Creating a soft image with the book light

Cinematographer Shane Hurlbut A.S.C. has worked on some films such as Need for Speed, Act of Valor, and Semi-Pro. In which he uses a lighting technique that he describes on his blog as a "Book Light." This configuration and purpose is definitely interesting way to light a scene. Essentially, a book light is any light source which is first bounced creating a soft effect, and then diffused even more through diffusion material such as bleached or unbleached muslin. When positioned the bounce and diff will look like that of a book. Also, now the bounce has become the source of light, making it so that moving the diffusion closer or further away from your subject can change the softness of this light. One last thing to mention is that in most locations this bounce source will probably have light spill everywhere, leading to light bouncing off the walls in many directions. To combat this, having a few flags or draping a large piece of duvetyne fabric in order to block off this light will be extremely useful in order to make the scene have an even look.

Go over and check out Shane's useful blog:
http://www.hurlbutvisuals.com/blog/2012/11/creating-a-beauty-light-with-a-book-light/

"Wind reel and print"

Well, it has come to that time of the semester here at Ithaca College when things start to get a little hectic with finals, finding a ride home, re-shoots, laundry, Kendall day, figuring out textbook rental return dates etc. Living in the college world, these stressors are supposed to be taking over my life, However, while working on my Fiction Field Production class short movie assignment, I quickly found out that "Manage Your Time 101" should be offered and be a requirement for all Parkies, if not every student in college.My experience working with my crew was one I will never forget. It was my first time writing for this type of assignment, and also taking on the job of Script Supervisor, never did I ever think that I would be in the local supermarket passed midnight on a school night. I wasn't expecting the amount of time I was about to spend with my classmates outside of out normal classroom setting. I wasn't sure how well we would all get along, if our ideas would even work well together, or if I even felt comfortable sharing my ideas aloud.

 I quickly had a reality check at our first shoot when it was 2:30am on a Monday night, cigarette smoke clouded the living room from our countless takes of cigarette puffs, and I realized that at that moment, this was what I came to college for. This is what I am meant to be doing. I then didn't even want to imagine where else I would be if i weren't in that clogged up smoky living room.

It always amazes me when its the end of the semester and in some of my classes, I maybe know the persons name who is is sitting next to me, the professors name, and thats about it. In others, I know everyone, everyone knows me, I am invested, and overall enjoy my time spent in the classroom. In this class, on the first day I knew about half of everyones names solely from being in classes with them in a previous semester. Once our "teams" were made for our movies, I had two ways of approaching the situation. One, I let my position be assigned to me, don't put too much opinion, and just flow. Or two, speak my mind, let my personality make its way out, and genuinely enjoy my time working with these 7 other people until the semesters over. Im happy that I chose the second route, because what came out of working with those 7 other people, was so freaking cool. I had no idea the amount of talent I was surrounded by, and if I was just open to it, I could learn a lot from these kids. Not only were we able to work together, share our ideas, and produce an amazing short film. We were able to have fun, and work as friends We created awesome memories together, and some pretty amazing friendships that I will forever be grateful for.

End of the Year Reflection

Today was the last day of my Fall 2013 semester classes. It flew by in the blink of an eye but I sure did learn a lot especially in this class, Fiction Field 1. Despite the fact that this class caused the most stress and probably took a year off of my life (slightly exaggerating) I learned so much.

After this semester I have a much greater appreciation for films.  I now realize just how difficult it is to make an amazing film. I loved this class because we were given one main project and were assigned one main role. I was able to focus on one job as well as offer assistance to my teammates when they needed something.

Working in a team is definitely not my favorite thing to do but with this project I had to let go and have confidence in my teammates. I learned a lot from it and am now more comfortable relying on other people to do their own jobs.

This project really showed me how much effort is put into every aspect of a film. It also made me realize what I wouldn't want to do and what I would like to pursue in the future.

Thank you so much Arturo for all of the guidance and help along this learning experience.

Cinema Verite Project Reflection

Yes I know that the project has come and gone but I figured, better late than never. Now before I start this, I would like to say that I did understand the point of the project. That in the real film world, if there had to be a re-shoot then it would be very important to try to mimic the same motions again as closely as possible and that just in general, if somebody can direct a person's subtle movements than they probably know what they are doing directing wise. However, if I'm going to be completely honest, I was not a fan of this project.

The main thing that I had a problem with was that there wasn't any fiction involved, there was no creativity. Yes I suppose that recreating something could be considered creative but I felt like just spying on a group of people and then recreating their motions wasn't creative to me. It didn't satisfy my creative itch. I think it would have been fun if we had a choice of a movie scene and we would do our best to recreate that. Because then we would have the choice of our scene and we would be able to put our own creative twist on it while still recreating it. I think that that would have been a directorial exercise that would have been both fun and informative.

Another thing that I wasn't a huge fan of was the actual video. I'll explain what I mean by that. In the beginning of the semester you said that you wanted us to make videos that we would want to put in our reel, videos that we were proud to show off and brag about. Now I only speak for myself when I say this, and not for anybody else in my group, but in all honestly I'm not that proud of the video. It's not something that I would ever show somebody mainly because I don't think it's very interesting or entertaining in any way. It doesn't tell a story and if I was to just show it to somebody, I honestly feel as though they wouldn't care at all about it. The one shot project on the other hand I am very proud of and I have showed it to my friends and family and I think that it came out very well. I liked the story I told and I'm very happy with how it turned out. This cinema verite project however, I can't say that I feel the same way.

Like I said at the beginning of the post, I do understand the point of the project and I do understand where this exercise came from and in all honesty I think it's a good idea to do. However, I really wasn't a fan of making this a full blown project. We spent over a month on this and I personally think that this is something that we should have done over the weekend as a quick exercise and then just left it at that. Making this a full project was something that I didn't really like. I really didn't feel like I put any effort into this and that's probably because I didn't. Personally I just wanted to get it out of the way so I could move on to whatever was next. If I was going to spend over a month on something, I would have liked it to be for something that I would end up feeling proud about, and as I have already mentioned, I really wasn't proud of this project.

Which takes me to our next project. This is the one that I'm looking forward to the most and probably for a fairly obvious reason, I have a lot of creative freedom for this one. Yes it needs to be based off of a news story but I mean, the news is more than interesting enough for a fictional story to come out of it. This is the kind of project that I would like people to see. After watching this final project, then people could form an opinion of my directing and storytelling abilities.

After-Effects and its amazingness

The end of class kind of blew my mind. After taking nearly the entire class to set up the lights and scene I figured we wouldn't be able to actually make a finished product. Once Arturo put the footage in, it took him 5 minutes to make a realistic scene. I thought it was amazing. That after-effects automatically made the reflection on the desk fit with the scene, that was awesome. Just how fast the process was and how many options you have to tweak things and make it look exactly how you want, I thought it was incredible.

Reflection

This is the planes I brought last class but with two circles. When I photograph it, it reflection was capture. I think is interesting to span on it.