Sports Media

Over the break, a father asked me to videotape his son's football game and edit the good plays he makes into a high-light real. He gave me a hand held camera and told me the different angles to shoot at for where his son would be on the field, whether it was defense or offense. This was by far the hardest event I ever shoot at. Football is such a quick game and i was constantly losing concept of where the ball and Jon were. Jon played the running back position so he was pretty much on every play. Jon's father wanted me too be zoomed in as much as possible and to always have his son on camera.

Towards the second quarter, my hand was already starting to get tired, and there was nothing i could really do about it. A tripod would have rally been handy. After halftime, Jon rushed for a 47 yard touchdown, breaking three tackles and diving into the end zone. The best part was that he was running towards me the entire time, so the shoot does like pretty cool as i zoom out and refocus during the play.

In post, I added some music and labeled what each short bit was before playing it. Mr Struss, Jon's father, was very please with what I accomplished and said that if Jon's team makes it to the championship, he would ask me to do the same thing again. Then it hit me. There are so many parents that spend a tremendous amount of money to have highlight tapes shoot for their son or daughter. So currently, I am making a website that will be linked on my old school's website for parents interested in a highlight tape for their child's college resume. I already have gotten few phone calls, and have 3 jobs for when I go back home after christmas. I think I might really have something here. Once the site is finished, I'll post again and have a link to the main page.

stop motion

was up late and ran across this. By far the best most creative stop motion video i've ever seen. The use of google street view to take us on a journey was beyond clever. I can't imagine how many painstaking hours this took to make.

Address Is Approximate from The Theory on Vimeo.

Battle of the Snow Whites

I know Kari already posted about Snow White and the Huntsman... but there are TWO new Snow White movies coming out in the next year. Here's the trailer for the other one... Mirror, Mirror. Which personally I think looks a lot better. It's not as dark as the Tim Burton version but it looks really funny. Julia Roberts plays the evil queen and I feel like this is going to be one of her best roles in years. Snow White is played by Lilly Collins (Phil Collins daughter btw) who was in the Blind Side, and Armie Hammer who played the twins in The Social Network is the Prince. It looks really good check it out...

There Will Be Blood

I've always been a huge fan of There Will Be Blood. The resurgence of westerns in modern filmmaking is the coolest thing to me. Daniel Day Lewis is one of my favorite actors and I think There Will Be Blood has to be one of the most beautifully shot movies I have ever seen. After watching it again recently I looked up a lot of the making of the movie. I got more interested in the sound when I was re watching the movie. Turns out it was scored by Radiohead guitarist Johnny Greenwood. If you watch the video below there is some explanation into some of the work behind the sound mixing itself.

The Glory of Gilmore Girls

Lately, I have been watching a lot of Gilmore Girls. My roommate has all the DVD sets and I spent all of Thanksgiving break watching them. I am really impressed with the quality of the show. It seems that there is way more than the usual 50 pages of material for an hour long show. The dialogue is so quick I might guess there are more like 70 or 80 pages of script squashed into that time slot. Not only is it fast, but its witty and intelligent...I would say about 30 references to pop culture that no one person could ever understand in one sitting. It's brilliant, I love it.

After watching so much, though I notice funny things every once in a while. They were filming a conversation scene between two characters sitting at a table. The angle of the medium shot of the man in the scene was taken very obviously without the other actor there - in reality her shoulder and most of her back would have been in the shot. It was actually really weird for me to watch and I couldn't wait for the scene to be over! Now that I saw that it is going to bother me through the 4 seasons I have left!

There are a lot of things like this I notice whenever I am watching TV or movies. I love it, actually. Watching things and going crazy because I can't fix it! I learn so much at school and it is really fun to catch it out in the real world. Very exciting stuff!

Learning the Language of 3D

Black Friday has come and gone, and with it, a crop of the latest technology and gadgets. One item making a big showing this year is the 3D television. The weekend saw discounts deep enough to finally give 3DTV's a push into the mainstream, which will undoubtedly help their adoption.

So far, 3DTV has been a little bit of a Chick-and-the-Egg conundrum, with very little 3D programming available right now. However, TV shows are now slowly making the transition to add the new dimension. Some would think that making the jump would be quite easy. You just add another camera 3 inches away, right?

Not quite. As it turns out, filmmakers are now starting to understand the language specific to three dimensional programming, and applying it to traditionally two dimensional films has proved a struggle. CNET recently ran a fantastic story on the language difference between 2D and 3D programming, and you can read it here: How 3D TV will change the look of 2D shows

I definitely recommend giving the article a read over. It's even more poignant when considering what our jobs may become in just a few short years. With the constantly changing landscape of media, it's vital to have a handle on the latest, because before too long, there will be even new advances to master and adjust to.

