CHEESE SANDWICH FILM FESTIVAL

CALLING FOR ENTRIES NOW!!!

If you don't already know, I'm throwing the first ever -one time only- rowdiest film festival of all time on April 1st, 2009. Make a 3 minute short about a Cheese Sandwich and you may win some of the coolest prizes ever conceived. All entries are free to submit, but a bribe must be given. All the bribes will be given away for awards. Also, cheese sandwiches will be served. It will be held at Jengo's playhouse. This is about random acts of CREATIVITY. So get out there and get dirty and make a delicious entry. Gracias - your fearless leader - Joselyn McDonald Director of Cheese Festivities.

Check us out on Facebook - Cheese Sandwich Film Festival (under groups)
Website www.cheesesandwichfilmfestival.com in progress.

One love.

Thanksgiving

I just wanted to tell everybody that I am so excited about the Cheese Sandwich Film Festival. Currently, we are the premier Cheese Sandwich Film Festival in SouthEast. Hopefully, one day, we can go global with that status. I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and gets to work on their Sandwich Entries. I just thought to myself that I will be sad when this semester ends. Oh and it kind of sucks to be a vegetarian on Thanksgiving. But I think it sucks more for the 270 Million turkeys that get killed. No - its worse for me. Happy HOlidays.
Joselyn

Crunkacorus 14

The title of this is for Lucas since last night a guy at the Cucalorus Staff Meeting started talking and I had absolutely no idea who he was. He must have worked at Thalian Hall the entire time and I never met him. I thought it would be funny if he just came to the BBQ and had no idea what we were talking about and started calling the festival Crunkacorus and saying that he only liked the sex shorts.... guess you had to be there.

Moving On. I've been picking up my brain off the floor for the last 4 days.

I cannot believe the festival is over. It came and went in such a flash. Thank you so much to everyone who was involved and everyone who came down and volunteered. We had a lot of fun, but it was a lot of work. The whole thing felt like a blur.

I still cannot believe that we all love each other so much even after 4 intense days. That says a lot about what kind of group we had working. Also, I heard a few people say that this festival was the best that they had ever been to. That blew me away.

I'm already preparing for Cucalorus 15.

One love.

Plus I love Bobby Awesome and Courtney so much.

Reading Response to the Article.

I started reading the article tonight and I can tell you that when it describes small art houses, I immediately think of Jengo's play house. For those that don't know, Jengo's is the small theater here in Wilmington that is home to Cucalorus and weekly small scale weekend screenings. I work there about 8 hours a week for my internship. Just this past weekend we screened a movie called banished. It's not well known like the feature length narratives that one might catch at Mayfaire. OH no, these films that we screen rarely even have multiple hits on major search engines. I love it. I love that I see some of the same people every weekend. Many of them don't even know whats playing, but they come anyway to support their local cinema art house.

This Saturday night I was working at Jengo's and we were screning a movie called Banished. It was rainy out and I was hoping that nobody would come so I could go home. About 5 people finally did show up. I realized that Thank God people came! Thank god people support their local movie theaters or they would fail and the option wouldn't even be there. So yes I am glad that those 5 brave souls came and watched a 2 hour documentary about race relations. It's tough watching for sure.

Continued 10/21

So I finished the article tonight. I need to reread the article I guess because all I got from the author is that art-houses suck and for preppy yuppies and that microcinemas are cool and trendy and you can play for tickets with muffins and shit.
I think it would be badass if the tickettaker at the screening started to give birth.

I got excited when I read the article because it made it seem like there are little microcinemas and art houses all over the country. So even if the worst scenario in the entire world comes true and I wind up in the midewest in a two stoplight town...... at least I can start my own sweet cinema in my basement.

My Role as DP

My role as DP is stated on the sheet that Shannon handed out, but I want to go above and beyond that. In fact, I know myself, and I know that I will have to be involved creatively as much as possible. It was incredibly fortunate that I got assigned the role of DP on this project. Dylan has a lot of knowledge about cameras. I am going to do as much research as I can about 8 mm cameras. I have the film in a very special place so that it has no damage. Tomorrow, I will put in the rental form to Tony. I hope that there is one available for this weekend.

Our group has had the most trouble just picking a band that we all could agree on. That is not to say that we were bickering, but we all had bands that we knew. The one thing that we could all agree on is that we wanted to make a fun, fast-paced music video. We settled on the band Sci Fi. They live and perform here in Wilmington, and Jordan is friends with the guys. They said they would help us in any way.

