IN TWO MORE DAYS, EYES RAVAGED BY THE TENSIONS OF ENDLESS TESTS AND THE SOCIAL PRESSURE TO EXCELL ABOVE ALL ELSE, YOU WILL TURN IN YOUR FINAL FILMS – MASTERPIECES OF THE CINEMATIC ARTS, EXQUISITE EXAMPLES OF CREATIVE EXCELLENCE WHICH WILL MAKE OUR FELLOW STUDENTS AND TEACHER STAND STUNNED WITH YOUR BRILLIANCE.  OR ELSE….

AND YOU WOULDN’T WANT THAT  !

[As it is way too complicated to get the final films to me 2 days early, and besides you haven't finished them I bet, we will look at them in the usual way so you don't have to get them to me 2 days earlier... which is tomorrow.]

The class takes a bow.

For anyone interested in doing so, tomorrow, May 31, is your last chance to enter the Asean-Korea Multimedia competition.  For information see www.aseankoreammc.com.   For those of you I suggested to put your fixed up pieces into some festivals, here’s a chance.  Might win some money too.

Meantime you have 2 weeks and a few days to get your final films ready for June 16th.  They better be good.  Or else !

And then, for a few more interesting photographers, you might look at some of these:

Joel SternfeldGregory CrewdsonAaron Siskind

Just keep looking

First, for those who brought in the work I want to say things are looking pretty good.  A big jump for most of you since the start only back in March.  For those who haven’t brought in the work – particularly the last two assignments – the five minute black and white film, and the blue or green-screen one-minute item, please bring those in this coming week and have them ready to show first thing.

For those little films you’ve made that I said looked to me to be good enough to consider sending to a festival, maybe with a final bit of touching up or some minor changes, as I likely suggested to you, here’s a festival coming up which I’d suggest you give a try.  It’s the ASEAN Multimedia Competition, in late July to mid-August, here in Seoul.  The deadline for submitting is May 31, so you have 9 days left.   See www.aseankoreammc.com for information and entry process.  I encourage anyone who has good things to consider entering.

If you do, try to keep your ego out of it – if they don’t select your work it means very little, it is more like rolling the dice when gambling.  So if you aren’t accepted, just enter the next one, again and again.  The same is true about applying for grants or anything like that.  Whether you get chosen has a little to do with you, and much more to do with things you have little control over.  So take it as a kind of game, flipping a coin.  If you don’t play, you can’t win.

Along this line, a little story.  This year a friend of mine in America finished a film and sent it to me to ask what I thought of it.  I looked and found it a rather odd, but a very well made and interesting film.  It is about gay people and theater, and the film itself is very stagey.  But it works very nicely, was well-acted and had a very particular personal style.   So I asked someone I know in the Cannes film festival organization, and asked if they would waive the submission fee and take a look.  They said yes.  So about a month ago, when I got a “no thank you” note from Cannes for a film of mine I had sent in at their request (though saying it was not, to my awareness, at all their kind of film), I sent my friend a note to ask if he had heard back.  He said, no, and that he hadn’t sent the film in.   Why?  Because he didn’t think he could deal with a rejection.   So he rejected for them.   I told him he was an idiot, and was frankly angry with him since I had stuck my neck out on his behalf and instead of sending the film he’d let his stupid ego keep him from doing it

Another person I’d done this for, a very young Korean filmmaker, Dahci Ma, had a short which I thought very good, and though it was far past the deadline and everything, I contacted Cannes and asked for her, they said yes,  and she sent her film and it was accepted for the short film competition and this evening she’ll be sitting in Cannes, surrounded by big movie stars and all the silly glamor, and maybe she’ll win a prize.  My other friend might not have been there if he’d  bothered to send his film, but then he perhaps could have been there too if had.  Instead he cut his own throat. (He sent a note to me that his film will now premiere in the Hoboken – New Jersey – Film Festival.  Big deal.)  Whether Dahci wins or not, just being in Cannes will be a big help for her.  And if she wins something – well, I think she’ll have no problem finding the money to make a feature she’s scripted.  My fingers are crossed.  Dahci is 24, and she dropped out of school at the age of 14.   She’ll be a director you’ll hear about in the years to come.   Look Ma, no degree !

