PAGEFLAKES ROUND 2
In my Pageflakes, under the Hollyn-Wood blog, I saw the post for Avid 1.0. He had a link to the commercial video put out of the original Avid non linear editing system. Avid is the industry standard for editing, and those who edit professionally have worked on or know about Avid. For film geeks, it’s a must. Check out the video here.
I’ve been using Avid since I was in High school from 2002 up till today. At first, I hated it. There’s a huge learning curve, especially for those who’ve never edited in their entire life. It was my first experience with editing anything, and it took me a couple of weeks to learn without having to ask for too much help.
Anyway, in the summer of 2002, I took a film workshop that taught me the Avid, and after that summer ended, I decided I wanted to be a filmmaker. So I bought my Canon ZR-50 camera, and I bought a cheap editing system, “Dazzle something” I think, and it was crap. I longed to use Avid again.
Christmas 2005, I got my wish. Soon, it’ll be time to upgrade to Media Composer, but until I can afford the 500 dollar upgrade, I’ll be fine with my old version for now.
Tropic Thunder Strikes!
The Film Blogs of gone asunder over the up coming film TROPIC THUNDER. Everyone from Aint it Cool, Gizmodo, Slash Film are wetting their pants over this movie that seems to have come out of nowhere.
The movie stars Ben Stiller, Jack Black, and Robert Downey Jr. playing actors receiving training for a “Apocolypse Now-esque” movie.
The blurb at the movie site is that these actors:
“…lead an assemble cast in “Tropic Thunder,” an action comedy about a group of self-absorbed actors who set out to make the most expensive war film ever. After ballooning costs force the studio to cancel the movie, the fustrated director refuses to stop, leading the cast into the jungles of Southeast Asia, where they end up knee deep in the shit.”
Jack Black plays an albino, and Downing plays a Australian method actor who decides to have surgery to become black to play the main role, that was meant for a black person, thus this picture. Also, theyhave Tom Cruise cameo where he plays a fat guy here.
There are several reasons why this film will be awesome:
- It’s a comedy about making a war movie.
- It’s a self-reflexive movie (A movie about making movies that knows it’s a movie, just the type of movie I like!).
- Robert playing an Australian actor playing a black man.
- Jack Black as an albino.
- And it’s an R rated comedy. Awesomeness.
All they need is Samuel L. Jackness, and this movie is box office GOLD! Trailer for Tropic Thunder below.
PAGE FLAKES
Recently I’ve created a PageFlakes account which is now accessible to all of my lady stalkers fans out there right here. It’s a website much like igoogle, that creates a homepage with a little more pazazz. You can basically put anything: blog feeds, rss feeds, games, news feeds, calenders and email feeds.
Now, follow me as I take you on a tour of my humble RSS Castle.
This blog is about user generated entertainment outlets like Youtube. He keeps a watchful eye on “usertaiment,” a term Lester Craft coined. He’s written interesting posts about how user generated video scored 22 billion views in 2007, and how men 18-34 are “two-and-a-half-times” more likely to watch video from the top consumer generated media websites - Youtube, Myspace, Veoh, and Break.com.”
Just these two articles alone are worth checking out his blog.
I like to check the box office daily. It also keeps me updated on a lot of film industry news. Many film related sites link to Variety, so might as well go to the source.
A filmmaker’s resource blog that has low budget tips and tricks for shooting films. A recent post is about building a rubber band mount for three bucks. Regular mounts cost 50 bucks, and I should know, I bought one. If only I would have known about this blog earlier, I would have saved myself some gas mone, and the worst part is that the 50 dollar device already broke!
I like his blog. He really does want to help out other screenwriters out there. During the writer’s strike, he wrote almost every day about being in the trenches. Two out of five of his posts are relevant and useful information about screenwriting, like what to do “when the character has two names” or “scripting a short film.”
The other three are usually about random topics like the recent death of the guy who invented Dungeons and Dragons.
He’s another screen writer but not as fun as John August, however, he has written technical and in depth information on the happeneings during the writer’s strike.
The blurb is “An open source social experiment for content creators.” Basically, it’s trying to grow into the ultimate filmmaker’s handbook, but in a low budget and more modern internet age. It was founded by the guy who made HEAD TRAUMA, a successful low budget indy film that owes much of its success to the internet.
A great resource for the indie filmmaker. He has a great book FROM REAL TO DEAL, a step by step guide to getting a film made on the cheap. He updates his blog every week by posting a chapter out of 53, which will take up a whole year to complete. I’ve recently purchased the book and it’s a must have for any indie filmmaker.
This blog keeps me updated on their great After Effect tutorials. They’ve made over 60 videos, and each one truly better than the next. They recently have a tutorial on making wounds “heal” and how to get that terminator T-1000 look. If I were you, I’d save up your lunch money and buy a student copy of After Effects, but it is really the best program you can have as a filmmaker.
It’s the number one underground source for secret tidbits and spoilers on upcoming projects. They always have their ears to the ground. For one thing, it’s a lot cooler than Variety, and more of an “Every Man’s” blog. They get straight to the point and they try not to show off their large vocabulary too hard like Variety does.
HOLLYN - WOOD (Norman, That is)
Written by a USC professor, Norman Hollyn is the Associate Professor and the Head of the Editing Track. He has links to many useful totrials on editing with Avid and Final Cut. He recently posted a link to two Avid sound tutirilas, something not heavily taught in editing film classes.
Ah, Nalts. He’s a prolific video maker (not filmmaker), having submitted over 600 videos on Youtube. He has videos that have been watched by millions of viewers. He’s a self-proclaimed “viral video genius,” well, after making over 600 videos he should be. His videos aren’t terribly funny, but through his youtube experience he has tons of free useful viral and online video information to share. Any indie filmmaker trying to harness the power of online video sharing sites should refer to him for wisdom.
My flakes are organized into three columns. The left column has the slowest feeds, meaning, the least amount of posts per week, and the middle has the highest amount of posts per week, and the last column on the right has my search and bookmark feeds.
The other feeds I have are My Active Blog Search and My Active News Search “Breaking Into Hollywood” but there’s nothing much there. They’re not very useful because they don’t quite match up to the words I’m using for some reason, e.g. I get “Academy Gets Looney for Toon Creators” and “Clinton Link in Brazil Ethonal Probe.”
Then there are my Del.icio.us and Diigo bookmarks, along with my Del.icio.us social bookmarking soul mate rickangelo, whom shares my interest in sites and film making information.
I also have a Zotero bibliography. I’ve included mostly interviews with filmmakers, like Kevin Smith and Jean-Luc Godard. I like the interviews because there is a juxtoposition of periods and career points: a 1995 interview with Smith when he’s first starting out and he explains his beginnings. Then we have Godard’s 1963 interview where he’s talking about the hardships of making a movie with an American Producer. Finally, there’s the interview with a Project Greenlight alum who is still making movies but is struggling in Hollywood.
Overall, I enjoy my PageFlakes page. I see it as a command center, a virtual neurological system through which I experience the Internets [sic]. Sorry, I’ve been reading too much William Gibson. What will the “Series of Tubes” think of next?