My biggest concern with filming the band after their show on Saturday night is Ligthing!!! Ahh, until I became a film major, I had little to no idea about how important light really is to exposing film properly. Light will really be my biggest concern. I need to get everyone to bring household lamps with them to The Juggling Gypsy this weekend. We should be filming some or their burlesque show.

I want to mention that I will support Jamie as much as possible. I know that we will do well together. We bounce ideas off another. I feel like the whole group does a great job of supporting when necessary and also checking eachother when our ideas get too out there.

I don't want to give too much away, but to get everyone excited, there will be aliens serving coffee to people on their blackberries. Also, there will be lasers and smoke machines.

I am pumped.

Second thoughts about the Self Portrait.

I have been thinking an incredible amount about what I should do for my Self portrait. Honestly, I think I have worried about it a little too much. REally I just want it to be entertaining, but deep, but not too deep. I hate it when people immediately delve entirely too deep. It makes people feel uncomfortable. Plus, that is not me.

So I think..... since cooking is one of my biggest passions that I will center my project around me in the kitchen stirring a big pot. Ill add things to the pot that make the recipe that is me !!!! I'm excited about this project. I will have to use a kitchen that would show me from the front as I add things to the pot. I think I'll have to use my kitchen at home in Jacksonville. We have a stove that's on an island. It should be perfect. I want to dress up like a housewife from the 50's. It's a bit of social commentary about what I think the South believes a woman should do. I'll get into that at another time. I will note that I like cooking because I like it not because it's expected of me.

At the end of the film, I want to pull out of the oven a beautifully messy colorful cake. Hopefully, I can put in some of my dad's music. I want it to be fun, entertaining, lighthearted yet sweet.

I should add that if I was a movie genre..... I would be the nerd love genre.

Joselyn Erin McDonald

Music Video

i think its funny that my group never even considered making a commercial even though that was an option. i think we all just enjoy music, and coincidently we probably all would enjoy a career in the music video industry. I wrote Bibis Ellison, a local musician, she said she would be happy to give us any of her music. She said she was excited about the project and wanted to see the final result. it was my birthday this past weekend, so I didn't get to meet with the group. We will most likely decide by today which musician to feature. I need to think of some good ideas. I'd like to make a music video out of candy. Ahhh I can't do the self portrait and the music video at the same time. My mind keeps blending them together. BUT BUT BUT BUT. I thoroughly enjoy this creativity booyah.
Love,
Joselyn

Ideas for my Self Portrait.

I have no fucking clue. I feel like a narcissist.
Here are some things I like:
*Royal Blue
*Honey Bees
*Orchids
*Purple
*Light Blue
*Baking cakes
*Candy
*People who wear costumes
*Graffiti
*House music
*Dancing
*Belly laughs
*70 degree weather with a breeze
*Sushi
*Vegetarians
*Spray Paint
I think my project will be a combination of all of these things.
I hope it doesnt suck.

RESponsE to 1D.

Assignment 1d. is going alright. Will and i are definitely on the same page stylistically. We remarked that it would be horrible to be paired with someone who had a dramatically different vision than yourself. Will is much better with technology than I am. It is great to work with someone who is very skilled at Final Cut pro. I am able to work the program, but I'm not half -way as proficient as I wish I was. Will and I had some difficulty with our tapes. We were still fighting to have The Traveler Stops to Watch. It was ours all along! We've had some issues with The Pilgrim carried a Turnip All the Way from France. We were tempted to change some of the burping, but we resisted. Hopefully, we can make the best out of the project and it will all come together.

Light Journal #1 and #2

Light Journal 1

The skylights in my living rom run parallel to each other. They are spaced about 2 feet apart and my ceiling is about 15 feet above the floor. They are incredibly annoying. We can never control the light in our apartment. Between the two large skylights hangs a fan that is continuously in motion, since we can't afford A/C right now. It's either gas or A/C right now. The result of the constant circular motion of the fan and streaming sunlight is interesting to see. My entire living room floor appears to be living. The circular shadows fall on the floor and on the chairs. it's hypnotizing. All my furniture looks like its squirming. The entire room moves and pulses.

Light Journal 2

My roomate always leaves her light on in her closet. She has a serious night light addiction even though its known that nightlights can cause breast cancer ladies! But that's a whole other conversation. She has blackout curtains in her room to ensure proper napping. Because of the curtains, her room is void of almost all light. When you see her closet backlit while the lights are off in her room, its straight out of a horror movie. The only light that escapes comes from the rim of the door. Light escapes especially from under the door frame creating a light walkway leading to her door. The rectangular rim of lights is magic.

