Month: May 2010

Ok, so when I first heard of this movie I wasn’t that impressed by the story line at all. My first impressions were not that great and I wasn’t that pumped about District 9. I generally speaking dislike movies that are in a documentary style, first person, or journal style. One example that defends my hatred for first person is Cloverfield. I was at first still disinterested when I started to watch the movie. I started growing on the style of the movie and as it continued on I became more and more interested in the plot and characters of the movie. I don’t know who this actor was, but I am very impressed with his acting skills for his roll.
The plot is very impressive. The movie is about a man named Wikus who was recently put in charge of evicting the Aliens that have landed and started to live on this planet. As he continues to try and evict them the Prawns( what they call the Aliens) start to show intelligence beyond what the humans originally believed. As the movie continues on Wikus gets hurt and becomes infected. Slowly he starts turning into a Prawn. Eventually it becomes evident to the government and they start to use him for alternative means. The movie continues on about how Wikus has to try and become normal, as he starts to become allies with the Prawns.
Overall this movie impressed me greatly. The Prawns were amazing, and they made a lot of sense. The cinematography was amazing as well and I really enjoyed how real the camera angles made the characters seem. I was curious most of the way though the movie about how the plot would end and the characters were very real to me. I enjoyed this movie to a great extent! It was really awesome! I would probably give this movie 16 points overall.

* Grace points are how many cookies I would give the director/people in the film. If I liked the movie a lot, they get a lot of cookies, but if I don’t like it, then they might very little cookies, or I might even steal cookies from them (as in negative points).

The article in the videomaker magazine “Tweeting with Video” talks about how many people have started to do something called tweeting with videos. It talks about how people can tweet with very small short clips. