4-23-07

Sharon Lockhart’s “Goshogaoka” was one of the first films that I have seen in which there is no camera movement through out the entire film, and with such a great length of time. The concept of a foreign country practicing an American sport and looking much more dedicated then the founders of the sport look gives great meaning to the practice itself. I know the practice was coronagraph, which gave less of a sincere feel to it, but was a great pleasure to watch. One of the first things I noticed was the fact that there was no hoop in the frame at all; no one made any shots through out the film. I felt indifferent in many ways about this practice and the way it was shot and staged. I felt cheated in the sense of that is not how you should play this sport, or that’s not how we do it in the U.S. But then again that might be how they practice in different parts of the world, so overall I enjoyed seeing basketball in a very different prospective.

4-16-07

Whenever I’m sitting and doing nothing, or whenever I come encounter with an awkward situation I have always thought to myself, why doesn’t anyone ever put these moments in their film, or make an entire film about them? Hamilton captured those situations very well, during the screening I did not enjoy the concept as much as I thought I would, it seemed very boring and pointless. After watching the whole film, I realized I really did benefit from the film, the characters, the setting, and the filming. I was surprised how the concept worked out in a narrative style film; I connected and was intrigued by the characters. It really moved me in the sense of me as a filmmaker and I really want to capture all of those awkward and non-active environments, that has happened to me through out my life.

4-9-07

Through out the all of Jennifer Montgomery’s films I found them very unique and diverse from one another. In her first film “How to use Equipment” I found it very humorous mostly because I could relate to having to teach people how to use what I find very simple equipment to use. I wish that she would had the other role because I was really into that film and the abrupt end to it made me feel incomplete. The second film “Age 12: Love with a Little L” was to me not as captivating in the sense that I could not relate to the situation, except what I observed of girls as a 12 year old boy, and I did see some moments that I witnessed but nothing to strong. There were many things I did not even notice until after talking to others in the class about certain metaphors of the adolescent girl. Jennifer’s last film she presented was the most powerful, but I did not see how some of the aspects she used were relevant, I suppose that after the long discussion of the “controversial” hand-made film that was created right in front of the camera, did have significance, that I will never quiet understand. When I realized that Jennifer was going around the states to her old film friends and slowly gaining her old film equipment I thought that she was mending some old relationships at the same time that she was getting her things, but the last interview I soon realized she was doing most of these things to create a dream that was all about her and just her.

4-02-07

“more junk in the trunk than a honda
i know you wanna do the JANE FONDA
one, two, three, four
get your booty on the dance floor.
work it out, shake it little momma
let me see you do the jane fonda.
five, six, seven now
if you dont know, let me show you how
to work it out..work it little momma
i know you wanna do the jane fonda” (Mickey Avalon)

Click Here to hear.

Those horrendous lyrics written by the rap artist Mickey Avalon were the first thoughts I had when experiencing the Scott Stark video “More Than Meets the Eye: Remaking Jane Fonda.” In Stark’s video he uses an old Jane Fonda instructional workout tape, as the background/plot to help tell the story of her personal life, and her thoughts of the Vietnam War, through text. The images that Stark uses through out his video, is Stark himself working out to the tape in various places and/or situations, such as a public parking lot, houses, fields, ect. With Starks choice to use himself as the central image and not the actual Jane Fonda workout tape is not as surprising as I first thought, you can hear the tape clearly playing as the soundtrack and through out the video I found that not actually seeing the tape was somewhat expected, if he would have cut to clips of the tape I would have felt letdown. After seeing the thoughts of both Jane Fonda (sound & text) and Scott Stark (visually) I have different prospective, on Jane Fonda as a person, and on styles, techniques, and purpose to video making.

3-26-07

When I was presented with the viewmaster I was expecting what I experienced as a child with my viewmaster, but the dilemma with that expectation was I could not quite remember what unique qualities the viewmaster had. Then I soon was reminded of those stories I fallowed along with as a child, but this time the stories told were much more interesting and the visuals were very powerful, especially in the 3D vision.

3-12-07

The camera obscura is one of the most un technological piece of equipment that I have seen that can produce a very powerful, colorful, and live moving image. I found the projection on the wall very entrancing I could not keep my eyes anywhere else, I kept on think how is this working? I think I know how but the fact that it’s right in front of me and I still don’t understand exactly how its working, and showing this in focus color projection of the outside of this building.

3-5-07

2x projection is quiet the visual surplus, getting twice the images as an everyday projected film. I’ve never seen two projectors running simultaneous time, I found it much more appealing than other videos I have seen with more than one image, such as “in this house” which is a video created on the computer so each video would never not be in sync. In “third eye butterfly” and “available light” the projectionist in a sense acts as the computer syncing the videos together, and choosing the placement of the frames. With this chose of showing the films this way it emphasizes the art of projection. My preference between film and video, keeps on moving toward the film side as this semester goes on, I find film much more personal.

2-26-07

The film “In This House” was what I believe to be a very different style of documentary. From the way it was shot, the display of the footage that was gathered, all the way to what they were documenting. I thought the way they chose to display what and how they were discovering was very unique. Through out the film the viewers already knew what the crew was digging up, leaving out a dramatic climax at the end. “In This House” gives you a choice between new/changing footage of the reason for the dig on the right side of the screen, or the continues footage of the dig itself, all while captions are shown through out the film. I found this film very interesting, not so much the content of it, but how it was made.

2-16-07

I seen and heard of people taking pictures of themselves once a day for a long period of time, and then making a sideshow type movie, but the most original one I have ever seen was Renato Umali’s I Learn Something New Every Single Day. With this video, Renato uses pictures but unlike the other “time laps” videos I’ve seen he goes out to the typical guidelines and uses different cameras and locations. When a new picture is presented so is something he learned that day, the fact that he takes time everyday to write down one thing he learned and to take a picture is very impressive.

2-15-07

In my Film 220 class we are learning how to use a 16mm Filmo camera. After viewing all of the 16mm films in Film 201 I have become more eager to start filming. I believe that 201 and 220 really compliment each other, and make a diverse style of filmmaking.

2-14-07

The film "All My Life" I felt was very talked up at first. I was egger to see this film and then when I did experience it I didn't feel let down, but I still felt that I should have been. I know that doesn't make much sense, but the colors and the sound track was so captivating, even if it was only 3 minutes.

2-13-07

All my life, I have worked with video, editing, and filming. But know I have started to use film; I enjoy the way it looks and feels much more than video. On the other hand I film is much more difficult to work with, cost a lot more, and consumes more time, but that is the price you have to pay for the better product.

2-12-07

One thing that I realized today was why I enjoy, film more than video. I have always leaned toward film but never knew why. But after seeing Gently Down the Stream, I found out that there is much more time and effort. In other words film feels much more personal than video.

1-29-07

The visual sight of the world around you through a pin hole, gives me a whole new world to see.



I found both Tomonari Nishikaka films interesting maybe one more than another, but I like to see experimental filmmaking. Market Street seemed more planned out and thoughtful, unlike clear blue sky that seemed almost spontaneous.

1-24-07

Michael Snow

Michael Snow created a film titled "So is This"; a set of single words one right after another to create a story/information for people to experience something much more then any other text could do. I really enjoyed Snow’s film mostly because, I’m not that fast of a reader, usually when I watch a film that has subtitles I could never keep up with them, and everyone around me could. But in his film, I felt that I was in it with everyone around me, and everyone was at the exact same tempo. It was a little weird for me when there is complete silence, until Snow presented us with something funny, everyone would laugh at the same time. The fact that there was no sound at all, but everyone would experience this film the same, was mind-boggling.