Making of Nightmare Before Christmas

First of all Tim Burton looks so YOUNG in these videos.
I just have loved the Nightmare Before Christmas since I was a child. It has always been so magical to me and watching these videos now only further solidifies the magic of this movie. Everyone on Tim's team is just genius and quite frankly the whole idea of stopmotion animation is mind boggling to me. I have no idea how these people make these masterpieces in a mere 3 years i feel like it would take me at least 10 to make something of that scale. There isnt much to say these videos kind of leave you speechless on the entire process. So check them out!

Star Wars Christmas

So many Christmas movies, so little time! I was very disappointed over the Thanksgiving break to find how few Thanksgiving movies exist. South Park is one of the few programs that regularly has Thanksgiving mayhem, and I think someone should start making more ridiculous movies like Thankskilling!
 Anyway, for the holidays I have a list of movies I absolutely have to watch, including Scrooged, The Grinch and Home Alone to name a few.  I stumbled across the Star Wars Holiday special last year, and boy is it worth watching... for a laugh!
For anyone who hasn't seen it, the Star Wars Holiday special was right after the first movie came out in 1978.    I guess the movie had a way bigger effect on people than George Lucas had anticipated and they threw together a holiday special that is a "Universe Happy Life Day" of some sort.  It is really hard to watch because of how horrible it turned out and I didn't get to finishing it last year.  I'm pretty sure everyone involved in it tried to forget about it and erase it from the history books!  Rumor has it that the cast was all getting drunk back stage while it was being aired! This really just shows that not all ideas from George Lucas are gold!

Hugo

A year of two ago I read, wait no, I should say watched a book, called Hugo! This book was not written but drawn. On every page was a new illustration telling a story about a boy and a mystery after the death of his father and the discovery of something his father was working on when he died. Over the Thanksgiving break I saw a trailer for the new movie "Hugo" produced by Martin Scorsese. I'm specifically excited to see this one mostly because I loved the new form of book media and the story as well. I also trust Martin Scorsesi's work and the animation in the trailer looks wonderful! I really hope I get the chance to go see this. If any one sees it before I do let me know how you liked it!!

Twilight: Breaking Dawn

Oh dear...where to start with this one. Yesterday my best friend and I went to go see it, since she has a Robert Pattinson...obsession. Overall, there were some decent scenes, and the set designs were amazing, but there was significantly less conflict in this movie. It's all about the mental conflict between Bella and the rest of the family about the baby's effect on her. The only time there was any physical conflict was at the end of the movie between the werewolves. Much like the first and second movies, the final confrontation is pushed until the very end, but even so, for this movie in particular, it was lacking. I almost would have been willing to stay another 2 hours to avoid the awkwardly forced ending. While many critics say the ending was awkwardly placed in the storyline, I don't see where else they could have put it. They're forcing two movies out of one book, almost like cutting the book in half and making two, thus needing to stretch out every little detail to make it a 2 hour movie. However, the silly little girl in me who read all 4 books will of course be going to see part 2 when it comes out.

Black Friday

Since it is Thanksgiving break I have been watching a lot of TV and this time of year it is all about the big Black Friday sales. I have also noticed that most commercials are all about the really big sales, which just tends to get on my nerves. I understand the advertising has its purpose, but watching the same ads over and over again for every single commercial break tend to get old. I think that maybe marketing companies should take that into consideration when they are bombarding the public with annoying ads to shop at ridiculous hours of the morning to get the best deals. They have convinced me that it is would be easier to just stay at home and shop online. There are no lines, no other customers to deal with and I can complete the task with just a click of the mouse.

Chanel 2012

I know this is my second post involving Chanel ( I admit I might have a bit of an unhealthy obsession) but they are just such a fabulously creative company. This is there most recent runway show and I am just obsessed with their set design! The Underwater theme for the spring summer 2012 is so perfectly put together that even the way the seats are positioning are in line with the water theme appearing as waves from an aerial view. I just Love what Karl Lagerfeld has done with the company he has stayed true to the Chanel tradition while at the same time keeping up with the fast moving times. I love Chanel for so many reasons but mostly because they show fashion for what it really is an art form. But I'm posting this for more than just my fashion obsession but to celebrate the fact that I will be working NY fashion week this Spring alongside of B Productions to film and stream Live fashion shows for major fashion houses. I just had my interview this week and I am absolutely thrilled to have gotten the gig. It will be quite the experience to join my two loves fashion and film into one great interview. Hopefully the fashion world wont eat me up and spit me out :0

More Scriptwriting Software Options!

