Boho Days

It’s here, yes oh yes. That beautiful and glorious thing we call summer.

The end of my semester was pretty hectic, which is why I haven’t posted in a while. For that, I would usually say “I’m sorry” but I’m honestly not. I’ve been busy, get over it.

So I had a few finals, they went well. And, for you “over worked” highschoolers reading this, let me tell you something…you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Wait till you get here. Your professors aren’t gonna give you cute little handouts telling you what’s gonna be on your final exam, oh no no no. He or She will just say “Our exam is cumulative and it covers every chapter we’ve gone over this semester. Good Luck!” Then you’re on your own. It’s tomfoolery I say. Tomfoolery indeed. BUT…I did pretty well and ended up with like a 3.4 or something for this semester. Not bad for a lazy clown like me.

rev·o·lu·tion /ˌrɛvəˈluʃən/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[rev-uh-loo-shuhn] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation –noun

For the 15 or so years that I have been in an educational setting, from pre-school to elementary to highschool to now, there have been very few moments when the way I thought about education changed. It’s always been a place where you go and sit in a classroom, listen to information, absorb it, and move on while trying not to expunge this mass of talk and text from our minds.
Well, my friends, very recently there has been change in the way I think of my education. To an even further point, I can say that I have been reinvigorated in my faith as it pertains to the way conventional “teach and talk” is coming obsolete.

For the past year, I have been involved in an immersive experience involving film and cinematic production. What was unique, even in the very beginning, was that this film program wasn’t run out of the TCOM department which would be the most likely, but it was built and done through the theatre department in conjuction with the Center for Media Design (CMD) and the Institute for Digital Entertainment and Education (IDEE). This was to get away from any standing convention on how this new film immersion was to be done. The next unique factor about this program was…there weren’t any classes involved. There were set schedules ofcourse, but no textbooks, no tests, no exams. It was indeed a true immersion experience. We were taught the basics of storytelling via several intense week-long workshops with our friend and IDEE fellow/advisor Bruce Economou. We were taught camera techniques in another weeklong workshop. We were taught principles of lighting by industry professional Elijah Dotson (BSU Alum). I myself was even sent down to Atlanta to become certified in Final Cut Pro (a high-end editing software), paid for by the DEOP program. With my certification status, I taught the rest of my peers the basics of video-editing and became known as the “resident advisor” on editing and Final Cut Pro. With these skills, we were set loose in our studio, with a little nudge here and there, to create product that is entertaining and hopefully commercially viable (the second objective was merely a pleasantry that we hoped for…). What came out of that semester was a media hit team. A group of artists that were given the tools, given the training, and asked to simply create. Create we did. To date we have made over 45 seperate video assets. Some with professional production companies such as Road Pictures, or Mediasauce. Some were picked up by companies’ websites as online video assets (click link, then “enter flash site”, then go to video player in bottom-left corner os screen; “Ball State short film project”). I myself worked closely with director Joel Umbaugh during the filming of our piece entitled “Diaries of a Meter Maid”, and learned much. One group of us DEOPers made films that will be seen by Hollywood agents. Others of us were contracted by bands that are signed or currently in the process of signing, to make music videos for their new label and contract (I am speaking of a band called Virgin Millionares…check’em out). Some are already in the process of making films for next years Student Academy Awards. Others have already won major awards such as a Regional ADDY.

The year’s been a wild ride. Full of ups and downs. Crazy and hectic at times, much like the real world. I have gained more from this year of immersion than the rest of my college career combined. I believe the immersion experiences here at BSU are a direct contribution to the integrity of BSU’s new slogan; Education Redefined.

In the coming months there are going to be great changes in my future, and they are due in great part to my experiences that I’ve had this year at Ball State. I can’t speak with any certainty what exactly they will be, but they are life-altering.

More to come, much more.

Below are pictures from one of our group meetings.  As you can tell, we’re one big happy family.

I am currently working as cinematographer and assistant director on the short film entitled “Proved”. It’s a heightened action movie about a man who comes upon a piece of evidence that proves whether or not God exists…and he must get it to the right people before the wrong people find him. This next part is an inside look at what happens on set.

My eyes open. The morning beams poke feebly in through my curtains, and I can tell it’s still too early for anyone else to be stirring. My gaze drifts over to my cell phone. It’s still 15 minutes till my alarm is set to go off. I shrug off the thought of laying back down and ease myself out of bed. The thoughts are already starting to buzz around…I’m preparing myself for the long day ahead of me. I am a cinematographer and a producer on a film, and this is the typical day of filming for me. This is what I live for.

6:30 am

I arrive at our shooting location for the day, St. Mary’s Church, along with the executive producer (James Roberts) and the director (Josh Carroll) of the short film entitled “Proved”. This is our 11th day of shooting and we are already running behind schedule. “So much to do…so much to do”. We look at the director’s notebook that contain the storyboards, and we walk through all the different shots that need to be accomplished that day. We do this so that when the actors get here things can move as quickly as possible.

