For obvious reasons everything still seems up in the air with this studio. I know that’s how the learning is taking place, more flexible than other straight-to-the-point, teacher-is-the-beholder-of-all-information classes. I like this. But I still don’t see the light through assignment 1. Missing Tuesday’s class was obviously detrimental towards understand how to reflect on this project, but regardless, shouldn’t I be able to give myself feedback otherwise? I don’t know what I did that was particularly creative, but the process was somewhat interesting.

In response to Adrian’s prompts:

• what matters to the camera? why? how can I use this to advantage?
  • Light is essential to the functioning of the camera. Play with strong contrasts? Shadows?
• what matters to the frame? why? how can I use this to advantage?
  • What’s in the frame matters to the frame. Things can exist outside this frame, but placing something in the frame is acknowledging that it exists. The more space something occupies in the frame, the more important it becomes.
• if I treat my images as more abstract and not ‘telling a story’ then what is editing? is it composing (like music), making rhythms? Is it also visual rhythms (like painting), and also of cadence (pace)? How can I use this to advantage? (What do I need to notice in the image to be able to do this?)
  • Films rely on emotion. Film editing heavily relies the editor to cut with emotion for storytelling. If we remove the story, do we in turn remove the emotion?
  • Cuts on motion provide a smoothness, a visual rhythm. Cutting on a graphic match could also be beneficial for maintaining a visual rhythm. Quick cuts (see Resident Evil: The Final Chapter) vs slow cuts.
  • What if instead of ignoring story altogether, we remove it from the foreground and focus more on such things as editing and the let the story tell itself through this?

As it’s an early piece, it’s not one I’m particularly proud of. It goes for too long, is too specific in its questioning of concepts we’ve touched on and needed more thinking.