The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Today was another day at home because I’m sick, which meant another day of boredom. While I was watching TV, I noticed that the movie The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was on. I’ve heard a lot of great things about the movie, and decided that I’d watch it. For those of you who haven’t heard about the movie, it’s about the life of a man who’s aging backwards. At the beginning of the movie he looks like an old man, and at the end he looks like a baby. He leads a very interesting life because of his peculiar condition; as all his friends and family watch him get younger as they grow old.

This was a really amazing movie. It was really long (about 3 hours) but I enjoyed every minute. While it was a very captivating story for me, my favourite thing about the movie was the use of CGI and make-up. Because Benjamin is getting younger, it is necessary for these technologies to be used to create the image of Benjamin at different ages. For example, this technology is used to make Brad Pitt (who plays Benjamin) look like an 85 year old man at the beginning and a 20 year old near the ending, and all the ages in between. I decided to write a blog about this because it excites me about how advanced technology in the film industry has become. It’s truly remarkable how realistic it looks that Brad Pitt is all of these ages (at different parts of the movie). It’s awesome seeing movies like these which really put the latest technology to use; I really hope that one day I’ll be able to work with this kind of technology to make movies!

Sick days, the pro video and O Canada

So for the last couple days I’ve been sick, and it really messed up my plans for this week. I missed the opportunity that I had mentioned before, to film and edit a professional video. The guy came in to film on Tuesday, but I was feeling so sick that there was no way I could come to school. In the end, some friends in my class filled in for me and made the video. Even though I couldn’t be a part of it, I was happy that at least someone got the chance to work it and had that experience. I still wish that I could have been there but I’m sure some other opportunity will arise for me in the future.

On Wednesday I decided to go to school, even though I wasn’t feeling much better. I didn’t want to fall too far behind in school, but what I really needed to go for was to film the O Canada video that I spoke about in a previous blog. My friend was counting on me to film this after school for him, so I didn’t want to let him down. However as the day progressed I began to feel more and more sick. I tried to find a replacement to film but no one was available.

Even though I was sick, filming O Canada was pretty great. As I said in my previous blog, I was really excited to help create this homage to one of my favourite Smosh videos. I was only there for the filming of the playground scenes (see original video), so needless to say I haven’t seen the other shots. I’m not exactly sure how the director intends for the final product to look, but I can’t wait to see it on this week’s DYTV.

O Canada Video

Today I found out that I actually am going to help out with the next episode of DYTV. One of my friends is in the 1-credit class, and he is in charge of making a video for O Canada! He decided that he’s going to have his band play the song, and he needs someone to film it, so he asked me. The way he wants to make the video is pretty cool.

In my 12th blog, I mention “Smosh” a group on YouTube that my friends and I are big fans of. About a year ago, they created a video called “Sex Ed. Rocks”; they teamed up with the rock band I Set My Friends On Fire, to make a screamo/comedic song about sexual education. In the actual video they are performing in a playground and playing on fake guitars. My friend really likes this video and wants to copy their idea. So he’s going to get myself and probably another person to help them model their performance after the Smosh video.

I’m really excited to help make this video; Sex Ed. Rocks is one of my favourite Smosh sketches. I think this video will take a lot of work but I’m willing to take the time. Smosh is a pretty popular group so I think that a lot of people will get the reference and it’ll be a really good video.

For future episodes

Even though we won’t be doing an episode for a while, I just wanted to list some of the things that I am hoping for next time. One thing that I would like to change is the jobs. I know some people got different jobs than our first episode, but I didn’t. I had to do Upcoming Events both times. I want to be able to try different segments so I can get more experience. I also want to be a little bit more organized, as I was saying in my previous blog, people were taking too long to finish their segments (including me), and that led to us being behind schedule. On Thursday after school we were supposed to have a rehearsal but not many people showed up, that’s another thing that definitely has to change, we were lucky that the show turned out so well this week, but as we’ve seen in the past, it’s not always like that. We need to have proper rehearsals so that we can produce the best possible outcome.

I think these problems come from the fact that we have such a small class, which leads me to another thing I would like to change. The last 2 episodes were literally put together by 8 people. This is the reason why it took more time to make and why we were behind schedule. Even though we had a really good episode on Friday, I can only imagine how much better the episode could have been if we had a larger crew. I think we should be working with the other classes for the episodes instead of dividing us into different ones. I think that if we all work together we can get a higher quality program in less time.

The second episode

On Thursday, we were supposed to have an episode rehearsal after school. However these plans fell through for many reasons. A lot of people, including me, were still touching up their segment, some people were sick, some had to leave early, and some didn’t even show up. Those of us who were at the rehearsal were pretty nervous about the episode, and because we didn’t rehearse, we knew it was crucial to rehearse early in the morning before school.

