They say you should not work with kids or animals....

I can vouch for the latter.  I wanted to experiment with "dolly in" and "dolly out" (moving the camera closer to the subject, or farther away without using the zoom feature--physically pushing the camera in on, or away from the subject), but I didn't want to film inanimate things.  The pregnant wife is asleep, and she would not box to this kind of interweb exposure, so the dog is subjected to my vanities.

"Sit" is not his strong suit.  But I think I got a couple of good shots.

Observe:

Forced perspective

I've always thought that those shots in film where the camera seems to be taking us through the looking glass were quite interesting.  For example, a doorbell rings, and the protagonist looks through the peephole to find three armed guys on his stoop.  That the camera can capture that fisheye look is really cool.  I tried to emulate the shot (sans the heavily armed antagonists, of course.  For the time being).  The second shot, the longer one, seems to have some trouble with the auto focus.  If I do end up using such a shot, I'll likely want to use a tripod for stability.

The third clip is a ceiling light fixture at an inverted angle, which would have worked perfectly except for the plaque with the writing on it that is clearly upside down in the shot.  Live and learn.

More tomorrow, as always.

Sometimes things look better in black and white than in color.  There's a movie called The Mist, directed by Frank Darabont, based on a Stephen King story.  His preferred version of the film is a b&w cut that the studio would not let him exhibit.  It's okay, though, the Blu-Ray release of the film contains the theatrical, color version, and Darabont's preferred, black and white cut.  The black and white gives the film an eerie, timeless look.

I decided to shoot the same street scene in color and then in black and white.  I think that the b&w has a tactile quality that the color is lacking.

More tomorrow.

So there's this shot in "Apocalypse Now"...

It's this shot, at the beginning of the flick, where Martin Sheen's character has gotten his assignment to find Brando's Colonel Kurtz, and Sheen is lying on his bed in a hotel in Saigon, the fan above him spinning, and then slowly the sound fades to the sound of a helicopter.

Clearly, I don't have a helicopter...(What?  You don't have a helicopter?)  No, I know.  But it's true.  I have exactly zero helicopters.  But I did experiment with the fan shot a bit.  I had seven clips to load in today, but I think I'll just load four of them, the ones with the fan theme.  I also changed the color palate a bit, to see what it looks like.

Here they are.  More tomorrow, of course, but I'm not sure where I'm going to find a mechanical shark...

The establishing shot

"In motion pictures and television production, opening shot that establishes the environment of a show or scene. The establishing shot usually has a wide field of view and serves to orient the audience to the surroundings of the situation they are about to see."

Got that off of answers.com.

It took me a while to figure out what my next shots would be, but eventually I settled on starting at the beginning.  I mean, why not?

These two shots are taken in my neighborhood, at night.  I figured I would give the camera a chance to show me what it's got in low-to-no light situations.  It's clear that if I do any shooting at night, it'll need to be in a lit area.  Or I can spend a couple grand on some lighting.  Yeah, that's not going to happen.

One thing I did notice is that the normally innocuous looking house in the second shot looks kind of eerie in the dark.  So there's that.

I think what I may end up doing it trying out different techniques that I enjoy from films I love, so I have more structure, once I've gotten the hang of the camera, it's capabilities and it's functions.

Anyway, here's tonight's shots.  More tomorrow.

Size matters

I took two shots today, earlier, before the majority of my time this afternoon was scarfed up by the new Call of Duty game.

I love that perspective can completely change through the lens of a camera. 

Not much to say about these ones, so here they are:

My "American Beauty" shot

As corny as that shot of the bag blowing in the wind was in American Beauty, there is something to the examination of the movement of the object itself.  I mean, you can inject it with whatever meaning you like, really. 

For my first shot, I wanted to go with something that made me think of something else.  I saw this leaf, clinging to the branch in the wind, and it made me think of the last US soldier to get on that helicopter when the Vietnam war was over.  Of the last kid picked for gym class kickball.  Or the last episode of "MASH", when BJ is leaving in the chopper, and Alan Alda's Hawkeye is the last man at the camp...or was it Hawkeye who was in the helo?  I can't recall.  I remember the shot, but not the specifics of the characters.  Whattaya want, I was like 9 and a half...

The kicker is, off-screen, there's like 50 other leaves. Just goes to show that the cinematographer or videographer can manipulate the image you see.  Lesson learned.


Anyway, here's the first shot.

Git 'r' DONE

I promise that this will be the last of the inspirational titles.  Today is the second day of setup for this project.

It could not have been any easier to set up the connection with the camcorder and the laptop.  1 USB plug, and 5 minutes later, I've got a veritable movie studio at my fingertips.  There's a program preloaded on the camera, apparently, that auto-downloads to the PC it's connected to.  What won't they think of next.  I mean, thirty years ago, I was playing Pong on my Atari 2600, and now I can connect a camcorder to a portable computer and be instantly ready for hijinks.

Well.  The design studio program is called intelli-studio, and it's got option to share the video with YouTube.

Speaking of YouTube, I set up an account, which is accessible via my e-mail address, or you can search for the page ProjectProJAY.  Remember, that's a soft "J" in the second "project".

Tomorrow, I'll have my first clip for you all, who knows what will come of it.  Happy Sunday night, all.

Oh, here's a cute dog.  To see if I can do this right:

Nothing to it but to do it.

This blog both the realization of a dream of mine, and the result of a conversation with a good friend.  Today, whilst golfing and then having dinner with my friend Paul, we started talking about what being creative meant to us.  We decided that it was partly a way to understand ourselves better.

We talked about how easy it is to disregard opportunity when it is right in front of our faces.  I have always been fascinated with film, and the process of making a film.  But I know next to nothing about it.  I do, however, own an HD camcorder for the purpose of recording my son's life (he'll be born in February 2011, or thereabouts).  It hit me this evening that I am ignoring the opportunity set right in front of me by fate.  My son's life has brought me the means to start a journey I wish I would have taken long ago.

But no more time for regrets.  Now is the time for action.

My plan is to create 30-60 second video clips, focusing on techniques, subjects, scenery, focuses, and the other myriad aspects of film, and post them here, in this blog, which may or may not become a part of a larger project as a film about a filmmaker learning about being a filmmaker.

Over the next months, I plan to evolve this blog, and at some point, learn how to make a movie.  It is called Project:  Project.  The second "project" is actually pronounced "pro-jay" with a soft "j".  Why?  I have no idea.  It just seemed silly, and goddammit, I like silly.

Tomorrow, I will take the time to learn how my camera interfaces with my computer, so that I can put my little vanity project out there for all the world to see.

Thanks for reading, whoever you are, and hopefully I can entertain someone along the way...