Video production class weblog--Day 3--order restored

1) Yesterday afternoon, one of the students and the technical assistant spent hours trying to get the Pinnacle software to work on the class computer. Somebody ended up bending a prong on one of the connectors, so I figured all was lost, but then he calmly walked down the hall to find a replacement connector. Then they took apart the computer to gingerly pull out a video card. After that, the software finally ran, so with a sense of a massive crisis averted, I could drive home.

2) Today, the class was mercifully free of technical problems, in part because I spent much of the time showing them scenes from movies to help prove my points. When I discussed Hitchcock's theory that reality is full of visual irrelevancies, I showed them the first scene of Rear Window to demonstrate how Alfred used the images of a leg cast, a smashed camera, photographs, and magazines to convey exposition for the rest of the film. The last shoot-out scene of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid demonstrates how one can constantly form compositions in light and color even in the midst of a gun fight. I also would freeze the shot and talk about compositional weights balanced on the wide screen.

3) We were lucky to have a film scholar visit from USC-Columbia, Patrick Nugent, who is in the midst of creating an ambitious 20 minute rotoscope film for his senior project. He showed the class samples from various film and media projects, and then he gave a power point presentation about the need to plan the shoot, write the script, storyboard each shot, arrange for permissions to use locations, get enough coverage, and so on. He used the light saber fighting scene from Stars Wars V to demonstrate the 180 degree rule, and we talked about creative solutions for typical lighting and sound problems in student productions. He said that in a way, the school has already supplied all of the white boards we need for lighting, since we can just reflect the light off of the walls.

4) After lunch, the three groups began brainstorming ideas for their 8-10 minute narrative films. We tried to get them to avoid the classic cliches of younger filmmakers--the alarm clock ring beginning, Pulp Fiction plagiarism, and moping emo adolescent lovelorn feel-sorry-for-me storylines. Then the students began to come up with excessively complicated story ideas that involved jewel thieves, drug dealers, obsessed murderers, stalkers, and zombies. (Contradicting myself, I talked of the need for plausibility, but I would also like one group to make a zombie attack scene.) Tomorrow, they will pitch three story ideas to the rest of the class. I will show them the 25 words or less Hollywood pitch technique from Robert Altman's The Player.