What is it?

"All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem." - Martin Luther King, Jr. So we've progressd since the 60's. Some of the race reguarding problems have found solutions. So, what spcifically are the problems we face now? Then one problem was segragation, that's quite a clear problem. We no longer have legal segragation, so what do we have?

So last week we got out begining kind of done. It's really cheesy but at the same time I think it will do. It's a flash animation that has just rethinking race going across the screen in different sizes and stuff. Haha Abby and I had a fun time with that. Things are kind of coming along...so we will see.

Yay!!

So I finished my senior portfolio at about 6 pm yesterday. So then I was able to relax and not have to be up all night last night. But when I tried to go to bed my nerves took over and all night I was thinking and rethinking everything I did. So in short, I didn't sleep. I drove up and dropped it off this morning, so the weight should be lifted, but its not. I am still nervous about it. I know there was nothing I could have done different, its great the way it is.  Now I just hate that we have to wait until Wednesday to have our results. Have to make us sweat it out I guess. But its over, so now I can actually turn my attention to other things I have going on this semester and catch up on all the things I've been slacking off on. Because even though my mind is set on graduation I still have 39 days until I'm there.

By the way Tony, I put you down as my advisor, since I don't really have one and I see you the most.

Look It Up!

Iterative.

Odd place right now

So what do you do when...

A.) Your Senior Portfolio is due the 30th,

B.) You have to close on a house you are trying to buy by the the 5th

and...

C.) You are losing your mind

Not sure that I am really paying attention to the documentary this week.  If there is anyone that would like to scrape lead based paint chips, prime, and paint a 2.5 car garage this weekend, let me know, I could defiantly use your help.  

kJHKEJHLGJKHEKJHFS:EHJGSD

Soooo I have no idea what the hell is going on. We need our rough draft of the documentary for next week and I have a feeling we are no where near that stage. I feel like everything is just coming down and I have no idea how we got so far behind. I know we have good footage of interviews. I never knew we needed that much B footage but I guessed I missed that part. All we can do is try and get things done right? I honestly just want to pass the class lol I thought we were doing fine but when we got back from our month break we just got hit with all the things that we hadn't done. BLAHHHHH well I guess we will just roll with the punches eh?

How freakin punk rock is that?!?

http://www.timeout.com/chicago/articles/music/71711/drag-city-revives-death
The first punk rock band- Death. Listen to politian in my eyes. Undiscovered and delicious. 1974

Even more musings, still not enough

You're walking around with a friend or two, real late, after dark downtown.  It's not the best neighborhood.  A nice car pulls up to the intersection a few feet from you, and you hear a faint "click, click."  What it is?

I was talking to a high school teacher friend of mine who told me she asks her students this when she teaches the biography of a black woman who lived from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Movement.

The white kids always say "I don't know... a gun?"

But the black kids just stay quiet.

She has to ask them individually, but then they'll answer.

"It's the car doors locking." 

I was still thinking that I really was only seeing race this semester because it didn't matter to me before.  But maybe it didn't matter because I wasn't getting the short end of the stick.  It still amazes me how hard it is to break away from my own vantage point.  Can it even be done?

scripting

So, after a day of watching and rewatching clips something may come out of them. Right now our entire segment is a bit segmented. We split the work to be able to accomplish something. So once the editing starts we have to try and make our ideas flow back together as one. 

But for at least right now we have a jumping off point. 

Optimism

I think I am finally feeling good about where we are now.  Christina and I just finished our script and I think its going to be good.  When I look at how all 3 parts are going to fit together, I think I finally have an understanding as to what the hell has been going on for the last 7+ weeks.

diving in with my eyes close

So we have all of our footage into the computers. Now to make it into something. I don't know what to make. There are a lot of words, but I don't know that they are saying anything. And this is what is going to guide us to our next collection of materials. We what these words to make images for us, so we know what to look for. I don't know if we should be thinking that what we have is going to lead us to what we need. 

And I do have to say that I wish I was giving this project more attention then I am. It's just so hard with so many other things going on. The main time hog it my senior portfolio. We have to have portfolios, sketchbooks, and resumes done by the end of the month for review. So I am just worried about that and everything else is taking a back seat. But it will be done and turned in soon, just in time for our heavy editing to start. Yay!

Ethics eh?

So these people we've interviewed, you spend a bit of time with them, you ask them a few questions and you get a general vibe on their opinion or view on the matter, whether their telling the truth is something else. So, I have these clips and now it's my job to put them together in a manner that conveys a message I want to convey. I'm finding it difficult to do that in a way that does not contradict how they feel on the matter. Personally, I have no issue construing their words into something entirely different to what they actually say. Not that I'm about to do that. So how does one draw the line on what is honest and manipulated. If we took a purists approach we'd play the entire interviews start to finish and in the order they were taken, let people draw their own conclusions while they nap. I'm not opposed to that. I could be done with this doco by Thursday. Then we could have pizza parties the rest of the semester. There's probably half a dozen classes I could take on ethics to help me through my edditing issue, but i'm a little short on time.

Has anyone else run into this? Any suggestions? Rules of thumb? Maybe a better question is what kind of doco are we trying to produce?

Color Line

That class was a bit too much this week. Has anyone ever heard of the "paper bag" test? If someone's skin was darker than a paper bag, they failed. This test was used to keep a young woman - who is now a grandmother - out of a black college that was operated by blacks. Another example of racism within one's own race. Delightful.
I thought that the students interviewed might be giving a different interview to people of color. The students were interviewed at the "dreamy" or "nerveracking" begining of the semester. After some of the semester goes by, I wonder if the responses totally change.
Has anyone seen Frisky Dingo? OMG. I put off my Praxis II exam, so let the celebrations begin with a marathon of side-splitting-disturbance this past Sunday. My throat is killing me from laughing so freakin hard. Now it's Monday night, and my script is partially scribbled on a Gorrilla Grrrls flyer.

weeeee

So we went over our film so far last week. I think my group has some pretty good stuff we could use, I went to class thinking we didn't have a lot. During class we got a couple more interviews and I hope they turned out well. It seemed like we got a lot of good information from the people we interviewed....now comes the production part....fingers are crossed!