So I ended up getting this idea about computers and what they would say to us as a species if they were sentient/could communicate with us. After bouncing ideas off of a few people in class, this idea kinda ended up hitting me and I just felt really really compelled to commit to it.
I’ve always really enjoyed stories involving technology and how it integrates with humanity itself and the good and evil technology can be used to foster/spread. Be it ideologies/messages. Cyberpunk stuff especially has always been really rad and appealing to me. Stuff like Ghost in the Shell and it’s ideas of the human experience and what exactly it means to be truly human. Not saying this video is on par with something like Ghost in the Shell at all though haha.
Personally I feel like if a computer could really talk to us, it’d be pretty subjective on what it would say depending on the user using it. So maybe mine here is speaking due to the way I use mine? How would yours speak to you? How would someone else’s speak to them? I just really really like the idea of that. Computers are by design made for their user to manipulate to an extent, especially dependent on the OS used. So the concept of what it could say to people is really interesting to me.
Creating this project wasn’t too bad in terms of the production part, but post production became incredibly hard for me to finish on time due to the amount of other finals I had to worry about this term. Thankfully I did get it done, but my need to finish videos/my perfectionism might’ve hurt me a little bit in the process. Just like to have my projects done and me happy enough with them before I fully give them to someone or upload them. I should really curb that habit at some point.
I really tried to go for more editing/after effects type stuff which I’ve only really used and experimented with in Time Based Tools. I feel like I could’ve and should’ve done more with it like maybe experimenting with more Z-Axis stuff but unfortunately ended up running out of time before I could really experiment or do anything with it.
I hope one day I can make more stuff like this in terms of themes. One of my personal dreams is to be able to make stuff to communicate ideas/themes to people, though I really wanna work on my writing a lot more as I feel a lot of this was very on the nose. But hey learning lessons and all that. I’m sure I’ll get there as long as I just keep trying and working on creating good scripts and content for people.
Thanks for watching and I really enjoyed my time with everyone here 🙂
Hopefully we can create more stuff in the future if any of you continue into media arts!
So when we first initially got this project to work on, I kinda had some silly ideas for what I wanted to do. The first one was this silly kinda riffing on nature documentary type stuff and then kinda breaking that to make a stupid captain planet joke because 5 elements. And then the more I thought about it I kinda ended up hating that idea and ended up going with a top 5 underrated games list idea.
I’m the type of person that isn’t a huge fan of reviews or lists when it comes to media mainly because they’re just really restrictive and boring and to me a number or a list doesn’t really give you the full qualities of a game. And when it comes to said lists, some of these tend to pick really safe, boring options and with underrated games lists especially they tend to pick games that while not everybody in the general population may know, most people who pay any attention to video games as a whole will definitely already know them. Same tends to apply to film lists and clickbait articles/reviews.
So starting out on this was a bit of a mess. I actually got the B-roll used in the number/transition clips first and worked from there, getting the footage of me in my own apartment later and then compiling all of the footage last. I used Premiere to string it all together and thought I’d made a mistake at first while making it.
Being embarrassed at me on camera and the dead air in the raw footage and all the takes I did. But as I began to edit it together and really work on it, it formed into mostly what I wanted and I actually ended up pretty happy with it. While it’s not perfect and there are certain things I could do better if I put a bit more time into it, I’m still pretty happy with it and I feel like I’ve really been getting better with editing if I can take something I first initially considered to be a terrible failure to be what I at least consider to be decent.
So I hope you guys enjoyed this goofy silly video and I’m really excited to move onto the final project!
For my Professional Practice assignment I decided to attend U of O’s “Art of Directing series” that they tend to hold from time to time. In this series of talks they bring in independent director’s from all over the globe in order for them to give their insights of the filmmaking process/the film industry if they have it at all to give. They held this one on May 1st at 4 PM in the Gerlinger Lounge at the UO campus.
Outside of the Gerlinger Building at UO Campus
This time it was with Director Chloe Zhao director of independent films such as Songs That My Brothers Taught Me (2015) and more recently The Rider (2017) which has won awards such as the C.I.C.A.E. award at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for 4 awards at the Film Independent Spirit Awards (Best Directing, Best Editing, Best Cinematography, and Best Feature).
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Chloe is a director from Beijing, China who initially went to school at Mount Holyoke College which is a liberal arts college where she earned a degree in political science. After realizing that getting actual work in US politics wasn’t really what she wanted to do she worked odd jobs for a while, mainly as a bartender for about 3 years before deciding to attend New York University Tisch School of the Arts in order to study filmmaking.