Everyone arrived around 6:45…everyone but one of the two people that was a host for the episode. After waiting until 7:15 for him to show up, we called him, and he explained that he was very sick and that he won’t be able to make it to school. This was a huge problem as we now needed to find a new co-host, and very quickly so that we would be able to rehearse before the episode. After finding someone to fill in, we had a very short run through which finished only five minutes before we had to broadcast live to the school.

We aired the episode, and to my surprise, it ran very smoothly. There were almost no technical difficulties, and all of the segments were done very well. Most importantly, our hosts did a very good job, even though one of them was only given the job half an hour before! It was a much better episode than our previous one, and therefore it was a great success.

Later in the day, I actually heard a few people talking about the episode and saying that it was really good, so I was pretty pleased. Unfortunately, my class won’t be doing another episode for a while as the two one-credit classes will be responsible for the next two episodes.

My segment

On Wednesday morning I had to get straight to work. During first period I went downstairs to the Chapel with a friend so that we could film my Chaplain talking about the peace vigil. He spoke really well and I was happy with everything he said, however I found that he spoke for too long, this was not supposed to be a very long segment. Nevertheless, I knew that I could just edit some things and cut out some of what he said; it wouldn’t be very noticeable because I was planning to have b-roll over his voice. The period was finished by the time I had filmed everything and transferred it to the computer, so I ended up going to comm. tech after school to continue editing. I asked my teacher for the footage of last year’s peace vigil, and he had informed me that he was unsure of its location, let alone if he even had it anymore. This threw a monkey wrench in my whole plan! If I didn’t have b-roll, I wouldn’t have anything to show over the talking, and if I just showed the talking, it would be a very boring segment! I decided to start finding pictures on “Flickr” that I could show in the segment, in the hopes that it would make it look better.

After a lot of work on the segment, I was still pretty unhappy. Everyone in the class knew it wasn’t really my fault, and said it looked pretty good considering the circumstances, but still I was disappointed. I mean, I knew I had made it look better than it initially was, but I wished that I had more time to work on it. I was pretty uneasy about what the rest of the school would think on Friday. But now there was no more time to worry about my own segment, it was time to think about the episode as a whole.

Planning for the second episode

Last Thursday, I found out that my class was going to start working on our second episode. I was pretty excited about the whole thing, because I was eager to produce a much better episode than we had last time. On Friday I realized that no one had assigned me a job, so after asking people in the class, they designated me to do a video on the upcoming peace vigil. I was pretty confident in my abilities until I realized two things: one, that the episode was going to be the following Friday (which was yesterday), and two, that I was going to be away Monday and Tuesday for field trips. This meant that I wouldn’t be able to work on my video until Wednesday! I was pretty worried and I understood that there was no time for messing around; I had to start as soon as I could. This meant that I had to plan out my idea. I decided that it would be a good idea to film my Chaplain, who organized the peace vigil, talking about the event; while he was talking, I would show footage of last years peace vigil (this is called b-roll), so that everyone can really see what the whole thing is about. I was pretty happy with my idea and excited to get to work on it.

Pro Video?

Last week I got offered the chance to film and edit a professional video. During comm. tech one day, as I was watching the announcements (I didn’t have a studio job because the 1-credit comm. tech class started taking over some jobs), the other comm. tech teacher came up to me and told me that she needed to talk to me after announcements. I said okay, but I was really confused because I hadn’t ever really spoken to her before, so I was wondering why she would needed to talk to me.

When I went to go talk to her, and she told me how much she loved the video I made for Jam Night. I got really happy. She went on to tell me about her friend who was an actor, and how he was going to audition for a play and needed a video of his monologue. She asked me if I would like to work on this video along with another grade 12. I was ecstatic; I couldn’t believe that she liked my video so much that she trusted me to make a professional video for an actor. It really boosted my confidence, because as I said before, I wasn’t completely happy with my video. Needless to say I accepted her request and am going to be working on the video within the next week or two.

Jam Night

Every year my school has an event called Coffee House Jam Night. It’s similar to the idea of a talent show, but it focuses around just music, specifically, the music that you would hear in a coffee house, which is usually acoustic. For them to have a successful night, they need to have sound technicians to set up the microphones, and adjust the audio and fix problems throughout the night. They also needed people to film the performances as well as interviews with people. Like all school events, my class was in charge of these jobs, and I, specifically, was in charge of sound. The only problem was that I hadn’t done sound before, so I needed to learn quickly. I was really eager because I wanted to learn for a while, because it seemed like a pretty cool job, and I knew that I’d need it in comm. tech when we switch jobs for announcements or DYTV.

On the day of Jam Night, my class had to stay after school to set up all of the equipment, which was surprisingly a lot of work. I did actually have fun though; I learned how to set up everything, and how to use the sound mixer. Throughout the night there were some troubles but my teacher watched over me the whole time and pretty much showed me everything I need to know. Jam Night was really great this year and I was really happy to play a part in it.

