you mum.

Xstacy.

I had to read and reread this article. It touched on so many facets concerning plagiarism, it was difficult for me with my ADD to stay on track. Furthermore, Letham uses countless authors of various sorts that I am incredibly fans of, as examples for his paper. I had absolutely no idea that William Burroughs and Bob Dylan sampled so much of their work from other authors/musicians. I hate hate hate plagiarism, but like Lethem says, "if this is plagiarism, give us more." Really, I feel like societies that don't protect intellectual property guidelines are just asking for mediocrity. I hate to say it, but almost noone wants to work hard for something if they will get no credit for it. That is just the way it is. If I wanted to compose a song, but as soon as I published it, someone could steal it and claim it as their own, I don't know if I would want to work as diligently on my music. There is nothing more heartbreaking than feeling cheated when it comes to your creativity. I've had people steal ideas of mine and claim them as their own. It freaking sucks. BUT, after reading this article, I could see a lot of Lethem's points. In a perfect/Utopian society we wouldn't need these rules. When we share information and technology, it helps our society grow. I found that quotation by Donne at the beginning of the article to be pretty profound. If we functioned harmoniously together where we shared information and didn't try to forbid the using of ideas and technology, then we would all be adding to this wonderful epic that is mankind and its output.
I wanted to add that I never knew the fundamental ideas of Surrealists until I read this article. That's pretty silly since Bunuel and Dali are two of my favorite artists. This article provides a lot of food for thought when it comes to the realm of sharing/plagiarizing/sampling. Whatever it really is.

On The Rights of the Molotov Man

I was impressed by the layout of this article. When I began to read Joy Garnett's perspective on her painting of the Molotov Man, I thought to myself "Man is this article one-sided or what." When I realized that Susan Meiselas would have an opportunity to rebut the Joy, I was pleasantly surprised. I think its interesting that this article is based off a discussion at NYU, between the two ladies. Its pretty funny that these women disagree so broadly, but their discussion was so even tempered. I think they would have been more livid with each other if they had been arguing the same issue. But they are debating two vastly different issues. Joy's argument is centered around her personal work with an image that she has no emotional ties to. Joy perceives the image of the Molotov Man as her own. She feels ownership with regards to the image because she stumbled upon it and emotionally detached from the picture by ignoring it for a small stretch of time. However, I feel like it would be hard to detach oneself from an image as powerful as the Molotov Man. Emotion is etched across his face. The utter power that is built up in his arm that will momentarily erupt is extremely captivating. There is no way that staring at this image for days upon days wouldn't make one feel attached to the picture. I feel closely connected to images that I am editing on Photoshop or images that I am painting. If I ever get success in the artworld for a particular piece that used found images, I think it is only fair to acknowledge the original artist. I know that the Molotov Man's struggle and the right to his image is his own, but let's be fair here. Sue Meiselas put in a lot of hard work to get that masterful shot. She had to be in Nicaragua during very volatile period and connect with the turbulence of the period in order to compose such a powerful photograph. It speaks very loudly. Joy Garnett should have credited the original photographer. At least she should have looked for the original photographer to give credit. Perhaps she was afraid that if she had the knowledge of who created the photo, she would lose her newfound "ownership" of the image. She seemed like she wanted the photo to have been unattached and floating in cyberspace. That would be nice, but with how connected the internet is, the truth will always come out. When I read Sue Garnett's rebuttle, I understood her connection to the image, but the debate should have been more focused on the ownership of art. She was making an emotional plea rather than an elegant argument regarding art.

Our ONE TAKE DAY

I think I have been reticent to post a blog on the One Take day because I have such mixed feelings about last Saturday! On one hand it was the best day ever. I love dancing. I love men. I love costumes. So when we decided that I would be dancing with multiple men wearing costumes, obviously I was thrilled. Unfortunately, our director got some "misinformation" about the length of shooting time. We only got to shoot for 35 seconds when we should have shot for 56. Plus, our footage was a little underexposed.

