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Tuesday, January 01, 2008

New year, new resolutions...

Well, 2008 finally put in an appearance. I was busy cleaning house and doing laundry so things would be up to my wife Megan's expectations as the year changed.
She has this... call it a "superstition", for lack of a better word... that if you start the new year with your house and body clean, it heralds a better year upcoming. I can't really say much about it one way or the other, since my state of cleanliness, the tidiness of my residence, whether I was awake or asleep, or drunk or sober (back in the days when I did such things) had, in my view, very little to do with the way that year turned out.
But, since we have a good attitude, and things look as though they're heading up {knock whatever}, I'll not dispute what she thinks.
I rarely do.
Cheers!
Al B.
Posted by AJL Bouchard at 10:28 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

Thursday, January 03, 2008

Serendipity and Creativity

 I have never been shy about crediting whatever percentage of my success in a particular endeavor is, in my view, due to serendipity... plain old luck, if your vocabulary is a bit constricted.
 Today, I was taking some state-mandated tests to get some additional education money, while wondering, in the back of my mind somewhere, what I was going to name my new (to me) car.
 Sidebar: Since before I was married, but much more so since then, I have had a practice of naming vehicles I owned. A 1952 Chevy BelAir I had when I lived in Colorado, because it was that particularly hideous shade of "toolbox green" that many early 50's cars were, and because it seemed a miracle to me if it started first crack out of the box, was "The Miraculous Green Machine", or "MGM" for short. My Uncle George's '72 LTD coupe, which I drove to Los Angeles and back in 1980, was "The White Shadow". A '79 Fairmont, also from my uncle, which resisted all attempts to send it to a junkyard, was "FrankenFairmont, The Car That Would Not Die".
 You get the idea.
 Anyway, I now own a late-model Dodge Neon, with the paint color described by Chrysler Corporation as "cranberry pearl metallic"... but which looks to both me and Megan to be more purple. Sort of "plummy", if you get my drift.
 We had been kicking around various names, without any real "click" that you get for the right one... until I got a sheet of scratch paper with this test, which the proctor said was to be used for scratch calculations, calculators not being permitted.
 On the reverse side of this sheet was the excerpt from a series of juvenile mysteries, the "Stephanie Plum" series, and the title of the book excerpted here, printed twice in large logotype, was this:
 PLUM LUCKY.
 Immediately, I took this as a sign of sorts, and tucked this sheet into my notebook to bring home. Megan and I agreed that this was indeed a fortuitous happening, and that we also agreed that this was a good name for the car.
 Serendipity.
 You can't beat it... so why try?
*
 In other news, the caucuses in Iowa are going on today, and the results will be broadcast in all the media outlets you can think of tomorrow. The speculation is that at least two, possibly up to four, "second-tier", underfunded campaigns will be out of the race for their party's nomination by the weekend. These candidates argue that they wouldn't be "second-tier" candidates if they got more coverage, but the media people retort that they'd get more coverage if they distinguished themselves more from the rest of the pack.
 Circular logic? Or just a vicious circle? You pick... I decline.
  Cheers!
 Al B.
Posted by AJL Bouchard at 9:30 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

By the way...

By the way, in case I didn't mention it before (and I don't think I did, or I wouldn't be mentioning it now...), you can email me comments on this blog at the link on the sidebar under the calendar, or use the following address:

madmanalblog@gmail.com

I do promise to read all the comments, and to respond where appropriate.

Cheers!

Al B.

Posted by AJL Bouchard at 9:33 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Ultimate Creativity...