The talk itself didn’t have much order and went all around so based on the notes I took I’m going to try to organize it all into different sections.
She told us how from a young age she was always interested in telling stories, originally being super into Japanese Manga to the point of even wanting to make her own. But feeling not very confident in her abilities when it came to art she ended up not pursuing manga creation.
Chloe Zhao (right) with Forest Whitaker (left) who produced Songs My Brothers Taught Me.
She wanted to tell real human stories about different and cultured people, finding the romanization of a culture more toxic then finding their real human struggles that we generally don’t see on film, which is mainly what both Songs My Brothers Taught Me and the Rider deal with. Songs mainly dealing with Native American’s and their culture and the everyday struggles of the characters in that film and the Rider dealing with cowboy/rodeo culture which takes the real aspects of the main actors life and fictionalizes parts of it.
Chloe always saw community theater and people engaging with community theater to be super interesting due to getting different people with different backgrounds and different cultural experiences really being able to put their all into their performances in interesting and unique ways. She also said that she sees audience interaction with a film/the screen to be something that she loves. Engaging with people who engage in the work you end up putting out is super key to her.
In regards to her crew she talked about how it’s a good idea to find people you trust very well and that you know you can work well with for a smaller production that you have more personal control over. If you have someone who’s wishy washy with you or that you don’t particularly work well with, then there will be clashing and problems that are bound to happen, especially on such a small production. She also said to make sure you take special care of your crew. She would always cook breakfast every single day for her crew.
I think I got a pretty decent shot of the chair Chloe sat in! Wasn’t a gigantic fan of the lighting overall in there for pictures honestly.
When it came to writing she said that no matter the size of crew every single part of the shoot/film all comes from the script. If a part doesn’t work while shooting Chloe said to just rewrite it and that’s a benefit you can have while on set. For the production of Songs, she wrote 30 drafts with a 10 page treatment which made the movie take about 3 years overall to write, while the Rider ended up only taking about a month to write comparatively. Money was also a factor as Songs didn’t really have much funding due to nobody wanting to back a first time asian female director making a film about Native Americans.
Chloe also made it a point to emphasize that it’s good to not be too bombastic or crazy with your first film as in a way your first really applying everything you’ve learned and you’re going to bump your head. It’s best to work within your budget/limitations and be realistic/reasonable with how you end up going about it all. First films, even if they’re not perfect or have problems or flaws can end up being calling cards to bigger films, even if they’re just a small short film! It’s all about learning the process, networking and getting your name around and out into the filmmaking world/community. You never need a lot of money to get your foot in the door somewhere or to open doors to better opportunities.
An interesting quote from her that I really enjoyed was when talking about budgets for films, she ended up talking about the Budget for the Rider and how it didn’t really matter. To her “Production Value/Budget doesn’t really mean much, $80,000 in South Dakota can be $5,000,000 in New York, it’s far more about the talent of your cast and crew during the production itself.”
We were told that creatively you have more advantages when small over working for a big corporation. When small you have way more leeway and far less studio intervention. She also suggested staying small if you’re an indie creator, as studios can end up taking notice of you and wanting you on bigger projects, or wanting to fund more of your work if you impress them.
Another quote I quite enjoyed was her saying she was from the “Terrence Malick school of filmmaking”.
Terrence Malick
Terrence Malick (The Thin Red Line, The Tree of Life, Knights of Cups) is pretty well known for filming primarily outdoors, often relying on natural lighting for his productions, focusing on philosophical subjects, mixing well known actors with non actors and trying to get real true raw reactions from them.
Her two movies really do follow these pretty well, dealing with real subject matters/philosophical angles, tending to lean towards using unknown actors, shooting outside most of the time and really trying to get real, raw and personal reactions and stories. It was honestly fairly inspiring to me as someone who wants to create/help create meaningful and philosophical media and art that tackles interesting subject matter.
What added to this was how she told us how she didn’t film using a monitor, or just sitting behind the camera all the time. She really tries to get engaged with her actors, letting them know exactly what she wants the actor to convey and really getting that across effectively. And the advice she gave of telling us to humble ourselves to the nature around us and that it will have the chance to surprise us while filming. She experienced this on the filming of the rider as they worked quite a bit with horses (specifically the main actors horse) which tended to wander around and do it’s own thing from time to time which ended up leading to some beautifully constructed shots for the film.
