Rate All 6 Projects

#1- Assignment 5: The Bolex Long Take- Now while I didn't get the chance to do second sensory element for my long take, which would have been really fun, It was still my favorite project. I love film, actual celluloid film, and I love shooting on film. Just the process of shooting on 16mm film, developing it, and then getting to project it all in one day was absolutley magical. Yes, magical. 

#2- Assignment 1: Direct Film Manipulation- After taking 302 experimental and getting to see the works of some legendary experimental filmmakers who directly manipulate film, I was was dying to get to try to do it myself. It was just as hard as I thought it would be, but actually getting to do it myself gives me a while new respect for those filmmakers who make amazing directly manipulated films.

#3- Assignment 2: Rhythmic Edit- I really liked the concept for this assignment.Doing self portraits is always fun,  but its a lot different when you are doing a self portrait of someone else. I enjoyed filming this one though as we got a ton of creative freedom while shooting. Editing was really interesting because I never had to edit like that before, but it was interesting to see the different rhythms that I created and also what other people created. 

#4- Assignment 6: 3D Anaglyph- I never thought I would get the chance to make a 3D movie, but we did and it was a ton of fun. I really like how we did the 3D the old school way and actually creating the 3D composition in After Effects really gave me some more insight into how 3D really works. It was one of those things that I didn't understand until I actually saw it happen. Creating the sound design for this project was really fun too, and I liked the whole idea of having a different genre for the sound design.

#5- Assignment 4: Crowdsourcing- The concept for this one was also really interesting. I really liked the idea and getting to plan our vignettes and then actually build them out of cardboard was a really fun experience. It was handwork, but I really liked how ours turned out in the end and I think the all cardboard thing forced us to have a lot of creativity. Also learning how to use the green screen was a great experience. 

#6- Assignment 3: Animation- Don't get me wrong, this assignment was a ton of fun, but animation just isn't my thing which is why this assignment is rated last. Doing a multilane animation was great experience however and gives me a whole new respect for filmmakers who choose stop motion as a medium. I am also now even more so amazed that it took Wes Anderson only 4 years to animate Fantastic Mr. Fox, it would have taken me at least 20. Doing the sound design was really fun too, definitely had more room for creativity with it being an animation.

Andre- Thanks for a great class. I learned a whole lot more than I was expecting to, and I will certainly be using what I learned in my filmmaking career. Definitely the most fun production class I've taken at UNCW. 

Is the rough theater relevant to what we do in 6x1?

Yes. The rough theater is definitely relevant to what we do in 6x1. In a way the rough theater can be compared to filmmaking. For example a nice theater such as a movie theater normally shows hollywood movies. The sound system is perfect and the the quality of the film is top notch. We have all seen hundreds of movies in movie theaters. However, I have seen some movies that I thought were better than these hollywood films at film festivals. At Cucalorus I saw an amazing independent no budget film at the city stage theater. The sound system was terrible, the seats were wooden, and the production quality of the film was significantly less than that of a big budget movie, yet it was much better than several movies I've seen in theaters. I have also seen several experimental films from experimental filmmakers working by themselves in the 1940s-1970s that blow my mind compared to what people make today. We do similar experimental work in 6x1 such as direct film manipulation and other newer experimental techniques such as crowd sourcing. All of the projects we do in 6x1 are not normal narrative films, yet they are really fun to create and to see what other people have created. We also create a small community of artists working together and we use whatever equipment we have to make art. I feel that this is the spirit of the rough theater. What we do in 6x1 is definitely rough filmmaking, especially compared to what most normal people would consider normal film production. The reading also reminded me of micro cinemas, where people show independent or local films either weekly or monthly in a makeshift theater thats usually located in someones basement. All of the people that go to micro cinemas could go to a movie theater instead and see big budget hollywood films that critics rave about, yet they choose to go to a small community gathering and view art together as a community.

Let It Ripple Cloud FIlm

Submitting a video for the new Let It Ripple crowdsource film was a really interesting experience. The crowd sourced film we worked on in class was really fun, but this was an entirely different experience. In class we worked on what would be in the background of other people talking, but for this assignment I had to be in front of the camera doing the talking. I picked an interesting location off of college road to set up my camera and film myself answering the question "what skills do we need to flourish in the 21st century?". Before answering the question I had to stare in the camera for a few seconds and raise my right hand which was both weirder and more awkward than I thought it would be. I talked about how in the 21st century we need more face to face communication. I feel that we text to much and use Facebook to much to stay connected and if we keep continuing this than by the end of this century there will be significantly less face to face communication skills. Studies have shown that people of our generation are already having problems identifying human emotions on peoples faces  because we don't talk face to face as much as people did before instant communication technologies. It was an interesting question to answer, but I'm think I didn't have the kind of answer that they were looking for. This also made me think of something that I never thought of before with cloud filmmaking. Wen they edit the video, they get to pick and choose that submissions they want to include, and therefore when people watch the finished product it does not necessarily reflect the views of people all around the globe. But this is common with all editing, especially when editing a documentary. In a documentary you have to find and shape a story or theme, which is what they do with all of the submissions. So I now view cloud filmmaking as a sub genre of the documentary film. Although instead of one filmmaker doing the documenting, everyone documents themselves and then sends that footage to the filmmaker. Overall it was a fun assignment and definitely a new experience. It would be cool if I make it into the final cut.