From Dahci Ma’s film, Ghost

So you all have 4 weeks to pull together a film – up to 15 minutes long, though can be only 3.  The only thing is it better be as good as you can do.   If you’re smart you’ll use the things you learned the last few months, and instead of waiting until the last minute, you’ll work at a nice pace, when you have the time and making the time.   If you don’t “have an idea” I’d suggest you go start shooting and I bet the idea will walk into your camera.  But however you do it – whether it is a documentary, or something “experimental” or a little fiction or anything else, you should bring in what you’ve done on it this Thursday to show us all.

And, if you have the talent, and the drive, like my friend Dahci, you might end up in Cannes someday.  Of course, if you don’t feel like doing the work we can always send you north to Uncle Kim, and I am sure he can put you to work.

Happy children with Uncle Kim, Our Great Leader’s father

So a week ago it was children’s day and all the children took the day off.  National holiday and all that.  Then this week class comes around and, uh, well….  looks like they didn’t take the day off, they took the week off!  The class has 17 people and only 7 showed up this week.    Hmmm…  I was told the good excuse was that there was a university kind of party going on.  I wonder what it will be this coming week.  Maybe something like, “But I really want to get an F and this is a good way to do it.”

This coming week the campus police will be stationed at the door of the classroom and everyone who wasn’t there this week will be arrested and taken away.  Not just an F, you go to jail:

Korean student who missed class taken for punishmentListen up, comrades !

So for those who cleverly managed not to be there, or to be in class but not have done the five minute exercise of last week, it is due on May 19.   Without fail.   And there’s another 1 minute exercise to do with that.

Now to the good children, the one’s who showed up and did the week’s exercise.  All of them – all three – were very good, very different from each other.

Hannah Na’sChoi In-yong’sShin Sang-hyun’s

These were each good pieces, perhaps in need of just some tiny adjustments to make them work as little narratives, but very nice.

Now the other exercise for May 19th:

One minute long.

Take one shot, lasting the minute.  This shot is to be blue or green-screened.  Which means you must shoot something against a blue or green (actually it can be any color you want) background so that you can then use the CHROMA KEYING set up in your effects menu.   The easiest and most common thing is to shoot a person in front of a blue or green wall.  How boring.  Use your imagination and do something more interesting.

Then take another appropriate shot or shots which you will print in behind this.

So I want you to get some experience in this technique, but I also want you to think creatively – about what is in front, and what is behind.  And to play with this.  In the back you may, if you wish use multiple shots, and any other EFX, transitions etc you want to use, and edit it.  You can even use music !

But make it one minute, a title and a black out at end.

And have fun!   Or else.

Uncle Kim orders you to have fun and do your work !!!

After of this coming week we will have four more classes -  on the last one the last project will be due.   Because I don’t really trust you, just like Uncle Kim up there, to be “free” to work on a final film on your own, I will tell you the assignment that will be due as your “test” is going to be a ten to fifteen minute long film, of your own choosing.  But you are going to have to bring in each week what you have shot, what you have edited, and so on.  So we can see it as it progresses.  If I don’t do this most of you will wait until June 14th and start then and make a piece of  sh…     I want you to make something good, so this is how we’re going to do it.  So begin to think about that now.

Spring sprang, so enjoy it !

ARE WE HAVING FUN YET?

Have a nice day off, which since there’s only Friday between now and a weekend I am sure many of you will find a way to bridge.    But, since you’ll have a bit of time here’s a little taste of some color photographers who are interesting.  There are many more.  Helps open your eyes and mind.

William EgglestonCindy Sherman Stephen ShoreNan GoldinJoel MeyerwitzThomas StruthAndreas Gursky

The above will link you on clicking the photographer’s name onto one source or another.  Have fun looking and just remember:

Kim Jong-un Loves You, Children !!

And remember to bring in very nice 5 minute films on May 12th!

First a little note to say that I was quite happy with the things we saw yesterday.  Seems like things are moving along nicely, with everyone finding something of interest within my little straight-jackets.

So, for May 12th, here’s the assignment.  This time same for everyone.