The First Episode

While my class of 8 had filmed all of the segments for the episode of DYTV (and 2 were going to be talent), it was decided that the 1-credit class was to perform the other studio jobs so that they would get more experience about how the production works. Even though it was a good idea, it sadly resulted in what I think was bad episode. It wasn’t really their fault, because I don’t think they had enough time to learn jobs thoroughly. I think that the same thing would have happened if my class had been running the episode, had we not been trained through the announcements. I think that the main problem was the audio, there was a lot of trouble with microphones and whatnot, and no one really knew what to do (I wouldn’t have either, because I didn’t have the chance to do audio).

However I don’t think that the technical difficulties were the only problem, to put it in the words of my teacher, our segments weren’t up to par. He showed us where we went wrong and how we can improve what we did; he also said that he wouldn’t count this as mark, because it was only our first time (I was really relieved because I receive a B- on mine!). After reviewing the episode, I too realized the mistakes we made, I was disappointed that I did not do a better job but knew that I was going to get another opportunity to redeem myself for next episode.

When are we going to film?

At first I was having fun doing VTR and being part of announcements, but after a while I got bored. I felt like we weren’t really doing anything in class other than announcements and because of that, we weren’t learning anything about film production, like I wanted to. Another problem I had was that we weren’t switching jobs for announcements, meaning that everyday I was VTR, and all I had to pretty much do was push play and stop a couple times, this meant that I didn’t even get the chance to try doing the other studio jobs . I was getting really upset at this and I began to regret that I joined the class; I was expecting to learn things I could use in the future so maybe I’d be able to get into a career in film one day. I was talking to another friend in the class and they felt the same way too, and we decided that we need to discuss this with our teacher.

Before we got the chance to ask our teacher, he told the class that we are going to start working on the next episode of DYTV. Suddenly I was no longer disappointed just excited. Finally! We were going to go out and film some stuff that the whole school would see. My job was to make commercials for upcoming events at the school with another classmate.

For my upcoming event, I decided to make a commercial for the school’s annual “Jam Night”, which allowed my school’s students to perform acoustic songs in front of a live audience. I was pretty excited about it as it was my first segment; I knew that it had to be really good so that I could make a good first impression. For my commercial, I decided that it would be a good idea to show what Jam Night is about and the type of music you would hear. Therefore, I decided to film 2 of my friends performing a song. I used 2 cameras; one operated by myself and the other by a friend, I cut the videos together so that I could have different shots. I was pretty happy with the commercial after it was done, and I actually received praise from some other people in the class, it made me really confident about it and I was very happy.

Announcements and Jobs

Being in the 2-credit class, we were expected to be leaders for the other classes, this meant that we had to develop an understanding about all the equipment that we will use in the class. Our teacher decided that we would be responsible for producing the daily announcements everyday. This meant that we had to put the announcements on camera, so that the whole school can see it. This task required a variety of jobs in and outside the studio including: Talent, Camera, Director, Floor Director, Audio, Switcher, and VTR.

In the studio:
Talent is name given to the people in front of the camera, for the daily announcements they are in charge of reading the announcements to the school. There are 2 people working the cameras, they obviously have to film the talent. The floor director is in charge of the 2 cameras and talent and instructs them on what they need to do.

Outside the studio:
The switcher’s job is to control what the viewer sees by switching between the 2 cameras and the VTR. The person who is running VTR is in charge of playing the pre-recorded segments, for the daily announcements they have to play “O Canada!” Audio is in charge of the sound mixer board, which controls the audio levels of the microphones and the VTR. The most important job is the director, they are in charge of the whole production, and they manage all the jobs, making sure everyone is on task.

All of these jobs are equally important for the production of the daily announcements; I think it was a very good idea for my class to run it because it gave us all a chance to familiarize ourselves with some of the things we will be required to do throughout the year.

Should I take it? Will I even get in?

During the summer I thought a lot about what I wanted to do with regards to the 2-credit comm. tech. On one hand, if I took the course, I would have it all year, which would be a really good chance for me to learn a lot. But on the other hand, taking the course would mean that I’d have to drop another course, and I was not sure which one I should drop, I wanted to take them all! Another thing I was concerned about was the workload and stress; in the past the 2-credit class was always run by around 20 people, so now to have it run by 8 would mean that we are all responsible for more work, and I wasn’t sure if I could, let alone wanted to, handle it.

At the end of the summer, after talking to a friend about the decision, I decided to take the class (if I was accepted). On the first day of school I showed up not knowing what to expect, i thought about it, and decided that even if I didn’t get in, I would still take the 1 credit and be happy…but I still wanted to get in. I looked for name to find on the list to find my first period class, which to my surprise was Comm. Tech, but I wasn’t sure if this was the 2-credit class or not. I arrived at my class and saw 7 others sitting at the table in class, I then realized that I was the 8th and final member of the class, I was accepted into 2-credit! Even thought I was still worried about whether or not I could handle it, I was overjoyed.