Month: April 2010

Hey everybody, just wanted to let you all know how the blog is doing. We’ve added a new page which explains the services which we are offering to the community. Please check it out via the link bar above or by clicking on the logo to the left.

There is also a new poll to the right where you can suggest changes and improvements to the blog.

Winthrop High School Graduation 1997 will soon be available on DVD. Yes you read that correctly, 1997. A VHS tape containing the entire ceremony was recently discovered. We have logged it onto a computer and will be burning one or two copies to DVD for the archives. If per chance you are interested in a copy talk to Ms. Shaw.


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Chris here. And here’s another movie I should have seen a long time ago. Well, anyway, even though most of you have probably seen it, I’ll give you a recap.

The movie starts out as Brian Cohen, is born a few doors down away from Jesus, which confuses the Three Wise Men, as they are both Jewish. Brian grows up not liking the Romans, who are occupying Judea, and he eventually joins the People’s Front of Judea, one of many splintered anti-roman groups who fight each other more than the Romans. I won’t ruin a lot of the humor for you, but I will give you my opinion of the movie.

About halfway through, the humor starts building up. At the beginning, there isn’t much funny about much of anything, which is what I didn’t like about it. It’s kind of slow. There’s a chuckle or two later, but eventually all those chuckles build up, and a single scene contains eight different things that made you laugh, so it gets good after a while. Also, there are two scenes that just made me laugh outright, simply because they’re so funny. (I’m not going to ruin it for you.)

I don’t believe in ratings, but if I did, I’d give it a 879,416,742 out of 1,000,000,000.

Now some people might say that this is not a movie, but it is I tell you! This movie was shown to me by Spencer and I have to give him a lot of credit, this movie is fantastic. The movie is about Dr. Horrible (Neil Patrick Harris) as he tries to get into the Evil League of Evil, which is a very high league of super villains. It sounds foolish at first, but it is amazing. The acting is very well done. Dr. Horrible has a crush on a girl named Penny (Felicia Day) who he sees at the laundromat weekly. He accidentally hooks up his nemesis Captain Hammer (Nathan Fillion) and Penny up during one of his heists. Dr. Horrible must figure out how to get his dream girl and defeat Captain Hammer.

The movie is a musical, I forgot to mention that. The songs are hilarious and very well done. One might not think Neil Patrick Harris has a good voice, but he actually does. The songs are highly amusing and very funny when one listens to the lyrics of the songs. My personal favorite is either “A Man’s Gotta Do”, or “Brand New Day.” They are probably two of the best songs in the movie. I have come to love Dr. Horrible to the point that I have made my parents watch it, though their lack of humor made it less funny for them than myself. I would recommend this movie to people 100% and even if you are like my parents and do not have a very good sense of humor you will still enjoy it, just not as much as I have.

Hey, all. I’ve been saying it for quite a while, and now it’s being confirmed– traditional TV and video as we know it is dead. Quite a few factors are contributing to its demise.

The first would be an end to filming standards. There are at least four video quality ratios on YouTube alone, and there are a slew of other formats. The only standard is the one that the cameraman chooses. Another factor is 3D, one of big video’s main gimmicks. Avatar… or Avatar in 3D? Unfortunately, it is referred to as the “flying car” or “jetpack” of the movie industry- cool concept, but nobody cares.

There is also the rapid evolution of bigger and better aspect ratio available at home, and cameras are getting cheaper and easier to use. Any idiot can buy a good video camera and make a crappy movie in 1080p with 60 frames per second. Editing is also going to get easier, and anybody is going to be able to do it relatively well. Distribution is already a large factor in killing traditional movies- why pay ten dollars to see it in theaters, or twenty to buy a DVD that’s incompatible with your system and you’re only going to watch once, when you can pirate it for free? Why pay $100 for a thousand cable channels you don’t watch when you can just watch it on Hulu? TV is dead. Dump your stocks and accelerate the process. Please.

And Now for Something Completely Different, actually that is the name of the movie. Released in 197, it is a masterpiece of British comedy. Created and produced by the same people who produced the infamous Monty Python and the Holt Grail, this film was intended to be a compilation of the best skits produced by the Python’s for the intent of getting U.S. citizens hooked on their acts. Although this movie is not the best acting, filming or based on story line, the skits in general rival that of almost all current comedy.

They have set the bar for current comedy acts and within this movie, they give it their all to show what they have formulated. The general Idea that I see is that if you look at the movie as a movie, it is not very good. However if you look at each skit individually they are works of art. They never get bored or dull and use the transition to great extents mixing comedic artwork to the changing of scenes, even at some points creating a joke by not even allowing the punchline to drop before switching.

