Author Archives: jackfahey

Collaboration

Did you have any issues in the making of your work? If so, how did you overcome them?

The only issue I can think of occurred in the editing phase. It would have been beneficial if I made myself more available to meet up and edit the piece as a pair, rather than doing a lot of editing solo at home and bringing it to class/to our occasional meetups. Obviously, it’s impossible to do everything together in class and so there will always be some measure of balancing what you do as a group physically and how you can edit by yourself. Perhaps we could have skype called while editing to include Jana a bit more in what I was editing at home. However we were constantly communicating on facebook, so that made things easier.

One way we overcame the difficulty of not being in the same room when editing as much as we would have liked to, was outlining what we need for the next week/session. Whenever we met up, we left with very clear, specific goals of what each of us wanted to get done before our next meet up, which in my opinion made for a very efficient editing process.

What makes a good collaborator?
I think being open to new ideas is an incredibly important facet of collaboration. It’s very well to have your goal and a picture of the piece of media you want to create, however very rarely can you bring that exact idea to life to-the-letter from the pre-production phase. There are always things that come up or interesting new ideas to incorporate and one should always be open to hearing how they can change/adapt the piece to improve it.

Another important element is gratitude. If your aim is a successful collaboration (and thereby creating a successful film) it is incredibly important to make sure your collaborator(s) feel like their input is both important, and received well. If you continue to disregard someone’s input, they will stop giving it. Fostering that open floor in a group is always essential to getting the most out of the collaboration.

Georgie Currie & Synopsis

Georgie Currie’s breakup with her boyfriend may have caused many tears and sleepless nights, but it was not without some avail. Inspired by this difficult emotional experience, the release of Daytime T.V. in 2018 (Currie’s first and very personal, emotional single) came at a pivotal time of her career. Now in 2019, with the launch of her new solo E.P flowers for your worst days, Currie is fully committing to her music. The next couple of years will be a trial by fire as she attempts to break into the music industry, while battling the many challenges she must face and overcome as a female artist. GEORGIE CURRIE is a 6 minute spotlight on an emerging singer and songwriter pursuing her musical dream.

Production Roles
Jana Politis – Camera Operating, Directing, Editing
Jack Fahey – Editing, Directing, Interviewing

Park Rhythm – Creating A Film in the Edit

Something I’m relatively familiar with after a rather haphazard production process for my shot film last year, taking a bunch of footage and trying to piece together a film in post can produce some brilliance in some instances, but it can also be (as in this particular instance) a painful and difficult process. I really struggled to find a narrative that could drive the piece forward, and to find good reasons to cut. I didn’t want to just cut for the sake of it, I wanted my edit to have some form of purpose if I was going to try and emulate Frederick Wiseman.

After a few failed attempts at creating some semblance of a coherent timeline in premier, I decided to employ a technique I used frequently last semester in my non-narrative film-making taken from Los, one of James Benning’s films. I just picked a number (5 seconds) and cut every shot at that moment. This isn’t how I was going to have my final edit, but I thought maybe some kind of interesting cutting rhythm might come out of it. I started to sense a sort of two-and-fro with the swings and the card game and so I settled upon those two things being the main parts of the piece. The film starts out with just 5 second cuts on the pieces creating a steady, monotonous rhythm (something perhaps felt throughout a lazy day at the park). Then when the card games start playing and the boy on the swing starts moving, I started cutting whenever someone either a)shifted their gaze (as if to cut to whatever they were looking towards) or b) whenever something either entered or exited the frame. I felt that this created a sense of being at the park, looking around at the other people and things, always being drawn to something moving.

For the audio, I tried to keep a lot of the swing and child sounds throughout the piece to tie it together, the audio cuts a lot less than the visuals do, with a lot of the swings audio being consistent throughout the short film. This was partly because a lot of the captured audio was unusable, but I think it gave it a bit of a through-line, which is important when a film’s narrative is being created through visual cuts, rather than an actual plot line.

