Festival Laurels!

Woo hoo!

I feel special.

Spring Break

For the break, I decided to take a few SCA friends up to Santa Barbara to go wine tasting a la Sideways the movie. We ended up going to only two Sideways destinations: Solvang Restaurant, home of the abaelskivers, and Kalyra Winery, an Australian themed winery where Jack falls in love with Stephanie. We also went to Rideau Winery, which was a New Orleans themed winery, whose customer service was horrific (they wouldn’t let us keep the glass, like in other wineries) and where their food was better tasting than some of their wines. We finished our wine tour at Alisal Cellar, a nice underground alcove away from the dehydrating sun. Heeding recommendations, we drove to Santa Barbara to eat at a small French restaurant called Petit Valentien, possibly the best deal in town with $18 entrees and under $10 appetizers. You could eat frog legs here!

That trip was the highlight of my spring break. Unfortunately after that day, it’s been bad news after bad news. Without going into too much detail, I’m still trying to wrap my mind around what happened while trying to finish my edit for my first project. It’s hard to focus when my mind and heart is elsewhere. Logistically, I’m having to take care of my younger sibling while everything gets straightened out so once school starts in two days, I have to take on a few more responsibilities. My birthday is around the corner but this year I just don’t feel up to celebrating the way I did last year. It’s just one of those years that has pendulum-like ups and downs and I just want to NOT feel, if that makes any sense.

Flip Mino Camcorder

I really want to buy myself this flip mino. it’s HD and I can plug it straight into my computer via usb port and jut upload up to 60 min of footage. this is basically what i need for auditions, catching things on the fly, etc. And, it’s not too expensive and it’s compact and portable. It’s smaller than my digital camera.

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scholarship

So I really want to apply to the directing scholarship due this Friday. We got an email this morning from Pablo saying that we have until the 25th to make a dvd of our reel but we have to turn in everything else, including our written statements, by this Friday.

Because of my international student status, I don’t have too many scholarships to choose from that are still accepting applications. That’s why I was so happy to learn that these departamental scholarships are open to all SCA students. There are a handful of directing scholarships and I’m not entirely sure if it usually goes to upperclassmen or if they try to spread them out to everyone, but I’m going to apply anyway. The worst thing that could happen is that I don’t get it. So what? I’ll try again next year. I feel like out of all the different tracks in filmmaking, I’m the most comfortable when I’m working with actors or when I’m creating an environment for people. I can see myself thrive as a director but I can also see myself as a producer. Perhaps I will be a director who is good at producing, or a producer who understands what the director wants. However, I don’t think I have the qualifications to submit a reel for the cinematography scholarship.

Today I got to sleep in a little bit since class was cancelled. I finally mailed out dvd copies of my past film to the cast and crew. I hope some of them make the Reel Women Film Festival’s screening of “Pretty.” I went straight to the editing lab after that and stayed until midnight. I am almost done making the rough cut. I just need to rough cut the last scene and then I can start going back to fine-tune it. As of now, I’m close to twenty minutes so I have to figure out ways to cut into the scene to make it shorter but without losing any significance.

Runs

Today was the day for errands. I went to school, then drove to drop off my light kit at Zemeckis, and then I drove to Wooden Nickel to drop off everything else. I had company, though. My classmate, Luke, was doing the same thing so we grabbed lunch at Porto’s. I couldn’t finish my lunch so I packed it so I could eat it for dinner. I drove straight to the editing labs where I stayed until midnight dumping my footage, converting it, and cutting the first scene.

A lot of what I shot is uneditable but funny as a whole. My dilemma now is whether to keep certain clips the way they are without chopping it up because it’s funny in its entirety, or chop it up in smaller pieces and play with the rhythm. I guess I should focus on laying it all down first before going back to fine tune it. I’m so excited about this project. Every time I look at it, I laugh. I wish we were allowed to upload this on public websites but I just read that we are not allowed to do this. I guess I can hold a small screening of it in my house for the people involved and just give them copies for their reels. It’s a shame more people can’t see it though but I guess it makes sense legally since I didn’t clear any rights, etc. although I bet if the Raiders saw it, they wouldn’t be too mad about it. It totally glorifies them.

I’m starting to think of ideas for project 2. I am really tempted to do a short 5 min documentary since we can use sync sound in this one. Some topics I want to consider: food, culture, immigration, dreams, courting (not dating), entrepreneurship in a recession. A mockumentary like “how-to” instructional films also come to mind. If I do another narrative, I want to do a film about freedom.

