Video backdrop series, part 10: Closing thoughts

I put together a total of nine videos for the concert backdrop. For the tenth one, the band used the exceptional "Night Chorus" music video directed by Matt Walla. You may have read some praise from me about it right here. How fun was it to see the band playing in front of images of themselves from the music video? Very fun. The video was perfect. The energy in the room was perfect. The night as a whole was perfect. And I'm not just glorifying the past. I knew this would be a night to remember while it was happening.

Since the tenth video wasn't my own, I was originally going to use this final installment of my blog series to show some clips from my footage that didn't "make the cut" for one reason or another, as there is a substantial amount of it. However, I find myself wanting to wrap up the series sooner rather than later, so pardon me if I take some short cuts here. Instead of clips, I'm going to give you some stills.

One idea that didn't find a home was a series of nature shots I took at various locations over the course of the shoot. Each contained some subtle movement (e.g. a leaf dangling from a cobweb, ripples in a stream, bugs swarming around branches, a fading sun), but it may have been too subtle to work as a backdrop. We needed exaggerated motion and contrast in order for it to be picked up by the projector and remain recognizable behind layers of stage lights. Not only were these images a little dull, they were also too literal. It felt more like stock nature footage you see between segments on PBS than an accompaniment to a rock show. See for yourself:

Then there were some alternate shots -- for backdrops that did get made -- that just weren't needed in the final edits (or were, again, too literal). These probably don't mean a lot to you because you haven't seen every shot that I did use, but here's a little sampling of my B-roll below anyway. (A little trivia: the hand in the first one belongs to R and was meant to be her cameo as she "pulls back the curtain" between the sidewalk and the trail in "Waking World," but, alas, it was too cheesy to include.)

I also have a few unused time-lapses that I'm not going to post yet. These are just some experiments that will likely make an appearance in some future, unrelated entry on this blog. They need a little more distance from this project and the right choice of music before they will be ready for viewing.

That about wraps things up then. It was a lot of work to document all of this, let alone create the backdrop videos themselves, but now that it's done I'm really glad I have a written and visual record of the project. Maybe "work" is the wrong word because I had so much fun stretching myself creatively (and technically, for that matter) to stitch together this quilt of abstract images for the concert. (Hmmmm... Why didn't I call this "The Quilt Project" instead of the "The Sweater Project"? That makes much more sense.)

Finally, I'd like to thank ThreadSpinner one more time for giving me this opportunity and so much freedom to build my own artistic endeavor on top of theirs. They took a huge risk by asking me to help shape their image at one of their most important concerts to date. There were times when I wasn't sure I'd be able to pull it off, but I've come to the other side with more confidence in my vision and a huge sense of satisfaction. The band makes for an imagination-spinning muse, one I'd like to work with again in the future.

Video backdrop series, part 9: "Darkness"

I have to admit this 10-part series is going on a little too long even for me. I'm looking forward to finishing it up so I can return to your regularly scheduled programming. But I can't quit this close to the end. We have two entries left. Bear with me.

The circumstances for this particular video were a little bit different from the rest. ThreadSpinner played "Darkness" during their encore, and that's a distinction right there because, at least in my opinion, an encore is a chance to experiment -- or play something unexpected and less rehearsed -- without necessarily reflecting poorly on the main set or the show as a whole if it's not perfectly executed. The band pulled out all the stops by playing a song that nobody in the audience had heard before. Not only was the song unreleased and unrecorded, but it was still being developed. I don't think the lyrics were even finalized at that point.

Yet the song and its performance ended up being one of the highlights of an already exceptional concert. It was epic and complex and came off a little bit looser than the other tunes, allowing for the band to really get into the music and feel their way through it. From my perspective, the music appeared to be driving them, rather than the other way around. I enjoy witnessing a band become bigger than a sum of its parts like that.

So how do you create a video backdrop for a song you haven't heard? Well, I was given a description of it as well as a backing track with drums and some effects added on. I didn't get the full picture of the song until I heard it performed at the sound check the day of the show, but I had heard enough to get the right pace, tone, and running time. There were some guesses involved too, and I was sure curious to see my results would fit with the music as well as I hoped.