As an example of the continuing subject of “Creativity”, let’s examine the most creative act most people I’ve encountered ever do in their lives.
That act is creating an identity for themselves.
Think about it… when someone is said to be “finding themselves”, aren’t they, in fact, creating themselves? They are making the image, the façade that they want to be accepted as. It may be The Jock, Good Girl, The Brain, Plain Jane, Mister Cool, Good Boy, Party Girl, or Disaffected Youth… it’s almost always a pose. The “real” person inside is usually wildly different from the exterior. (And I use the term “real” advisedly… the façade shares as much reality as the interior person.)
Upon reaching adulthood, usually defined by society as the end of your academic life, you are (or were, at the time I graduated) expected to select a career or a profession, stay with it, work your way up the “ladder of success” (a misnomer if ever I heard one), until you retire. Your identity becomes inextricably bound up with your job. Look at the men who spent their entire careers working for one of the automakers, for example… ask them who they are, and they tell you what they do. “I’m a die designer,” they say, or “I work on the line.” But it isn’t the sum total of their entire lives; it’s just something they did to make money.
When I was in the early years of elementary school, in the public and parochial school systems of the city I lived in, I was unconcerned about how people saw me. As I gather, most children of that age are. As I grew older, however, differences intruded upon my consciousness; I already knew how to read, and read well, before I started school. I was almost as blind as the proverbial bat, having been found to be highly nearsighted with astigmatism by the age of six, but refused to wear my glasses. I was overweight, because my grandmother, who was primarily responsible for raising me, equated “fat” with “happy” and “healthy”, probably harking back to her youth in northern Ontario, when skinny people were those who had no food.
The fact that I was labeled as “intelligent” didn’t much help, either. As you are probably aware, the young are especially intolerant of difference, rejecting and ostracizing those who did not share their attributes that were socially valued. I was unskilled at sports, not from a particularly affluent or prominent family, and not conversant with the social etiquette skills demanded by the group at large.
At the beginning of fifth grade, I was sent to a Catholic military boarding school in south central Wisconsin, run by the Congregatio Sancta Cruce, the Congregation of the Holy Cross, the same religious order that runs the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. This four-year stint (finishing the final two years in their new relocation at a former novitiate outside South Bend) provided its own challenges in formulating an identity.
When I finally began high school, at a Jesuit-run school on the South Side of Chicago, I was about as confused about my identity (or identities, if you will) as I’d ever been. The following year, because my mother and stepfather had relocated to Baltimore, Maryland in his never-ending search for steady work as a structural ironworker, I was enrolled in a high school run by the Order of Friars Minor, Conventual – known as Conventual Franciscans, or “Blackfriars”. This was the high school I graduated from three years later, at the ripe old age of seventeen and a half.
By the time most males graduate from high school, they’ve had quite a lot of experience at socializing with females of equivalent age. They’d been in school and in the neighborhood with them since early youth.
I, on the other hand, had been removed from a coeducational environment after fourth grade, and for the following eight years, was ensconced in single-sex education of a highly limiting kind. Add to that the fact that I was always the “new kid”, with no socially acceptable traits going for me, and many socially questionable ones apparent, and my desperation in trying to fit in, but not being able to, was quite understandable.
Being removed from this segregated existence, and thrust into a coeducational public university setting, was culture shock of the first water. It was a toss-up between women and alcohol, and, since I had precious little experience with women, alcohol won.
A friend of mine once said that when he was nineteen, he was drunk most of the time. “Everything,” he continued, “was either a blur… or a challenge.” I had less blur, with proportionately less challenge, than he did, but I was basically marking time.
It wasn’t until I got married that I feel I was really beginning to consciously remake the image I had of who I should be. I’m still in process with that, but I feel better about it than I did when my wife and I met almost twenty-five years ago.
If you ask me who I am, I’ll tell you “I’m Al Bouchard.” If you ask me what I do, I’ll tell you “I do lots of things… I write, I make movies, I do podcasting, I design web pages, I take care of my family, I try to participate more in my life.”
“But what do you do for a living?” often comes the question. I usually smile and say something like “Whatever pays me at the time. It changes from day to day.” More often than not, this produces an exasperated shake of the head, a good deal of mumbling sotto voce, and the quick retreat of the person who asked the question.
Hey, I’m sorry… I am who I am, I do what I do, and if you don’t like that, then there’s precious little I can do about it. Especially since I don’t plan to conform to your narrow little pigeonholes about life. And I can’t say “I’m sorry”, because I’m not.
Posted by AJL Bouchard at 7:26 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

Monday, January 14, 2008

Interlinking with the World At Large...

