BlbobobUCALORUS

One of the films I saw was the messenger. I like woody harrelson. I thought it was decent I liked the first half of the film a lot better than the second half. It started to lose it's momentum the second half and I started to care less about the characters. I also did not like how it turned into sort of a love story between Ben foster's character and the chick from minority report. Some of the bar scenes lighting wise annoyed me becasue it was so dark and it did not really fit it just seemed like they didndt have enough money to light the whole bar. It was a very interesting subject matter and the performances overall seemed good.

Another film I saw was Entre Nos which was really depressing. I got credit for seeing this movie for my spanish class as a cultural event but the story did not really refelct hispanic culture it centered more around living poor and beign a single parent. This family from south america were living in a big city in the US and the father left for florida. He sent money a couple months and then stopped. The mom was forced to move out of the apartment while trying to scrape some money by selling empanadas and collecting recyclable cans. She had her daughter and son help in the process of collecting the cans. They slept on park benches, stairs to subway, and anywhere they could. They kept at it hard and eventually made a enough money to move into a really cheap apartment. The mother finds out that she is pregnant again with the father who left. The landlord said that a real abortion would cost $350 and that she could provide an in house abortion for much cheaper. THe mother did not have an extra $350 to get the real abortion and did not have enough money to feed another mouth or be pregenant for 7 more months because she had to make money. She chose the in house abortion and the landlord gave her this tea that raised her body temperature so high that the abortion is successful. Fall comes around and the older boy must go to school. It ends there and the credits reveal that the mother is living on a ranch re-married, the son is the head of something at a really prestigious college, and the daughter was the director of the film and made it for her mom. Up until the last end credits that showed the kids went on to do big things and starting from the street it was depressing. Without those end credit follow ups I would have not liked the movie at all. It made the movie.

Glow stick blboobobexerience

I wanted to make a stop motion using just glow stick liquid as my light source. It was around halloween time and i remember how when we were kids we would crack open the glow sticks and put the liquid on our arms/face and it would look so cool. I went to a copule party stores and compared prices because the amount of liquid i needed is a little expensive. I found that the single individual packages you actually get more money for the liquid than the big variety packs. I still got a variety pack because it had an assortment of colors. I picked out white for the stars and to my dissapointment when i cracked open the liquid i realized it was the same as the blue but the plastic container was a different color and thats how they achevie the variety. At first i put some liquid on a black piece of foam board but it sunk through and dind't illumnatie. I accidently spilled liquid on my carpet and it came through much better. I made teh earth with green and blue which turned out well and the grass was of course green and used blue for the sky. I put my thumb over the opening of the stick and quickly dabbed the liquid onto the carpet to create a spread of stars. I did this quickly fearing that the background was going to fade away too fast. Doing the mushrooms was a slow and tedious process especially because the required exposure for this was 8 seconds. 8 seconds also showed the imperfectdions in keepin the camera perfectly still and in the same spot the entire time. Because the shutter was open for so long it can detect the slightetst movemnt of your finger on the shutter release button. I went through and did a smooth cam filter later and it actually helped alot. The background of the green grass started to fade away but I let it happen because the scene was going to change to just the stars. I had to keep re-doing the stars every once in awhile as they were fading away. I also didn't realize how sharp the pieces in the glow stick are that break it apart as I got some dug into my skin and made me bleed alot. It was cool to see this glowing painting on my floor and then when i turned the lights in my room on there was nothing. The editing process waas alot easier than i thought it would be because i could change the duration of each photo all simultaneously. I added a little star burst filter on the image to give the stars a sharper shape to them. The color i left and remained the same as it was shot. The hardest part was getting enough liquid it seemd like when you cracked open the stick you have a lot less than you think you do because most of it is the hard material you crack. Overall I had alot of fun making it and I'm happy with the way it turned out.

