Forty eight hundred feet's worth of tiny pictures!

Well folks, seems all that hard work paid off - all 4800 feet of the film came back just fine and dandy.

Fuji 160T

Delivered in boxes that suspiciously look like they should be housing pizza, the negative smells of that old, familiar celluloid. I rediscover how much I miss having a hard copy of the things I shoot. A mishandled SD or Red card can mean you've lost your day. But, I suppose the downside is, I'll be hauling this processed footage around for the rest of my days. 

It was recently delivered to one of my two editors - who will sync up the sound and produce the assembly cut of the film. I only skimmed the footage when it came back to me - so I really look forward to seeing it in some sort of order and with sound. It will then be delivered to my second editor, who will take it through to fine cut.

Kodak 500T

Seeing 16mm footage makes me just feel warm and fuzzy on the inside. After a couple years of seeing rushes from the Red Scarlett and Epic, I just sink in to the grain, and the softness of the image. It's the bean bag chair of cinema mediums. I shot the film on four stocks, mostly because I could, and just seeing how those four stocks reacted to colour... it just makes me love the medium (even more!). I was having major buyers remorse in the time between when the film left Seattle and arrived here. The process and transfer costs ran almost twice what I had budgeted - which amounts to a lot of money. But seeing what we accomplished on celluloid was definitely reward enough, even for a mountain of money that I don't have.

Over the past couple weeks, I have plunged head first into the world of stop-motion animation. Part of me is absolutely falling in love with the process (which will make falling out of love when I go to actually do it all the more... explosive) and the other part of me is feeling completely refreshed at just this new body of names, history, and knowledge. Maybe it's because I've spend six years in film school and I'm tired of those same old names popping up - but it's nice to not sigh and say 'ugh, not him again'. I've been reading through an absolutely incredible book called The Advanced Art of Stop-Motion Animation by Ken A. Priebe, and have another little pile of books to leaf through after that. Going through stop-motion's history is a weird combination of technological track backs, cultural history, and the ebb and flow of the film industry itself. I'm absolutely revelling in it - and it's nice to be interested in a topic I'm actually doing in school. But I guess it's a topic I picked... and I'm basically paying to research things on my own time... but shh.

Kodak 250D

I've got a pile of things prepared for next week when I go to put the puppet of Tinder together. I keep thinking its going to be a breeze, but deep down, I know it's going to be a bit of a fight. I keep wanting to set aside my studying this week to do some sculpting and sewing, but that tiny part of my brain that is actually responsible keeps pulling me back in front of my textbooks, even if the rest of me is sort of completely unenthused.

All mixed in with this, I've been piecing together little press kits about my last two digital short films, 'My Favourite Things' and 'A Spoonful of Sugar'. I'm continuing to feel out the festival distribution routes, and these two films are sort of providing me with two different kinds of guinea pigs to see what's up. 'My Favourite Things' is now online and available for viewing on Vimeo.

Rest assured, I have like... three other blog posts started about a bunch of futile feelings I have concerning a lot of large-question, not-a-lot-of-answer problems that I seem to be painfully mulling over these days. I picked up a book earlier this month thinking it was about how wonderful whales are, but it ended up being more about the horrors of the whaling industry - which all week has spun me in that familiar arc of that frustrating environmentalist loop. I've also been experiencing something I'm sure there's a term for, but can't quite put my finger on it - it's a large-and-in-charge disappointment with popular culture. I guarantee that's going to be a rambling post you can all look forward to.

Fuji 64D

So, back to 'My Old Flame', that working title that's starting to stick - thank you - again - to my cast, my crew, my family, proofreaders, location volunteers, supporters, rental houses, believers(?). We had a great shoot, I can now definitively say since there are pictures on the celluloid for sure. Now the next steps can finally start, we can start tentatively jogging to the finish line somewhere in the distance. A screening location will soon be secured - and rest assured I will bother you all about being there from now until May 2014. So prepare yourselves for that.

And I listen to the irritating fireworks that go off every three minutes here in East Van, I am wishing you all a safe and happy Halloween!

Things to look at:

I started a Facebook page for my film 'company' - become a fan! See some things! (Also, tweet? Tumblr?)

Joel's film 'Buttfuck Nowhere' is on the NSI!
Check out Girls with Swords and the Kickstarter that launched
Feminist Frequency - be sure to check out the Tropes vs Women series they've got
And if you want more rage, check out Not in the Kitchen Anymore

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
I'm really excited about Hyper Light Drifter

Remember, everybody's got a thing

Salutations, autumnal breeze.

And by autumnal breeze, I mean raindrops both large and cold.

“The thing is you have to fight the whole time. You can’t stop. Otherwise you just end up somewhere, bobbing in the middle of a life you never wanted.”

—	Alexander Maksik, You Deserve Nothing

While I sit patiently waiting for my film to return to me from it's trip to Seattle, I would like to talk briefly about all of these 'Generation Y' articles that seem to go through fits and spurts of straight up bothering me on all social media fronts. Even last year they lured me in with their apathetic temptations. Every time I read one of these (or, pretty much any article from the Thought Catalog) I feel conflicted. The internal conversation always went something like, 'sure, sure yeah, I can sort of relate, I guess,' followed by an uncomfortable silence in which I would try to figure out why this article even mattered. Why I felt so troubled about these articles wasn't ever inherently clear to me - they were just frustrating to read. Generalizing problems through such vague and blanketing terms, their fates seemed similar to that of the astrology column of your local newspaper. Bitching about being a twenty-something now seems to be the 'it' thing to do. Not offering up any solutions, nor questions that we can work towards an answer. Everyone says we're lost, doing not enough of one thing (sex/drugs/rock and roll), not enough of another (sex/drugs/rock and roll). 