When poking around the internet over break, I stumbled across this little gem of a website: Plotbot.com. It is an online scriptwriting program, which is great, but not new. The killer feature of Plotbot, however, is it's potential for collaboration.

I've been a firm believer in using Celtx for over 5 years now. It's free, capable, and easy. However, the one problem I've had with it is collaborating with other group members. I always wished there could be a love child between Celtx and Google Docs, that everyone in my group could edit in real time, without having to worry about emailing the latest version. And this is where Plotbot can shine!

It seems to offer all of the core functionality of Celtx, and is being offered for free as well. It's the product of two USC film students, so you can be sure that the creators have an idea what their audience is looking for. If you've ever been frustrated with having "Screenplay final," "Screenplay final 2," "Screenplay final 2 editted," and more clutter up your desktop, give the website a try.

Bonus: You can change the site's language to "Pirate!"

Data lost, data found

 So, with everything being done on computers these days, I feel it's relevent to blog about an issue that will most likely affect everyone who uses a computer to edit video...DATA LOSS!  Every good professor will tell you that when you have a project you need to make copies and copies and more copies to prevent losing footage from shoots. This is excellent advice, but murphy's law tends to strike when the chances are low and the stakes are high! What if the computer you were using to edit on suddenly won't start up correctly on the exact same day that the flash card you had video on showed up blank, and all your files were deleted? 
Don't freak out! There are many ways to recover your data!

Here are some helpful things to keep in mind about computers:

• Your hard drive files are not entirely controlled by your operating system. This means that if your operating system fails you can usually still get access to your files by using a different operating system! Your computer will still need a new OS install, but your actual files are seperate and still fully intact. 
• Hard drives and flash media are designed to write ALL of the original storage blocks before overwriting. This means that even if you delete something accidentally from a computer hard drive or flash drive/sd card, it remains on the drive until more data has been written to the drive than the size the drive is. An example: if you have a 16Gb sd card and have only ever written 10Gb of data on it, the physical drive actually still has the 10Gb on it even if it is deleted, until you overwrite more than 16Gb.

I'm sure this sounds complicated and/or boring so you don't have to remember exactly how it works, just remember that technology is robust!! And everything ALWAYS goes wrong at the worst possible time, so don't lose hope until the situation is truly f.u.b.a.r.!

Hell on Wheels

     Many networks are trying to build up the amount of original content they broadcast, this is an attempt to pull in viewers.  AMC is one of these networks.  They have just recently created a show "Hell on Wheels."  This show is a period piece which takes place just after the civil war, while the transcontinental railroad is being built.  It chronicles the story of one mans journey to avenge the death of his wife.  There have only been three episodes, but even in just that short amount of time it is clear that this show is going to be awesome.  The characters are extremely well developed, and the drama between them, and the situations in which they are placed are believable and realistic.  I am a Civil War reenactor so I like to think that I know something about how the 19th century looked, and the sets and costumes are beautifully done and even the language is  appropriate.  My issue with the show is that the writing cheats sometimes.  There have been several times where a character will go on a huge monologue about something, and at times they are not even talking to anyone. I feel that this is a cheating way to get information out to the viewer and perhaps it is just because we are in the first few episodes, hopefully it will stop.  The show is very graphic and gritty, a definite draw for some people.  My big question now is whether or not the show will last.  It is very similar to "The Walking Dead" and has the same feel, this could pull some people in.  On the same hand it could drive people away, as they already have a show which fills that gritty show need.  Only time will tell, I hope it makes it.

The Art of the Title

The Art of the Title is a site that collects and documents, well, titles. I really recommend this site as a source of inspiration and information since they have a great compilation of the most important film and television motion graphic title design from all over the world, covering early examples (Saul Bass below) as well as the most recent works like Game of Thrones, Rubicon, TooBig To Fail etc.

could not link the movie itself, click on the LINK below

I really like this title sequence (Catch Me if You Can) which I believe we have seen in class. But this LINK shows a little more about the process of creation for such a sequence which is interesting to study.

Although there are tons of title sequences on the site, many of which I am sure you remember, To Kill A Mockingbird is a particular favorite of mine. I saw the film as a young boy and then recently as an adult (or old man!) and I still love it for its powerful storytelling. It scared me when I first saw it and did not know what the film was about, yet everything that was to come was already present in those 3 minutes.

foreign cops

i don't know if i have to post this we since its break and all but here is a little post anyway. I came across the trailer for the new Nathan statham movie "Safe" and the back story for his character is he used to be "the big apple's hardest cop, once upon a time". I don't get it. Why would someone want to leave there country and start over being cop when your from England or Ireland? It also happened in bridesmaids with officer Rhodes but it was a comedy and he wasn't the main character so it wasn't that big a deal. I really don't understand it and it kinda takes me out of the movie and i was wondering if anyone had this problem as well.

