Phew! This has got to be the largest set yet. Lighting it was a marathon and building it was an eternity. So here, submitted for your discerning approval is a shot of he entire animation area. I’m using what looks to be part of a baby crib as a lighting rig, three shop clamp lights, a goose-neck desk lamp and a borrowed kino flo tube light. Sheets of printer paper and clothespins work as light diffusers. Here’s proof positive you don’t need a zillion dollars to make a movie. “You just need,” as W.S. Burrows once said, “a little make due and know how.”
58mm 10x Macro Filter Kit is in the house! There’s no comparing the quality of the Canon EFS 18-55mm lens with the macro filter to the macro on the Sony DV Cam. The superior quality lens combined with the macro filter adds an incredible new dimension of depth and richness to the image. Surprisingly, there is enough depth of field with the aperture cranked down to keep the figure in focus. I had to shoot close-ups with the macro on the DV Cam for the previous shots. They turned out satisfactory, but ooh la la … Yes Macro filter!
The gift of working space from High Concept Laboratories is truly a boon. In the last week I’ve been able to accomplish what has previously taken months. Without the quotidian distractions of home I’ve been able to acutely focus on the pleasurable experience of actual film making. (I know its technically a video but I’m not interested in getting into a semantics argument with myself on the blog.) I’m rather happy to announce I finished an entire usable sequence of shots and can hardly wait to get back to the “lab” to make more.
High Concept Laboratories has graciously invited me to their studio for a four month artist-in-residency program. I plan on moving most of the materials from my home studio to HCL. The plan is to complete the “Cowboy Project” in two months then have the rest of the time to start building a new project.
The pic below is a shot from the HCL open house on Saturday. I installed my marionette from the Ghost Conversations movie in a complex pose that continues the body as landscape concept from the film into real three dimensional space. I made sure to make use of the unique surroundings the gallery provided. The puppet strings are attached to strange disused antique machinery attached to the gallery walls and piping that snakes and weaves across the ceiling. In the background you can see mural and video installation by artist Joe Miller. Chicago experimental filmmaker Carolyn Faber got caught in the frame admiring the space.
Snapshot Exercise 8