Crowdsourcing

I honestly thought crowdsourcing was the same thing as crowdfunding through sites like Indiegogo or Kick Starter. I had absolutely no idea that there was also crowd sourced design, micro tasks, and open innovation. Its overall a genius idea that is now finally possible due to the instant communication methods caused by advances in technology. But when I think about something like the concept of Wikipedia, I don't see how random people all working together on the internet to create the world's largest encyclopedia would ever work. But it worked, and it worked very well, so much so that its pretty much my go-to when looking up information on a specific subject on the internet. I found the idea of crowd sourcing design to be especially genius. Why would you ever pay someone to design a logo for you when its cheaper for 300 people to design you 300 logos and then you can pick your favorite. The idea of cloud filmmaking seems to be significantly less popular than crowd funding or micro tasks, however it can be very effective for creating new innovative films. I really like the principles of the cloud making manifesto that the moxie institute created. I feel like the manifesto really captures the spirit of crowd sourcing by really encouraging filmmakers to explore the interconnectedness of people all around the world. It is truly amazing that people from all over the world can work together to create a single short film. Whoever said 2 heads are better than 1, was right.

Acoustic Ecology

I find the concept of acoustic ecology very intriguing. Noise is something that I never paid a lot of attention to. There are obviously a lot of different sounds happening outside, but I never really take the time to stop and listen to each one individually. I usually just tune out all the excess noise without even thinking about it. When I do take the time to listen to each noise individually, I quickly realize how ugh sound pollution we really create. I had never even considered the fact that we create so much noise all the time, especially drone noises that are continuous. In just my apartment alone my fish tank filter, air conditioner, and refrigerator all create a constant noise 24 hours a day. I really like how the author of the article referred to God as the first great acoustical engineer. It's interesting to think about how sound was created naturally before we built things that created sound. I also never even thought about how thunder is the loudest occurring sound in nature. I've heard several sounds louder than thunder but these were from man made objects such as fireworks or guns. Its actually pretty smart of the military to use sound as a weapon in there psychological operations. Music specifically is really good at evoking certain emotions so therefore it would be a great tool for psychological operations. I could definitely see how playing really loud heavy metal music for 24 hours would easily drive anyone crazy.

Film manipulation: reflection and how it's relevant to you as a filmmaker

I really enjoyed being able to manipulate film by directly altering it. After taking FST302 in experimental film and seeing many amazing films from people who have directly altered film, I had always wanted to try to do it myself. After having the experience of making a one minute 16mm film by direct manipulation and seeing how hard it was to just do a simple animation, I have a whole new respect for some of the great 35mm hand painted films I've seen that are longer than 10 minutes. I think its really interesting that artists even thought of using the medium of film for direct manipulation. I don;t think that direct film manipulation is relevant to me as a filmmaker today at all. Unfortunately, film has become a dead medium. Cinematography isn't even offered at UNCW anymore because no one shoots on film. I now have to take an art of the camera class on digital filmmaking which I'm sure isn't going to be nearly as cool as shooting on film. If we lived in a world where everyone still shot on film, I feel that the direct manipulation would be more relevant to me as a filmmaker. When you shoot on film you're doing so by exposing each frame 24 times every second. Direct manipulation is similar because it is a frame by frame process. You can take your manipulated film and look at it and have some kind of idea what it will look like when projected, just the same as if you took some developed film and looked at each frame before running it through a projector.

Media Fast Vlog

Synesthesia/Cymatics

       I found the concept of cymatics very interesting. It was cool to see the effects of different sounds waves on particles of sand. I knew what sounds waves looked like but I had no idea that they could create geometrical shapes and patterns. I found it very interesting that scientists have theories that sound waves could be responsible for creating geometrical shapes and patterns that are found in nature. I thought it was really cool that they could even recreate the cymatics of certain sound waves to visually prove or mimic their presence in nature. Cymatics can also artificially bring life to matter by forming and moving it. I enjoyed seeing the different geometrical patterns that different sound waves created. When sound can be seen, senses are mixed which then creates synesthesia. Synesthesia is when human senses are mixed or combined. Although synesthesia is technically a medical condition, I find it very interesting that it has come to play a large role in the artistic works as well. I have especially seen a lot of synesthesia when watching the works of famous experimental filmmakers such as Harry Smith. I had no idea that cymatics were first studied so long ago by iconic figures like Leonardo Da Vinci and Galileo Galilei. One day. I hope I get the opportunity to experiment with cymatics myself because I would like to see it happen in real life. It will be interesting to see what advances will be made in the field of cymatics in the future.

Response to hand-painting.

The first thing that I noticed about the film was the synesthesia. The film was synced up to the music perfectly. It seems that the film evolved entirely around the song, therefore making the film some sort of visual representation of the sound from the music. I also noticed that at certain parts of the song were consistently represented visually in the same manner. For example, when the song slowed down and only a few bass notes were being plucked, the screen was mainly black except for a few white lines which represented the bass notes. On the other hand, when the song picked up its beat, the visual representation was much more chaotic and colorful.