Vlad mastery

In class recently, we have had chance to try the vladmasters. In their own little world, they were sweet.

First, what I liked. I really liked the narration that the cd's had; it really gave a personalized vioce for the project. The music fit as well as the vioces with the story. The disks were personalized just as much as the vioce was. They had cool designs and were really awsome by just being put together by hand and idividually. The experience that we had was all on its own also. The 3d images were nice to look at as well as a change from the 2d perspective that films usually create. The timing of the clicks we had to do was crucial and well set up for the narration, expectially with the last set of disks, the music and slide changing were beautifully in sync.

The viewmasters were fun to play with, because either which way you held it, the show was still going on. The viewer was really the master of his/her own destiny because we had the choice wheter to move on or to stay behind; watch the clips while looking up or down, and at our own pace, backwards or fowards.

Some things were just a pain while doing this art. While thinking about what other media this could be offered in, I thought up of a vladmaster type show, but with only one disk. The changing of the disks was really cumbersome, and brought me out of the world i was viewing. Though intentional or not, the pauses between disks brought me back into reality and had me remeber that I was viewing a show. I would like to see a show were one disk is used and the narration and click speed is the key to express the story. Another thing about the viewmasters is how my arm cramped up while holding the device, the disk changing helped, but four shows in a row hurt a little.

At home over the weekend, so far, I played with binoculars while watching T.V. This was really cool, minus the head-ache, because I focused in on the action where I wanted it to be. The whole screen didnt fit in the binocular view so I could pan where I wanted too. This was another great medium for watching a story just like the vladmasters, but it kinda hurt my head after a while, my eyes were in pain too.

The level of interactivity was fun and more exciting than some of the work we have seen so far. Interactivity is becoming a bigger issue these days than it seem to be previously; not only in art but technologically. For example the Nintendo Wii. This uses a remote type controller where the player can point and move with sensors in the remote and out. This brings a new level of gaming as well as being able to be the first to use movement as a key factor in gameplay, you can really get tired of playing the Wii.

Spring Break Obsura

The camera obscura was a pretty amazing sight. I never knew that a single hole, with a little attention, could produce the image from the outside. I have even gone ahead and tried it at home so far, well, with minimal luck that is.

I really can see why Ethan would stray away from a single shot images of a camera for this different approach to show images. At Kenilworth, some of the classmates disscussed how he should give the outside a image, or produce a scene on the street to be projected. Though a great idea, we saw Prof. Bogner strutting around the front of the building and some other students doing cart-wheels. For the first time, I saw people engaging with a picture, creating it their own; to some extent.

The time lapsing was my favorite part of the trip. I really thought the clouds projected on a ceiling was a fantastic idea, and a great piece of modern art. I really would like to make something like that at my own home, either projecting the sky or my backyard full of little gnomes and such to make my room look cool. A neat idea I thought of right away was to project water from the outside in and onto the ceiling. An ever-changing ceiling design would blow the lid off visitors and friends. Also, being as cheap or as expensive as one wants it to be, who wouldn't want to try some home experiments with light technology.

Excess is not the term I'm looking for...

I really don't know which was more interesting in the latest class, The Available Light, or the girl sitting in front of me having hyptic jerks through-out the class.(when you fall asleep but then jerk waking up) The style of presentation of two projectors was really a new way of watching a film, but apart from Brent Coughenour, it was more of a experiment than a real image/film.

Start with available light; exposed film? If any two year old was aware that accidentally opening his daddy's film and unraveling it would make a film then all our children are masters of a ever changing art. I really don't have too much to say about this piece, to me it seemed like it would be a great start on something cool to make, but not a finish product. At one point it looked like birds were in the frame, like those flying V's we draw on pictures as kids. A concept of exposing film would be interesting to play with, but presenting this piece by itself was pointless.