oooOoOOo YESsssssss men

This approach to show the issue of culture jamming is a big dual between what people think is acceptable ways of controlling others. They used settings which were normal and within those settings worked as a part of the problem but exaggerating. And people still didn't catch on. It is all just a way of tipping the scale away from selfish behavior and spreading wealth and power among others. That's the huge struggle is surviving for yourself vs surviving for others. A lot of their arguments were moral issues, showing that the distribution of wealth and power was a moral issue and selfishness and surviving for ones self is not the right way to live. it's hard to change whats already in power because those with the most wealth help out their wealthy friends because they are not a threat to each other. And its hard to tell how many people would flip and turn selfish once they acquire that much money. We're hypocritical beings and money enhances those behaviors. Money is the new consumption to live. It seems like it would take a catastrophic disaster for the wealth distribution to change to the point where the majority of people are satisfied which might not ever happen as long as money is around or at least it will never happen with capitalism. Capitalism supports that range of distribution so we as a people can't be happy with each other. If we find a way to devalue materials on earth and appreciate the good things about human behavior and interaction we could all have a more meaningful life instead of working really hard to have 3 garages and stand in a huge living room to sigh and go yes i made it. Fuck that I wish we could just be happy with tasty food, laughing, and fucking. Our creativity and imagination is the curse. We can have more complex ideologies about living and that our lives stand for something more than just eating, laughing and fucking but we can also dig ourselves deeper in a meaningless materialistic life but in the end at the way way way end does any of it matter at all. It's nice to say that we tried really hard to give everyone around us the best lives possible but no one is going to care when it's all over. And I think thats the underlying problem for not changing and not giving up our material possessions bevcause we all know deep down this is our only go around at the world. And we're going to take everything wihle we still can EVEN if that is a gratification that you're helping out for the greater good and not just money.

"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources." -einstein

I've thought about this idea of how much influence is copying in art forms. As in the article with the molotov man I feel like the right was there to make the picture into a painting and it would be nice to credit the photographer. I don't think ther'es anything wrong with copying the picture and making it into a painting. Making the painting and then selling it I feel is a slightly diffferent story. I wouldn't care if anyone copied my pictures or adapted them but if they made money off of an exact same reprint I'd be pissed. The closer the adaptation is to the real piece the more pissed I would be. I don't think it was wrong for hte painter to paint it and not give credit to the photographer it just devalues the painting in my opinion. The Lethem article talked about all these famous artist who used other pieces of art/literature and became more successful with it. as human beings we copy we're mimickers we do that to everything thats how we learn, and when it comes to the creative realm when you can break off more ties to where the influence came from it feels more special and valuable. Alot of times it's impossible to trace where the influence came from for a piece of art but there have been many shots in films or scenes in films I thought were amazing then realized where they got the ideas from and then I don't credit it with as high value anymore. It's amazing if a painter can re-create a picture and make it look very similar but it's even more amazing if that painter could create an image wtih that sort of detail from his own imagination. Unfortunately imagination only stems so far from the behaviors and images you mimic in your expereinces and I guess the more the idea is recycled through our creative mines and the further away you can get from the original source the more unique and special it seems but maybe its just our lack of ability to connect teh dots from all the creative sources to find the source(s). There's a different kinds of appreciation. Appreciation for the skill and the way the art is polished according it its own craft. And the appreciation for the originality (or the lack of ability to figure out where the source came from). A "true artist" i guess wouldn't care if their pieces were copied and the new art gained monetary benefits and praise from it but I would. It's hypocritical because that piece I would make is just bits and pieces ripped off from everything else.

LOoooooong Take experienco -BLOBOOBOBloBLO!!!