It probably wouldn't do much good to write these essays if I didn't expect them to be read.
I am linking, as selectively as I can, to other places on the Web, and hoping I get reciprocal linkages in turn.
As an example, here is a link in this blog to another blog:
The Blog of Peter John Ross
Peter John Ross, of Columbus, Ohio, a/k/a Sonnyboo Productions, is a filmmaker of note, having just released a feature, Horrors of War, toward the end of last year. It's a tale of World War II GI's battling against the Nazi zombies... not that hard a concept to get your mind around, once you get past the initial shock. (After all, zombies have been around since forever, it seems, and with the occult preoccupations Hitler had, it's not a stretch to think he might have authorized that sort of experimentation.)
This link goes to Sonnyboo.com, his movie information page:
Drink up
Here's another link:
ScriptNurse - Write Better, Right Now!
Don Bledsoe, the Head Nurse, is an experienced writer who helps anyone who needs it and finds their way to the site. I did, and I'm the better man - and better writer - for it.
Write Better - Right Now!
For now, I'll let you go... I've got some catching up to do with the [ugh] household chores.
Cheers!
Al B.
Posted by AJL Bouchard at 10:49 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

Friday, January 18, 2008

Visual Eyes...

Since this (talking about film/video/photography/other visual arts) is the purpose for which I started this blog, let's begin, shall we?

Starting from the beginning...

A spinning ball of hot material began to slowly cool, throwing off lighter elements as it slowed its spin... [Nope. Too far back.]

Let us assume, for the moment, that you've got a camera. You've read the manual, several times, and have shot enough with it to be comfortable with it.

You want to make a movie.

Okay, so now what? With a $100 camera from Big Buy, or whatever, you're not going to be shooting 2001: A Space Odyssey, or even 201: A Spaced Oddity. {Well, maybe... Aaah, not.}

You can, however, shoot something you can be proud of. "How so?" you may ask.

Simple. Follow the Five P's.

Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.

Yes, for those of you who were in the service, it's one of those little mnemonics they drill into you so you don't forget something critical, and screw up yourself and your buddies. That doesn't mean it has no value; on the contrary, it's an important part of your toolkit, as much so as C-47 Media Attachment Clips (wooden spring clothespins, to civilians) and Gaffer's Tape.

Preplanning has the value of preparing you for the unexpected... which, despite public relations puffery, happens all too often, and all too easily.

Now, to the stages of making a movie. There are four main stages, in order:

  1. PRE-PRODUCTION
  2. PRODUCTION
  3. POST-PRODUCTION
  4. DISTRIBUTION AND EXHIBITION

We'll discuss them in order, in the next four installments of the blog. For now, just remember this lesson from the collected wisdom of no-budget moviemakers:

"The camera doesn't lie... but watch out for the cameraman!"

Cheers!

Al B.

Posted by AJL Bouchard at 9:23 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Pre-Planning Your Pre-Production

All right, you're ready to begin.

You need a story. Since this would be your first attempt, a small story will do. (Remember, War and Peace this ain't.) Let's use, as an example, a simple story.

Geeky looking man walks up to pretty girl crying on a bus bench. He asks what's wrong, and she says her dog was stolen.

Geeky looking man ducks into nearby phone booth; with a flash of light, he becomes GeekyHero. GeekyHero dashes off at super speed to find the dog.

A disreputable-looking character sits nearby holding a dog. GeekyHero sails in, coldcocks the disreputable looking man, and takes the dog.