It was pretty scary when we were developing the film and it should have taken seconds to see exposed images. It was minutes before any recognizable image appeared. Blah! But when we finally projected the footage, I was pleasantly surprised. The dance sequence was awesome! Everyone really pulled together to make a fun Busby Berkley dance sequence. If we had minutes to shoot rather than seconds, I think it could have been mind-blowing. Actually, that would have been bad to have minds exploding all over the place. I guess Andre really does know what he's doing. But yeah, if everyone hadn't jumped right into putting on costumes and rehearsing, we couldn't have pulled it off.

I really liked how creative this project forced everyone to be. Also, the weather conditions spiced it up a bit. I already felt like I was developing Hypothermia from the first One Take, so when the Second One Take came around I was a little bit cooky. I think it shows in Daniel's team's footage. I "tiger strike" Landon and break a board on his bake. Thus fulfilling every female's dream of attacking a man viciously with a wooden object. Landon represented every man that has wronged me in my life. That is quite a load to bear. He handled it well.

I'm quite excited to see how people edit these and add music to them. Dustin and Charlie have taken on the responsibility of adding music to our One Take. I'm interested to see where they are going to take it. It would be awesome with a music montage, but I leave all creative decisions to them. Emily and I will most certainly help them at any point, if need be. She and I are brainstorming about soundtrack choices for our stop-motion animation. I love the footage. I really do. I think it turned out really really well. If I could afford to shoot completely on 8mm film, I would do it in a heartbeat. Its the most unique and beautiful film. What a shame people don't use it more. Actually, I probably wouldn't like it as much if more people did.

Overall, I must say that it was a treat to film with the Bolex. I don't know much about that camera except what the resulting footage looks like. I wish I could go back in time and extend our shooting time, but I did learn from my mistakes. I need to verify assignment information and realize that film can be unpredictable at times.
jozx

Ideas for Image Capturing.

Can we sketch images?
If so I would sketch some images and use a scanner to import them. Actually. I hate scanners to be honest. They take so long to import. I'm stressed about the timing of the 48 hour project as is. I'm going to be juggling the organization of the Cheese Sandwich Film Festival and trying to complete my 48 hour film. I hope it turns out masterful. I've been brainstorming on alternative ways to import and create images for film. Last year at the end of semester screening in December at Jengo's I saw some pretty cool ideas. The video from the cell phone was pretty creative. Well, maybe not creative, but ingenious because it saves time and energy. I'm thinking that I'm going to use my Canon Hi-Res still camera and shoot on continuous mode. Emily used this camera for her Rhythmic Editing project. I think the tonality and quality of the shots were pretty superb. As for the content - not so much.
During the screening last December, I was trying to think of alternative ways to capture images. Its kind of a tricky assignment since we are not supposed to use traditional cameras. I'm not sure what else I could use. I know somebody is going to use a method to capture images that is going to make me entirely jealous of their ingenuity. I was wondering if we could use found footage. I think that would be awesome to layer found footage and audio for my project. The overall project would feel more polished if I could do that and then import images from photoshop. I really like that idea actually. If I knew the feel of my project then I could begin to make some audio for it, but I haven't a clue. It all depends on the damn mystery object. If its a knife I'll make a dark theme song and if its a butterfly I'll make a happier song. It's all really in the air right now.
I was thinking that I could record off the television and use footage from broadcasts and the cooking channels. I'll have to get on food network's programming site and see if they are going to have any cheese sandwich episodes in the near future. That would be fantastic timing.
Its great that we are getting to exhibit our films at CSFF. The whole assignment is about community involvement in film and alternative modes of exhibition. What could be better than a music and film microfilm festival set here in our very backyard. Enough self promotion.
While I was sitting here at working thinking about my 48 hour project a thought came to mind. It would be incredible to print thousands of tiny images onto paper and do magazine transfer style onto film and then project that. Then I would use a continuous camera to shoot the projection of the film and cut it up and edit the projected film. I would do it if I didn't have conflicting time issues. I think it would play out really well with music. I could pause it and speed it up at different points.
It could also be cool to use found footage animation to make my 48 hour project. I wish I knew how to capture video off the internet. I think I'm the only person in film studies that doesn't. I'm not technically savvy. Blah. When I find out what the mystery object is, I'll have a better idea of how I want to tackle this project. Also, my time issues, like i said will play a big part in determining how my project comes together. tatta.