8:00 am

By this time I have allotted various tasks to our Production Assistants (PA’s) and my Assistant Director of Photography (ADP), such as setting up cameras, lights, sound equipment, etc., so that I can sit down with the director and talk about what we want the “look” and “feel” of the different shots to be. I sip my coffee, wondering what creative discoveries will be made in today’s process.

9:00-12:00pm

The actors have arrived and they get in wardobe and get their make-up taken care of. We walk through the motions of the first shots, while I concentrate on the different camera movements that I’ll be executing. From here, we move quickly and efficiently. The past 11 days of shooting have given the crew and myself a feel for how we each work as a cohesive unit. This makes today’s shooting go as smoothe as ever. We breeze through the first half of the day, and break for lunch.

1:00-8:00

During this part of the day, we tackle some of the more difficult shots. These include all the shots with the dolly (a cart-like vehicle that is pushed along a track to create smooth camera movements), and all the shots with the steadi-cam (a device that mounts the camera directly to the operators body, allowing for fluid movement that would normally have to rely on hand held operation). The shots on this particular day are intricate in detail and must be very precise. It can be taxing sometimes to have to do a shot 14 different times to get it right, but in the end it’s worth it.

8:15-9:00
Dinner

9:00-11:00
We film the last scenes of the day and send the talent home. We stay and clean up while conversing about the days events.

11:00-1:00am
We review the footage from the day, looking through for anything that didn’t work, anything that worked extremely well, or anything that needs to be re-shot. We are happy with today’s work, and with that thought we retire to our own beds for a couple of hours, thinking about what discoveries will be made tomorrow, and what darkness we will light and be compelled to explore.

Me on the right, setting up a complex dolly shot with director Josh Carroll.

Hey All. Here’s a short piece that I just produced (with Bobby Richards) for a sketch comedy show that we’ll be putting on in April. THe comedy troupe is called FUNTIME. It’ll be a live sketch show with various pre-recorded segments intermingled within the performances. Here’s a sneak peek…

Just click on the link to view.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=xpvzvqZZREg

Me being featured in this year’s annual BSU President’s report.  I am pictured here with my lover…

Click on the picture to take a look at the actual report.

So…I have just decided that I am staying here over the summer to take classes and to be involved in numerous film projects. I’m gonna try and knock out about 9 credit hours over the summer.  Also  I JUST SIGNED MY LEASE FOR A NEW APARTMENT…which is going to be a grand and glorious transtition form living in the dorms.

Let me talk a little about the dorm life.  It’s not or everybody.  In fact, it’s starting to turn out to be a pain in my ass.  I am so incredibly busy and most of the activities I’m apart of take place off campus…so transportation is always a problem because there isn’t suitable parking in any of the residence halls (when I say there’s no suitable parking…I mean that if you park at the dorms, it seems like you always end up with a $60 ticket or you get towed).  When I move into my new apartment, I have my own garage and I can park there whenever I want to.  NO MORE FREAKIN’ TICKETS!  I swear that’s where most of BSU’s money comes from…parking tickets.  They hand’em out left and right, without a care in the world.  I wonder if the parking service emplyees ever think about the pain they’re causing when they lay a ticket on someone’s windsheild.  The absolute MADNESS that ensues when someone sees a ticket on their windsheild.  I wonder if they know that it changes that particular persons mental state to insanity.  AHHHHHHH.

You can tell I have vast experience in this area.

Another thing that I extremely dislike about the dorms is that unless you live in Noyer or LaFollete, you have to walk across campus just to get food.  And even when you do, you have to do it between certain hours or else you can’t use your meal card.  In my aprtment…I can eat whenver I want.

Moving on to more important things, we are about 2/3’s of the way through filming the short film entitled “Proved”.  I’ll have screenshots and more info soon.

Have a happy Spring Break…going to Myrtle Beach…have fun in Muncie if you’re staying…sorry if that’s you…

From here, we move into full production phase. Right now, I’ve got about 5 film projects lined up. (barring the recent blizzard here doesn’t impede them anymore than they already have.)
The first is going to be produced for the Letterman scholarship (hopefully). The Letterman Scholarship is a $10,000 endowment given by Letterman himself to assist students in the TCOM department at Ball State each year. I’m acting in it, so I won’t see any of that money…but acting is about the glory! Not the money! (propoganda…) It also feels pretty good to get back into acting, since for the last year I’ve done nothing but “behind the scenes” work. It’s funny, because I actually came to Ball State as a Musical Theatre major…and now it feels like I’m “coming back home”. Hokey?  Yes.  We wrapped on that project already, and its in the post-production phase.