I rushed through the long take experience because I only had the camera for a day and had to check it out at 1:30, and it was dark/cloudy/raining so my exposure opportunities were running out fast. When I first opened the can of film it was yellow and a big chunk of it slid to the right of the daylight spool so I was very afraid that we had exposed a huge section of the film. I put the film in and off we went. I didn't have many people working on it just me and one other person. I didn't really have any good ideas for action so I wanted to just go for something simple but have it very polished and execute the camera work nicely. I was going to follow my friend with a dolly move then switch to a steady handheld motion while he's being dragged into the woods. I switched it to 12fps, and couldn't remember if I needed to switch anything else on the camera. I ran through it one time but was afraid since I was guessing and had it on 1.8 that everything would be in focus. I had a mini tripod attached to the Bolex and mounted it on the back of my friends truck while driving behind the actor. Moving off the truck while keeping the eyepiece to my eye and not letting any light in while making it as smooth of a transition as I could was very difficult. I decided a slight shake would work with the narrative if he got hit in the head at the same time. While filiming the take the dolly up looked fine and even the handheld low angle shot looked smooth. I ran the rest of the film and hoped for the best. Once I was ready to develop I had all of my tubs out. Mark was helping me and said that their roll of film was not nearly as big as mine. I had to develop the whole spool and it was a huge handful of crimpled up film I had to quickly dip into the devloper. Fearing that the 1.8 was too much I only left the negative in the developer for about 3-4 seconds and quickly put it in the wash. Except it was the fix. I messed up and switched the buckets around. I put it in the wash immediately in hopes that I could devlop it further if necessary. I started to see a define image and thought maybe it had developed just enough. After much contemplation I put the film back into the fix for several minutes. I washed it out and dryed the film. I could see many scatches from a close examination and was worried they would show up everywhere and they did. Im not sure where it got so scratched probalby just the hand processing bunching up all the film together and rubbing against the edges. However at that point I was just happy that I got an image considering the potential exposing the raw stock at the beginning, guessing on exposure while it was getting darker, and putting the film directly in the fix after the developer. Mark and I tried a technique to get a better transfer. We set the projector up against a white card and made the frame small compared to a large screen. The smaller the projection the sharper the image looked. I recorded the footage on 1080p, brought it in final cut and adjusted some contrast. Again it's scratchy but oh well. I think it looks alot more interested when the motion is fast at 12fps rather than the normal 24fps. Despite all the potential for failure I'm glad I got an image.

LOoooooong Take experienco

Scratch **erra errra (turntable sound)**

I like this film from the junkies better than the first couple we watched. It seemed to have more interesting effects. I liked how the frame was moving from side to side, it caught my eye and I don't believe they did that in the first videos. Another part that had side to side motion was when they had the shapes move from left to right. Most of it was an assortment of colors and indistinguishable patterns but there were things like the CO2 symbol. I also liked the live action of the plane and the sand creature was the best part of the film. My views on the style was pretty much the same from the first screening. I don't respond to it emotionally and it didn't keep my interest after awhile. I wanted it to slow down so I could really take it all in, instead its so hectic I can't even notice the details of the picture. I problaby wouldn't like a live action film that flashed by that fast either, even if it looked colorful and interesting. There are beautiful images and colors and pattersn everywhere that it takes more for me to be interested or care about the piece. I just don't have a desire to watch it again because I'm not emotionally invested in it. Even if you saw a painting that you really loved you appreciate the image but you also respond emotionally which is why you hang onto that painting. The scratch film junkies film didn't give me any kind of special connection, maybe because the images went by so fast. If this was a serious of paintings I could probably have more time to look at the image and respond. After writing this I have identified that the duration of these images being shown is the primary reason I don't respond to it. I don't like very quick cuts in films either. I just need more time to really apprecaite it instead of it having just glaze over. The process is defenitley unique and difficult and I apprecaite the work that goes into these films but its not what I prefer to watch. Because all the objects are indistinguishable there's no way for a close to universal meaning to be dispalyed so I also don't like that it's so subjective to the filmmaker that the viewer is on his own to write the story. I wouldn't watch a film if that's what it was for I would just make it myself.

Chion, here's a sound: BLOBOBOBOBOBBBL!!!!