Even today I can ask my brother about “The Lumber Jack Song,” and they will instantly burst out in laughter or start rehearsing it for me. If anyone has the time I would suggest watching this or any of their works. Not only that, but the countless documentaries which I have just recently become addicted to allow for hours of sitting back and actually learning about people that are funny. All in all the skits individually get a 5/5, but the movie in general lacking basic composition gets a 2/5!

“Get it done.” These words have been stressfully uttered this week as Anna and I have been editing fiendishly in attempts to get the “Good Life” music video completed. We are pretty much done with the video, which we have to send in tomorrow to make the deadline. Minor editing jobs such as smoothing out transitions are the only things left to do. I’m happy with the outcome of the video, and I think it has a good chance of placing in the competition. Cabaret 2010 is finally done, which relieved some stress, with the help of Spencer’s/Pat’s wonderful multi-clip discovery. 

As we all know, trying to record a video sequence on-time and as you wanted is almost impossible these days! Laura Martone has written a short article for Video Maker Magazine, called: Video Production Scheduling funnily enough!

This very compact and general guide did not personally present new info, but in fact just organized it for me to understand and use more easily. Anyone who takes Video production learns to make a story board first and then they must decide on a place to shoot, and actors. What if you forgot to get permission from the place you were shooting, or your actor was sick, What then?

“. If you take the time to create an accurate shot list, consider details like location availability, and fashion a shooting schedule accordingly, your shoot will go much faster and smoother – and your cast, crew and client will thank you for it.” Not only does this show the general idea of cast, time, set, location and product, but this actually shows the investment of money. These days everything is money and whether it be saving your clients by saving time, or by saving you time to earn money at the high school job, I am sure all of us have!

In conclusion, I believe all students should be made to read this article… Seriously, read it! Shaw might describe it, but you can realize it is not just her “lying” to you. With this not only can you save yourself time in making your next video, but you will also save Shaw from haveing to stare blankly at another piece of “High School Trash”!

Day for Night
This article tells you how to create a night scene in the middle of the day! A very helpful tip is to NEVER shoot the sky. You also have to carefully pick a background. Once you have your scene you need to darken down your image and lower your light level. Ambiance is talked about in the article. They use the example of lighting a candle to make it believable. But a candle wouldn’t do the trick for this scene. You need more light. maybe high beams on a car or a high powered flash light would do the trick. A simple way for a short scene is waiting for twilight. It allows for enough light without the sun in the sky. It also allows to make a more believable scene simply by turning on some lights in a house or having street lights on. The final step is to get the color temperature right. Blue is what people think the moon light is more like. But you need to take the right steps. You cant just edit the scene and make it look blue because that will look false and wont sell to the audience. You need to white balance the camera with more of a warmer color such as a light orange. You put a orange CTO in front of your lense then white balance it with a white piece of paper or something. when you return to the scene it should add a bluish color. Remember to K.I.S.S (Keep It Simple Stupid).

Kick-Ass
I watched a movie over vacation in the movie theaters with my good friend Travis Hutchins. We both thought that this movie would absolutely suck. The previews did an awful job at advertising this movie. Anyways travis and I watched the movie. The movie is about a young teen 17 years old who decides to become a “super hero” he names him self “Kick-Ass” but in actuallity he gets his ass kicked everytime. he had an accident prior to his super hero decisions which nearly abolished his nerv endings. HE FEELS NO PAIN! Righto. He was caught on camera defending a guy who was being attacked by a gang. He was now all over the internet. a girl he likes needs some help with some thugs. he thought that he could help. He shows up at the thugs place and nearly dies until another “super hero” shows up and saves his life. he wants to give it all up but he cant because people need him. One thing leads to another and now hes dealing with the biggest Drug dealer in the city. Everyone dies. not really. But close to it. Watch the movie and see for yourself

The “Good Life” music video is almost done! Which is a good thing considering the deadline is this Friday… We are filming our last scene this afternoon. It was supposed to be me baking cookies with Rylan, but since Rylan is in Florida we switched it to me walking in the beautiful Maine woods. So we will film that, and tomorrow we will scrapbook our lovely pictures and make them come to life. Yeah, we switched it to a scrapbook instead of frames on a mantel because Mama Doyle freaked out when I messed with her mantel display. So, it’s a scrapbook now. Hopefully we will win 1,000 dollars soon!!