All Rightee Then...

Hi, every(any)one!

Clearly -- as any of my students already had figured out, I suspect -- my ability to judge how long it takes me to do things is substantially limited. I thought things were going quickly with the unpacking, but then reality set in... and then literally as I was setting up my editing station, my partner Pete fell off the roof! Aack!! It was A) scary (I found him lying on the ground, moaning, basically unable to move), B) not even half as bad as it could have been (only one night in the hospital and no neck or back injuries), and C) time- & energy-consuming to do everything around the house that he was unable to do for a while. He's hobbling around with a Frankenstein boot now, back to work and off the Vicadin; seems as normal as he ever did...

And then, this past weekend, I did set all aside, editing included, in order to participate in the 48-Hour Film Project. Woo-hoo!

90 groups participated in Minneapolis this year -- reps gather on Friday evening and receive their genre, line of dialogue, prop and one character. Then we have 48 hours to write, produce and edit a short film (4-7 minutes) including all these elements. It's stressful and fun! I directed this year, which added to the stress, for sure, but it definitely worked out. We had a great group of people! The poor writers stayed up until 3 am working on the script Friday night, then Sat'y morning we secured some locations (really lucked out, there), and I made the shot-list (!!!), and then we shot 'til 8pm. Sunday we edited, turning in our finished product to the judges 15 minutes before the deadline! There will be a screening of a dozen or so of the films (including ours) at the Riverview Theater in South Minneapolis on Tuesday.

Ours is called "Finishing Touch" and you can view it on the editor's website, here: web.mac.com/paulyfunk (he lists our assigned genre as "Comedy" but it was actually "Sci-Fi" -- blame that on the lack of sleep!). On this same website, if you're interested, you'll see another video called "Return of the Century," which is the one I Assist. Directed last year -- that one was harder to edit and really should have been a full 12 minutes or so in order to make complete sense -- but, hey, you can see me in it as a guest at the party! :)

It was interesting this year to direct a script I didn't write most of -- always a good experience. No film written and shot and edited all in TWO DAYS can be perfect, and of course there are some flaws with 'Finishing Touch,' but overall we're quite proud of all we managed to pull together and it's got me all revved up to get back in to See & Be!!

"Attraction = Moths to a Flame" scene, here I come!

Love and Peas,
REA

unpacking

Hi - Just thought I'd let y'all know two things:

1) I'm on schedule to start editing & blogging this weekend, and

2) I accidentally signed into my old blog (http://peculiarpix.blogspot.com) when trying to get on here and, reading it over, I think I will probably start writing on there again, too. Maybe I'll combine them, but I'm not sure yet (I'll take votes if anyone cares). The other one's purpose was more philosophical, more about the writing and thinking, less about updates and the progress of the film. It wasn't Seeing and Believing specific, but was about my journey (if you'll allow) as a Quaker director/writer.

Hmmm...

Rachel

Merry Month of May

Hi there -

It's been crunch time around these parts -- end of term grading and packing up the old apt while trying to clean/repair the new house to get it ready -- little time for walking the dog, let alone editing.

But here's how the next few weeks look:

-- We MOVE on Sunday the 11th (in honor of mothers everywhere)

-- I get students' final papers on the 13th and will spend the next few days grading those, having to submit final course grades by the 16th.

-- I will likely spend a week unpacking and setting up my new garden (she grinned)

-- Then, starting around the 23rd of May (you know, give or take a day or two), I will set up my summer editing station and get back on it!

-- I will spend the summer editing!

Right now it's unclear how much temping/money-work I"ll have to do over the summer -- possibly none!! -- so I might be editing Full-Time (when not sailing or gardening) which would kick butt!! It's also unclear whether or not I"ll be coming east this August. We'll see.

So -- back to grading now, but that's how things look from here!

Love and courage,
REA

possibly...

... I think I might have fixed my camera today... even Tape 22...

...thinking seriously about getting a playback deck now...

REA

camera issues & local film

Okay, so... I tried to use the camera for taping some of my students as they gave their Informative Speeches (I teach Public Speaking), and it was having the same problems as with Tape 22 -- a kind of digital flipping & skipping on playback of the tape I was testing to see if it was the right tape to use. This means I really do have to bring the camera somewhere to get it looked at -- sh@*!! :(

Saw my brother in an independent film here recently -- 'Further North.' Lee's in it, along with small parts for Laura (his wife) and Calvin (one of their sons), and a bunch of local actors I know, including Pete. Took them two years to film it over three seasons! They used high-end professional equipment -- the director has access through his job, I understand. Producer was boom operator, that sort of thing -- I'm not sure how much money they had. A lot of it was shot outside in the snow when it was like 5 degrees! In fact, Pete was supposed to get shot and the bloody back of his head was going to go flying off, but the blood contraption kept freezing, so they couldn't use it.

As truly "indie" films go (friends working together, no one getting paid), I don't think it was any better than See & Believe could/will be. There were things about it that showed more feature experience, and that camera really did take beautiful pictures, but the characters were pretty cliché, for the most part, and the story was skeletal -- some intriguing shapes, but basically pretty shallow. It was an hour and a half of people shooting people, thinking about shooting people, and trying not to get shot. I respect its labor and effort and, if I do say so myself, my brother's performance, but I'd much rather work my ass off on a film that was at least trying - even unsuccessfully - to be worth the ones and zeros it's printed with: to make an audience think about something. Or else to laugh and feel good. 'Further North' just made one feel ill, and not for any philosophical purpose.

Those are the movies I like: movies that make you think, and movies that make you laugh and feel good. These seem like worthwhile endeavors. ...although-- there are movies that are trying to make audiences laugh that I do NOT like, but I think this is probably because these movies are at someone's expense; they're not respectful of humanity and its intricacies.

Layers, dude: I like me some layers.

I like that in music too.

Okay, well. There it is. I'm going to look into buying a playback deck and fixing my poor camera. Maybe tape 22 will play in a real deck.

On a personal note, we haven't been able to move into the house yet -- still too much work to be done -- but the water is now on, the new door is in and we're getting impatient, so it will probably be only a few more weeks (five more weeks of teaching - hmmm...).

Hope you're all well. Let me know you're there!

Rachel