She ended off mainly by talking about big studios and telling us to stay true to ourselves, but to compromise on certain things and cooperate to what the studio wants as well if you are working with a big studio. She had been given offers for bigger films and is even working on a new movie funded by Amazon soon enough which to me is fairly cool and exciting to hear her going from a no name unfunded film like Songs to the success of the Rider at festivals to being funded by Amazon. It’s inspiring and shows that even small creators can really make it.
Before leaving, I first stopped by the catering provided by UO catering which was pretty great!
Great job to the catering staff!
And then I got a chance to introduce myself to Chloe and ask her two questions.
The first being about what she exactly looks for in an editor for her films, as I have an interest in and want to become an editor for films/media.
Her response was she does the first rough cut of the film herself and then she looks for someone who could work the best with constantly changing/adapting content. Someone who can adapt to scenes they may have finished needing to be tweaked/adjusted/changed completely when needed. As when a film develops things can change due to reshoots/script changes and what not.
The second question I asked was about what she suggests for an editor trying to get their foot in the door/in the industry at large.
This probably wasn’t the greatest question since she’s a director so she didn’t have a ton of advice to give from her personal experience, but she did say that her editor on the Rider came from and looked into Sundance labs and editing fellowships which since talking to her I’ve began looking into. These supposedly put you with real professionals who analyze and critique the work you give them and teach you how to improve your craft, as well as matching you up with directors who need editors for their work. So I definitely want to begin looking more into this if I personally can.
Overall, I’d say my experience with this professional practice was fairly positive and I’m definitely going to try to be on the lookout for more events that the Cinema Studies program at U of O puts on from here on. I ended up going to the Icarus showing they put on yesterday too and it was pretty great! Learned quite a bit from that cinematographer who showed up there so they definitely have some very valuable discussions and showings for people who are interested.
So for this project I had trouble initially coming up with a story to really talk about. I knew I didn’t want to just do something like an Aesop Fable as that would feel too simple and easy honestly and I just wouldn’t be that passionate about it. But when Mel told us that we could tell a story about a game or movie or some kind of experience that we had with said game or movie, I knew immediately what I wanted to talk about especially with my love of analyzing the media I engage with and discussing that love with other people.
So I picked to tell a “story” of sorts about a wonderful game for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 called Nier. (To be honest this is more me telling you of my experiences with the game and breaking down what I feel about its themes and what not in about 5 minutes.)
Nier to me is a sort of unappreciated masterpiece. It’s the type of experience that comes around every once in a while in every medium. Something that comes off as special and that the creator involved (in this case Yoko Taro, who by the way could be a whole case study in his own right in my honest opinion and highly recommend watching any interviews he has done within the past 3 years). Almost as if the creator really had true heart and a true vision about their work even if they didn’t have the full on budget to get every part of it they wanted to across.
Yoko Taro during interviews regarding last year’s hit, Nier Automata. He’s quite the character.
In a way it’s fairly inspiring as someone who wants to create meaningful art and that even if something isn’t the most polished product, or makes a ton of money, it could still resonate with people and become beloved in that way and I hope to be able to hit at least that with some kind of audience someday (though money and success along with those is always very nice too).
Music (Shadowlord’s Castle Memory, Shadowlord, The Lost Forest, and Ashes of Dreams New) and dialogue used are from Nier which is owned by Square Enix.
So to be completely honest I’m not a huge reader of blogs, I read some game news blogs/sites like Gematsu and browse reddit film discussion boards like r/movies or r/truefilm to get some nice film discussion going. Otherwise I tend to stick to interviews/film analysis on Youtube more then anything when it comes to learning about filmmaking and the whole process of it all.
So for this project I ended up finding this blog right here.
I found this blog interesting and I think others interested in editing mainly because it’s a blog started by a freelance editor and writer who discusses multiple different topics, from how to break into the business, to interviews and analysis of the editing of different films, to looking into professional editing tools and the way a professional editor may edit their timeline.
I think the site itself is pretty well put together. With clear labels at the top depending on where you want to go and a nice search bar helping the viewer search for whatever they want across the entire blog if they are searching for a specific post. It’s also just nice and clean, with nice blocks for each post separating different posts nicely away from each other.
I would say the quality of information is pretty nice though some of the interview posts can feel almost like aggregates of information or interviews that other people have done rather then most stuff that he himself has actively looked to get. But otherwise getting his own professional opinion/outlook on things is always very very interesting.