 

W2: A COLLECTION OF LIKE OBJECTS – “Vintage Bikes”

This week we explored the photography style of Martin Parr, who’s photography is full of bright and vivid photos that often delves into the relationship humanity has with technology. For this experiment, we took one of his more recent photography books, a collection of shots of remote Scottish post boxes, and used a similar approach to photograph a collection of like subjects.We decided to settle on bicycles as our single theme tying this collation together. Further limiting the scope, I elected to just include photos of vintage and/or retro style bikes.

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                   

 

This collection of photos displays a variety of vintage bicycles juxtaposed with the concrete footpaths, steel seats and busy streets of the Melbourne CBD. This prevalence of old school cycles reflects the current trend of disregarding modern, engineering and design to favour more simple, traditional styles. Perhaps this nostalgic trend is because of a want of a simpler time.

 

This photo is probably the most extreme example of this idea of the vintage, retro style infiltrating modern Melbourne. The hand written, painted sign, the calling out to the Melbourne public to consider the words of Jesus and the Christian faith, the old bronze statues in the foreground of businessmen, the milk crate on the bike. All of which comes from a time long gone, thrown into the current day, busy streets of the Melbourne CBD.

F is for Fake Reflection

Can a forgery be art? Thats something that I came out of this film wondering. Is the art or the artist more important? It seems, in the eyes of the collectors, that the value of the artwork comes from who drew it, rather than what the artwork says or is. When explaining the problem with a forgery, pure aesthetics cannot be considered. The mere existence of forgeries existing that have fooled art critics/experts reveals that the aesthetic value of the painting is not what brings the value of a forgery down. Any critic who holds the opinion that forgeries are somehow inferior pieces of aesthetic work are exposed to hold an absurd opinion every time a fake piece of art slips through critique and makes it into a collection or a museum or a gallery.

So if not the aesthetic value, what is so wrong about a forgery?

Last year, The Etienne Terrus museam in Southern France was discovered to have 60% of its collection as forgeries after an art historian was asked to rearrange the exhibits. That the many townsfolk and tourists alike were fooled by these forgeries was labelled a disaster by town officials and museum officials. But was the beauty, inspiration, awe and excitement that these paintings awakened in people somehow lesser because of the artist? I would imagine that, had those paintings been actually done by Terrus, the reaction to them would have been identical. Its certainly a talent, one that is trainable, to be able to paint in so many different styles so believably.  Perhaps these forgeries are an artistic discipline in their own right. It just remains to be seen whether any of these forgeries will ever become famous enough to garner monetary value in their own right as fakes, rather than pretending to be painted by someone else.

What do I want from Real to Reel?

I think, first of all, the most important thing is hands on. A few of my studios have been very minimal in terms of actual filmmaking, and the project brief from this studio seemed to indicate that there would be a lot more actual filmmaking for the assignments. The news that we would have a filmmaking/photography/podcast etc task every week to work on in the studios on top of the film assessments was music to my ears obviously, thats the kind of thing I was hoping for out of this studio. I’d also like to perhaps bring my outside corporate filmmaking experience into the studio for the photography weeks. This sort of realistic, biographical photography that we explored in week 1 coincides well with my experience in the marketing film industry because these sorts of shoots would definitely be at home in that world. The podcasting elements are interesting as well, I’m very limited in terms of experience in producing any kind of audio outside of music, but the medium itself is something that I sink a lot of time into, and have always thought about perhaps producing/creating my own podcast.

But my passion, and what I want to explore most throughout this studio, is creative filmmaking in all shapes and forms.

 

In terms of a tangible goal, I’d like to get to the end of the semester with a film that I’m happy to put into my portfolio and use to advertise myself as a filmmaker. There has been a significant lack of that in this course, last semester being the first time that my studio was actual completely focused on filmmaking and produced two pieces of work that are welcome additions to my folio.