The next is a trailer for the mainstage production of “The Colored museum”, being produced here at Ball State on the University Theatre stage.  I shot that last week and edited it for the past couple of days.  Click on the link below to view it.  The play “The Colored Museum” opens tomorrow and runs for two weekends.

http://rjrichards.iweb.bsu.edu/coloredmuseum/

Next, we move on to a movie that’s being shot for the theatre departments L.A. showcase. I acted as cinematographer for this piece, and was pretty excited to get the chance to take on this difficult job at the ripe age of sophomore…this is usually a job left to upperclassmen.  We shoot that this coming weekend, so I’ll hopefully have a full account on that soon.

I started my TCOM writing classes this week.  I have to go through TCOM 206, 207,and 208 (Copywriting, Screenwriting, Newswriting) as part of my pre-TCOM core classes.  So far they haven’t been too bad.  I can’t wait till we start in on script writing, ’cause that’s what I’ve been concentrating on for about a semester now, so I should be pretty far ahead of the game.

I also start pre-production for my personal film next week. It’s a dark comedy about a documentary film-maker that becomes so obsessed with his subject and blinded by ambition, that he ends up killing his subject to make it look like a suicide.  Again…a dark comedy…I’m not twisted…just dark. Fine line maybe, but don’t judge.

More to come…especially if I can’t dig my self out of this snow.

Brilliance.

This semester is full immersion for me. Nothing but film (except two of those pesky core classes).

This semester is also based on product, not on grades.

Let’s do a game of catch-up. My semester started off full-throttle. As soon as I got back I had to prepare to be a part of a presentation that the Institute for Digital Entertainment was giving for President Gora and the Provost. The presentation was on the new digital institutions within the Center for Media Design (where I work). This presentation included (but was not limited to) the work that was being done by the Digital Entertainment Option Pilot (DEOP; the immersive study program I’m in all this year) all last semester, as well as projections for the work that we’ll do this semester.

As part of this presentation, we had some business fellows fly in from L.A. to work us through some workshops, as well as give us their interpretations on where the film industry was going, and to give us an idea on the niches that college-aged students and graduates would fill in this rapidly changing environment. Jay Williams (Former VP form Disney), and Shawn Stoner, who are both BSU alums, were among two of the three business fellows that came in to give first hand accounts on the film industry. The third was Pine River Entertainment’s CEO Bruce Economou.

To fully take advantage of this immersion opportunity, all 14 of my fellow DEOPers and I pitched a screenplay to these industry big-wigs and got feedback on our scripts, and our ability to “sell an idea”. In Hollywood, being able to sell your idea to a producer is sometimes more important than your screenplay itself. Afterall, making them want to read your script is the hardest part. A fruitful experience.

More in the weeks to come…much more.

So…

Wow-whoa-we-whoa. This semester has started off with a bang. I’ve only been back for a couple weeks, but it already seems like I’ve got my whole year planned. First off, Christmas break was a well-deserved break. Ate a lot, rested a lot…but after about a week I was ready to come back up to BSU and start my semester off.

I have already started with sooo many projects it’s been rediculous. But first, let’s look back really quickly on last semester.

For those of you that need a refresher, I’m in an immersive film program called the Digital Entertainment Option Pilot (DEOP). Here’s a short video telling about the DEOP and some things that went on last semester. Please take some time to take a peek!

DEOP STORY
http://web.mac.com/rodgerwsmith1/iWeb/IDEE/DEOP.html

THE MAKING OF DIARIES OF A METER MAID; click on link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgblZQ7KJGE
So, it’s been a while since my last post and I want to supremely apologize to any readers that have been checking back on a frequent basis. I will make no excuses.

However, I will tell about the last couple of weeks of my semester and how they ended up being.

So…as you may know I’ve been working on a project called “Diaries of a Meter Maid”, which was supposed to be a short webisode to be premiered in January. A few things have changed on that. For one, editing it by myself has been…, um, a lot of fun? The independent director of the piece, Joel Umbaugh, has been very supportive of me doing it by myself and has given a lot of guidance in that matter, which is something cool that has come out of this immersive experience. I think of Joel not as a superior, but as a friend and kind of a mentor. It’s cool to work with a professional that has a passion about the same things as you do. And, as with the rest of the semester, I have been learning by doing, not by hearing or being taught what to do when the time comes. That has been an invaluable experience.

Another thing that has changed is the deadline for the piece was pushed up. Instead of having to have it done by the beginning of Christmas break, I was allowed to finish it and add final touches over the course of the break, which made all the difference in the world.

I’m going to wrap this up now, but I’ll leave you with one final thought on my immersion for this semester. It has been irreplacable as far as the educational experience goes. I can’t tell you how much I have benefited from these past 6 or so months. Working for independant production companies, creating content for advertising firms and small businesses, having workshops conducted by industry professionals, and having the pressures of the real world and marketplace on my shoulders (all through funding by grants and Ball State University itself), really forced me to push myself further than I ever thought possible. I am extremely excited about spring semester and I can’t wait to fill you in on all the juicy details.