One of the concepts I had been throwing around (for another song actually) was to shoot food coloring being dropped into water. It's a neat effect, but it's not a completely original idea. If you go to Vimeo.com you can probably find all kinds of examples of camera experiments like this. Shooting food coloring is sort of a rite of passage for videographers. I wanted to give it a shot too, but I wasn't sure if I wanted the results presented along side the rest of my backdrop videos, which were, at least to my knowledge, more original creations.

It was the weekend before the CD release party -- the band was finalizing the order of their set and rehearsing with the videos I had already delivered -- when I decided to go ahead and make this one last backdrop. The show just would have felt incomplete if the encore didn't have a visual to go along with it. This was a simple concept that I could shoot in my own home. And really, the look of the food coloring seemed a perfect fit for this psychedelic song.

My set-up was a glass pitcher filled with water, a white sheet of paper behind it, every directional light I had pointed at it, and my camera zoomed in just enough to cut out all of the "glare spots" caused by the lights and edges of the pitcher. I ended up setting up the shoot four or five times over the course of the weekend because little imperfections (reflections in the glass, out-of-focus food coloring) kept appearing after I imported the footage on my computer.

I probably ended up with an hour's worth of me dropping coloring into the pitcher and about five minutes of it that I could actually use. But those five minutes were pretty cool. I was able to alter the colors in my editing software and reverse the direction of the fluid movement to make it look like the coloring was being removed at times. I ended up being really happy with the results. And it's funny because I don't think any of those imperfections I was worried about would have been noticeable on the screen during the show anyway. The projector didn't show that much detail. Oh well.

I'm not going to post a clip from the concert this time. First, I really messed up the audio on this one. It wouldn't do the performance justice (hear it for youself at one of the band's live shows instead). Plus, my second camera ran out of tape by this point in the show. Lastly, since this is an unreleased song I'm not sure if the band wants clips of it online yet. So you're only getting the two stills below. Eventually, I'd like to use the footage for another short experimental video à la the Moonrise or Silence blips I already posted. It's on my list.

Video backdrop series, part 8: "Waking World"

While this is not necessarily my favorite video from the backdrop series, "Waking World" is probably my favorite song from ThreadSpinner's new EP. My head was flooded with images the first time I heard it, and that is essentially how I define a good song. It takes more effort to NOT create a video for something like this.

If you haven't done so yet, go and download ThreadSpinner's EP (details at the band's website). It's inexpensive, well-produced, and full of gripping, inspiring tunes. This video project would have been a lot more difficult if I hadn't liked the music so much.

Because there wasn't much struggle in the idea phase for this one, and because the motif I had in mind seemed to match up okay with Sarah's suggested themes, this was the very first backdrop video I shot. Here's an excerpt from an email I sent the band describing the concept:

"I want to walk down State Street at night and then speed up the footage, maybe add some motion blur. I'll also walk on a trail in the woods under sunlight and give it the same sped-up treatment... and sort of blend them together, dissolving back and forth. It might look a little repetitive, but the frantic forward movement will suggest the kind of searching you describe, without distracting the audience from the music too much. When I'm on State, maybe I keep going all the way to the end of the wharf and end with a shot of the vast ocean. In other words, what we find at the end of the 'search' is a dark, blank canvas of possibility..."

I burned quite a few calories hoofing about six miles total with my camera pointed in front of me. Some of the walking footage was sped up to 1500% in post-production, so I needed a lot of it to cover a four and a half minute song.

The original cut was relentlessly fast-paced, but I ended up making some changes after hearing a live recording of the song and discussing it with the guitarist, Jon. The energy and tempo were slightly different in the live version; there was more "build." That was one thing I had to watch out for -- the songs would not be performed exactly as they were recorded. Jon eventually gave me some bootlegs from a practice session, and I worked on timing everything to them instead of the ones from the EP.

The revised video starts with an almost drunken, blurry-eyed stumble through a riverbed and gradually speeds up into a tear through town. In post-production I added the black, feathered border, giving the video a kind of tunnel vision, which was meant to tie into the lyrics about "tunneling through earthen promises." Near the end, the video turns into a big, chaotic blur before finding some peace in the darkness off a pier. It was another case where I had to loosen up on the editing and just let it flow.

