i've gotta learn this stuff

and this translucent stuff

stuff is changing mhmmm

first of all...

alright. I've got ideas that I'm more excited about.

but first of all, something totally unrelated, I read this in an interview with michel gondry:"He and Spike used to shoot “exquisite corpse” films. (Spike shoots thirty seconds and shows Michel only the last frame, and then Michel shoots thirty seconds and shows Spike only the last frame." 

okay, so I really want to do that this summer. any takers? it doesn't matter if we live in different cities. we can work it out. 

ANYWAY

I test shot some stuff for my dancing movie. and i came to the conclusion that the "pop" trick shot effect is going to work. and it looks pretty neat. SO instead of overwhelming the film with my poetry, and instead of making it kind of a downer, that i'm not excited about shooting, I want to monopolize on this popping effect and combine it with the music. So here's  how it's going to go: I have a cheap-o casio keyboard in which I will score the movie with. and I also have tons of instruments sitting around. So I am going to start the movie with the 1 character dancing and a cheesy casio beat playing in the background, and then a little instrument will pop into the character's hand (and this instrument sound is added to the score). So that character will keep dancing, then another character will pop onto the screen and dance, and then another instrument will pop into that character's hands, this will continue until the frame is filled with 3 (or more if i can swing it)  people playing instruments. then random objects will start popping into the frame to crowd the characters. I also want the background to trick shot change from white to red cellophaned and from white to tinfoiled. so the film will end with a climax of nosiy characters and objects crowding the screen with a tinfoiled or cellophaned background. it's gonna be tricky. but i think it will work. 

revised plan

thanks so much for all the great comments. okay so here's my new plan: 

visuals: the story arch goes like this: three characters,  standing in front of a white background. the shots cut inbetween each of the characters. film starts with medium shots of each character's face, then the music comes on, and the characters start awkwardly bobbing their heads. as the music continues and gets more intense, I start reading poetry over the music. I am not on film. BUT there will be cuts of mouths on the screen that will sync to certain parts of the poems. probably the word RED. (I'll probably still film a few scenes of the characters reading the poems, but i don't plan on using them right now.) as the charcters dance, and the poems and the music continue, objects start popping onto the characters. (as far as the technical part of this goes, I'll have the camera running and the character dancing, and people holding an object on fishing line, then i'll tell the character to freeze, and we'll lower the object on fishing line in front of them, then i'll tell them to keep dancing. I realize there might be a jolt with this plan, but it's the smoothest one i can think of.) the objects on the characters will pop onto them and off of them. and while the red costumes add up, the background will also be turning red, (i'm gonna cover it in red cellophane) As the background turns red, the characters will also be cellophaned. so the cellophaning will start from the bottom, and by the end both the characters and the background will be covered in red cellophane. during these scenes i will also be dumping red glitter on the characters and i'm really considering doing something with red paint. Anyway, the film ends with the characters in mass chaos ripping the cellophane off and throwing paint all over themselves and glitter falling on it all. 

this sounds like its gonna be real long. but i'm keeping it under three minutes. 

as far as sound goes i'll either pick and choose parts of poems OR i'll read all of them and work with layering them over the visuals and the beats. 

  

pre prod

location: it's either this or my kitchen i've been using for my films 

lighting diagram, if i use the kitchen again. 

some ideas for the red costumes

a very chaotic storyboard

1. alright, so the poems listed below will be read over some beats.  either a casio keyboard, or my friend siphine's beats. www.myspace.com/beatboxbush I'm not sure about the order of the poems yet, or about how many i will use,  but all of that sound will happen in final cut. 

Poems

#1 

And why not the sludge of decimals the metal of colors the color’s comes slick blue stripes by something-new-ish again and again over under on the chromatic and the monotony

 

Me.

 

You.

 

In the accordion keys on the

Acrobats on the

 

Tight.

 

Wire.

 

Of war on the pretty faces of the dead

A sense of order

And chaos

Of broken organs

And dismembered guitars

On a beach of beached values

Like whales their ideas of “normal”

Broken by fishers of men soul hunting

For any gratification under the salt of the world

 

With their prostitutes, and their Jesus

building an army

Making peace with violence and loving sex like a war

#2

She’s tall and skinny and takes her coffee the color of a once crisp business card that’s been left in the dirt after a meeting gone sour.

 

He likes to call himself “mobile” and “open” even though he’s never left home, just took over the business cleaning up after his father who died with Jack in one hand and a knife in the other. He just took one sideways look at his dad, called the funeral home, and caught up on the cleaning appointments for that day.

 

But he’s nice. And she’s clean. And they met just like they do in the movies. But their sex is never bloodless and it just isn’t lit with that same tungsten light. 8 years experience cleaning other people’s homes. These people live on wheels as to avoid too much commitment. She thinks about this sometimes, like she thinks about the photographs under her bed, rotting away with their pages of glossed memories. And she decides she’s not really cut out for the stationary life in all its shades of beige.

 

But everything we see about her life is nice, and mostly clean. It’s an exhausted metaphor, vacuumed, waxed, etc. everything they told her she needed and all that she didn’t want. It’s a pity people don’t act live only in our imaginations.

