My experience during the Bolex Camera shoot on Saturday was not only an
extremely important learning experience for myself, but the entire class period
was an incredible amount of fun. The fact that we had such beautiful weather
for the shoot was terrific for filming and made our environment both extremely
beautiful and comfortable. Watching other groups work on their project was not
only extremely enjoyable, but allowed us to have a better sense for when we
eventually got the Bolex camera. Something that I thoroughly enjoyed seeing was
the major collaboration and volunteering from the class as a whole for my
group’s long take. Not only did this make our final project better, but it allowed
for new thoughts and ideas to enter our discussion about the concept. Several
days after that Saturday shoot, I realized that the energy and enthusiasm from
that day stemmed from the fact that everyone was having so much fun. It’s rare
to be involved in a project for a class and everyone is genuinely happy to be
there. That was definitely a big highlight of the day and for the semester in
general. I also really enjoyed tackling different conflicts or creative
decisions due to the broad spectrum of ideas that were being presented. Making
these on the spot decisions really added to the excitement because we were
watching our concept slowly morph throughout the creation process. Finally,
after all the fake blood and dead body placement had finished, we filmed our
Bolex one shot project and I couldn’t have been happier about the results.
FST334 001 Jack Bailey Blog
Sunday, April 24, 2016
Monday, March 28, 2016
Rough Theater
The intricacies of the theater set is always something that has
always fascinated me. The architectural details are always thought of as being
very minute and small, but in actuality, have huge subconscious meaning into
the viewer. The entire idea of a stage setup is created in order to serve the
audience and to help bring the story to the receiver. For three years, I was a theater
constructionist for my high school and have first hand knowledge about this
phenomena. The amount of detail and work that goes into painting the picture
that will end up seen at the premiere, is massive and may even take months. It
was through this experience that I could clearly see how the human experience
is dependent on so many more factors than say, the actors, dialogue, or story.
This is not only a truth for physical plays and musicals, but also for many
other mediums that have the same kind of function. In film, the frame and all
aspects within the frame have a huge impact on how the receiver takes in the
information. As a visual species, we depend on the elements within our vision,
including peripherals, to fully intake the complete portrait of what is being
given to us. On a stage, a huge responsibility is to make sure the action can
be viewed by every member of the audience and in order to do so, careful
blocking and dressing becomes an imperative to make sure that every seat in the
house is capable of experiencing what’s on stage.
Monday, February 22, 2016
16 mm film reflection
Working and experimenting with the 16mm film has been
such a fascinating experience for me. For me, this project gave me a real
hands-on idea of the limitless possibilities to manipulate film into something
of my own creation. The actual physical manipulation of the strip was both a
learning experience and an opportunity that created so many possibilities for
creative experimentation. The chance to use oils, ink, and other materials was
one of my favorite parts of this assignment and was also a massive source of
creative possibilities. Feeding the film into the projector and watching how
the different techniques and tools affected how the images were shown really
gave me a satisfaction for the work that I put in. I can only imagine the
massive amounts of artistic decisions that I can make in the future after
becoming further experienced with this kind of assignment. I thoroughly enjoyed
working with bleach and discovering how it can affect the images. But the most
interesting aspect to me were the different patterns that you can make within
the film. When watching the film being projected, I was able to see that in the
future, I could strategically use these patterns in a rhythmic method and
create something that has visual continuity. What I look forward to the most is
how relevant I can make the vast amount of patterns to the narrative in the
film. This kind of experimentation is really what has me excited for future
assignments in this class.
Tuesday, February 16, 2016
R3
I’ve always
found crowd funding and crowdsourcing to be a fascinating and interactive way
to fund and gain awareness about a project. I see crowd funding as an example of
how the industry of film and innovations in other fields can gain momentum and
progress to new stages in a way that could never be accomplished before this
new age of connectivity. The first time I heard of crowdsourcing was the Star
Wars project that Disney spearheaded a few years ago. The fact that something
so expansive could have contribution from regular people who don’t work in the
industry was something that I absolutely loved. This brings about questions
about what kind art will be created in the future as crowdsourcing becomes more
popular. The Internet has lead to so many innovations and the idea of both crowdsourcing
and crowd funding will have major effects on how many industries function and independent
ideas get traction. Wikipedia owner Jimmy Wales gave an extremely eye opening
speech about his company and the uses of an encyclopedia that users can edit.