The View is good for something...

So I kind of hate 'The View." Whenever I have tuned in it has been a bunch of women jut babbling about random things, getting into arguments, or interviewing someone either I (a) don't care too much about or (b) was in some random, horrifying accident. Not something I usually find entertaining, unfortunately. I, in fact, am very disappointed in Whoopie...you can do better, girl.

But, I came across this video/article...about Eric Stonestreet revealing to the world's population that he is indeed straight on one episode of the view, only to meet his current girlfriend who told him upon their introduction, "Oh, he is straight!" (To those of you who do not know Eric, he plays Cam on 'Modern Family' and is super flamboyantly gay...and hilarious.)

So, while the show, at least to me, is just no good, at least if found romance for one of my favorite current TV comedians. Dawwwww how cute.

A Trip To The Moon In Color

Many people are aware of the iconic picture of a rocketship landing in the eye of the moon, and most film students (the ones worth their salt, anyway) know about the film from which this image comes - A Trip To The Moon by Melies' in 1902. Well, Serge Bromberg discovered a copy of this film in Barcelona that had actually been in color, and knew he had to save it. The film had largely decomposed, but Bromberg was determined to salvage it.

The film was placed in a humidor where the chemicals’ vapors prompted the celluloid to unpeel itself. The chemicals were also destroying the film in the process, making the endeavor a race to get each image digitized in order to recreate Melies’ hand-painted film frame by frame before the original film was gone forever. (Bromberg will not reveal the exact nature of the chemicals.) They essentially made A Trip To The Moon in color!

Now Bromberg is about to release his documentary, The Extraordinary Voyage, that depicts this process. It's being shown at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Here is a link to the MoMA page about the screenings.

Snow White Remake

I'm sure many of you have seen Tim Burton's remake of Alice in Wonderland, well, he's at it again. Next summer, Snow White and the Huntsman will be released in theaters, and I personally couldn't be more thrilled. After being skeptical about the remake of Alice in Wonderland and being proven horribly, horribly wrong, I can't wait to see what Burton does with Snow White. My only criticism is Kristen Stewart being cast as the lead (ugh.)

The IMDb link is posted below, there are multiple trailers and you can view the cast and decide for yourself whether or not this movie will be a bust or a blockbuster.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1735898/

James and the Giant Peach

James and the Giant Peach directed by Henry Selick is about a boy name James (Paul Terry)who was a happy boy until his parents died. They were killed by a rhinoceros and because of that he goes to live with his two terrible aunts. When he bravely saves a spider then he finds magic boiled crocodile tongues. Right after that an enormous peach begins to grow in the garden. James decides to venture into this giant peach where he meets the spider he rescued and many other insects including a lady bug and centipede who become his friends. Together the strange group makes a plan to get to New York City and that is when the adventure really begins.

I enjoyed this movie as a child because of the claymation that was used in the film. It was very well done and I'm sure it took a while to get everything perfect. I know that creating a typical movie takes a great deal of time, but adding in the individual movement of each animated character made the filming even more intricate. Even though it is great children's film, I found that after watching it again as an adult it is also entertaining to a wider audience.

References:

The Wise Little Hen (1934), Jaws (1975), The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Voxer

A little while ago my friend Maxwell told me about a little app called Voxer! Ever since I downloaded it I have been hooked. As much as its cool for friends It is also extremely useful for filming!
The App is used to voice text people you can connect it to facebook to see you is also on Voxer with your friends! You can group some of your friends. Film wise this is very convenient since you can make your crew into a group and during filming you can press the button down and tell everyone in the area that may not be able to hear you say "action" and "quiet all around". The entire crew will get the message (assuming they're all on iphone's, or ipods with wifi.) The App is also available for Android phone users but that version is much more buggy than the Ipod/Iphone app. You can also do a one-to-one chat with just one of your friends! And when you're not on set and you just happen to be a props master, you can ask "Hey does anyone happen to have this prop that I need for the next shoot?" I love it mostly because it is so much more exciting to voice text people and a lot faster than just texting them. NOW, say if you're in a class room and someone Voxers you. Hopefully you have your volume down! You can listen to the message later or if it's an immediate situation, you can text them right there on Voxer in the same window and just ask them to text what they just said to you. If you're in a crowded room full of loud people you can switch it to the ear piece built into your iPhone and listen like your listening to a voicemail. The only thing I didn't like about it at first was that you have to train yourself to wait a second and listen for the beep before you talk otherwise it will cut you off. It's also created a sort of new polite behavior, you also have to train yourself to text the person first and ask them if they're in class or if you can voice them, just a polite thing to do for your friends. Other than those tiny issues, it's really a very useful app! I love it and encourage others to try it too!