Tomorrow’s class is canceled, meaning that I can edit longer. I want to try to finish a rough cut of this project so I could submit it along with “Pretty” to the scholarships that are due this Friday. I hope I get one. It’s one of few scholarships I can actually partake in since most scholarships are only open to U.S. citizens or permanent residents.

They should have a scholarship for Korean Bolivian women filmmakers.

Shoot day #3

Today was a pretty awesome day.

We got to our set at 9:30am and started setting up the scene. This was our final scenes from when they go to their friend’s house to watch the superbowl, to seeing the Raiders win the superbowl, and ending with a dance number at the end in a victory celebration. Everyone is in face paint and wearing black and silver. My boyfriend and his friend (whose house where we were shooting at) and my dancer friend were all extras. My dancer friend choreographed the final dance number for everyone to do, and my makeup artist started getting really into it and suggested we end with an individual pose at the end of the dance number. I loved how creative we all were! This is what I call creative synergy.

I white balanced every scene, I only used one light plus natural lighting, and I tried hard to focus. I also grabbed sound. I hope the biggest lesson we are to learn from this project is that we cannot do everything ourselves. I already knew this but now I know it even more. I love working and collaborating with people and having people do their best in the position they feel that they are the best in.

We wrapped at 2:05pm so we were 5 minutes over. But, breaking down and loading up my car didn’t take too long and we all had fun. I took a look at some of the footage I shot and I just can’t help but laugh. It’s so visually funny. I hope my audience feels the same, too.

When I got home, I decided to try and squeeze everything into my Mini so I could go to school and drop off the light kit and so I don’t have to come back home before going to Wooden Nickel. After an hour of heaving and lifting, I managed to fit one light kit, three large cases for the Spider dolly, 4 c-stands, 2 extra arms, 4 sand bags, 8 flags/nets (without the flag box), a milk crate with two lights, two stingers, a dimmer, and extra clamps, and a set of apple boxes of various sizes.

Maybe I can save up money and buy something else instead of a van. Looks like I won’t be needing it anyway, for small projects like the one I just shot.

Shoot day #2

Today’s call time was at 9am originally but I told the actors to come at 11am because we ran long yesterday. I guess I forgot to tell my PA because he showed up at my house at 9am. At least I was up now and had time to set things up. The makeup artist and two of my classmates, Jorge and Ritvik, also showed up at 11am to help me out. Today’s shoot was the big one. We had to finish all the scenes that took place at my house because we’re only shooting for four hours at a friend’s house tomorrow and we have to be done by 2pm.

I ended up shooting a lot of the scenes hand held. There are a lot of lighting problems, glitches in continuity, and I forgot to white balance and have consistent sound.

So, basically, I am going to have a hell of a time trying to edit this together. On the bright side, I had so much fun and I think everyone else did, too. I had good food on set, I had great people helping me out, my makeup artist was awesome and had great creative input, and my actor and actress were great with each other. Their performance was so on point. I coudn’t ask for more.

My classmates were really fun to work with and very helpful and supportive. Lots of inside jokes are starting to form. One of my classmates’ response to everything was “let’s just tape it.” Kind of reminds me of Tim Allen in Home Improvement and his love for duct tape.

For dinner, my mom donated Korean Fried Chicken, which was a hit. Yesterday she donated sushi. I have the best mom ever. My actress brought her dog over and her dog was upstairs the whole time and my mom was totally okay with it. It wasn’t always like this but now I’m glad she’s got my back.

We got done a little before 9pm and my friend (who DP’d two of my short films) came over to help me break down my set. He loaded up my Mini with all the things I’d need for tomorrow. I couldn’t believe how much stuff fit in there. We loaded the Spider dolly in another car (three big cases). I felt really lucky that all these people banded together and decided to help me out on this project.

Shoot day #1

Today was the first shooting day for Raider Nation. I know at some point I have to change that title but until something good comes to me, I’m calling it Raider Nation for the time being.

I woke up this morning to go pick up the equipment from Wooden Nickel. I didn’t take my car because I thought it was too small. Once I got there, the guys were telling me that a Mini actually can hold a lot of stuff. I laughed at them. After loading up the car, I drove to Porto’s bakery to get some craft services and to buy a cake for my boyfriend’s birthday party at 10pm. They told me one cake serves 8 people so I bought two cakes.