 

He never called it a problem, maybe a compulsion at best. She was his therapy. He was her secret cause. It was nice, their house on Jonathan street. No wheels, and always clean. But their relationship was never bloodless, though they had found just the right way to light it. It looked so bright from the outside window, and sometimes she would stay underwater in the bathtub maybe a second too long watching the bubbles blur to the surface and repeating in her silent misdirected way, I’m happy, I’m happy, I’m so happy it hurts, I’m so happy I could die right here. And one day she did.

 

 And on that same day, the owner of the business card that she compared her coffee to once quit cleaning and just stood outside and counted all the mobile homes on the freeway, and prayed to god or whoever that he wouldn’t die alone.

#3 

by the red door with a Spanish man with a

ponytail, when another Spanish man with

out a ponytail with a hat and

he walks past alone and muttering to

 

himself and us in a language I don’t

understand. So I smile and play the

ignorant American. He and I sit

alone by the red door that only

opens from the inside when the man with

 

the hat without the ponytail comes back down

muttering and motioning to his noise and

“intoxionada?” I smile laugh

he smiles at my stupid smile pulls

 

a little red guitar out of his pocket

it says MEMPHIS in bold white writing and he

says something else then goes out the red

door that only opens from the inside. 

2. storyboards at the top...

3. answer these questions:

a. What are each character's life goals/objectives

there aren’t really established characters. But I would say the overall motive here is to explore the connotations with the color red.

b. What are each major character’s obstacles to reaching their objectives?

These things that keep popping in front of and on them, these predetermined roles.

c. What are the actions the characters will use to overcome their obstacles and reach their objectives?

They will dance dance dance

d. What are the ways and means the characters will use?

Dancing writing reading, mostly dancing

e. What adjustments do the characters make when their actions and means don’t succeed?

From subtle awkward to more courageous awkward

f. What realistic doings are the actors engaged in?

they are trying on new selves. I think we do that everyday.

 

4. Breakdown the Script to determine the following:

a. The number and types of actors required

4 actors-awkward dancers

b. How many scenes each actor will be in and the total length of their performances.

Total length of each actors performance will be about 30 seconds. Total length of the entire performance-mayyybe 4 minutes

c. The requirements, number, and types of locations.

One location, a lighting studio. I need a white background that I can paint red.

d. The number and types of stunts and special effects.

nope

e. What special costumes and makeup will be required?

Glitter, cellophane, maybe tinfoil. Lots of red costumes. Anything that is red, and can be worn in some way.

f. What props are required?

See item e. 

5. location scout-either the lighting studio at school, it has a power box, two outlets, and a few lights, or the kitchen i've used for my past 2 films with a white sheet for a background. 

6. see map at top

7. either this friday and saturday night. 

music videos for some inspiration

this one just looks cool at first, but it gets repetitive

Passion Pit, "Sleepyhead" from Neon Gold Records on Vimeo.

trick shots yeahhh!! this is the kind of editing i want to go for. 

this one for a color scheme-red/black/white. i love how bold it is. it gets repetitive too, though. Not enough of an arch for me. but you've gotta love a band with a color scheme...

reviewed idea

Idea number one seems to show the most promise. However, I want it to have a stronger arch of action, so I think I'll combine it with parts from idea number two. The theme of this project was to show people awkwardly dancing, and to transform them using trick shots into costumed characters very unlike the ones they began as. I want the different actors to go through many different roles in this one film. For example, the film will begin with these 3 different awkward dancing characters. Different costumes will pop onto them (using trick shots) and the costumes will drastically change the way the character is perceived. This was the original idea. Now I am thinking about changing the background as well, and incorporating the idea of a monochromatic color scheme from idea two. The characters will be placed in front of a white background, and I could make every piece of costume that pops onto them red, so the film ends with these red characters, and as they are being costumed, the background could also be gradually painted red to match the character. The film would end with a character blending in to his or her background. As far as the audio for this film, I have a series of poems I have written that deal with the color red. I am thinking about layering a voice over of these poems with the music the characters are dancing to. To tie in the seriousness of these poems with the strangeness/goofyness of the characters dancing, I could use elements from the poems for parts of the character's costumes. 

3 new ideas

1. trick shot dance

In the lighting studio against the white background I will have different people dance. These people can't really be good at dancing, they need to be more of the head bobbing awkward types. As they dance different objects will suddenly appear on them, in a trick shot way. Some sequences I've been thinking of are having hats suspended by fishing wire appear above their heads, and mustaches appear on faces, maybe feathers appear on heads, wild masks, etc. The sequence will end with the characters in their awkward new costumes. I would also like this film to be in black and white, and the music will be a cheesy casio keyboard drum beat. It will probably only be about 2 or 3 minutes long. 

2. red room/tinfoiling/transforming a space 

I will paint every object in a space red. Actors in red suits will appear with red mouths. i would want a variety of closeups on the different mouths. This project would probably be based on my fear of mouths. I don't really know how to explore that, but I want to see what kind of mood i can create with everything painted red. I would like to explore space and how things can blend into the background . Maybe I could intercut the red room shots with shots of the same red characters covering the red room and every object in it in tinfoil. This could be a commentary about the inevibility of conformity, no matter how unique something seems. 

3.the highways essay

I'm still toying with my original idea about highways and my hotel memory from the last project. I'm not sure if it fits in with my manifesto though. And I still haven't really established a reason for filming that idea other than pure aesthetic/common memory grounds.