First Robotics: the superbowl of smarts.
Every year I get to cover this event and cut a short piece to play at the end of the closing ceremonies. Im always struggling to figure out how to shoot it all, cover the 3 different robotics competitions and still deliver something vaguely coherent by noon on Saturday, 3 days after the event starts. This year we also created a short run of 60 DVD’s to be sent out Saturday afternoon in addition to what feels like a really tight schedule.
Normally, I shoot and edit with a second camera person to help out and I end up not sleeping a whole lot, which is hard since for the last few years I am shooting the week prior as well and get pretty worn out. This year I brought Alex Bryant along who has been helping me with all sorts of productions this year. Alex is in the MFA film program at AU and is a solid, dependable dude who I can drop in any situation and know he will handle it extremely well. Im lucky to have him.
We went with Dubstep for music this year and that really threw me. I’d never cut to it before and that slowed things down a bit as Alex and I figured out some ways to cut to it that weren’t repetitive.
Overall, Im pretty happy with it, we brought a big pile of Kessler Crane tools, including the KC12 crane, a Cineslider with an Oracle motion controller and the ever solid K-pod which added to the fun and complexity of the shoot as we’d run around catching stuff, edit, grab the crane, run back out, use it, hide it some where and move to the next thing. Not much time to have any error or re-shoot. I got more or less one chance to grab something, and if I didn’t get the reaction we were hoping for, we’d move on and hope we got it later. I have to thank Joel Graves of Kessler Crane for being Johnny on the spot with excellent customer service when we needed a part for our Motion Control kit. WIthout it, that gear would have been dead in the water, and Joel was responsive, able to ship quickly and didn’t kill me on shipping which helped me as I didn’t budget for overnight shipping on parts I thought I had. Thanks Joel.
Finally, the kids who attend this event are pretty amazing, the mentors who support them are great, and the entire event is so unique I am hopeful for the fate of humanity in a small way after coming back from this event.
1000 FPS Ballet. Awesome. What’s the over-under on lighting this? Maybe 16K?
Ballet dancers in ultra-slow-motion, at 1000 frames per second, to the sound of Radiohead.
The Makers: Women who make America
It’s been a busy week already with the launch of the Rt. 42 website http://www.the42bus.com/ and its various press yesterday, to today’s major launch of the new website www.makers.com its a very exciting couple of days for me.
Im very proud to have been involved with this project over the last year interviewing women in DC who have been part of the shaping of America of the last half century. In addition to the new web videos, a 3 hour feature doc is underway for 2013 to play on PBS in 2 parts. I am truly excited that the young women in America and around the world can hear these women tell their story in their own words. There are more videos to be added to the site over time as the become available, but this is an amazing store of American history.
You can learn more about it here: http://www.makers.com/about/
Below are some of the ones I worked on:
http://www.makers.com/sandra-day-oconnor
http://www.makers.com/ileana-ros-lehtinen
http://www.makers.com/hillary-rodham-clinton
My favorites Pat Foote, the first female Brigadier General in the US Army and Chief Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg are not online yet, but all the stories are really something else.
Please check out the site.
LOTR Legos.
I think I am going to have to get this for my son to test it extensively. I should make sure it’s safe.
http://gizmodo.com/5884547/exclusive-videos-of-the-new-lego-lord-of-the-rings
Besides, while the Lego stuff is cool for Star Wars, PJ isn’t going to come along in 10 years and completely ruin the films.
Besides. Eomer has a horse outside.
A 1956 home entertainment centre.
(Source: spuzzlightyeartoo)
“I want to learn something. That’s the real pleasure, when you understand an idea or you answer a question. When I was a little boy I used to think you could get all the answers to all the questions. I thought that you could learn who God is and will he answer why he made me. You think you are going to get those answers but you don’t. (Laughs)”
— Francis Ford Coppola on what interests him, happiness, money, and creative purpose. (via curiositycounts)
Fun video(in german) about Zeiss lens stress tests. Awesome.
So yeah, it is a film by Keanu Reeves, but it looks to be done really, really well and he got access to a lot of the people who use this tech at the highest level.
I can’t wait to see this.
Ok, thats a level of out of the boxness that is truly awesomesauce.
Ok Go seriously blow my mind with their videos, the creativity, imagination and innovation is just awesome.
If you have ever wondered what I do for a living, shooting is one major component of my work. I don’t primarily shoot or edit or any other singular thing, my primary focus is moving the story along, what ever it is, where ever it is.
I am a story teller first and formost, the rest of it is the vehicle. I truly enjoy the act of shooting: its hard, physical, and a synthesis of the many disparate parts of my brain - technical, emotional, logical, imagination, listening and looking.
Hope you enjoy it.