I would say that this is definitely a blog worth at least giving a glance if you’re interested in looking into film editing! Be it the software or looking into the processes of film editors and the industry itself!
This scavenger hunt assignment was a pretty fun time. Me and Jewel did most of it together, using my Canon Rebel t3i to get our photos. Though we forgot the statue outside of the health and wellness center so that one we did separately and I chose to do the creative shot on my own since I wanted to think more about it and what I wanted it to be.
So to start this journey off we decided to go to the equipment checkout first since that was closest and the place that’s basically been beaten into our heads in various different classes I’ve been in so far (Photography last semester/audio and this class this semester).
Equipment Checkout (Building 18)
Here we have Terry on the good ol equipment checkout grind!
We started our journey here as we both knew where exactly where it was and it was the easiest part to locate since both of us had Digital Photography last semester in the same building so ya kinda end up passing by it a lot!
Studio with Blue Cyc Wall (Building 18)
I dunno what it is but something about the lighting makes this look like a crumpled blue poster to me.
So I had no clue that this even existed quite honestly. Like I shouldn’t be that surprised but finding it was pretty neat as it wasn’t too far from equipment checkout. The space for it was pretty huge as well with the blue wall itself taking up like a quarter of it.
Center for Student Engagement (Center Building, 2nd Floor)
Free popcorn is a pretty hard deal to turn down.
So for some reason I’d always thought that this was somewhere in building 1 for some reason. Not fully sure where I got that idea but it is nice to know that there is a dedicated room to ask about clubs and what not over just looking on the website for it. Gives it a bit of a more personal feel to it. Finding it was pretty simple too thanks to someone from the student help desk (also on the second floor of the center building) pointing us in the right direction.
Main Art Gallery on Campus (Building 11, 1st Floor)
What do the shadows say about the duality of man?
I’ve had another photography class in Building 11 so finding the art gallery was pretty easy for us. Though I was a bit confused to if the bigger building behind building 11 is the MAIN art gallery or if it just has extra pieces or something like that. Either way Building 11’s art gallery is pretty nice, great lighting, great showcasing of the works put on display. They even gave away food during the art walk they were having which was pretty cool (I didn’t really want any but Jewel said it was pretty good!)
The Art-O-Mat (Building 11, 1st Floor)
The grey parts look like big goofy teeth to me and I can’t unsee it.
I straight up knew exactly what this was once I looked up how to find whatever the Art-O-Mat even was. I’ve passed by this so many times from when I had photography in Building 11. I just never paid any actual attention to what it was called and when I first saw it again I kinda laughed. It looks pretty neato though.
The Library Reference Counter (Center Building, 2nd Floor)
Coming up with a references joke that doesn’t make me hurt inside is surprisingly difficult.Â
I’ve actually personally never been into the library here honestly. I’ve always wanted to stop by but just never have due to either time or laziness. Walking in and over to the reference desk at first was a little awkward as I tried to get out the words to ask if it was cool if the guy working at the desk was cool with being photographed. He was really nice and chill about it though and now I know where the reference desk is so it a pretty nice experience.
Statue outside of Health and Wellness CenterÂ
I wasn’t sure whether or not to keep the table in frame or not.
I completely forgot this building existed, which to me is pretty funny since it’s right in front of the school. I’m not an observant person sometimes!
I had to go on my own a few days after me and Jewel got our photos together and finding where this building was located was a journey in itself. I thought, health and wellness is probably the gym area around building 4 and 5. I took pictures of the boy with the tree coming out of his head statue for assurance but decided to look around more.
I ended up going behind the school, down near the track and football field. I never realized there were some nice paths and things all around the school like that. So much so that I might start taking more walks during my down times here. And from there I ended up looping around, finding a Veteran garden which was pretty nice, relaxing and fairly barren with no people if a bit barren in terms of what the garden fully had.
Then I looped around and remembered “Oh yeah the Health and Wellness building is in the front of the school isn’t it?” and then I found it. The statue itself was pretty interesting, I didn’t actually take too much of a look at what the words said on the sides but I did take a step inside and look up at the clouds. It was pretty relaxing for a minute.
Mary Jo Kreindel’s Office (Building 11, 1st Floor)
I relate to the clutter in that office pretty hardcore.
This was fairly easy for me and Jewel to find as Mary Jo’s office was thankfully right next to the Art-O-Mat, art gallery, and Judy Gates’s office so we kinda killed like 4 birds with one stone! Unfortunately I don’t think she was there so I didn’t get a chance to meet her but what can ya do I guess?