W1 : Eve Arnold Inspired Mini-Essay – “Girls”

When I saw these three girls laughing their heads off I knew that they’d make great subject for this Eve Arnold inspired photo essay. The girl on the right was very tentative about having their photo taken, but the other two were completely unphased by the shots. Especially the girl in the middle, who wasn’t camera shy in the slightest. Their conversation eludes my memory, but the three of them continued to share an honestly impressive amount of laughter throughout the time it took to take the photos.

The girl on the left drew my attention, she was somewhat separated from the other 2. They were laying back, leaning on each other while this girl sat with her legs and a bag between herself and the conversation. All three girls seemed to be great friends, through the conversation I never got the feel that any two girls were closer with each other than the third, but her body language somewhat distanced herself from the ongoing laughter.

This shot is the only real evidence of any nerves in the shoot. Outwardly, she seemed absolutely unconcerned by the presence of the camera lens. Her hand however nervously played with her lighter throughout the shoot after she lit another cigarette. She went through two in the 5 or 10 minutes that we were shooting. Her bracelet caught my eye too “It Girl” is strangely apt considering she was the girl that immediately stood out to me, among three girls that themselves stood out to me on the steps of The State Library.

Reflecting on Illuminate

The act of noticing is permanent, never ending and constantly evolving. That’s probably the first thing that comes to mind. What we notice and what we focus our attention towards is being perpetually influenced by an immeasurable number of factors and stimuli that make honing the skill a real struggle. This is why this form of experimental filmmaking is so important, because we can both explore the “impressions pressing on us at every moment” (Mason 2001) and also negate these actions through the lens of film. The camera is unbiased and doesn’t succumb to outside forces. It simply records what it is pointed towards. Obviously whatever it captures is somewhat biased due to the operator, but it still gives us a framework to eliminate these biases somewhat and experiment with what we notice in the frame rather than what we notice through our own eyes. John Mason (2001) says “We need to be selective to survive” and that’s exactly what the camera offers us as filmmakers. The ability to be selective, without using selective bias. James Benning explores this concept in most of his films by removing the influence he has over the frame and in the edit room with his shooting rules; timed cuts, he doesn’t move the camera once its set up etc. (Palse 2009) These kinds of tools are definitely what I’ll take away from this studio.

Through my first film I explored lingering and priming. And with this latest experimental project I explored wondering, and to a minor extent continued with lingering considering each of the pieces piece lingered on the one shot in the and stayed in on respective location. From making this short film experience, the most integral way that I have evolved my process of noticing to make audiovisual nonfiction are in the rigid rules I implemented before I got to the set/location(s) for my filmmaking. When I am trying to create media centred around noticing, the best way to do it is to ensure that I stay on task. The recipes we create, and the rules I outline before I begin my shoot are essential to this endeavor. Deciding on framing, equipment needs, shot duration, camera movement, shot types etc in advance of the shoot can aid in the act of noticing freely because you remove yourself somewhat from the situation. You aren’t impulsively moving the camera around, and this enables you to capture uniform shots of different locations that is not only useful in the edit room, but also allows for patterns and similarities to emerge in unforeseen ways.

Throughout the course I feel that the three most key learning outcomes I have discovered would be;

The importance of Intentional Noticing And Reflection

Obviously, we are constantly noticing things. But what is incredibly important as a media practitioner is the ability to look inwards and observe our own noticing as a biased, deliberate practice. John Mason (2001) says that reflection is the “vogue term” for this process, but that usually not effectively implemented. This was certainly true for me before this course. I had made several short pieces or films but never really looked back on the project as a whole. This studio has shown me the importance of this part of the media making process. I’ve had countless ideas for this most recent experimental piece just from writing extensively about the previous work I did. And similarly, I’m growing ideas for my next work outside of class from this exercise. This form of “experiential learning” (Mason 2001) is key but it requires intentional noticing. Noticing as an abstract idea cannot be honed, but this act of intentional noticing becomes an inquiry into our own biases and a “practical approach” that can be reflected upon and improved.