Bye bye Community?

NBC recently announced plans to change up their Monday and Thursday nights due to lack-luster ratings:

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/14/nbc-overhauls-prime-time-benching-community-and-prime-suspect/

The most upsetting part about this is their change to Thursday nights, as the Thursday night comedy block on NBC is my favorite time to watch TV. In the article it mentions that Community is being benched. Which is a huge disappointment, as this one of the best shows on TV right now as it never fails to try new things and still be funny. The only upside of this is that it's being replaced with 30 Rock-which I miss desperately. The show isn't cancelled but it makes me nervous that this is getting benched while Whitney simply gets a new time slot. And fortunately Up All Night will be moving to Thursdays where it definitely belongs, as this is one of my favorite new shows.

Just not ready to say goodbye to this yet:

Nostalgia

When I came across this video mixing clips from 1980's movies and television shows with electronic music, I was interested to see how many of the movies and shows I would recognize off the top of my head. Some of my favorite movies are from the 80's. Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Back to the Future (only the first one of course), Weird Science, Risky Business, Terminator, Fast Times at Ridgemont High and The Goonies are among my all-time favorites. While I have to say 95 percent of the stuff was completely unrecognizable to me, I did manage to recognize some clips. How much can you recognize?

Skinemax from Smash TV on Vimeo.

I'm so excited!!!!!

The muppets have a new movie!!!!!! I've loved the muppets ever since I was little. So now that Jason Segal and Amy Adams are starring in the new one... I've been excited since seeing the trailer for the first time!

My all time favorite Christmas move has always been the Muppets Christmas Carol... the old guys in chains kill me every time!

When I first saw the trailer for their new movie I thought it was just another dumb movie at first I didn't understand where it was going.. then Kermit showed up...

The other clips released for the movie look pretty funny too (Poor kermit... YOU ARE A CELEBRITY!!!)

Recently on Muppet's creator Jim Henson's birthday, Google did their thing and paid tribute to the great puppetier.

Truth be told I had not even know that he was dead (for my entire life, actually) and when doing research found this image of Mickey comforting Kermit after Henson died. The world lost a great imagination that day, and I found the drawing incredibly moving. I wonder why Mickey and Kermit have never teamed up before.

Network Styles

     It is a well known fact that networks play shows that are similar, specifically original series.  In todays world, with thousands of channels, they must work hard to get an audience, to do this they focus on niche markets that are interested in only a few story lines.  What I find most interesting however, is that it is not only the type of show, such as crime or comedy but the entire look and feel of the programming.  The color pallets are the same as is the over arching concepts and editing styles.  USA for example has  many original shows.  They all have the same concept of a main character who is good at what they do even though they are not accepted in the professional world.  A detective who must pretend to be Psychic, a lawyer without a degree, a doctor without a hospital. On top of that these shows all have the same colors, witting, and quick edits around witty comments.





Somewhat new to the mix of original series AMC has "The Walking Dead" "Hell on Wheels" and "Breaking Bad" all of which share the down and dirty feel with people on the brink of disaster just trying to hold on, again the same colors and cinematography.





FX does the same with shows like "Wilfred" and "Always Sunny in Philadelphia." I find it interesting that they don't necessarily stick to a topic, but a feel.  USA is witty whether it is a medical show or a cop show. AMC is dark and cinematic with a dying father or a world overrun by zombies.  This tells us that we don't really care what kind of show we watch, as long as it plays the same emotional tune.

Mega-Misconceptions. Why Megapixels mean nothing.

So, I was just in a discussion with my roommate about what makes a high quality camera (He's a PC, and I'm a Mac, so we always get into tech debates). He was extolling the latest offering from Sony, which touts over 16 megapixels. Thinking he was talking about a video camera, I called foul. Though he was discussing a still camera with video capabilities, it sparked a discussion about the difference between resolution for video and still photography.

My roommate is a Photoshop junkie, and a bit of a HD fanatic. When I told him that DVD's resolution wasn't even half a megapixel, his jaw just about hit the floor. But it's true! Take a look at some common resolutions broken down below:

• DVD - 720 x 480 = 345600 = .35 megapixels
• 720p - 1280 x 720 = 921600 = .92 megapixels
• 1080p - 1920 x 1080 = 2073600 = 2.07 megapixels

So right now, the gold standard of HD video is basically the same quality than my very first cellphone's camera, almost 6 years ago. What gives?

