edit + re-edit // 11.01.05 this week, my shepherd is rob seward. my daily assignment is to "select some video footage that i will be using for my pressure project. each day i will map out pieces to be considered for use at week's end." my pressure project is to "re-edit the footage i selected in my daily exercises to make something new." this is not going to be easy. i have some questions at this point. should i include the sound? should i include a theme or write up of the pieces i selected? what do the peices i select say about the message i am looking to build at week's end? walking home from school tonight, jeff and i were talking about the assignment and the act of using "found footage". what defines that term anyway? surely the pieces i find each day will have a message, but should i forget what they are saying and base my selection on what pieces make me laugh, cringe, blank, etc etc? regardless i'm worried about picking obvious clips and creating something entirely pedestrian. i know i need to check this fear at the door, though editing clips from an existing piece will no doubtedly effect the direction of my piece. i'm not convinced that using some clips from the 20th century will yield enough to say something. and by something i mean "something". archive.org i found a few clips on archive.org tonight: http://www.archive.org/search.php?sort=%2Fmetadata%2Ftitle&query=collection%3Auniversal_newsreels%20AND%20firstTitle%3AS http://www.archive.org/details/1959-06-01_Space_Monkeys http://www.archive.org/details/universal_newsreels the secret life of a cat // 11.02.05 this project is much harder than i knew it would be. the problem isn't that i cannot find footage, it's that there is jsut so much great footage out there. that being said, it is difficult to not look at this week without thinking of a narrative filter. of course i am doing my best to not view entries that i find worthy as part of a larger narrative. i'm attempting to let go and find the pieces that speak and go from there. the private (secret) life of a cat despotism my japan, your america so they tell me again // 11.03.05 today i surfed through archive.org again. there is so much material here, i was up late last night watching stream after stream. it can be a bit exhaustive. I wrote rob last night, and he responded that I could edit each night, if i wanted to be a real masochist. good point, i think i'll get to some editing tomorrow or the weekend. i would like to explore more material and find other sources. getty online // 11.04.05 searching getty online was near surreal. within a few moments, i was able to quickly find contemporary stock video clips galore. oddly enough, i found so many that had a twinge of risque home video, most of the videos were approaching near-porn. it was just shocking to do a search on fabric and see video clips of people making out. still the most strangest aspect was the bland, vanilla, formlessness of the videos. they were so devoid of any emotion and they reeked of cookie cutter people in cookie cutter homes. the white tube - scary found film footage as inspiration posts of process // 11.05.05 i have been a bit negligent on posting videos, so after rewatching some my faves that i downloaded, i present these ones to you. i've been focusing on process and hoping that watching "process" will help inspire me to think about it within everything i work on, with, or whom. i apologize in advance for the obnoxiousness of posting so many videos advertising getty online. bottle processing boxes o bread car assembly line egg processing line juice processing line monuments line microchips mimiograph oil spouting printing money tiger sheets shorn sheep sorting quarters splitting us money jeans, jeans, jeans // 11.06.05 i'm tired of wearing jeans. i want to get new pants!!! jeans? more jeansx still more jeans! abstract monday // 11.07.05 over the course of the week, i've been looking at film and video clips. from found footage, to some pieces of video art, to experimental stuff. i watched parts of koyaanisqatsi. now it's time for me to construct something. aaaaaabstract process... process... process... // 11.13.05 finding footage online is really easy, deciding what to do with them is entirely different. though you can build themes and narratives that can work throughout different styles, periods, and types of footage, editing them was by far the hardest part. two minutes too long, this piece has some elements that work really well. perhaps a revisit over thanksgiving break will be a good time to cut some more. all of the footage was found online and linked above. if you are bored with your footage, grab some online!