Image curiosity of pictures.funnyjunksite.com/.../ brain-drain/
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Media Meditations2, #3: Acting for the first Time
Now I've always been a person who lacks co-ordination and direction, how I ended up as the main character in Geoff Klane’s student film I have no idea. I don’t know if it was a sort of process of elimination situation or the drawing of a straw but it still, he choose me. I would have been perfectly satisfied if I was holding a boom mic or a light the whole time but I guess it was time for me to step in front of a camera.
Knowing my lines wasn’t even the hardest part. Knowing how to become this character “Pat” was easily the most difficult; I had to move like this slacker film student, I had to be as unbearable and lethargic as possible like this slacker film student I was playing. All in all I had to be a complete slob with no regard for anyone but myself. Having spent time around people like this it didn’t take long to settle in and really become this character.
As I’m writing this meditation I can’t help but find myself in a mental daze from all the work I’ve put into this film all weekend. On top of all the acting, I’ve been running around with my head chopped off trying to complete the stack of work I have due in the upcoming weeks. It’s been hard trying to do all my stuff while trying to give Geoff the effort of exact performance of this character. I give a lot of these filmmakers credit for their work because in no way is any of it easy. A simple five-minute scene took us over an hour to shoot. All the production had to be perfect; lighting and sound were crucial to any dialogue that was muttered between the characters. Some scenes we had to do over with different camera angles in order to show the emotion and mannerisms that the actors were given. It’s not a good feeling to see the director with his hand in his face to your own poor performance.
Now Geoff is a friend of mine who I met playing guitar at the grind and being at the weekly digital film making screenings but when it came to working on this film, he was the boss. I want to give him exactly what he sees this movie to be in his head…. And that’s hard to do. Given the fact that this is my first time acting it’s hard to find this emotional transfer to put into the character. I try to be a studious person who has a good sense of morals but I’m playing my evil twin. Geoff told me to try and stay in character this whole week until we’re done with all my scenes and I can’t be a prick for a week!
By next weekend the whole film should be finished and then it will go into post-production. This will require hours in front of monitors on Geoff’s behalf while he edits this film on Final Cut Pro. We filmed the whole movie on a Panasonic HVX using a three point lighting system with a different set of colored filters. Now the interesting thing about the three point light filters is that the color filters act as a means of expression within the mood of the set scene. We only used the colors blue, red and orange but what I could gather from the scene that we shot using these colors was that they really helped set any kind of mood or feelings that the specific scene explored. I haven’t seen a whole lot of the scene because Geoff believes that if I see myself on camera it will make me change my performance. I completely understand that due to the fact that I’ve never acted before and I would want to change any kind of attitude I’ve been portraying throughout the film. We’ll see how I do and I’d be happy to post the video on my blog upon its completion!
I look forward to the completion of this movie because I’m eager to see what my performance was like. Acting is something that I defiantly want to try again in the future if this goes well, and who knows what will happen next year. I might want to take an acting class to truly understand these actual characters we try to mask.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Media Meditations3, #2: Big and Heavy
Monday, April 5, 2010
Media Meditations2, #1: Getting Summer Started
As I turned on my computer the other day I checked the usual websites before I tried to accomplish any sort of work. I checked the facebook, Email, then I logged onto Jambase. Now this website is something of a favorite because it gives up to date tour information on every band as well as providing up to date articles on recent shows(http://www.jambase.com/). So you can imagine my excitement when I found the article entitled "Phish Summer Tour 2010". Now I have been waiting for this news for months and now it was finally upon me. I started the video that came with the announcement and I was immediately captivated.
My limbic brain picked up the beautiful coordination of music in the song, “Taste” from the “Billy Breathes” album. I began to tap my foot and shake my head whimsically as the bright colors and coordination of the synchronized swimmers in the video continued to entice my limbic brain. I felt like a child clapping my hand to the news of the tour dates close to my home in Connecticut. All the emotions that I had felt when they announced the reunion tour in 09 came back to me. That feeling of loving something so much and getting this pleasure of finally being able to see that was this great overwhelming sense of completion. My Limbic brain was literally going to leap out of my skull!!!
I watched the video several time due to the fact that I was overwhelmed with happiness. It’s great how Phish uses a few persuasive tools such as humor in all there performances and their announcements. In the video we see the drummer Jon Fishman do a cannonball into the pool and smile into the camera underwater. Though he is a very talented drummer he is a mascot of the sort for the band. What’s more funny then a 5’5 middle aged bald guy wearing a dress. The band was named Phish is association with his last name during a night of tom foolery and shenanigans. Then at the end of the whole video we see the infamous Phish logo for the band. This symbol is a perfect embodiment of the band in its entirety. If you look closely at the symbol there are several bits of information and double entendres to it. I would not think it would be appropriate to name what they are but see if you can find them you self…
I look forward for the months ahead when I get to see my favorite band again. I’m getting a taste of that on April 20th when I get to see the movie about their music festival “8” in 3-D. So it looks like I have a lot to look forward to. You will get a media meditation on the movie but we’ll have to wait.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
What up Midterm
1. When I first signed up for Electronic Media Writing I did not know what to expect. Personally, I have always had a vendetta against certain aspects of media, before taking this class I had never blogged or used twitter. Like many others of my generation I am an avid email and facebook checker. I have always been willing to try new things and as time went on I found that the media meditations were a segment of my homework that I looked forward to. What I realized through our meditations and chapter blogs was that blogging was a great way to reach out to people and express my own voice. Other work that I felt very compelled by was the script writing. Learning the different format of dialogue within a script was a stimulating process that gave great understanding of the work put into making a commercial or news program.
2. The most important thing I have learned as a critical reader, writer and thinker was that given the current media trends in today’s society we can see how using the tools and programs of our generation(i.e: Myspace, Facebook, Twitter) can be manipulated to one’s own advantage. This summer I plan on using these forms of social networking in order to promote and network my band.
3. One thing that I myself would have wanted to do differently in class would be to use my blog for more personal use. I enjoyed doing media meditations but I would want to journal my own thoughts. I really didn’t take into consideration the fact that people who aren’t in my class would possibly look at my blog. I have thoughts and ideas that I would like to share with the world.
- One thing that I would have wanted to do in Electronic Media writing would be to see more movies in context to promotional techniques that are used in conjunction with the movie. I would want to see how certain things like commercials, reviews, interviews, satire mocking the film, and social networking are used in conjunction with the movie.
5. Looking at the course blog has always been a great way to look back on work or refer to past information. I find that the book provides stylistic and knowledgeable insight on media networking and formatting on specific programs. The book gives great examples like how the “Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade” are produced. Through this example we the reader have a first hand knowledge of the matter.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Media Meditations #3: Transformers again?
Nouveau Michael Bay : Explosions !!!
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