Wrapping

I now have it, a script. I am in the phase Dr. Lamb would call wrapping and while my script is not failsafe, I do have a general idea in where I want to go. I am going back and forth between creation and processing information. While before I was going between webbing, wiggling and wrapping, I now feel taht I am more in the wrapping part of the project.

First off the cards. I talked with my uncle and he suggested using paintbrush to create placards to write words on. I messed around with this a little yesterday and it works. I just take an old picture, paint it all black and waa laa, I have a backdrop for written words. I plugged it into Movie Maker and it works. Now just to make the frame and text and I think that is easy enough as I have done both with paintbrush before.

The script is simple. It has to include my son and be close to three minutes. So to make something that would incorporate warplanes but keep it a little less than serious, I took a cue from Charles Schultz and thought of an idea of a duel with the Red Baron. Now just to get him in the sky with the Red Baron. I have been toying with a dream sequence. I will start shooting that this weekend as I will be home and it will be more natural as I am not sure how he is going to work with the camera.

The other bit is the music. I listened to some old scratchy 78s and have a few choices. Most come to three minutes giving me the time limit I need for my script. I also think the scrathcy sounds of the music replicates what I have heard on some of the films I have watched.

Now the question of how to incorporate other pieces of film into mine. I feel that since I am not making any money off of this and the films I am dealing with nicking scenes from are over 70 years old, I will be alright but I can't seem to find a way to transpose those onto another media. I will work with that once I get the initial scenes with my son shot.

As Kuhlthau says around this time a person feels relief and I can say I am truly feeling that way. Whiel i still have a lot to create at least now I have a ballpark idea of what it is I am creating and knowing that pulls a load off of my shoulders.

Confidence

Through some emails and some revelations I am feeling a tad bit more confident in my project. First off to start, I have been very hesitant in what I have been doing. The thought has entered my head at times that has really questioned what I was doing. Was I doing the right thing. It seemed like the farther I went along in my project, the farther from my goal I was getting. My searches spiraled farther away from an ending and the frustration grew.

At first I took a pretty generic thing, film, thought about it and figured I liked silent film and wouldn't it be neat to make a silent film. All of this part of the inquiry came quite quick. I knew of Windows Movie Maker and its potential (though I didn't know all the techniques and am still learning) knew of some films from the time period and had a great amount of motivation behind me making me want to do it.

But then came the rehash. What should I film? Can I make a movie? Do I have the resources available? Is this project even acceptable, after all its for entertainment, not anything academic. Through searching and emails I am now feeling that I may be onto something. I have reached the point in Kulhthau's process where I have formed my focus and am now collecting information. It is in this point that confidence starts gaining and I can truly feel that way.

To start off first I have an idea of what kind of film I want. I want something that serves more of a purpose than just to complete this project, I want something that my family can enjoy. My parents don't get to see their grandchild all that much so I was figuring he could be the major star in it.

Next I tried thinking of what genre I wanted. Prelinger archives have a series of shorts in their repertoire and watching them gave me some ideas. I like the slapstick features of Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin but don't really feel like I can fit my two year old son into this style of acting. I watched Hell's Angels, a flying movie that was originally shot as a silent and see that I may be able to do this. My son's room is loaded with model airplanes and I may be able to use these to make flying scenes. I was also thinking I may be able to use some snippets of aircraft shots to make other parts. I am still wondering on copyright on this but I think if I am not making it to make money it might be alright. At least that is what I heard.

I was wondering about how to make the word stills and called up my uncle who has been working with Movie Maker since it came out. He told me about the caption function but I have been a little disappointed with that. Most of the old movies had a frame around the captions and I can't really find a way to do that with the caption model. I think I'll look to see if there is a website that messes with this or even if I could make it myself.

As for music, I have a stash of old records from the 20s and 30s and now that I have a record player that can convert them to MP3s, I think I have a soundtrack. These discs never go past three minutes so I now have a time limit also. It's like everything is falling into place.

Now to make a script or at least think up a direction I want to go. Now that I have some confidence that I know where I am going, this project is becoming fun again. Now to see if I can get a two year old to work with me.

Eureka

Finally I have found something. Prelinger Archives, a website, has a host of films from all different time periods and after typing in Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin I found some silent film. These are short films, usually twenty minutes long and they do a good deal to show me how the word slides and film techniques of the time were. Most of what I watched were comedy films, many involving slapstick and over the top chase scenes. I need to think of something to make with the limited tools I have, but what?

I would love to do a war movie but lack the technology to do so. A comedy would be nice too but I don't feel like my wife, my son, or myself have much to offer in that category. It seems the farther I get down the pathway of inquiry the more muddled things have become.

I watched a modern day silent movie and while the main actor did a great job at being comedic through his actions, I found the movie a tad bit dull and stupid. The music was jazz from the fifties, not even fitting the time period. That is another aspect I need to find, how to add music to the final project. I have some records and have the tools for converting them over, now I just need to find the proper music. Movie Maker is still new to me and while I am learning a lot by just putzing around with it, I may need to look up some website tutorials dealing with it.