Well, for one, still photos use resolution in a very different way than video does. Traditionally, high quality printed images use 300 pixels per inch. The standard for media seen on any type of screen is actually only 72 pixels per inch. This originally stems from technical limitations (It's really hard to make screens with 300 pixels per inch, let alone process the signal to it), but it is part of the viewer's expectation, and seems totally normal to us now. If you were to print out a web image though, you could easily see the pixelation, which seems like a rather low quality picture on paper.

The the thing is, you never print videos onto paper, so video image quality never has to be seen in the harsh light of print. Even tech-lover director James Cameron isn't in a race for more pixels. He said, “4K (ultimate HD) is a concept born in fear. I would vastly prefer to see 2K/48 frames per second.” So there you have it! If 2 megapixel images are enough for James Cameron, then they are good enough for me!

Learn, Move, Eat

Some have you have probably seen these before. Basically these short films are about "3 guys, 44 days, 11 countries, 18 flights, 38 thousand miles, an exploding volcano, 2 cameras and almost a terabyte of footage... all to turn 3 ambitious linear concepts based on movement, learning and food ....into 3 beautiful and hopefully compelling short films....."

Its pretty cool to see how these guys told the story of their travel by boiling it down to 3 basic principals

Girl Panic by Duran Duran

Lets just start off by saying that Duran Duran is probably one of the coolest bands of the 80's! Second I have to say they were also one of the most modern of their era. Duran Duran always found a way to make themselves different from the piles of other 80's bands trying to make it big, whether it was through hiring fashion designers to give them a cool look (giving them the title "the prettiest boys in rock") or being among the first bands to hire pro directors to shoot their videos with 35 mm lenses they were always going above and beyond. Their newest video Girl Panic pays a tribute to the band and is a play on the fact that they were the first band to use super models in their sexy controversial music videos. IN the video the band members are some of the best super models of the 80's (Naomi Campbell, Helena Christensen, Cindy Crawford, and Eva Herzigova) talking about Duran Duran's history. The whole video is just so cool. its beautiful shot after beautiful shot and just so visually stimulating. Tagged along with an awesome song I recommend everyone watch it!

6 days to air- documentary

    So I finally got around to watching a documentary about South Park that someone mentioned to me last month. The documentary is called "6 Days to Air" and is about how each episode of South Park is created start to finish in 6 day increments. They finish the episodes on the day they are supposed to air!! This is INSANE! And Trey and Matt actually look VERY calm for how much pressure is being put on them.


    I want to work in this field, and this is intimidating!  The South Park crew consists of probably 10 members or less that are all magnificently talented. I realize that many shows come close to the deadlines in production, but I didn't know that Trey and Matt go into the writers room with NO solid ideas in their heads! These guys are sleeping at the office to save time while working! I also underestimated how talented Trey and Matt are for doing almost all of the voices of the show.  I thought that by now they were successful enough to pass voice duties on to someone else!
Overall it's a pretty inspiring documentary though!

Here's a link to the documentary, sorry no emmbedding for it.
6 Days to Air

some tv i enjoy

so, when i get bored on the weekend i turn to the internet, its great i don't know why people don't talk about it more. Anyway i get bored and i head to this thing called youtube and i watch clips of videos and entertain myself. I found out that there are tv show on youtube ( crazy i know) also there are British tv shows. also if you are really reading thing i'd be surprised because I would have zoned out by now soooo ya. here are so clips that you might enjoy,



i said might also there are these





i liked it, so i shared it

Two Amazing Videos

Don't let the thumbnail fool you, this is actually something very amusing that I think all park students should see. It's a literal parody of major movie trailers, and it's pretty accurate. By literal, I mean that instead of words, the actors say the type of line that would be delivered, the logos are titles of what kind of company's logo would go there. I thought this was too cool not to share.

The Colbert Report 

For those of you who didn't hear, an Ithaca physics professor was on the Colbert Report, making ice cream levitate. WHICH I THINK IS AWESOME!!! :D

The Guide to DIY Filmmaking

Although most of us love to make movies, we (obviously) don't have big budgets to get awesome gear and large crews. I found this image online of things you can use or make to get more professional-looking shots with minimal money paid. It's pretty cool! It has stuff like using a wheelchair as a dolly, some pipes as a steadicam, Chinese paper lanters for lighting (who woulda thought!), and how to make cool sound effects at home. Some examples of those are slapping a pair of leather gloves for a bird's flapping wings and sliding the top off a toilet for a stone coffin opening. So cool! I wasn't into filmmaking before I came to Ithaca, and now I feel like a whole world is being opened to me. Huzzah!