You are to make a 5 minute long film.  It is to be a narrative – to say in some way it “tells a story.”  This though does not mean you have to have actors, or people at all.  You may, but it is not at all necessary in order to make a narrative.

Rules:

15 to 20 shots.

The camera must be rock steady for all but 2 of the shots.  In those 2 the camera must move.

The film is to be in black and white EXCEPT for one shot which must have color.

No digital effects to be done in camera.  You may use the normal controls of the exposure, either by shutter speed or diaphragm, and you may of course use focus but otherwise no digital effects in camera.

The film is to be edited on a computer editing system.  In using the editing system you may use the following:

Transition effects.

Menus which alter the graphic look of the image in

—-     Adjust (brightness/contrast, extract, etc.)

—-     Blur and Sharpen (gaussian blur, etc.)

—-     Color Correction in the color shot.

Do not use other editing menu effects than those in the menus above in Premiere or their equivalent in Vegas.

You may use sound though you do not have to.  No music.  If you use sound use it to enhance your narrative.

So the basic idea is to keep it simple, tell your narrative/story with the shots – their composition, content, formal qualities – and with the pacing and sense of rhythm from editing.   As you have two shots in which the camera can move, make them a part of your narrative – where movement pushes the idea visually in some manner.  And as you have only one shot which has color, it would make sense to give it some dramatic reason – it is your one bright color in a gray painting, so use it to good effect, narratively.

Wood, by Leighton Pierce

So if you analyze the film I showed this past week by Leighton Pierce, it had a narrative:  a boy in a backyard, sawing wood, with a mysterious sound – a squeaking noise – and a red reflection in water.   We do not know what these things are, but step-by-step it is orchestrated in a poetic manner, so that in the last two shots of the film we can figure out that the squeaking sound is of a swing, going back and forth, its red seat casting a reflection in the water on the table.  It is very simple, but it is a kind of “story” and it is what holds all the images in that film together.   Pictures and sounds carefully composed, like music, to draw you in, engage your eyes and ears and mind.  A little poem.

So have a good free week, and use some of it to play/work on this film for May 12.  I look forward to seeing some good things!

In a handful of days I will post another blog, directing you to some interesting photographers using color.  I hope you have take the time to look carefully at all those I listed before working in black and white.  You can learn a lot about how to make images work from seeing them.

.

Josef Koudelka

Now that the mid-term testing is done, the soju has been consumed, and you have all turned into Easter bunnies, it’s time to resume life’s normal things and get back to classes.   I know that this is not really what you would like to do on a lovely spring day, but in case you didn’t notice, we don’t seem to have any lovely spring days (yet).

So this is just a reminder that on Thursday it is supposed to be sunny, like a spring day, or at least the weatherman says it is supposed to be sunny.  We will cross our fingers, and hope.  Except, sadly, you will have to be indoors for 3 hours of the afternoon, from 2 until 5.  Alas.  But we hope in that time to see some nice black and white 2 minute films, and a strange assortment of things that “Time” can do to images.  Meantime when you arrive in class, please load up your files into the computer, so we can move along quickly and see everything.

.

.

OK, hope all of you are doing well half-way through mid-term finals week.  We don’t have a class tomorrow, as you know.  But meantime I want to give you a handful of names of photographers to look at.  Just Google their name, and look up images.  You’ll get pages full.  To see them big, I am sure you know what to do.    I ask you to spend a bit of time looking, and trying to understand what makes these photographers special.  I’ll also list at the bottom a few URLs of things on my blog, photographs friends of mine have made.   As you look try to figure out why in general these photographs work, how they have tensions built into a “still.”  How the light, the angle of the camera, the composition of the elements, the printing technique all combine with the “subject” to make something much more than just a “picture.”    Just look and then look some more.  Let it slowly soak in.  You can spend a life-time doing this and if you are attentive and mindful, it will be good for you – whether you make photography, or videos, or anything else.  It will be good for your life and your understanding of it.