Here's a quick look at the concert performance. This clip is from before things get really out-of-control. I was working on another clip from later in song, but the pieces weren't quite fitting together, so this will have to do.

Video backdrop series, part 7: "Running Away"

Sorry if that last post was a little long for the Twitter era. I'll try to keep this one under control.

The concept for this backdrop is similar to the one for "Liar's Chair" in that it is an abstract visual design made up of four or five distinct pieces, none of which are really related to each other. For some reason this one had a way of collecting the ideas I had that just didn't seem to fit anywhere else.

I floated a flashlight in the kitchen sink, hopped a fence to shoot in a park after hours, and manipulated various sources of light (e.g. Christmas lights, the sun) to get some pretty random results that sort of inappropriately suggest "running away" considering the lyric used is actually "I'm NOT running away." Whoops.

The version we ended up using was essentially a first cut. I had intended to circle back to it and try to fuse the separate pieces together better, but the band seemed satisfied by what I already showed them and I was up against a deadline, so the revision never happened.

What's really surprising, especially after me telling you how this one should have failed, is that it worked really well. This was the penultimate song in the main set -- near the climax of the concert, if not the climax itself -- so it had to work. When it did, it was one of the best moments in a night full of great moments.

This may be the only entry in the series in which I post a complete song. My recording of it is not solid all the way through, but I liked one section near the beginning and one near the end, so I figured this is easier than posting two separate videos. Plus, posting stills doesn't really work for this one; you need to see it in motion.


I cheated a little bit in my editing: two shots from the video are actually from the sound check, rather than the actual concert. How else was I going to get a close up of fingers on a keyboard?

Final thought: The guitar part in this song rules!

Video backdrop series, part 6: "The Unmaking"

When I first started discussing this project with the band, Sarah (the lead singer/songwriter) listed some images and feelings she associates with a few of the songs. Most of what she told me was open to interpretation, and I probably didn't come anywhere near close to recreating what she envisioned, but it was still helpful to get inside her head a little.

One song that she did not give me any thoughts on is "The Unmaking." I was kind of relieved because this is one of their older tunes that I had listened to a bunch, and I already had something in mind for it. For some reason this song screamed science fiction at me. Maybe the backing synths sound kind of like a UFO landing or something -- I didn't over-analyze it. I just knew that was the direction I wanted to take this particular backdrop.

Okay, now jump back ten years. I was in college, taking a summer course in Barcelona. A few classmates and I went out with some locals to a hole-in-the-wall club down some dark alley. The entrance was unmarked and the place was about as big as our kitchen. It was stuffed with people dancing to techno music and it had episodes of the original Star Trek series projected on the wall.

I liked how the old television show was being used for a purpose for other than what was originally intended. I'm sure the episodes had a story line, but of course nobody was trying to follow it. That wasn't the point. There was a pulpiness to it -- a sense that it could go on for a really long time without attracting too much attention, just adding to the club's ambience with trippy special effects and cheesy acting. I've been in other bars since then where they play film noir on plasma screens usually reserved for sports games. They are like moving, old-time photographs on the wall. I like that kind of stuff. My backdrop video project as whole was meant to be a decoration like that... and the segment for "The Unmaking" had to be sci-fi because of Barcelona.

So what better opportunity would I have to pull out the Star Trek influenced Super 8 film that my uncle made with some of his friends in the late 1970s? Growing up, my brothers and I referred to this piece of work as "Uncle Jimmy's Space Movie." My dad would set up the old screen and projector once in a while and treat us to a showing of it and a few others my uncle made. They were a huge inspiration at the time and planted a desire for filmmaking in me.

When my dad eventually bought a video camera, two things happened: (1) I started making my own movies, and (2) we transferred our collection of 8mm films to tape. Then, sometime post-college, I went through the VHS tapes and digitized some of the contents in order to further preserve them. This included the space movie as well as the "Mud Brothers" clip I showed you last year. I really didn't have any other plans for these old films at the time, but I was happy I had them handy last August.