Don't get me wrong, I don't have to have a meaning for every film I see. Take Brent's Film for example. The booms and the old projector feel of the film was a devastating scene. The whurr of the projectors fit well with the sound on screen, following some really wicked pictures of the kid on the bike, the forests, roller coaster, this was the only piece that I enjoyed watching. While watching the film I wrote down that it was a visual assault; fitting, I think. The kid on the bike gave me this eerie Damion feeling that echoed while seeing the top of tree and shining light, a god-inspiring image, staring at the sky in that sense could be either good-a new path or such-or like being at a funeral. The film had a different visual tie, something of a horror to nice scenery to action flick, definitely weird and my one of my favorites of the class so far.

Middle East

Being lost is a bad feeling. Any kind of lost bring about the feeling of despair and anxiety. Whether it be lost in a town, lost at wal-mart, or lost within yourself not knowing what to do or feel. The first video we watched, the installation of Vacuum, gave me that impression first. Secondary impressions brought me recognize the elimination of something but not being about to and only pushing it aside. We all know we cannot vacuum snow, the snow is merely pushed aside; a culture pushed aside, a race that is put off and exiled here and there. This is a sad feeling many of us in the U.S. will never feel, exile and a lack of country.

Though not a feeling I would want to feel, the people in Lebanon had to feel it, the feeling of disparity that was shown in The lost ones. The people on the building signified a feeling of being outside the community, far away from the beauty of the town. Those people did not even look at each other, lost together, looking for a old culture that is not existing anymore. The music, unlike many of the experimental videos we have seen---many did not even involve music---set the mood. The mood of disparity and difference, any other music could shows a different meaning. Music could have set the mood of happiness even, it would have needed a different set of shots though. The shots in the film were really sweet too, the girl laying over the edge with her arms out, the man holding on to the top of the building, really informative shots.

The film with the belly dancing music was the best though. It put the music first, something I have been waiting to see in a experimental sense. It reminded me of a B&W film call The Man with the Movie Camera. Both films followed the power of the music, changing with the beat, moving faster or slower or changing pictures. The power of music is a compelling force, it, like a good narrative, could evoke several emotions. A scene of a father son reuniting, cast with good narrative, gives me tears sometimes. With good music, goose-bumps form on my body, a feeling of fear could form waiting for a change in scene--horror movies--Lots of things need to be taken into account when looking at films and music is a huge aspect.

The reason I look at music so much is that I enjoy it. I really feel the music when I hear it, for example Silent Hill. That movie had a decent plot and such, but the music was brought from the 4 games that have been put out before the movie. It just brought a different perspective to the movie, where the people who have heard or played the game before could relate the score.

This trailer has a few of the games soundtrack in it, a fuzzed radio means death is near, or monsters. Sound is more meaningful that sight sometimes I think. imagine the sound of packing cigarettes, it could never be anything else if you think about it.

Finale

In discussion today we talked about waiting. Hell, waiting sucks. The installation idea is really cool though. The possibility to put the image outside, looping and not having a beginning or a end. That idea got me going about a film where it has 4 or 5 different parts to it. I mean like a movie that has 3 different perspectives, if you watch all three you'll have the whole story, but if you just want the view of the buff guy, or the petite girl, or the rich guy, its all possible.
In my film 210 class, we have been focusing on perspective lately, the film The Birds to be specific. In many of the experimental films we see the perspective of the camera, but in D'est, the camera isn't feeling like the same old camera. I felt like a tourist in those country's, just waiting and watching while these people dissect me with their eyes. This film does a great job with time also. As with So Is This the filmmaker has the control of when we move on, there is no directed point where the camera moves on when its supposed to. Pretty sweet, but still a drifter, i found myself and the audience restless; I cant stress that enough.