I've always wondered how music/sound for a lot of people is very emotional. Certain notes and progression of notes tend to make people's emotions react to it. Some psychologists say that when we "feel music" or those few notes that "hit us" are because of deep rooted memories we have of sounds from the outside world bouncing off the womb before we were born. I feel that the right choice of music in a film can turn a good film into a great one. Music can be the soul of a piece because it works the emotions so strongly. When people have asked me hypothetical situations would you rather be blind or deaf and I always chose deaf. Sound is important in film but to me images speak much more volume than sound. I feel like the sound is the spice or the extra life to the film. Sound not only speaks to our emotions but also other parts of our psychology. The article talked about tempo and sound speed affects our behavior. Many restaurants will pace their music based on the type of service. For example fast food restaurants play fast paced music because it will cause people to eat faster and get them out quicker. I've thought that people's responses in movies has much to do with the music and how much it affected their emotions. There are so many other factors but people with very similar taste in films I feel music is the dividing line on how much they liked the movie. Everybody that can hear enjoys some type of sound on their own and theres no proven reason to why they like particular types of sound. Sound never has to explain itself, its just instantaneously explained when it enters your brain, a movie or book or painting you have to look at and somewhat try to understand it, but with a sound it's quicker, your reaction is almost immediately without having to interpret and form it into a meaning. It's hard to explain why people like certain notes in teh same order or certain sounds played in sequence next to each other but theres no exact explanation as to why that's appealing. Sound is personal. It is very individual. People debate all the time about what music is better or what sounds are better because it's so individual. You don't have to think when you hear music or sounds its a gut feeling, I feel that's why much scores are in the background but still has a big impact. I feel that sound especially sound that accompanies an image is like the backbone of the piece. Theres a certain type of validation that comes with an image and a fitting sound. The ability to hear is possibly for just defense and a tool to help hunt for food and somewhere along the line it got strung with emotion. And now it seems that the primary purpose of sound is to elicit an emotion then it serves a purpose: defend/hunt.

Wells Reading Response blblbobobolboboblobbol!

I agree with a lot of Wells said. The viewers grew up and have been trained at a very early age to be used to narrative linear films and the animation that followed was a drawn version of those films. I don't think experimental animations got as popular because it's harder to comprehend and appreciate because our brains have been interpreting experience and time as linear. It's going against years of conditioning thinking and interpreting everything as having a beginning middle and end when really a linear timeline of existence is impossible. The linear story is just close to our day to day experience so the first filmmakers I believe were clinging to what they know best. Experimental animations can be interesting, but they don't hold my attention for very long. I get frustrated or bored that I can't understand a story that is completely non-linear. I wouldn't be entertained or interested to flip through a book of abstract paintings for 2 hours straight. I feel that alot of the experimental animation filmmaker's intentions are never clearly shown in their work, and then the piece doesn't interest me. If it's so vague what their intention is then that piece is made just for them and not for the audience. And Wells said something similar that the relationship is between the artist and modes of expression rather than what is expressed. That’s cool for the artist but it sucks for the audience. So it just depends on what kind of animation you want to make, one for your audience or one for yourself. Or a little bit of both. The more you make it for yourself the less reaction you’ll get from the audience. If a filmmaker has made a film for himself with vague messages and the intention routed deep in his subconscious and you as the audience member likes to decipher it and come up with a meaning that is probably not close to the filmmakers intention but just reflects all the experiences in your mind then that’s how I think alot of experimental films work.

Cameraless filmmaking blboboboblblblo!

I think cameraless filmmaking is very creative and also very difficult. It seems that the filmmaker "does more work" in order to get an image, instead of using a camera. It's also much harder to control the image and get what you want out of it if you're trying to produce a coherent streamed idea. It also seems more difficult because we're using 16 rather than a larger format. I think it would be much eaier if we had a bigger space to work in. I think the process of making cameraless work is fun but I don't appreciate the end product as much as other experiementals. I like animation, but I don't really like the end products of ink application/scratching etc. I just like images that have a more direct meaning. The colors and designs are nice but they go by so fast I feel like I dont have time to suck them in and appreciate them. I think the newspaper/magazine transfers could be really interesting if you could see what was being put onto the film instead of a closeup of the ink dyed on the paper. I'd appreciate it more if I saw an intention of the filmmker clearly through that process. I've done contact printing before in high school but it was on 8X10 sheets which gave us alot of freedom but of course it wasn't a moving image. I wish I had brought in smaller objects so I could form some sort of rhythmic pattern. My favorite technique in cameraless filmmaking is probably scratching an animation. It can get tedious especially on a small 16mm square but I like the end product. I want to see if there are any feature length cameraless films, but that have some sort of structure. Cameraless filmmaking is good because it gets you to break your normal patterns and get creative again. Sometimes the creativity can turn into routines or patterns and it loses its purpose.