Part of the charm of the space movie lies in its roughness -- in the loose editing, in the decay of the original film, in the jittery projection. I didn't mind all of that, but I did make a quick pass through and edit it down a bit for the backdrop. Some of the talking scenes went on too long for a crowd who wasn't meant to follow the story. The problem with this shorter cut, however, is that I ended up with three and a half minutes of a space movie for a backdrop that needed to be five minutes long. So I had to supplement it with some of my own original footage.

After my additions were made, the backdrop was no longer about the space movie. It was now about what was happening in a room where the space movie was playing. It plays on a TV screen in the shadows, and there is a mysterious figure who crosses back and forth in front of it. Eventually we follow that figure out of the room and see where he goes. It all comes together in what I think is a satisfying conclusion, tying together the inspiration and the inspired, bridging 30+ years of a genetic bond over artistic creation... I'll shut up now.

This backdrop includes a cameo from a much younger version of my dad, seen on the "video conferencing monitor" in the movie within a movie below:

It also includes a cameo by me, in a brief sequence that attempts to match the space movie shot-by-shot:

Are you starting to see why I was nervous about showing this one to the band (not to mention a crowd of 150 concert attendees)? In the end I think it worked fine as a set decoration, yet I like that there were a few extra rewards in there for anybody who might care (i.e. me).

Finally, here's a clip. Keep in mind you're only viewing about a third of it. I might try to get a full-length version online eventually, but this better suits my needs right now. Enjoy!


P.S. A big thank you to my uncle Jim for allowing me to use his work-of-art!

Video backdrop series, part 5: "Liar's Chair"

We're halfway there. Are you still with me? Ah, that's okay -- I'm mostly doing this for myself anyhow.

The backdrop for "Liar's Chair" attempted to with ceiling fans what "Summer Storm" did with sprinklers (it didn't quite work, however... more on that below). There are also some flashes of purplish light (sped up horizon tilts through trees at a slow shutter speed), bursts of almost unrecognizable freeway traffic rushing by, and an electrical current running through the second half (one of the few effects I used that was not captured in-camera but rather taken off the Adobe Premiere effects shelf and tweaked to look more explosive). The still frames you see here don't do the actual results justice because this backdrop is all about patterns of unrelenting motion and timing to the breakneck pace of the music.

The bummer part of this particular backdrop is that the first minute or so could barely be seen on the theater's screen. There just wasn't enough contrast in my ceiling fan footage. Add to that bright stage lights and a projector that wasn't great with subtle shading/color, and you're limited to subtle background movement when you wanted something audacious. Luckily, by the time the lightning bolt showed up, the visuals were complementing the band's energetic performance nicely. That's the section captured below.

Video backdrop series, part 4: "Summer Storm"

The backdrop for "Summer Storm" was one of my favorites. It's one of the few ideas from my initial brainstorm session that made it from concept to completion relatively unchanged. What I did was take about 20 shots of the lawn sprinklers in our courtyard up close and at a really high shutter speed so that the individual droplets of water were visible and appeared to hang in the air. The video starts off in slow motion, so that the frames change to the beat of the music, and as the music picks up tempo and builds, the droplets become a flurry of color and motion. It was quite a sight when scaled up to the large theater screen (in my own humble opinion).

I like that there is some ambiguity as to what you are looking at in this video. It does look kind of like a rain storm, which fits with the song's title and lyrics, but there's an awful lot of sunlight where you would expect gray and there are flowers and other objects in some shots that are clearly not getting wet. What is it then, confetti? There are a few hints along the way, like in the shot below were you can vaguely make out a key shape in the background.

But we decided to cut the more obviously revealing shot (below). Seeing the sprinkler at the end felt like a twist that cheapened the abstractness of everything seen before it. So maybe the audience was left wondering... or maybe they didn't care... I don't know.

As usual, I'm also posting a clip from the concert. You actually don't get to see much of the backdrop in action here, but I really like these shots of the band members, so this is what you're going to get.

Video backdrop series, part 3: "Follow"

Part of what made this project so much fun was the open-endedness of it. The band had the final say on what stayed and what went, but otherwise I had all the freedom I could want, allowing for my own artistic expression to be layered on top of their music. The vision for "Follow" was one I set out to construct deliberately. There was a feeling I wanted to convey and, while I did struggle with getting the flow of it right, I'd say the results were more or less successful.

