Class Notes

Today in Digital Video I realized that anything is possible. Watching the videos made me feel for the first time that I had a connection to film and video making. It all seemed possible. Even the George Orwell (Orson Welles to the rest of you) film seemed like something I could make. David's clips from the visual narrative reminded me of my short stories that I haven't made in decades. David Lynch's Rabbits and Gummo also were interesting to see. I am not sure how it all fit together, but it did. Thanks to David, Joy and Justin for the clips!

First stereo video

So yesterday I made my first stereo video. Thanks to David who let me borrow two cameras which I taped together and videoed around the house.
("I taped the two video cameras together to tape the stereo video.")

Well the stereo idea works. The question is who is going to sit and watch more than 5 minutes of it. There still are many questions to be answered about the technology. The cameras need to be able to move or angle inwards when extreme closeups are filmed. Well, there are some scenes that work better than others.... It's actually quite a dog of a piece and I even managed to get a pussy cat in.

I also hope I am not re-inventing the wheel. I joined the Stereo Club of Southern California and I'll ask at the next meeting about this type of film making.

First Committee Meeting

At Ron's request, I will spill my guts here about my first and most recent committee meeting. Lesley, Kim and Ron are on my committee. As I look over my notes to this meeting, I realize that my work is still at an early stage.

Kim did not seem to like to deal with the technical aspects of stereo photos and could not get past the "gimmick" quality. As far as painting on images from my past, she did not feel the work was enough about collective memory. She suggested to look at Mary Kelly's work, but even about that she said that a critic had the same response to Mary's work as Kim had to mine: "So what does this have to do with me?" She suggests I explore more biography than auto-biography.

Something was said about fragmentation of images relating to the stereo views.

Lesley suggested reviewing some artists work that I was already aware of and gave me a great lead on a job.

Ron pointed out that all my work had or has some sort of extra thing attached to the photography. Painting on them, stereo etc. it all seems to shy from straight photography. He asked the question: "When does it become 'explorations in how to make your work more arty'" This is true, I have always moved away from straight photographs for the art venue.

So what can I conclude from this meeting?

First no one is going to tell me what to do.
They will tell me they like it or not once they see it.
So basically, it is a production driven process. Something like my painting on photos may not be working at the moment, but with more effort, it could turn into the cat's meow. So it seems you won't know till you do it and present it.

Where will I go from here? Make em bigger! Like I always say, if you can't make em good, make em bigger.

A Clockwork Orange Revisited

In class on Tuesday showing bits of the movie felt very odd. Not only because I was revealing my past, but also because I was discovering just how much this movie had affected my perception of Art and the vision which I have come to think of as my own. Ludwig has been haunting me regularly, I will be raking the leaves and suddenly from no where I will find myself humming the 9th. I have been re-possesed by the shear power of the fight/rape scene that overcame me nearly 3 decades ago! The desire to commit visual mayhem is overpowering.

I wanted to have a conversation with Ron about "making a film". I was wondering if you could expound on your thoughts so that I could focus this raw energy that I have re-discovered.

Finally figured out why

So there you are! Now I know what was wrong. I changed my server to firefox and everything started working! It was my Safari server that has been giving me trouble. I could not upload images or publish my posts. Only until I noticed that I could not pay with paypal and or get google maps to work did I realize that it had to be the server or my computer or my DSL line. In fact it could be the DSL line that was the original culprit because it was upgraded and perhaps in doing so, my server became less affective- not working all the time, but giving the illusion that all is well...
11/23/06

Clockwork Orange

For my presentation on Tuesday, I wanted to explore the two films that got me interested in the arts. One was Clockwork Orange that I was able to find in the school library and the other was David Lynch's Erasorhead which I am haveing trouble finding. I was able to watch the first 45 minutes of Kubric's film and was surprised at how timeless it seemed. I will try to watch the rest of it before Tuesday.

Genocide Video

Yesterday I showed the bits and pieces of my unfinished Armenian Genocide video in class. I am unsure of how to proceed with it. The reaction of the class seemed muted, of course the subject is hard to talk about. What I did take away from the discussion was that I needed to strip away the gloves and present the case straight forward and from my perspective. Though it has historical elements, I think the class felt that I was hiding behind that to get my own point across. I will try a re-write for this project.

In the mean time, I asked David if I could borrow a camera for a test to see if my stereo video "freeviewing" idea will work.
I actually need two identical cameras, so if anyone has two identical video cameras let me know.

Change of Plans

Yong is not able to make it today, so I will have to find another camera or wait until Friday to try out the stereo idea.

My first post.

I have not seen any video work done with the "freeviewing" idea. The 3D work has always been with the splitting of images by colors or with polarizing lenses with the viewer wearing glasses for viewing as a single image. If you see the image without the glasses it confuses the mind.

With freeviewing, you will see two separate images and will have no eye apparatus to wear. But there is training involved to get the viewer to understand how each eye has to see to create the stereo affect. I am basing this idea from still photos and am hoping that the information will translate into motion pictures. One of the problems besides getting a person to "find the stereo" is the energy and effort needed to sustain this freeviewing. It may be to difficult to expect an audience to sit for a long period of time and view a film in this way. But we shall see!