The impact of blending two or more semantically opposed elements

Before this studio, I think if I am being honest I was quite rigid in my filmmaking. Cuts had to be timed perfectly, things that weren’t crystal clear needed to be either reexamined or expunged etc. However this studio has taught me that I need to embrace these murky elements within my films/media projects. One such project that is both a perfect example of this and also incredibly beautiful is Mazen Kerbaj’s Starry Night (2013). A minimalistic trumpet improvisation over the backdrop of the haunting sounds of war, gunfire and bombs in Mazen’s city of Bierut recorded from his balcony. Linking two completely unrelated audio/visual elements together on screen can create a powerful impression for the viewer and call upon them to further contemplate the implications within your work.

Limiting yourself is a worthwhile practice

Throughout the various media projects I made this semester, I think an incredibly important tool I will carry forward is to limit myself. Which sounds like a bizarre thing to do, but it can be incredibly useful in honing filmmaking skills. Limiting my shot duration, limiting my framing, limiting my input into the camera work etc were all huge benefits to the projects. There is an inherent quality in simplicity that this studio has allowed me to explore through experimental filmmaking that can create truly inspirational work. There are several examples of this throughout the Studio. James Benning’s films such as Los (2001) or Ruhr (2009) are perfect examples of implementing this tactic.

 

 

References

James Benning. (2001). Los. [Online Video]. 26 October 2001. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZGxdGRJ3rg

James Benning. (2009). Ruhr. [Online Video]. 2 November 2009. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVXuEi3tau4

Mason, John. Researching your own practice: the discipline of noticing, (p.29-38). London: Routledge Falmer, 2001

Mazen Kerbaj. (2013). Starry Night. [ONLINE].  July 2006. Available from: https://lautremusique.bandcamp.com/track/starry-night

Audience Participation

I’ve decided on a website; Illuminatemelbourne.weebly.com. Hopefully by the time you are reading this, that link will actually be active…

I went with a completely black design on the website, I didn’t want any distractions from the videos themselves. This also had a secondary, and honestly unintentional, creative outcome for the website. On the main decision page, the videos themselves act as lights in the space and reflect the experiment, which i think works well. It isn’t entirely clear at first that these are links so even the experience of choosing the first video is an experiment into wondering and light.

The layout of the website lead me to continuing to explore how I could facilitate the audience into interaction. The entire goal of the experiment is to explore the effect that light sources have on noticing, so I think that this interactive element encourages the audience to contemplate the effect further. If they are choosing what they are watching, they will, perhaps, wonder about why they are choosing the videos they are watching. The website lends itself perfectly to this experience. Each link to a video invites the audience to navigate the spaces freely in whatever order they are drawn towards, I hope that this will enable them to contemplate why they are making the choices rather than just sitting in front of a screen and watching videos play.

 

All that’s left now is the exhibition.

 

“Fix it in Post”

All my pieces are edited together now, I’ve settled on the first idea of just using the best 6 and I think it comes together to form a really strong experience. At first I experimented with editing them together into one single longer video, but I thought that it was lacking something so I scrapped that idea pretty early on and went with the separate videos.

I’m trying out korsakow at the moment, but I’m really struggling with getting it to function exactly how I had envisioned. Im contemplating maybe exporting these videos to youtube and hosting them online somewhere, though I really like the idea that Korsakow presents in terms of having an interactive experience.

The edits themselves are similar. Pacing is the throughline that binds all 6 pieces together. The light movements are timed with audio cues, and though the audio cues themselves are different in each video (music, diegetic sounds etc) they are reminiscent of each other in a way that I think builds the clips together into a cohesive experience, rather than just 6 separate short films. This was definitely something I was worried about when I first started editing, I didn’t want this to feel like 6 random videos thrown together into one piece. I wanted this to feel like a complete experience for the audience that makes them really question how and why they notice.