This one can be filed in the literal category -- not literal in the sense that the lyrics are directly translated to the screen but rather in the sense that most of the images are identifiable as what they really are. The band said they wanted abstract, but in this case I took a risk and gave them figures on a moon-drenched beach, rolling (then crashing) waves, and even a lifeguard stand. These images were meant to create a sense of place... and it was a place I like to be. In fact, I was at this same location enjoying a bonfire under a full moon a few nights before the shoot. That was the inspiration.

This shoot involved some low-light photography, which is always tricky. You don't realize how dark the world can be until you take a camera outside after the sun sets. Some of my images turned out grainy and/or blurry. For consistency, I degraded the good shots to match the bad ones in post-production. This gave the video a kind of vintage film look that appears like a stylistic choice rather than a shortcoming. Maybe.

The snippet below is my favorite single shot from this backdrop. It's 45 minutes of a rising moon condensed into 20 seconds. It was a tricky shot because I didn't know exactly where or when the moon was going to come up, what arc it would be following, and what exposure I needed on the camera. And I only had one chance to get it right. I learned that shooting time lapses of sunsets are much easier than moonrises.


And here's a clip from the show. This recording turned out only so-so, but you can see a few shots from the backdrop in it and hear some of this wonderful, emotionally complex song.

Video backdrop series, part 2: "Six Keys to Walking Safely"

Some of the backdrop videos began with a clearly defined vision that I then attempted to materialize the best I could. Others were born from experiments with the camera where I simply captured what looked cool and later decided how the footage would be used. "Six Keys" falls into this second category.

R and I were heading out to a show that was part of the city's Old Spanish Days Fiesta, and I decided at the last minute to bring my camera along because at that point in the project everything was a possibility for use. The clock was ticking and I only had concrete ideas for about half of the songs. So I taped some traditional Mexican dancing at this Fiesta show because the color was too vibrant and the motion too constant to pass up.

I spent quite a bit of time editing the footage into a big, multi-layered swirl to go along with "Six Keys," one of the band's faster paced songs, and was pretty happy with the results... but somewhere in the process I lost sight of the original goal for these videos. Sometimes when doing this type of work I become obsessed with the details and forget about the bigger picture. I didn't really think about whether it any sense whatsoever to associate Spanish/Mexican dancers with the music; I was too busy choosing the right dissolve transition between flamenco and hat dancing.

I showed the resulting video to R; she didn't like it. I showed it to the band; they weren't crazy about it either. I loved the original video (I still do), but it wasn't right for this purpose. The images needed to be more abstract. Nobody wanted to see faces or colorful skirts or sombreros. Once I took a step back from the editing, I agreed.

But I wasn't ready to throw away the work I'd done altogether. My solution was to blur the images beyond recognition. The color and motion would remain mostly intact, but the detail would be obscured to the point that it looked like you were watching a reflection in a puddle.

A shot like this:

... became this:

At first it felt like a shame to cover up all of the detail -- for one thing I could have edited quicker if I had started with the blur -- but I liked the idea that there were hidden images in the backdrop, vaguely calling to mind some of the local heritage and perhaps subliminally telling the crowd to get up and dance :-). The revised backdrop works for me. What it's missing in dimension and clarity, it makes up for in fluidity and mystery.

Here's a short clip from the concert to give you an idea of how the backdrop looked in action:

Video backdrop series, part 1: "Where the Game Begins"

I'm going to try something new (and possibly even more self-indulgent than usual) on this blog over the new few weeks/months. I'm going to post an entry for each of the backdrop videos I created for ThreadSpinner's album release concert in which I describe -- and show clips and/or stills from -- the videos and discuss some of the thought and work that went into making them during August and September of this year. There will be 10 parts to this series in all, so this could take me a while, but some of the descriptions will be less detailed than others and most will probably read like a stream of consciousness. Let's see how it goes. And don't worry, I'll still be mixing in some regular blog entries as well.

If you have no idea what video project I'm talking about, you can read more about it here and here. Let's get on with it then...