With all this going on right now I have to say that I am in the 4th stage of Lamb's 8Ws. I am wiggling all over the place. But then again it feels as if I keep repeating the process. I find information through webbing, wiggle around with it try to weave it into my project, only to find that my project has changed again to something else. I seem to be repeating these three areas. First it was for what project I was going to do. When I figured out it would be film I then repeated my process to narrow it down to silent films. After determining to make a silent film I once again went through the process to determine what film I want to make. If I continue this process I will never finish the project. Well off to do more research and thinking.

Go Ahead

Now what? I got my silent movie project OKed but that just opens up more questions. What do I film? What should I make my movie about? Can I create a plot in a few minutes time? How do I make the word cards that are between shots?

I have played around with movie maker and successfully put in moving images, I even found a technique that makes your image black and white and makes it look all old and scratchy. It was interesting to do this with images taken just recently as with a simple click of a mouse.

Now I plan to start looking at some websites for ideas. The library hasn't been too kind with silent film selections. Modern day films (some really awful, Rambo III for instance) make the cut but such classics as Birth of a Nation and Metropolis get no shelf space. Maybe the main library can help me more.

Anyways this is now where I sit. I thought that finding exactly what to do would actually clear up a lot of questions but it has actually given me many more.

Next Phase

I think I hit the next phase in my inquiry process today. I think it is what would be called webbing. After I decided that silent movies would be something that I would be interested I did my best to look up websites that deal with silent movies. There are many out there, some better than others. As I watched some bits of the films that some of these sites provided I thought wouldn't it be interesting to make one of my very own. I have over the past year been working with Windows Movie Maker to make slide shows of my kid for my parents. I have been using music and different stills to portray what is happening in our house as they do not get to see their grandkid all that much.

So the thought came into my head about possibly creating a silent film using some of the old techniques found back then. I just received not too long ago a camera that has video feature and I would like to play around with it. I am not sure if I could do something like this as this project would be video, rather than written and I am not quite sure how it would be graded. From all indications it would be very free inquiry to say the least. I will get it checked by my prof and see what she says but I have already started giving some thought to it and have some ideas rolling around in my head.

Wondering

Its been a week since my last post but since the last entry I decided that I would research old films. I had a lot of time to think about it and thought that it would be the most exciting and challenging. The topic is broad that I thought I should probably narrow it down. At first I thought about a genre such as war or comedy but that was too general. I then thought maybe a production studio such as Republic or RKO but that idea fell out of my head, then I started thinking about a particular actor or actress. I thought about Lillian Gish who I only know cause she shares the last name with me (no relation) and I have no real clue as to what she did or who she was. While I was pondering this point I noticed that she came from the silent movie era and this interested me much more than her. I have shown silent films to my history class and am always amazed at how these films still resonate with middle school students who are bombarded with every kind of technological advance. Maybe its because its comedy but I still find my class laughing along with the exploits of Buster Keaton.

But how would I cover silent films? To me this is kind of perplexing and also what do I look at. Should I do one film in particular, a particular studio or even how one of these movies were made and the different acting techniques used. Watching any of these movies one can tell how exaggerated some of the actions are. That is where I sit now. I'll wonder a little more over this topic and see where I go but as for now I think silent films will be sort of interesting.

Thinking

By just reading the introductory parts of the texts, I noticed that I am always inquiring of different things. Ever since I was a kid, questions would arise in my mind and unlike then, I now have the internet at my fingertips to attempt to find the information to my questions. I don't know how many times I have used the computer to answer questions that have meandered into my mind. Today for instance I used the internet to look up the work of cartoonist Milton Cannif. In times past (from what I can recall) it has been to see what El Nino is, what other games Klaus Teuber has made and what makes a megalopolis different than a metropolis. The internet has made it so easy now to inquire about the random thoughts that pop up in my head, that shortly after I get the information I so desire, I usually relegate my thought to the back of my head and in short time often forget that I even inquired of it in the first place. It is usually when I go back to type something in the browser keyword space, and see all the past words that were put in there, that it jogs my memory. But there are still a few that are in there that I have no idea where they came from.

So for this project I want to look at something that goes a little deeper than my shallow ponderings. Things that I have thought about but have never really gotten into. Here are a few that I am interested in but never really delved into.

1. Older movies have always interested me. Growing up I always was intrigued by the stories my grandparents told me and I think it was this that made me really interested in the films of old. Now that you can buy a lot of these old forgotten films at the dollar store for 50 cents, I spend more time watching them and wondering about how they were produced.

2. Zeppelins. I live by Notre Dame and its usually an awe inspiring feeling when the Good Year Blimp goes over the backyard. It's hard to imagine that its only about 1/4 the size of the zeppelins of yore. I often wonder what those things were like.

3. I have been doing family research of my family for the past few years and have become interested in my grandma's cousin who was killed in World War II but never found. I often wonder if I am able to get his medals and exactly what happened to him. All the family was given was his Purple Heart and a flag but everything about this man has faded into history.

So there you have it. Those are the top things I am interested in finding out about but haven't really tackled yet. I'll see where I go.