Here's the website with the picture I found if you're interested in learning more.

Big Fish

Big Fish is a film that I have recently watched directed by Tim Burton about a father, Edward Bloom (Ewan McGregor, younger years; Albert Finney, older years) who is dying of cancer. His son Will (Billy Crudup), a journalist, who is trying to learn more about his dad by piecing together the stories he has heard over the years. The son ends up recreating his father's elusive life through the legends and tales inspired by a few facts that he has gathered. The film, which is tells the story through flashbacks, starts when Will visits his father for the last time. Will has not seen his father for a long time because he thought his dad was a liar who did not care much about his family. As he learns more about Edward’s story, Will finally begins to understand who his dad really was.

I enjoyed this movie and the way that Edward seemed to make up his life as he went along. I could see why Will did not like his father, but it was interesting to watch the way Tim Burton built the film around the father and son. This is the type of movie a viewer would either really like or find too disjointed. It is a matter of personal preference, but I would recommend seeing it and making up your own mind about this part fantasy, part realistic film

References:

The Circus (1928), The Wizard of Oz (1939), From Here to Eternity (1953), Wild Strawberries (1957), 8½ (1963), Bonnie and Clyde (1967), Deliverance (1972), Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1974), The Shining (1980), The Evil Dead (1981), Ladyhawke (1985), Pee-wee's Big Adventure (1985), Batman (1989), Edward Scissorhands (1990), Batman Returns (1992), The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), Go (1999), Fight Club (1999), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), "Smallville" (2001), Identity (2003)

Happy Feet Two

I can't even explain how excited I am for Happy Feet 2

Elijah Wood is back as Mumble and Robin Williams will be playing his variety of characters. I'm also really excited for the new editions like Pink and Common and can't wait to see what they do with their characters.

Here's a behind-the-scenes featurette I found, it's awesome to see how much fun all the actors are having and how great of an experience it was for the people involved:

ThanksKilling

Appropriate title for the timing. As most of you knew I was watching Thankskilling recently and it was extremely funny. I looked it up on IMDB and it said (the ultimate low budget experience which is exactly what it was.) All of the "bad parts" of it are meant to add to the funny aspect  of it. It is listed under comedy thriller horror. So, if you like all three you should watch it. It had me laughing all the way through. I think it is especially funny to those of us wo appreciate production because of its featured bad acting, terrible lighting, horrible scripting, and terrible camera work. I also noticed that it's budget was "estimated $3,500". Probably only including the guns and amo, fake blood, camera and tripod. I even found the theme song to be catchy. I especially liked the echoing turkey gobble in the background! R-rated for good reason, but not unbearable. So while you're all enjoying some turkey this thanksgiving you should plop down to watch Thankskilling this season.

Alternative soundtrack uses

One thing I love is when music from a film is used dubbed over separate footage. The results aren't always pretty, but in this case, the outcome is truly stunning. Take a look and enjoy it for yourself.

android dreams from Samuel Cockedey on Vimeo.

Oops

Whilst stumbling today on the internet, I came across this video entitled "Oops" by Chris Beckman.

Beckman created this piece with fount footage off of YouTube that all involved people dropping cameras, and put them together in an oddly compelling piece. The YouTube page says "Beckman's aim to recreate the allure of the search and the voyeuristic pleasure of finding a captured moment that resonates led him to the image of cameras being dropped as a way to "contextualize these 'throwaway' videos and their transcendent vérité immediacy."

I'm usually not the biggest fan of found footage pieces for some reason, I think because I would rather someone film stuff themselves, but this one grabbed me. The way the shots go together seamlessly is really impressive.

Copryright Protection - A waste of time

So for anyone who wonders what Blu Ray anti-piracy technology consists of, look no further! It's complicated, ...really complicated actually.
And in my opinion an UTTER waste of time and money.  This technology was the first to require you to have the specific decoder pre-installed in tv's or computer monitors to watch it.  Someone cracked blu-ray very quickly after it came out, but believe it or not, regular dvd's have to be decoded as well.  Regular dvd's have to be de-scrambled when they are ripped otherwise it looks like a scrambled television channel when you watch them.
One of the coolest things you can do in some spare time (over the summer) is take an old computer and turn it into a home theatre! This means streaming movies and tv shows directly to your television just like netflix! Cause, let's face it, netflix doesn't have all the movies in the universe.
Blu Ray Wikipedia

Ripping movies to a digital device is illegal though. Digital Millenium Copyright Act doesn't allow you to 

alter a movie you already paid for...what? This was probably to hinder illegal distribution, but what about the people who actually pay for movies?! The "digital copy" you currently get with a movie only allows you to have a copy on one computer. Period. You can already buy digital device formatted movies, but I'm not paying for another (digital) copy of a movie just to prove that I'm not going to distribute it to someone else!!   Also, I'm a HUGE blu-ray fan, and I have blu-ray rips because the diagram above has created many problems with playback on my computer.  Problems that kept me from watching movies I PAID FOR! 