What better place to begin the series than with "Where the Game Begins." This is not the first video I made for the project, but it was the easiest. Some of them I struggled with for hours and hours, trying to get the look and feel right, but not this one. I literally spent 15 minutes shooting it, 15 minutes editing it, and then put it away until it was time to synchronize it to the click track. I didn't second guess myself because this one just felt right, and I needed to rely on intuition if I was going to have time to finish ten of these puppies.

The reason this one was so simple is because the whole thing was caught in a single shot. All it is is a blurry close up of a candle flame flickering roughly to the beat of the music. It starts off as an unrecognizable little spark in inverted black and white. As the song builds, the image gradually grows more flame-like, and then in a key moment, it switches to color and the audience should finally realize what they are looking at: a fire that complements the burning passion in the heart of the song. Well, that was the idea. I'm not the most subjective critic.

I really loved the moment of that switch to color. This song was played pretty early in the show, before the audience really knew what to expect, so this was the point when they were shown that the video was indeed timed to the music. I'm a little surprised we managed to pull that off actually. If the images had been half a second ahead or behind the music, the moment would have been missed altogether. Timing-wise the entire show went off without a hitch.

The clip from the performance below contains only the second half of the song -- it starts right before the "switch" -- so you miss a lot of the build up, but check it out to get an idea of how the backdrop video was used in the show. I can't stop watching it myself.

Release

The title of my previous entry, Unveiling, may have been deceiving because, while I did announce the project, I didn't show you what it looks like. Unfortunately, unless you joined us in the theater last Friday night, you won't get to experience the full effect of ThreadSpinner's one-of-a-kind album release concert. It's as simple as that.

If my video backdrop is never viewed by anybody ever again, I'd still be happy with the way things played out for the 130 people in attendance. There's something to be said about a one time only event that sticks in your head and is shaped by the gaps in your memory. My contribution helped heighten the excitement and drew a distinction around this particular concert by a band that is already plenty awesome without any kind of "video enhancement." It was an amazing night that I won't forget any time soon. I'm so happy to have been involved in an outright art project such as this.

But of course the preservationist in me couldn't leave it at that... So I taped the concert. Now my plan is to edit together my footage of the band playing in front of the backdrop with footage from the backdrop itself to create (1) a full-length DVD for me and the band and (2) some clips for the web. For now, you can check out a few still frames I grabbed from the video right here.

Keep checking back as I continue wth the multi-part unveiling.

Unveiling

I think it's okay to report on my latest project now...

Here's the deal: I've been working with the local band ThreadSpinner to create 40+ minutes of video that will be projected on a screen behind them during their theater concert / album release party happening this Friday, October 2nd. (I was originally going to plug the concert to help sell tickets, but I just received word that it is now sold out!)

This project is much different from the music video I assisted with earlier. The video here is not meant to hold the audience's attention all by itself. Rather, it will (hopefully) enhance the complete live experience. The music is still the #1 priority. Seeing the band playing on stage is #2. My contribution, along with the lighting setup, is meant to add to all of that without distracting the audience.

It has been a challenge to NOT draw too much attention to the video. The goal has been to keep it abstract, showing colors and motion rather than objects or people. How do you capture an image without really capturing an image? And how do you make it interesting enough? I've put a lot of thought into it. My strategy was to begin with real objects, preferably ones that involve some kind of motion (sprinklers, ceiling fans, Mexican dancers, etc) and distort them so they just beyond recognition. I'd love to show you some examples... but not until after the show... and even then, only with permission from the band.

In some regards, I failed at keeping things abstract. During my recent infatuation with photography, where the goal is usually to capture the world as vividly as possible, I trained myself to find proper lighting and make sure the focus is set appropriately, so this project was counter-intuitive. It helps to know the rules if you are going to break them properly, but I'm still learning those rules... So some of the results are more literal than others. I'm telling myself variety is good.

