Meeting Chris Paul

On Thursday afternoon the group drove out to Brentwood Bay to meet Chris. It took us twenty five minutes longer than it should have, but after stopping at two initial (and incorrect locations) we finally found Chris' house. Things were a little bit shaky at first -- we were late, Chris thought we were his daughters friends, Chris and his wife were in the middle of another meeting-- but everything was sorted out quickly and we introduced ourselves to Chris and his wife, explained our ideas so far to him, and began to hear what Chris had to say about the project.

At first we explained to Chris that we envisioned a collaborative project in which he could input any ideas that he may have or information that he may find beneficial for him; after all, this project is supposed to be beneficial to the artist, at their personal disposal, and available on a QR code at his artwork in Cornett. Right away he pulled us into his office space in his house and began to show us sketches he was working on, rings he had just made, past pieces of art that he had inventoried on his computer, and even told us about a "failed" idea that he had thought about with angora sheep wool.  

What I liked about our initial meeting with Chris is that he was very open with us. This is a good thing because we were able to bring up a topic and he was able to just talk about it until we interrupted him with another thought. While we were with him in his office I began to jot down a list of topics that I thought would be important to touch on in our interview with him. When we went out to see him we didn't have a list of questions yet because we were so clueless as to what the feel of the movie would end up being like based on Chris' personality. We knew that he was warm and welcoming based on what Andrea had told us, but I always find it intimidating to meet people who are more established and knowledgeable than I because as I often feel like I am wasting their time, or out of my element and should not be bothering them. However, I think myself, and the other girls began to ease up on our tension and apprehension once Chris began chatting. He brought us to his studio space where he showed us a bunch of his glicee and silkscreen prints, some carvings he had been working on, as well as some other smaller stuff he has been working on and told us a little bit of background information and meaning behind a few of his pieces. I really appreciated how comfortable he was and how honest he seemed about his work, his inspirations, his methods and ideas, how he came about selling art, etc. I think that these aspects of his personality will be really important when we film because the more genuine and willing to talk he is, the better our film will be, in my opinion.

A few key things I picked out of my notes from Tuesday which I think should be discussed in our film are:

• His work in Cornett and the collaboration that went into making that
• Teaching- both from his mentors, as well as the teaching he does
• Where he gets his inspiration and ideas from, what he does to create his own unique style of art and why he does this, and how he got started with this eclectic style
• What types of materials, colours, ideas and patterns he looks for and uses in his works
• How he began selling art, the prominent places his works are displayed and how he became established as an artist 
• The impact of specific people/ family members in his artworks 

There are just a few things that I think will be important to cover, although I am aware that we only have a limited amount of time to work with him and that we are creating a short film. Hopefully is enough time to fit all of these things in!

I'm really happy that we finally got to meet Chris! I know that we definitely have a few things in our treatment that need to be augmented before we finalize it, but nothing major will need to be changed. I feel like now thing are beginning to come together and materialize because before now we were just sort of waiting in limbo to see what Chris would be like and how we were going to structure the film. We are going out on Tuesday evening to film B-roll while he teaches a carving class, which I think will be a great opportunity to see him working on projects, interacting with his students and hopefully be able to see him in his element while we works with his hands. Next thing to do is start editing B-roll, and then to sit Chris down for our interview!

Editing Workshop Footage and our Treatment and Proposal

Wow! I'm really beginning to get excited for this project! This week we met three times before class to work on our project! I was away over reading break, as were several other group members, so we arranged to get together Sunday when we had recouped and regrouped and ready (if that's possible) to get back into school mode.

On Sunday afternoon, we came up with a goofy little skit and shot some scenes to edit of Krystal coming to school and then realizing once she got to class that it was cancelled. For the workshop we were supposed to capture a variety of shots so that we could play around with them in the in class iMovie tutorial to learn how to use the program before we edit! First we tried to get an overhead shot from a second floor window in Cornett of Krystal walking up to the building, including a panning shot of the field with Krystal walking towards the camera, then we attempted to get several long and medium shots of her walking up the stairs and walking up to the doors. We got a few close up shots of Krystal's face as she tried to open a set of doors, as well as an extreme close up of her hands as she tried to shake the doors open. We played around with getting a little bit of audio both on the camera, as well as on my phone in order to see how they both sounded. We attempted to get creative by trying a few more obscure shots, such as having Krystal walk up a flight of stairs while we shot from a flight/ two flights above her, her moving quickly with a blurred movement affect (this was accidental, but worked out I think), as well as trying to catch proper timing when using a phone for added affects (trying to not have two different times when looking at a phone's screen clock for inconsistent editing). We were trying to be conscious of camera movement --we didn't use a tripod, which was a mistake--  we didn't necessarily end up with a level plain when we tried to do panning shots, or we had different heights of bricks in the background or shakiness in our film from holding the camera by hand. Regardless of these flaws, we learned how to alter the white scale depending on the lights in the room/sun level outside which was good. Depending on where we film our interview with Chris this will be very important. We noticed when we went to his place (this will be discussed in the next post) that his work studio has overhead lights, which we are worried will make a humming sound on the camera, so we will have to see how that goes when we film B-roll on Tuesday!

We also worked on our treatment this week. We had never done this before and we found it was a little bit challenging to do before we met Chris because we were not sure how the film was going to fall into place so it was hard to map out in detail what was going to be taking place and what specific ideas would happen at what times, etc. What ended up being a good thing was that we didn't have to hand in our treatment at Thursday nights class like we were supposed to because after meeting with him there are clearly a few things that we will need to switch around!

