Light Post 3

For our last photo shoot, Ashley and I decided to go Downtown to finish up the last of the our reel and get some architecture and busyness that is downtown on a Saturday night. We found several cool compositions and angles on the boardwalk as well as graffiti and brick roads. Unfortunately a lot of these shots didn't turn out as well but the experience was positive and would love to do more shooting downtown.  

Light Post 2

For our second photo shoot we decided to go to the south end of Wrighstville Beach for a some night shots. There was an incoming storm and some excellent overhead light from the moon so we knew we could get some great experimental shots. We scanned the beach for interesting ideas and since it was night time we decided to leave the aperture all the way open and take maximize the light exposure. It was a lot of fun shooting a night time and really liked the composition of our shots.  

Light Post 1

For our first photo shoot we decided to venture into a wooded area to see what kind of natural shots we could find. As we walked around taking light meter readings of different plants, trees and benches we noticed they all had a very consistent light reading so we knew we wouldn't have to be moving around the aperture to much. Once we started bracketing we knew that our shots wouldn't come out as stable since we were just using a handheld method. We shot about half of our roll and decided we wanted to save the last half of our first roll to use for a night shoot.

Assn. #1b – What did you learn about sound design?

With the absence of a visual medium, sound takes on a completely different form. The same is true when combining together a collection of sounds into an abstract soundscape. The mood and tone of a soundscape can be drastically altered with just a few tweaks here and there. As a group, our first task was to identify ourselves with all the sounds in our library so that we could begin to piece together the concept of our soundscape. We process was simple, build our soundscape through trial and error, adding what we thought gave our concept life while – removing what didn’t seem to mesh with our idea. It was fascinating to hear the nuances of how each sound interlocked with another. Since we settled on the idea of marriage for our concept we wanted to include Parkers conversation with his mother since their whole conversation was about his mother and father’s anniversary. We wanted the listener to feel like they were engaged in the conversation so we added some muffled voices to other end of the phone call as well as adding in a car engine starting to create an environment around him. Since we were allowed to get abstract with the soundscape we decided to alter several of the sounds and juxtapose them together to create a sense of ambiguity. Overall the soundscape took a life of its own and it was incredibly interesting to have everyone in the class listen to it and describe what they envisioned.   

Group 1b (Danet and Walt)

Since it was only three of us we were very easily able to communicate and establish times to come in an collectively work on the project. We took turns editing and contributing ideas of where we should take the soundscape. Overall I think this was a great group to work with and would love to work with them again.

Group 1A (Nick, Parker and Christian)

This was a great group to work with. We all worked together to create the sound library and meet all the requirements for the assignment. Parker was a terrific leader as far as organizing and collecting a lot of the sound bank. Nick was excellent at keeping the sound levels correct for each sound. And Christian was very creative coming up with different ideas for sound. Overall I loved working with everyone in this group!

Jonas Mekas

Natalie did a wonderful job of showcasing the beautiful life of Jonas Mekas. Having escaped Nazi labor camps, Mekas voyaged to America in search of a better life. After washing up on the shores of New York he purchased a 16mm camera that he soon fell deeply in love with. Mekas loved the concept of catching the “snapshots” of life and soon he found himself shooting anything and everything around him. His first film “Guns of the trees” which displayed no real plot but rather a spontaneous slice of life feel to the film with an ambiguous ending. As he grew his own personal style Mekas soon started to gain a reputation and popularity for his documentary style shooting, simple editing and repetition. A tremendous experimental/avante garde community began to sprout up out of New York with Mekas, Warhol and Brakhage at the center of it all. As a self-described child at heart, Mekas saw film as a celebration of life and which often included his family, friends and loved ones in his pieces of work. In one of his most famous films “Walden” the viewer is shown a chronological home movie style film that showcases the people and places in his life. Jonas Mekas still lives till this day influencing and creating as much as his young heart desires. A special shout out to Natalie for making such a great presentation on his work and life!