My working title, The Sweater Project, originates from the band's name. I was trying to think of something that is spun with thread similar to the way my video was "spun" by the music. Yeah, I know sweaters are probably made with yarn or wool or something, so this may have been a stretch. Work with me here :-)

Despite some of my humble negativity above, I am very proud of this work. Its debut will be a big night for me. Some members of the press will be included in the 130 attendees at the event. I think I'd prefer if they made no comment about the video over a negative one in their reviews. We'll see. I'm rather nervous about putting my work out there. I've never had the chance to do something quite like this before, but I'm glad I have it now. This is the kind of thing that makes life interesting.

I'm hoping to eventually get some of this video online and viewable by the public in one form or another. It's something I need to talk to the band about after this all blows over. They are understandably conscious about their image and don't want some crazy guy going and posting clips of their music all over the place.

I gotta go make some dinner. I'll let you know how everything goes sometime next week (regarding the show, not dinner).

Radio silence

I've been distracted lately. During the last month or so my mind has not strayed far from the video project I'm putting together. The blessing and the curse of the project is that it's not your typical scheduled film shoot. Most of it requires little preparation -- which, don't get me wrong, is nice -- but having so much creative freedom makes everything and anything a possibility for capture. The act of narrowing it down is a big part of the challenge.

The other part of the challenge is making it look cool. There's a trick to avoiding cheesiness in video production, and I haven't fully learned it yet. Above all, the results of this project need to be visually appealing. I'm taking a photography-centric approach, shooting in broad strokes, and trying to follow my gut on the editing rather than getting too wrapped up in perfectionism. It's kind of like the opposite of the eighteen Bud Light videos I made; those didn't have to look like much, but I edited the heck out of them, stressing over every cut. This time I don't have the luxury of editing frame by frame because the final product is going to simply be too long (and my free time too short). If this all gets done (and I'm going try my hardest), I should have about 40 - 50 minutes of finished video. I still have a ways to go, so don't expect a lot of blogging for the next month.

I'm enjoying myself. In some ways I feel like I'm returning my roots, as this is most similar to the kind of meandering, moods-focused, music-inspired work I attempted to do way back in my early days with my dad's camera and two VCRs. (Hopefully my current work is an improvement, but we'll see.)

My deadline is near the end of September. After that I will have some stills to share with you. Eventually I'd like to rework some of the footage into a shorter, web-friendlier product, but that's pretty far off right now.

I'm not sure if all of the secrecy is needed, but I'm going to keep it up just in case. Plus, building anticipation is fun, even if I'm just setting everybody's expectations too high (and by everybody, I mean the three people who read this blog). Maybe it's too late to come up with a code name, but I'll give you one anyway. For now, I'm calling it The Sweater Project.

Untitled

Good evening. Nice of you to join me for the continuation of this one-sided conversation. Not too much is new, but I figured I'd drop you a line just because this blog needs one last entry before the month ends (I'm cutting it pretty close).

Last weekend was busy. We attended three BBQs, a happy hour, and a dinner party. It's good for me to get out and socialize considering I spend so much of my time during the weeks alone. Not that I mind working on my own... I just need to cultivate relationships with others once in a while lest I forget how. And there are some amazing people to meet around here. Take this dinner party we attended in Summerland for instance -- everybody there was so interesting, successful, and friendly. The food was great too. We sat out on the porch after the meal and soaked up the dimming glow of the sky with a view of the ocean. It was my kind of scene.

I've been practicing with my video camera during a couple of the evenings this week. The still above is from some test footage that I managed to transfer to my computer in high definition (click on it to see all of its detailed glory, shadows and empty space and all). I've been shooting in HD since I got the new camera, but every time I transferred footage to the computer, I had to down-convert it to standard definition. So painful! This week I got a new, spacious hard drive and found a plug-in for my editing software, finally allowing me to edit in HD. It's yet to be determined if my PC can handle processing it for sure, but I'm going to give it a shot on my next project.

Speaking of my next project... it's beginning. I met with some people -- who's own art I really admire -- last night to discuss it. I'm sworn to secrecy for now, but I'll share some details in the coming months. This is an exciting one. It will feel good to dive into something I'm passionate about after exercising with a series of smaller projects recently. I'm hoping my practice with still photography will pay off now as well, as aesthetics will play an important role.

The project does not yet have a title. I'll try to think of some kind of code word for it soon.