Term 2: Week 7: I've found the record button and I'll never lose it again

Monday

In Kim's class we had a good discussion on storylining and editing each other's work was very revealing - you could see where the weak spots in your own story were.

Tuesday

Unusually for me, I didn’t feel a huge amount of anxiety before this assessment; that changed about two minutes in. Mostly it was the time limit: I’m fairly confident I can now put up a camera and all its trimmings and mount some lights but getting it all done and then packed away again in under an hour is a challenge, just the way it was challenge to just do the camera in thirty minutes which I can now do pretty easily.

One very important thing I learned during the assessment was how to do backfocus. I thought I knew, and I did mostly, but I have been mistaking the take-the-whole-lens-off-screw for the adjust-backfocus screw the whole time. Embarrassing, but good that I now know it (it was because I remembered it as “the screw at the back of the lens” which it is, but not that one).

The camera element went smoothly, I’m getting used the kit now and I only had to consult my notes to verify that I was setting up the monitor correctly, which I think I did well. I was especially proud that I got the bars to exactly thirty seconds, not a second over.

The lights were trickier. By doing all the work by yourself you have to be running back and forth between all these lights and then running back to check the viewfinder and it’s quite stressful. I also had to abandon my plan, which had been to use the Kino lights as a fill simply because I wouldn’t have had the time to set them up and de-rig them. Then I had trouble trying to re-arrange my set-up to try to create the look I wanted, which was especially hard since we were just shooting a fairly flat mannequin. My personal taste is for quite a high level of contrast, which would have meant a strong key light and virtually no fill. Still, that didn’t fit the requirements of the assessment and I’m sure there’ll be plenty of time to play around with creating “looks”.

The de-rig was the most stressful part, since both Julia and I were scuttling about trying to pack away lamps which were still too hot with no protective gloves while time ticked away. Still, we were only a few minutes over; I would have preferred to have gotten in under an hour, I don’t think it was too bad, and it certainly wasn’t for lack of trying.

Overall then, I’m pleased with my performance but as ever it could do with more practice to become accustomed to the kit and more confident in how to use it.

Then afterwards, as stress relief, we went to go and see The Princess and The Frog. Made us feel like we were six years old again.

Wednesday

We had a rather depressing but interesting chat about the furutre of television online.

The depressing: no one watches good things on the internet, not when there are clips of cars slipping on ice. And, even if you do lure people into watching your magnum opus, you can't actually make money out of it. I keep coming back to it, but I think Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog bucks this trend - people watched it, it's good (it's brilliant!) and even though it was available for free people bought the DVD. Sadly though, not everyone is Joss Whedon.

Friday

I really enjoyed Sunset Boulevard, and I found some parts very scary indeed. I think the heroine may be my new role model: if I can but live as eccentrically and as opulently as her I'll die happy. Crazy, but happy.