With UltraViolet these issues may be somewhat changed, but I foresee format issues for those of us who already hate Hollywood technology.

movieclips on youtube

i found this channel on youtube that has a bunch of different film clips. they are organized by actors, directors, genres , themes and even props

the clip below is form the genres "british horror" which gives you an idea of how organized it is




they even have clips listed under the props they use like the one below is for "staffs" and they have a bunch of them




again this should give you an idea of how much information  you can get just from this one youtube channel.


check it out! ( the exclamation mark shows i mean it) Its a great way to look at clips form special directors, actors, genres and themes if your looking for inspiration this  is a good spot to start.

40 Years and Running: "A Clockwork Orange"

It's amazing how after even after 40 years Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange" still manages to leave the audience... petrified, awed, breathless, confused. Most other oldies usually fall victim to the test of the time (see: "Catcher in the Rye") and where at first they were dangerous and obscene, they become novel and childish in contemporary hindsight. However, "klassy Kubrick" instills all the aforementioned fear and just plain "i don't want to watch this, but I can't walk away" even in today's loose society.

I think the integration of classical music and ultra violent behavior, coupled by scenes of imaginative, grotesque, and simple cinematography , are what truly set this movie apart from most others. Kubrick was a perfectionist and a intellectual, he imposed iconography, symbology, and metaphor into every one of his works, but "A Clockwork Orange" steals the stage (no pun intended, actually...), as the trailer vividly (epileptics beware) shows.

If you still want a good scare; if you still want a good perspective into the mind of a "droog;" or if you just wanna see a movie that puts people through more emotions than a calculus final, "A Clockwork Orange" is for you. Bring a pen and paper, though, you'll not want to miss a thing.

Band of Brothers

I didn't get a chance to see the show when t originally premiered on HBO because I didn't have the channel at the time. Two years ago, the same people the put BOB together premiered another miniseries, The Pacific, about the Pacific theater of war during WWII. The show was visually gripping and provided a look at the combat of war and the toll it takes on its combatants that I had never seen in a television program or movie before.

I know the video is a little long, but it shows how much work went into creating such a detailed representation of the war.

Last week, my roommate ordered the first disc of Band of Brothers from Netflix and I was instantly hooked. The miniseries follows the same story arc and the production value and execution is just as good. So many of the elements are the same that it almost seems like the prequel to the pacific. If you're a fan of war movies, you must check each of these out.

Autumn

I don't know if anyone remembers, but earlier this year Arturo mentioned filming one of the waterfalls around here in the fall. This water fall, at lower Buttermilk, is at the same location our cabin from our previous film is at. So last week I went down and shot some video. The last part of the video has some clips from fall break, incase your wondering. I'm always making little videos like this, but mainly check it out for the waterfall stuff!

American Horror Story

"One of the fastest pick-ups in the history of the network"...

This unlikely new show is doing really, really well! I was honestly not sure how it would go...horror is usually a genre most popular in film, rather than television. I read an Entertainment Weekly article about the show when the issue came out. It looked interesting, and I was intrigued...yet horrified. Some of the characters and themes of the show that were described were just plain creepy to me, and I honestly decided not to watch it for the same reason I still haven't seen Paranormal Activity or Final Destination movies...I am so easily terrified, especially when the plot is somewhat realistic. In this case, I am currently looking for a house to live in next year, and everyone knows that most houses in Ithaca are pretty old (mine this year was built in 1900.) A.k.a. they are all haunted. Therefore, I was staying far away from the show.

Until I read this article.

Even though I know it will probably terrify me to no end, reading that a show gets picked up for a second season this fast tells me that there is something about it that I need to see. Whether it is the acting, the story, or hte production value...I need to jump on this bandwagon. I don't know, but the raving reviews from my friends who have watched it and the fact that it is getting such great reviews from magazines and bloggers make me want to suck it up, curl up in bed with all the lights on, and enjoy some awesome television.