The mission of bringing an incredibly accessible encyclopedia to so many people
is a game changing idea and it has done just that. My favorite parts of Jimmy
Wales’ speech was when he was talking about the reality of many criticisms
toward Wikipedia and the challenges that accompanies many actual criticisms. I
loved Tiffany Shlain’s manifesto on the cloud because of all the incredible
advantages that it will offer. This insight into the future of cloud filmmaking
only makes me want to think about the many different advancements that will
allow result within the decades to come. The amount of undiscovered filmmakers that
will be found and recognized for their achievements are massive. Not to mention,
the content that will be accessible to viewers of all languages will help to
increase audiences for all kinds of films.
Monday, February 8, 2016
R2
I found David
New’s observations on sound and the recording of sound to be not only
insightful but incredibly fascinating. The way he describes sound is unlike
anything I have ever heard before. He views sound almost as a living being and
is a constantly moving force. He made an observation about time before sound
recording that explains how sound was “committing suicide” because all that
humans had was memory instead of an actual copy of the sound. Yet, he explains
that even recording sound can never fully capture how it really sounded in the
real world. Jim Cummings’ article, “Opening Our Ears to Acoustic Ecology” continues
to talk about the living fabric of soundscapes that constantly exist around us.
I had never heard of acoustic ecology before but its study is unbelievably
interesting as it unveils the dependence that every creature has on the
universal, everlasting soundscape of the world. This article has inspired me to
do some soundwalking of my own and truly take in the natural collection sounds that
inhabit the world around me. I’m very pleased to have been introduced to
soundscape art and have been researching this on multiple websites. Justin
Boyd’s Sound and Time was my favorite of the assigned reading due to Boyd’s
unique relationship with sound and his own personal perspective. His passion
for recording sound, adjusting frequencies, and playing with different
environments is very cool to watch. He shows an art that I was unaware existed
on this level and the depth of what he is doing is very inspiring. R. Murray
Schafer’s complaint that we have become too unobservant of the natural sounds
around us is a dead on observation. I know I am guilty of this as I ignore
these sounds on a regular basis. The comparison of sound complaints from the
past to today is also very intelligent and very singular to the modern world.
The idea of cities being sonic sewers is definitely a big part of the problem
and has definitely desensitized us to an overpopulation of sounds. The
designing of a healthy soundscape was one of my favorite parts of all the
readings because of the amount of intelligence that goes into designing
something so beautiful. After reading all of the assigned readings, I have
definitely been given a more insightful view on the auditory world around me
and will devote much more time to experience it.
Sunday, January 31, 2016
R1
I found the Wikipedia entry on Synesthesia to be absolutely
fascinating. I had always heard about people associating songs or pictures with
certain things like colors. I had never understood this phenomenon but the
examination of it in the Wikipedia article helped to see a different
perspective. I have been able to experience Associative Synesthesia in certain
songs. If I listened to a song during a specific action such as eating cookies
or drinking soda, then I will tend to associate the song with that food or
drink. The Ted Talk video about Cymatics was a learning experience for me that
unveiled so much about a subject that I knew very little about. The Chladmi
experiment was mind blowing for me to see because of its graphic depiction and
visualization of Cymatics. To watch sound take a physical form and move via a
force that we otherwise cannot see was a very cool experience. I have always
found the idea of individual perception and its effects to be an incredibly
interesting topic. How Daniel Tammet describes his worldview being dominated
through word/number associations with color, emotion, and personality is partly
relatable and partly foreign to me. The way he views the world is clearly
exclusive to himself and how he shows to the audience is easily palatable. The
example of showing the numbers, one through twelve, really showed just how different
and bizarre his worldview really is. His explanation of how the word Hnugginn
is seen as a sad word further cemented to me on a deeper level how different
and strange his perception are from mine.
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