I would like to offer you this counter article in Contenders Magazine written by the affable Alex Caulfield: 100 Things that Prove You're an Asshole - seek out the original article if you wish, but I did, and I was faced with immediate regret.

I'm finding articles on the internet more and more irrelevant and frivolous as ever. A lot of things circulated around the blogosphere are just plain irresponsible. And there's just so much of it. I can't take much at face value because the internet is full of trolls and hoaxes.

The problem with a lot of these Gen-Y/nutburger articles is trying to pin blame on things.  And then, while my eyes are open to all that blame-slinging, I see so much more! When I was home in August, I had my two time-a-year access to satellite TV, and the 24 hour news cycle (and Guy Fieri marathons, who are we even kidding). All I was able to see on the news is people trying to blame things on other people. Yes, so this happened - who can we blame? Some parents in the United States are still trying to get John Green's books banned - let's blame a young adult fiction writer for exposing things to our children that we haven't been able to explain to them because there is no way the real world will ever effect them in any way. Your kid fell off a jungle gym - the obvious solution is, apparently, to label the playground as 'dangerous' and berate whoever is in charge to dismantle it or you'll sue. So your kids aren't getting good grades in high school - obviously, the solution is to blame the teacher's ineptitude while your kid learns nothing of value, not from school, and not from you. The winner these days is never the good guy, it's whoever gets away scott-free. It seems that the one who slings the most slander becomes saintly.

And becoming aware of this common string - I am rather aware now of how I utilize blame in my own day-to-day activities. It takes a lot to change your own perspective in life, a lot of the time it's easier to remain the same, remain ignorant, remain blind. The more positively-inclined teachers at my high school made it abundantly clear to me back in the day, that change begins with one person. This meant something to me when I was in my teens (it mostly had to do with recycling), but it means something slightly different to me now. 'Be the change you want to see' is this rope I hang onto above a deep, dark pool of all of the big, unfortunate problems that plague humanity. If you look down for too long, it gets really depressing. I mean, those are some large-and-in-charge problems. But that rope is what you've got. So, hand over hand, you've got to climb. At a certain point, you resign to the fact you'll be climbing for the rest of your days, so you climb. My climb begins - on an infinitesimal scale - I'm weirded out with people not making any eye contact in my neighbourhood. So I've started making eye contact with like... everyone. Whether it's little things, big things, or everything, take it and do your best to fix it, even if no body else is giving it a try.

Okay, and here's one more thing, here's a new pet peeve I have. In fact, it's become a big, snarling pet peeve. It might have something to do with that big, dark pool previously stated. See, for a long time, I haven't known what I wanted in the short to long term. In the past two or three years, I've been figuring those things out. It's sort of like feeling your way across a snow-crusted glacier. That shit's scary. But if you survive, you learn, and off you go to another glacier. I've been figuring out what I value, what I need to get to where I've got to go. While I was figuring those things out - it was common place to sort of get stepped on. After getting stepped on one too many times, however, that lesson's been (finally) learned. And upon presenting someone new with a list of things that are, to me, common sense - I was met with abject back-pedalling. The first time I was able to call someone out, they tried to weasel out of it by saying I was wrong. Naturally, I was hurt, but the hurt was so temporary. Because I knew I was in the right. It was so magnificently empowering - hell, I might just need to do if more often.

Respect isn't even something to be earned, it's something you've got to demand. Sometimes you literally have to shake it out of other people, or leave them behind. I don't even know.

Here's to a self-imposed ban on letting people walk all over me.

Anyways.

My film was shipped last Monday. I await for it's return, and with it, all sorts of truths. When it comes back, that box will be either filled with a great deal of worth, or none at all. It's driving me bananas. Bananas, I say!

It's been a weird month back in Vancouver. I feel I'm behind in all aspects of things. Really feeling the rain, and we've only gotten a toe into fall.

Is there strength in solitude? Perhaps.

Probably old news, but you all should probably read Markus Zusak's The Book Thief.

Oh, and the photos in this post are ones I took in August in Canmore - trying out Lomography's colour 800 speed 35mm still film. So good, so vibrant, very versatile. I pretty much just love Lomography. So. There.

Happy rain, everyone!

Things to look at!

I've got to recommend the Netflix original series Orange is the New Black
Jaeger Designer - I don't even care, this was a fun ten minutes of my life
Dating Tips for the Feminist Man - a good read for everyone, regardless of gender or sexuality
Canadian Frame(lines) is raising money for yet another project of super-ambition!
VIFF is in town! The most wonderful time of the year, second only to Christmas!
And while at VIFF, I saw Jessica Oreck's new documentary Aatsinki - she's a very cool lady who does very cool projects (like this one) - there is also a super interactive website they've done up called The Aatsinki Season
Be sure to check out Plastic, a short film by Sandy Widyanata about body image