So Far . . .

So far I've enjoyed the magazine transfers the best. I guess it's because you have less control of what your film is going to look like. Meaning, you have to use pictures or articles already made and it is impossible to plan out exactly how your product will look like after cutting them into thin strips. I don't know I really enjoy creating something that is out of my control which takes on a life of it's own. My only regret is I tried too much on my little strip. I knew it was going to go through the projector quickly but I did not take into account how hard it would be for the brain to process the images going by. They are going by so fast you need to stick to a uniform theme so that all of the images mashed together would create something memorable to the viewer.

I also enjoyed scratching on film very much. You can really see the personality of a person once you have viewed film they have scratched. This project seemed destructive but constructive at the same time. The original portrait becomes the canvass. This paradox is very interesting, especially when the artist who scratches the film uses the original image. I noticed some students did this by scratching everything out but maybe one of the actors on the film. This created a halo effect, most of the time, changing the meaning of the original narrative. (if there was any to begin with) But scratching was the most pleasurable project to actually do. It was fun to watch the finished product because it was our first project. But the process it's self was very enjoyable, more so than the others.

The rayograms were great. I believe that they use rayograms in the horror film, The Ring. I may be wrong about this but the little girl creates art and they look like rayograms. I don't know, it might be something fun to check out. Anyway, this is another project where you did not have as much control of what you were creating. The room was so dark I had to guess where the film was and this was fun because we were not sure what our end result was going to look like. I enjoyed this project because you had to share your film strip with a partner. This forced you to create some kind of coherent art. This was very helpful because it forced me to plan ahead and try to express something through the rayogram. We chose to show the progression of elements/minerals. We started with grass, earth, pine to metals to crystals. I hope this idea is expressed through our rayogram.

Painting on film was interesting because I did not really enjoy the painting because I felt like it was going to look like crap when it was projected. This is only because it did not look great while I was painting. However, to my surprise, it looked great, better than all the other projects. Something about the light projecting the colors onto a screen is beautiful. Therefore, I think I am going to use a lot of painting in my Earth, wind, fire, water project.

a moving picture giving and taking

I love how in the middle of a page, right after he has explained how to do something he will say something like: if you feel compelled to experiment with this right now then this is where I leave you, or something like that. It is also very helpful how explains the different types of film: black leader, clear leader and so on. It seems as if he is really into his filmmaking but there is a hint of sarcasm when he explains things. His explanations and great detail started to bore me because 1 - I did not have film to work with in front of me, and 2 - I know what spracket holes and 8mm film looks like. So all of this seemed a little drawn out but I understand some of the readers may not be filmmakers, yet! I like how he gives that brief story about Melies. That was a breath of fresh air. I like how he gives the little analogy about going to a Dartmouth football game when explaining how to understand something you must first understand the language and technique. "I DON'T WANT TO DISCOURAGE YOU FROM ATTEMPTING ANYTHING. . ." Great quote.

If you have a light meter, give it away. hahaha He then goes on to say, stop reading this book, or something to that nature. I wonder what Glenn Pack would think of this. I love his outlook on equipment. I totally agree with borrowing cheap equipment especially as a young filmmaker. Things were little confusing when he was explaining the rayogram. I had a hard time visualizing what he was saying. All-in-all I found the article very helpful.