Media Creation Lab (Center Building, 2nd Floor, Library)
Who’s bad at keeping their reflection out of images? Not me no way.
After we got our Reference desk photos me and Jewel ended up coming back to find this one as we totally ended up missing where it was located. We got help again from the wonderful people at the student help desk right outside of the library and found it was just on the other side of the library. We ended up finding it and it seemed fairly barren. No one was using it but there were many stations setup for doing editing/media arts work.
I might start using my down time at the library more to get work done in there as it honestly looked cozier then the indie lab to me. (Unrelated Side Note: They were also carrying a manga I thought was slightly obscure so I was surprised and now wanting to see their full collection is a pretty exciting thing)
Judy Gates Office (Building 11, 1st Floor)
I may not have a huge interest in much theatre but that is a nice poster I gotta say.
After the art gallery photo me and Jewel ended up getting our photos of Judy Gates’s office. While we were in the process funnily enough, Judy herself ended up coming out and greeting us. She was very nice and friendly and was pretty cool with us getting photos. I’ve been meaning to meet her for a while honestly since she is one of our main program advisors and I’m pretty glad that I know what she actually looks like now.
Mel’s Office (Building 18, Room 216)
I’ve got Jan’s Visual Literacy class too!
As soon as we finished getting photos of the cyc wall we immediately went straight for Mel’s office as we both knew where it was. Funnily enough though, Jan (another media arts professor here at Lane) was having a meeting with a student. She noticed us and acknowledged us nicely as we tried not to disturb her too much as we got our photos. It was pretty funny and a fairly quick photo session in my opinion.
Flags inside of the Students First Building (Building 1)
I love the way the lights are bouncing off of the flags. It just looks nice.
So this is apparently the student’s first building? Had absolutely no idea it was called that until I did this so hey the more you know right? I’ve passed through here who knows how many times at this point due to the counseling center, financial aid, etc. It does make sense given those resources along with the gender equity center and the student pantry.
So when we got there I messed with the white balance on my camera a bit to try getting the lights to look more yellowish white then the blue I took the picture at. I think it makes the flags stand out a little nicer though I feel like I could’ve focused the shot more on the flags honestly.
Turkey Shot
DID SOMEONE SAY TURKEY’S LADDER????? (GET IT BECAUSE THE TURKEY’S HEAD IS BLURRY AND DISTORTED LIKE THE VISIONS IN JACOB’S LADDER (REFERENCE HUMOR IS DEAD)
I ended up taking this on a different day and it was pretty funny. I tried a couple of turkey shots on the field next to building 16 where the turkeys tend to roam. When that didn’t end up working out all that well for a creative shot, I noticed this turkey in the distance right under Building 17.
I thought it was perfect and I kept my distance to try to get some fun blur shots with it. I got some okay ones with it kicking the dirt its claws kept getting buried under but I was really fond of this one. I really dig head distortion type photos/imagery. Stuff like some of the monsters in the Silent Hill games with their head twitching and head distortion they use in that or Jacob’s Ladder (which funnily enough is one of the major inspirations for the Silent Hill games) as a film example.
So while it’s not the most perfectly framed. I really liked it even if it isn’t to that effect of distortion effect I could’ve achieved with it. Makes me want to experiment with distortion like that more via video and photography.
Heyo there, my name is Jaylen but you can just call me Jay.
I’m a 21 year old from a small town in California who has hopeful dreams of becoming a film/video editor whose pretentious art will be able to touch people’s hearts or minds. I want to make things that either entertain or make people think about what they’re watching. I want to connect with other people through the art/content I create or help others to create.
I moved out here initially to pursue game development but ended up floating around until I came to the conclusion that I want to get into editing.
I’ve been pretty passionate about film since I was a kid. I remember wanting to be a director before realizing that my real passion was the editing process. I tend to edit my own videos for fun (nothing I’d share here though ;3) and to me editing is like solving a puzzle in a way.
It’s all about putting the pieces together and constructing something to put out and share with other people. For me the process is just really fun and interesting regardless of if I succeed or fail, especially since editing is such a key part of the process.
My hobbies tend to include playing/discussing video games, watching/discussing/analyzing film and anime, listening to music, writing every once in a blue moon, and sleeping way too much. Biking and photography tend to also be pretty fun times.
It’s nice to meet you all.
P.S. Perfect Blue and Ghost in the Shell are phenomenal films that everyone should watch.
 
Jay's Editing Den 