Synesthesia blbolbobobolbolbolbol!!

This is an interesting phenomenon because most of us don't experience the world this way. We as humans have agreed for the most part on certain symbols to represent expereinces through our senses and sometimes our wires get crossed differently. As far as who is right in the symbols there are two answers. I think the day to day answer the majority of people in the world agree on a symbol and it becomes truth like red blue green. But jsut because the majority of us can agree on calling an object the same name doesn't mean that's what the object really is. Its tough to say what is really the truth since we only have one vessell to expereince the world, our own bodies. That's something I've always wanted to do is step inside someones body just to see how they perceive light and if the world looks the same. And I never understood how studies show that dogs see in a certain color.

I think alot of senses can get mixed into one symbol as well. Certain symbols like love can have tons of different memories and visuals sounds and smells attatched to them. For example the person with synesthesia learning his words at a young age learns the letter H. and perhaps that child's mother was cooking chicken soup at the time. Later in life the letter H smells like chicken soup. That child has a very good sense of smell and whatever comes into his nose attaches itself to whatever he learns. The defenition of synesthesia itself is kind of just the minority of agreed experience. I wonder how much we could learn or discover if our minds/eyes saw the world differently or more accuratley to what it really is rather than having to dull itself down for our brains.

Its interesting that we use symbols for everything including math to understand the universe that we live in. Symbols that we have assigned end up answering big questions for us even though we created every symbol that make up the answer. We have all the little pieces but just don’t know how everything comes together. Things that are considered actually true to me are things that don’t have emotions involved. I feel that the more emotions are brought into trying to understand something the more opinionated and subjective it becomes. Humans have many emotions and I don’t think in trying to understand why we're here has anything to do with an answer that is rooted in emotion. For example being on earth to help/serve each other or “god” I don’t feel is the truth. I feel like the sum of our parts (our brain) can create the imagination and illusion of more possibilities and answers to our why questions but there is no big why. It just is. I don’t think humans are an exception to nature or an exception to the chemicals and compounds of the earth. I don’t think we are separate from the chemicals that operate our entire body and mind. Me “choosing” to move left or right down the road is composed of millions of chemical reactions bouncing off my environment. It just seems foolish to think that we are so special of creatures that we defy the particle behaviors that bond our body. A human walking around with an iphone is just as natural as a bear with a fish in its mouth or oxygen bonding with hydrogen. It’s all chemicals reacting to one other even if it is a million times more complex than hydrogen bonding with oxygen it is still just a reaction. But I’m not saying we can’t be happy and eat some cupcakes! :-)

I like the parts that had a combination of live action and scratching/dying. It seems more skillful to manipulate the film around those small empty spaces rather than just scratching and dying the whole image. I feel like there’s more concentrated intent when you’re working within those small spaces and limitations. In the middle it seemed to be more random imagery with no consistency. There was an overload of different kinds of shapes, designs, and color. A lot of it went by so fast I couldn't distinguish some from the other. Sometimes I felt the music was working with the images and other time’s it seemed to clash which might have been the point. If the point wasn’t to clash then the all the bells and whistles were annoying because it was just constant sounds with no rhythm. There were a lot of colors and sounds. I would be more impressed if it had some kind of coherent structure doesn’t have to be a linear narrative, but something that has its purpose shown a little more clearly. That’s about all I can say without reaching into my mind and pulling out a bunch of bullshit and interpretations that probably aren’t relevant to the intention of the piece.