Alternative Focus

So far in class we have seen many films that focus on the art of viewing, the power that it has when the only sense we are using are our eyes. But, when are we going to focus on something even more powerful, the correlation between sound and images.
The last film we watched, D'Est, had sounds as a stimulant, but not as a main factor. It wasn't the film though that got me think about sound, it was the readings we did by Chantal Akerman. She writes about her motivations, and music is a big motivator. I have the same feeling that I just want to shoot a huge film that focuses on music and the sweet shots that I would put along with that funky sound. For example: The Refused have a song "New Noise" on their A New Noise Theology EP. The song has some crazy footage, but just watch at some points were the music directs the movement. At about 1:30 and 4:00 minutes are a couple of the some distinguishing shots.
Only a few films we have watched have a distinct sound to vision comparison, but have a dominant visual aspect. Like Vertical Roll by Joan Jonas, The constant tapping is a soundtrack, relevant to the image portrayed, but the image commands the sound. The dropping of the frame commands the length between hits. OF course you also have some ambient sound from Lisa Steele's Birthday suit, but that is not a controlled aspect. That sound is just there for the reality of the nude body. It justifies that she is not hiding, not from the viewer or the world.
Music Videos are a great way to express music through visual images, I hope we get to see some in class this semester.

Cultural explosion

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At the start of the film in class today, I already noticed two main pieces of the scene to declare its background. The drapes were white and clearly polish,I noticed because I come from a very devote polish/European background, and the vehicles that drove passed the window were European; not to mention the window opened to the inside, very classic in Europe, not so much in the US.
A little background on me. I was born in the US, in Chicago Illinois 1988, January 15th. You can go back and walk into that hospital at around 7PM and hear my loud screaming just as I came out of my little room, never to return. I learned polish first before my English and have kept most of my polish traditions, especially the house setup because of my mom, furnishing and such. Also, food at my house is very traditional. Greasy foods that give you most of your vitamins so cholesterol is high, but you stay skinny...Great success!

So, because I speak polish, been to Europe over 7 times in my lifetime so far, I knew where we were after a few shots. Most, if not all, the shots were about culture. The shot of the old couple in the beginning playing cards and just chillin in the morning was typical. The guy eating the home cooked meal was typical, I swear I've seen that same table at my grandma's house and the cabinet setup. The doors, if you noticed, consisted of less wood and more glass or plastic screens. At one point of the Polish orchestra scene, also in the first twenty-thirty minutes, there was a muffled dialogue between the band and speaker, he forgot what the name of the polka song was, he asked the band after he thanked the audience members for attending.

Because the filmmaker was traveling through europe, there was a certain narrative between the long shots of people just standing there and waiting for the train or bus. The producer shot the people waiting and then some cultural aspects of the city or country that was visited, and back to the bus. We definitely started in Poland for a while, then we moved on across the boarder to the current Slovakia, a deeper dialect of polish with less sz and cz sounds. Cool thing is that both languages: Polack and Slovak, even Russian and Ukrainian but not as easy to understand, come hand in hand, one can speak only one but understand both. I knew we were in the Russia/Ukraine section by the establishing shot of the sign sometime into the film with the weird writing on it, the Russian alphabet is funky.

The lines of people were fun to watch. European culture, I thought, was best expressed in those sequences. The way I was taught to treat life is to keep your distance from self expression. Most of the people at the bus stop knew the camera was there and just looked at it funny. I mean the women stared at it, typical of Slavic nations, and the males looked away, but still caught glimpses a little here and there. If that same camera was in the US every self-righteous person who noticed it would be on the spot yelling and screaming. The mentality at the bus stops was don't say anything, it has nothing to do with me, just let them film. There were a few oddballs that criticized the camera filming them, and the woman most likely yelling at teens being dumb, or drunks being dumb, but then waves it off because she knows she can't change anything. In that scene with the older woman yelling, I couldn't understand what she was saying, but just the way she said it convinced me plenty, my mom has the same tone with me, strange, it's very culturally European.
Finally, our crowd which we viewed the film in was great. I mean really, I thought the film was boring and repetitive. The crowd was more restless than a pack of hungry wolves. A huge pile of change dropped, I dropped my cellphone twice, and everyone around me was moving constantly or sleeping. Though culturally explicit, like a culture fist to the face---HYAHHH!! TO THE FACE!!---it was presented in a slow fashion that bored the audience after about thirty minutes in. Personally it may have been fun to scope out the culture differences for me a little, it took the fun out of any narrative that was expected by the typical American.