Black and White Photos that move me.

Yeah I like Danny Glover.

Review of Assignment 1b.

I had no idea that assignment 1b would be so tedious. I like the sonic aspect of film ver very much. In fact I'm interested in music videos, but remixing sounds for the project "At the Doll Hospital" is killing me. I've spent over three hous in the lab trying to get to 2 minutes and 30 seconds and I am still very unhappy with the results. It's going to take at least another 3 hours with Jordan and my complete attention. To figure out how to drop the filters and to understand which filter gives the desired result has taken the most time. I thought I would be much better at this than I am. Making creepy sounds that aren't cheesy is harder than I expected.
The other night I was in the editing lab putting filters and speeding up laughs so they sounded really high pitched and creepy. The lights shut off in the lab and I ran out. It scared the crap out of me.
Sorry I sound whiny. I just miss the visual. Shooting on 35mm this weekend will definitly spice up this assignment. peace.

Review of Assignment 1a.

The best part of assignment 1a was meeting Brandon and Emily. The second best part of assignment 1a was following people closely with a shotgun microphone trying to pick up on their conversations (that unfortunately were void of interest.) Actually, it made me a little sad that out of the 4 or so groups of people we "stalked" nary a one were actually talking to eachother. People need to spice it up a little bit.
Getting the sounds didn't take too long, but logging, capturing, and creating the log with the sounds and times was extremely time consuming and tedious. Very, very, tedious. I hope I never have to do that again. I think better things are to come with 1b. Although, I have been known to want to leave the very second I sit down in the editing lab to work on a project. blah blah blah

Sound Journal

1) Small water fountain in lobby of my work. I'm trying to block out the sounds of the cars passing by outside the window as I concentrate on the small fountain. The water drops about 6 inches and plinks plinks down a corrugated surface to land on polished rocks. The individual drops hitting the rocks. I am pleased that I can easily concentrate on the plinking water. It has an extremely calming effect. Although, it kind of sounds like pee or bubbles popping. I feel so gullible for enjoying this sound. In the past five minutes I have gone from energized to drowsy due to this damn plinking of the fountain....

2) Now I am listening to cars passing by outside my work on S. College Road at (:45 in the morning on a rainy Thursday in late August. I absolutely love the rise and fall of the hum of slow traffic outside work. Its rumbling hum that is so incredibly melodic. The large glass windows suppress the sound of the engines but the sound of the tires on wet pavement still manages to waft into the lobby. The slight rattling of the glass is aids to the solid sound.

Reading Responses

I just reread the Hans Richter article so that I could write this reading response with the text fresh in my mind. I liked that he drew the conclusion that experimental filmmakers are in their own sense original artists and not dependent on literature. I believe Richter's article tried to touch on such a broad range of topics in too short of an article. It felt like I was constantly was trying to keep up.

Scott McDonald's article was definitely the most comprehensive and easiest to relate to. I liked his concept that because audiences have been trained started at an early age to believe that a narrative feature film is the only acceptable type of movie. When I saw my first experimental films in Kreul's class last year, I admit I was counting down the minutes till it was over. I considered it a film, but not entertaining nor enjoyable. I love the whole idea that experimental film could serve as a cultural revolution. yay.




Finally, Fred Camper's article just amused me. I love that he even attempted to put parameters on experimental film. Good luck with that Camper. His article further affirmed to me that Stan Brakhage is the man. According to Brakhage, the term Avant-Garde was " too European " and "Underground " film making was also a misnomer because he lives "9000 ft about sea level." Glorious.

My roomate and Lucas are explaining why the Caribou want us to pipe out the oil in Alaska. Something about the pipes creating heat and workers dropping food for them to eat. They are convincing me slowly. F Anwar

Filmaker Manifesto

My Filmmaker Manifesto:

I want people to see my movies and have a spiritual experience.
I want to make people think.
I want people to stop thinking so much.
I like love stories that don't seem like they have anything to do with love.
I want my films to feel like living paintings - beautiful and complicated and rich in color.
This is hard to plan out ... my manifesto..... I usually just feel things out.
I want women to actually be portrayed they way they are and not how geek writers want them to act. I want real characters with real experiences and I don't want all the endings to be perfectly tied up in a bow.

My Manifesto is Coming Shortly.