(here is the link to the iMovie tutorial video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KHwiCTMyJE)

Attempting to Learn How to Make Something Look Good on Screen

This week our group got together at Felicita's before class. We touched base on what we needed to do during reading break next week. Last week Andrea sent emails to each groups' resident artist with little bios that each group member write in order to get the ball rolling communication-wise between our artists and ourselves. At our group meeting we figured out which days would work best for us to meet Chris. We sent him an email of introduction and now we are waiting to hear back! Hopefully the week after we come back from the break we can get together to make arrangements with him, and then soon after we can get together to film our piece with him! Very exciting, I think things are going to start to come together now! 

In class we talked about a few things that I found to be interesting. Firstly, although, not overly exciting, we talked about the structure and 'how to' of writing treatments and proposals for documentaries. This was a good learning experience for me for two reasons. Firstly, of course, because I have never done something like this before and didn't know what to expect when I saw it titled on the syllabus. Secondly, my brother is a documentary filmmaker, and I have never really been clear of the paperwork process and preparation that goes along with films he has created in an academic setting. I knew that an enormous amount of time and effort always goes into preparation, but seeing a list of details that must be thought about in such specifics before filming made me appreciate what my brother does more-- not that I didn't already understand how much hard work he puts in.. but still. We talked about how integral it is in our films that we tell a story through images and that we really want to create an informed representation of our artists.

Another thing that I found really interesting was looking at the ethics form that is involved in academic research. This is something I have heard lots about in different research classes, but I have never actually seen the form. It is HUGE, and very very very thorough. It is really interesting to see what needs to be considered when doing research, as well as what had to be done by Andrea in order for us to be able to do this project. This was something I am happy I finally got to go through, and it was really helpful that it was something that Andrea went over with us, explaining all the while, instead of me reading it over to myself, because I for sure would have had questions along the way.

Once again, we talked about screen composition. I went over this a little bit when I updated last week, but we watched a few short films about the rule of thirds and different shots. I appreciated the longer one we watched on different shots where we looked at full, medium full, cowboy, close up and extreme close ups, but, this time, instead of just looking at which shot was which, we talked about which shot was used for what reason, and what you can capture in a scene depending on what kind of shot you chose to use. Watching this and talking about them was helpful because I am not used to thinking about these things in a critical way when I watch things. Now I am trying to do this when I watch things to try and see how things are put together, if I think things could have been shot in a more effective way, or why a shot or angle was chosen/done really well.

FILM CLIP: one of the short clips we watched-- the guy in this film was great.... I will forever know how to place a windmill in appropriate composition)

During reading break my group is going to get together to write our treatment, as well as film our practice film for our edit workshop. I hope everything begins to come together nicely, and I am excited to see what happens in the coming weeks!

Boring center

Pazzazzzy and in thirds

Looking back at old photos I can definitely see a benefit in taking photos that follow the rule of thirds...












(Film clip link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSSOZxLnNyc )   

Classtime with Devin and the Early Stages of Working with Cameras

This week, on Wednesday, our group met downtown to put together a small presentation for the class that would give the class and Andrea an idea of where we were at on research, questions for Chris, etc. We were supposed to start to create the concept for our film using our research and the ideas we've covered in class. I really enjoyed this meeting because it was the first time the group had gotten together to really discuss what we envision for the film. I'm really hopeful that we are going to produce a good film because it seems that between the four of us we have some interesting ideas that will work well together! I think we are all looking to make a film that is not overly artistic or complicated. None of us are overly enthused about a lot of background music or fancy effects. I know I'm not overly familiar with camera work and editing so I think it will be best that we keep things simple and 'elegant' and avoid crazy shots, etc.

In class on Thursday night we had a guest lecturer, Devin, a former student who produced a film in Ghana called Mango Driftwood while doing work for Dr. Stahl. I really liked this class because we got to interact with a someone who had done this type of project before and because Devin and Andrea were helpful in going over different shots and concepts during the movie, and afterwards we got to discuss different film techniques and shots. We looked at different things that he did in his film that he liked, as well as aspects which retrospectively he wished he hadn't done/ used in his film. I found this especially helpful because it was helpful to hear him reflect on the shots he had taken before, and what he would possibly have done if he had done this now. This gave us a few ideas of what are good things to try and capture in our film and things that we should try and avoid. One thing we talked about was that we should never Zzzzooooooommm in on someone in a documentary style film, especially during an interview.

This class was a big class because, with Devin there, the class went over a variety of stylistic techniques. We looked at what was stylistically pleasing when you are filming. This included how to get proper lighting when you are shooting, depending you whether you are inside our outside and depending on what kind of lighting there is in a room. We looked at the 'white balance' or how to adjust lighting on the cameras we will be using so that colours are balanced and not altered.
I hadn't really thought about this before, but it makes a lot of sense thinking back to short movies my friends and I made in Jr. high for class projects. The lighting was ALWAYS wrong and everything and everyone always looked so sickly green/yellow or overly white... NOT that the white balance was the only problem in those clips.. but perhaps they wouldn't have been so god awful if we had at least been a normal colour. We also looked at how to position people in a way that that the lighting works with the camera instead of causing weird shadows, angles, lighting, glare, etc. and how to use those fun screens with the white, gold and silver reflective screens for filming, and talked about which is most useful in what kind of lighting. Something I was a little bit familiar with is rule of thirds, another thing that I learned about in Jr. High (I know, look, apparently I actually learned things in my youth...). I originally learned this in art class when we talked about positioning things when you create art on paper. This is something that over the years I have been conscious about when watching movies and looking at photographs because it really does make a difference. Photos typically look pretty shotty when you neglect this, so that was a good refresher, and definitely something important to consider when we are filming and editing! We also went over different types of shots on the chalkboard: long, medium, close up, extreme close up, which I hadn't really ever thought about before Anth 309, and was kind of just guessing when we talk about these kinds of shots last semester. Luckily i was right.. not rocket science, but still good to keep and eye out for and pay attention to in our film!