Josef KoudelkaRobert FrankSebastiao SalgadoHarry CallahanRichard AvedonWeegeeWalker Evans

So just cut and paste these names and Google the image pages and go searching.  There’s a few good art book stores, one in Hondae, where they have some good photography books, and I’d guess some libraries here do too.  Last year there was a wonderful exhibit of Walker Evans photographs in a photography museum in Gangnam (I think it was).  The next batch I’ll post will be in color.  But since for most of you the coming assignment is to be in black and white, I thought these would be a good thing to ponder.

Meantime also check out this, and this and this.

Gary Winogrand

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First off, sorry we ran out of time, and some of you didn’t get to screen your pieces.  But I thought it was a good idea to show some little films first, to give an idea of some of the things I am trying to get you to grasp.  I have looked at the files here and I’ll be writing you each over the next two weeks.

I was happy to see a nice jump in the quality of most of what we saw, and an indication you are putting  a little more time/thought/work into it, and I hope having fun along the way.  Learning should be fun.

Meantime, here’s the assignment for April 28:

Visual Directors:

A film, 2 minutes long, 12 shots.  The film is to be in black and white.  No color. The compositions MUST alternate in some manner from left to right; front to back; dark to light, on each cut.  Use CONTRASTS on each cut so the eye is moved around the screen actively.  The camera must be absolutely still except for 1 shot the camera may move, though you don’t have to have a shot in which it moves. In 1 shot you may use a digital effect, but if you use it it must have a good aesthetic reason.  The film is to be with sound, and you should use the sound creatively.  No just putting music on it.  And you may use computer editing system.

Now when I say make sure to use some alternation in each shot-to-shot, to move the eye around, it should not just be for that, arbitrarily.  It should be in the context of the total film – in other words there should be some internal aesthetic logic as to why and how our eye is being pulled around.  So this means you have not just to mechanically make shots like this, but you have to think about why it makes sense in your movie to do so.

When I say the camera must be absolutely still, I mean it.  So you will have to put it down somewhere solid, or put it on a tripod, or find some other way to make it absolutely still.  Please.

.

The horizontal lines are actually parallel

.

 Advanced Visual Directors:

With a one minute shot in which something moves, but the camera is still, use the “Time” Effects menu to alter the nature of the shot.

With a one minute shot in which the camera moves, use the “Time” Effects menu applied to the shot.

See what happens and try to orchestrate it so each shot works as a good shot/film.

Then using the transition menu, and whatever other Effect menu item you want, marry these two shots to make some kind of film.

So this will require first that you experiment with the things in the Time Menu, as they are a bit complicated to understand.  In my version of Premiere there are 3 items:  Echo, Posterize and Time Warp.  Each of these has multiple settings, so they are very flexible, and probably in turn it is easy to make an awful mess with them.  So you must play a bit to see what it does, then think about a shot that would seem to work nicely with it, and then shoot/edit that.  So I suggest you make a temporary test shot with camera still and something moving, and camera moving.  Use these to see what happens, and then figure out what you want to do.

I checked on-line to find what Vegas calls these, but it doesn’t come up using the words I used, but I am sure Vegas has these kinds of effects, but maybe calls them something else.  I’ll keep looking and if I find it I’ll post it here.

.

Have a nice weekend, study hard for your mid-term exams, and check back here in a bit for some more thoughts and suggestions on making the films for April 28.

Says:  I need Photoshop !!

Or perhaps he just needs a visit to a plastic surgeon’s office in Seoul where they can easily cut away that extra chin.  However, whatever he needs, he tells you that it is your assignment over the mid-term test week to read The Great Leader’s book on cinema, as this will tell you everything you need to know to make great films and satisfy your humble teacher, Professor Jon.

Available from Amazon

From the deepest recesses of his warmest heart, Kim Jong Un, following the most sincere advice of his father, The Great Leader, strongly encourages you to all work hard to do well and excellently the exercises given to you by your teacher, the humble Professor Jon, so that you may follow the path to true patriotism for the fatherland and come to make great cinema or at least wonderful propaganda videos exalting Our Great Leader, whom I will soon be !

If, on the other hand, you fail to bring in excellent work in the coming weeks, we will sign you up immediately for service to the nation in another way.

 

Our heroic People’s Army

Kim Jong Il from in younger days, tells you to remember always

So just remember Yonsei cinema students to always follow Our Great Leader’s advice on the Art of Cinema!  Or else !