I could start off this entry by celebrating some arbitrary milestones, although I don't really have any today. It is my 651st day of blogging on Editing Luke though. For those of you who accidentally clicked onto my blog looking for Will Ferrell or the Office Bloopers, I apologize. It was a post I made over a year ago and it still gets me clicks.
I do have some news though, and I thought a quick summary would be the best way of addressing some of the recent questions I've received - or a way of answering the questions I'm sure you're all just too busy to ask.
1. My spin-off blog, 2 Edit, is now retired. Yeah, that was quick. You may have noticed that I started posting some of the entries from that blog here to phase it out. All said posts are now labelled in the 'Memorabilia' category and feature old notes, props, mementos, and souvenirs from my various productions from years past. In short, getting traffic is hard enough and I didn't want to invest more time in something that actually shifted focus away from my work here. Promoting one blog is enough, so I've just decided to merge the concept of 2 Edit into Editing Luke.
2. The Chico Bandito series still has a couple of episodes left and I'm planning the finale for the end of April 2009. It's been a background project for months now and I'm anxious to finish it up and promote the entire thing; Perhaps even merge the episodes into one short for a festival, who knows. To date the series has been quite popular and has received over 10,000 views. To check out Chico Bandito thus far, click here.
3. By the end of this month the Yobi.tv Season 1 finals begin! You may remember that my film The Gizmo Tree was voted in as the top film for week 17 back in December 2008 and became a semi-finalist. Thousands of dollars are on the line for the top films, so I'm getting prepared to promote and campaign for your vote in the coming weeks. For the record, this competition has some of the largest prizes of any festival or contest I've ever been a part of - I'm prepared to work for it.
4. I'm trying to make plans for a brand new short - hopefully a new festival entry for the 2009 circuit. This is an update, because aside from the everyday edits I do, this is a more elaborate undertaking. I'm already soliciting possible actors, working out original music sources, and coming up with concepts. It's really a mixture of these things that determine what kind of short I'll make. If I can find sufficient acting talent, there's nothing stopping me from making several projects. Every year since 2004 I've produced at least one or two shorts that really defined what that year meant for me - both because of the experience of making the movie itself, and because of the subsequent recognition or promotion that the short allowed. I'll certainly be trying to draw on as many people as possible to really up the ante this year.
That's all I've got for now, but I feel a creative kick coming on as my 25th B-day approaches on March 31. Stay productive folks, we're closing in on spring!
Mar 13, 2009
Mar 12, 2009
Black Hills Postcard
Date:
May 2007
Associated Video(s):
This is one of a hundred postcards I picked up while on a road trip from Regina, SK to Rapid City, SD and surrounding area. The amount of driving that my friend Andrea and I did allowed for a wealth of shooting while on the move, and I took advantage of it. Nothing quite like the open road, good music, and a camera to capture the experience.
Related Post(s):
Mar 9, 2009
Alphabet (2006)
I think one of the most challenging things about growing up is the way our relation to time changes. We become nostalgic and equally obsessed with the future. When we're young we don't think about remembering, and as we get older we wish we'd remembered a lot more - of the good times anyway. This notion was the basis for my video poem assignment of Film 400 in September 2006. The short titled, Alphabet.In starting off another year of university, and in one of my final core production courses no less, I had education on the brain. For my video poem I started to reminisce about my journey through elementary school through high school and onto university, thinking about the significance of being in a classroom for a good chunk of my life. I had several ideas revolving in my head, but I kept coming back to the idea of trying to remember my first day of school; how I couldn't remember the beginning of something that became so profound and defining in my life. If you ask me, it was the perfect fodder for a film assignment.
For my theme I decided to focus on leaves with a school yard playground as a large portion of the backdrop. To me, leaves were the perfect symbol of memories. They grow, die, decay, come in a variety of sizes and colours, portions breakaway or breakdown, and as nature has played a major role in some of my other shorts (A Chill in the Air), the way it renews itself is similar to our own re-defining of our past from time to time.
The title, Alphabet, is an obvious reference to education, but it's also meant to express the concept of something simple becoming more complex: letters to language, etc. as in comparison to the first day of school and ones entire educational career.
In the grading of my assignment my prof wrote:
"Great visual structure that has a sophisticated flow with the music. The mix itself is deftly created; the images have an internal movement that allows you to move from scene to scene with a special fluidity. The use of the camera in relation to the structure and meaning of the work is quite sophisticated. Great treatment of the assignment, Luke!" 93% - I was happy :)
More than the theme of the project, which is honest but somewhat aloof, it was the technical aspect of this short that actually made it stand out. This was the first school assignment that I ever shot on my Sony HDR-FX1 camera, which proved essential after my slow evolution from 8mm to Hi8 to D8 to MiniDV. I still feel that had I not pushed myself to use my other cameras to their full potentials, I wouldn't appreciate the wealth of options my newest camera still affords me. For surprising myself with the result, that alone, made the assignment a great experience.
My friend Tyler, a source of friendly competition throughout the semester, also made a video poem in Film 400 titled, Thoughts in Motion. It's tough to reminisce about the class without including him in the mix.
Alphabet (2006)
Directed by Luke Fandrich
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