Back at the bus bench, GeekyHero hands the dog to the girl, expecting to be made much of for his heroics. She looks at him and says, "This isn't my dog."

GeekyHero faints.

See? That wasn't so hard... which is why I shot this one myself about thirty years ago. (The footage is still around here somewhere...)

I was going to say "for the moment, we won't bother with proper script format"; but if I do that, then you might get into bad habits that would take much more time and effort to break, and replace with the right ones. So we'll give you the right habits now.

Since I'm assuming you are impecunious student types, or maybe just cheap (like me), there are places where you can get free script formatting software. I'm putting in a partial list here; places like ScriptNurse Screenwriting Site , Celtx Production Software , Cinergy Script Editor , Page2Stage Screenwriting Software , and The DV Cafe - Free Downloads for Filmmakers  have downloads you can get. And if you Google® "screenwriting", you'll get an absolute overload of sites to search. (Great time wasters.)

So, once you have your script in proper format, you have to do what they call a "breakdown".

(And, no, you aren't having an impairment of mental function, nor are you having mechanical problems. This refers to listing all the cast and elements [costumes, props, locations, special effects, special make up, and the like] that you need to shoot this epic.)

This is an approximate breakdown of what you'd need:

  • Scene One - girl on bus bench crying.
  • Scene Two - Geek turns into GeekyHero, and runs off.
  • Scene Three - Disreputable-looking man has a dog; GeekyHero punches him out, takes dog.
  • Scene Four - GeekyHero hands dog to girl; she says "Not my dog"; he faints.

Cast Members: Girl, Geek, Disreputable Looking Man (DLM).

Costuming: GeekyHero Costume (in addition to regular clothing).

Props: Dog, Handkerchief/tissues (depending on the preference of the actress).

Locations: Bus Bench, Phone Booth, another location where DLM sits.

The next part of preproduction is figuring out how many pages of script are shot per scene. (This is a lot more important for a 120-page script than a 12-page one... )

If you have your script to the point where it's done, and you don't expect to make any more major changes, it becomes "locked". Any further changes are done on what are called "revision pages", which are printed on a different color paper and added to the copy of the script. Say Scene Four is on Page Four, and is revised to run onto a new page; the new page is not numbered Five, as you would expect, since the stuff that's already on Page Five stays there; the new page is Four-A. Additionally, if a scene is deleted, a notation with the scene number is put into the script to keep the scene numbers constant and consistent.

Confused yet?

Anyway, pages are measured in eighths. Half a page is not half a page, it's "four eighths". The script supervisor (if you have one) is supposed to keep tabs on how many scenes are shot, how many eighths each scene runs, how many takes were done, and which take the director thinks is a keeper.

By the way, you'll probably be doing this all on your own, since this is a simple project.

You need to find a location where you'll be shooting, cast the actors, which in this case might not be too difficult if you have enough friends, get the dog, costume, and camera, film, tripod (DON'T FORGET THE TRIPOD!) and batteries, and set up when you'll be doing it.

A few other things to consider, while we're talking about pre-production... Will you be paying your actors anything? Will you be feeding them? (Tip: If you're not paying them, feeding them is a really good idea; they might want to work with you again if you do.) Will you be supplying the transportation? (Do you really want to have three actors and the dog in your car with all your stuff? On the other hand, if you don't put them in your car, will they be able to get there?)

There are a lot of things to think about.

*

Well, we're now progressing to the Production phase; that's the next iteration of this blog. Until then, be happy... it could get worse.

Cheers!

Al B.

Posted by AJL Bouchard at 9:34 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

Monday, January 28, 2008

Results of Productions

Okay, then... Last time, you had your script, your cast, your breakdowns, your equipment setup, and your locations. With all this done, what's left but to stick your actors in front of the camera and shoot?

[Do I disillusion you now, or wait until later? Aaah, better you know now...]

There's a very old saying that goes, "There's many a slip / Twixt the cup and the lip"; the reason some of these sayings get to be very old is because they're very often true.

