Super 8 Stop Motion

This past week was my first experience using a Super 8 camera. I've always loved the texture and feel of super 8 being projected on screen and I've always wanted to shoot some footage myself. However, I was not aware of the camera's ability to shoot frame-by-frame and thus allow for stop-motion animation.

In class, we set up apple boxes and intermittently set up panes of glass on which we could animate. Though I usually like coming in with a distinct plan and know what we are trying to achieve, it was fun to let our animation take on its own life and develop as we moved along.

It will be fun to see how it all comes together, especially after this weeks Pixilation exercise. But regardless, it was a great experience and this is just another reason i'd love to have my own Super 8 camera.

Project 1 - Scratching on Film

In this class we are essentially working on many different projects similtaneously so it can be hard to keep track of everything...

Last week I began my portion of scratching/painting onto film. Kenny (my partner) had already begun the process but he left about half the strip blank for me to experiment with. Our 9ft length of film has a single shot of a lie-detector test reading off results... Kenny bascially decided to leave the dials and buttons section untouched and scratch/color the portion where the needle recorded results onto paper. I liked his philosophy and decided to continue with it..

Another technique I adopted from kenny was scratching on film, then coloring it over with chalk. I think this creates a nice effect and i think it will look even better once projected. So I continued onward scratching down our strip but where kenny's artistry is a bit chaotic, mine is a little more geometric and planned. I would take a shape or design and let it 'grow' frame by frame and kindof develope on its own with whatever felt right. Although mine has many different progressions, i would say that each series is related in some way or at least flows into the next. Additionally I used a few different colored chalks to color in my scratches... I tried to maintain a 'natural' feel with lots of blues, greens and some cosmic purples and reds thrown in.

As we finish up this portion of project one I would like to play a bit more with the sound portion of the film... maybe get some scratches in there to distort it a bit... Id also like to add some paint and more colors

Synethesia in Art

After reading the Wiki blurbs about "Synethesisa" and "Synethesia in Art" I have a better understanding on what this 'extra sense' is and what causes it. However, on of the things I found most intersting is how artists with Synesthesia incorporate their ability into something tangeable for everyone else.

Naturally there are some people who will have a vision or exterience and translate that into art but the one anecdote that stuck out to me was how Marcia Smilack uses her synestheic skill to take photos. She used the example of looking down and a reflection in water, ever-changing with ripples and waves. She would wait for the moment of a synestheic experience to act as a signal for her to take the picture.

"I trust it to be a reliable signal that tells me it is the right time to take the picture... I think of my synesthetic responses as vital messengers that arrive faster than thought to deliver one urgent message which I always heed: beauty is lurking."

I think that this method in particular can bleed over into my own work in this class and in the future. This technique is not limited to synesthetics. Sure, they may have some extra-sensory perception that benefits them, but essentially what Marcia was doing was trusting her gut and waiting for particular moments and just going with it. Nothing is certain, especially in experimental film and I think a little happen-chance is a good and nessessary step in filmmaking.