I arrived at my basement with all the equipment and food and my laptop to check over my shot lists. Soon, Rama came to help me set up the spider dolly. The actor and actress came and we started to rehearse and by around 2pm we started shooting. I love comedies. There is so much more synergy because people love to laugh. We were able to shoot all the montage scenes, which were the first five scenes. The only real problem I ran into was that I didn’t record sound for the bulk of the day because the audio was set to “EXT” which is the setting we were working with in Cinematography class because we were learning to use a boom mic. I set it to “INT” and had the actors do some pickup sounds.

We wrapped at around 8 pm and I raced over to my boyfriend’s birthday party of around 30 people.

We ended up only eating one cake.

Crossing the line

Today I screened my directing scene to the class. My professor said it was good. The only note he gave me was that I crossed the 180 degree line in one part of the scene. I assumed I set up the room in a way that made sense visually when the characters cross back and forth but in looking at it again, I could see how I did obviously cross the line. It looks jarring now.

I think it’s interesting how when I edit something for so long, I forget what is good or bad. I come back a few days later and it still looks the same. Then, someone points something out and only then can I see it. I wonder if that means I don’t think outside the box.

Today was my last directing class with Peter Robinson. I’m pretty sad. He was one of the best professors I have and I learned so much in the time I had with him. I’m not sure why they are cutting this class shorter than the other classes. I would assume we need to continue honing our directing skills. I’m not sure how this curriculum is set up. It’s really confusing right now because although I am aware of when certain classes end and when certain classes turn into another type of class, I don’t completely understand the logic behind some of the decision made.

Anyway, I’m shooting my first project this weekend. I have my actress, who has acted in my past films. When she auditioned, I felt like she was the best one for this particular project because she is open to do anything and brings a lot of humor into everyday activities. As for the actor, I decided not to go with anyone I auditioned. Not because the actors didn’t give a good audition but more so because I wanted to find someone who could be a good match to my actress. My boyfriend reminded me of the actors I worked with in the past in comedies and I realized that I could call up some people I knew so I did, and he agreed to help me out. I’m really excited. I have a feeling they will be perfect for their roles.

On another note, the SCA building is finally feeling more complete. Today I came on campus to see construction workers erecting a statue of Douglas Fairbanks. He’s the guy who founded the film school. The statue is kind of funny because Doug is wearing some sort of costume and he looks like a pirate.

Not only did we get a new statue to complete the look of the building, but the cafe area is finally open so we have a place to sit and chill. The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf opened its doors and they ran out of food in the first half of the day. Cinema students cannot walk all the way to cafe 84 to eat anymore. They should stock up on more bagels and sandwiches. I should write them a letter. They are not optimizing their profit potential. Also, they should be open as late as the editing lab is open. People get extremely hungry at around 11pm after spending the entire day down there without going to the bathroom or eating and when they come out, they look like rabid zombies and they just need something to boost their blood sugar level.

Car service

Living in LA and spending most of my time trapped in a car in rush hour traffic, I have found many ways to cope with these stressors. I have about 17 presets of radio stations ranging from Reggaeton, Pop, Country, Christian, News, Smooth Jazz, to Rap, Hip Hop, Spanish Ballads, etc. I also have my go-to cd’s in my glove compartment – Shakira, Gospel, Coldplay. Interesting mix, right?

The other thing about spending so much time in my car is that I have come to pay closer attention to every warning signs, emergency lights, and noises. My car has a central “brain” that is wired to everything so if the tire pressure is low, the light for tires will come on and I used to drive it all the way to Mini service to have them look at it. It took me about four times last year to realize I can just add some air and reset the light to fix the problem.

This time, the check engine light came on. I’ve only had this car for a good solid year so I knew nothing was really wrong with the engine but I still had to bring it in to make sure nothing else was wrong. So, on a Wednesday morning I decided to drive it to Mini service to have them look at it. I waited in the lounge and did some homework while waiting for my car.

Lo and behold, there was nothing wrong with my car. The brain was screwed up. 3 hour detour from my day but at least it wasn’t unpleasant. They have pretty good customer service and I’ve gone there so much that I just bring my laptop now and work on stuff while waiting for my car. I contemplated renting out an SUV (they have an Enterprise on location) so I could go and pick up my equipment for Wooden Nickel but the thought of having to drive it back and trading cars, etc. made me rethink it.

If I had $7000, would I buy a used van or a camera?

Right now, I’m leaning towards a van.