You could have planned everything to be shot in bright, sunny weather, and the forecast is for exactly what you want... but a rogue storm cell could dump rain all over your location during the entire time your actors are available.

You could be setting up to shoot, and a police cruiser could roll up, take a look, and ask for your permit. Which you don't have, since you didn't think you'd need one. Which you try to explain to the nice officer.

You could conceivably be making your "one phone call" from the local police station. Or, depending on the whims of the officer in question (and they can be quite whimsical, believe me), he could confiscate your equipment and issue you a citation to appear in court to show cause why you should get them back.

Your leading lady could be having her period. Your leading man could be dealing with a case of near-terminal acne. The dog could be suffering from worms, and dumping mounds of malodorous manure at the slightest provocation.

[My, didn't that roll trippingly off the tongue? Occasionally, I come up with some alliteration that astonishes even me.]

[And no, that isn't always hard.]

Now I don't bring up these nightmare scenarios to stop you from making a film; on the contrary, I just want to prepare you for situations that could happen, so you'll be prepared to deal with them as best you may.

For a short film like the one we've outlined in the previous instance of this conversation, chances are that none of the things I've described above will happen.

But they could.

But, for the moment, let us assume that everything goes superlatively well, and you've completed all your shots just as you planned them.

You feed, thank (and possibly pay) your actors, take your footage, and go home.

Onward to POST PRODUCTION... which is next time, unless I come up with some interesting sidelights about production to add first.

We'll see what develops.

Cheers!

Al B.

Posted by AJL Bouchard at 9:00 PM
Categories: The Main Blog

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Additional Production Credits By...

Okay, then, I may have rattled some of you with last entry's recountings of problems involved in production... especially with one as fast and short as what we had in the sample script.

Understand, things like that can and do happen... but there's no saying it will happen.

Now, on to some things I didn't discuss last time...

On a larger crew, the director (you) usually tells the cameraman (you) where to put the camera, and how he wants the action "framed"(positioned in the picture). The gaffer (you) rigs the lighting (sun) to best effect for the picture, helped by the key grip (you) and his chief assistant, the best boy (also you).

The sound recordist (you) places the boom operator (sometimes you) to get the best sound in the external microphone while keeping it out of frame. The assistant director (you) gets the actors to their marks for perhaps one, and maybe more, rehearsals, at the whim of the director. (A point to note: Some directors can be very whimsical; this is not necessarily a Good Thing.)

When all the technical side is prepared, the director will call "Camera," at which point the cameraman will start rolling. The sound recordist will report if they have sound, and the director will call "Action." The actors will go through the scene, and the director will call "Cut" when the scene is over. After checking with the technical side, to see if they have any objections, the director will either accept the take ("Print", coming from the old days of making a print of the good takes to show later) or reject it, and repeat the procedure above.

Sounds really dull, doesn't it?

Well, it can be... except when your nerves are on edge because you're doing an effects shot that is not repeatable. (You have two cantalopes to stand in for an actor's head being run over by a car tire; using the actual actor is not an option.)

For something as short as our sample script, it could probably be shot "in sequence"; that is, filmed in the order you see it on screen. For larger productions, with many locations, costume changes, and other logistical issues to consider, scheduling is usually done to shoot all scenes in a particular location at one time, then all scenes at another location... Tearing down a setup and moving it to another location can be time consuming, so the most efficient utilization of time and personnel is used. This is the job of the Production Department (usually you). There are shareware programs to help you; I use a few myself.

The theories behind lighting for mood and effect are something I'll go into another time, just as I'll explain (one of these days) camera angles, "Dutch tilts", and the 180 Degree Line, among other things.

For now, let's just take our footage, get back, and GET READY TO RRRRRUMBLE!!...

(Sorry.)

Cheers!

Al B.

Posted by AJL Bouchard at 10:14 PM
Categories: The Main Blog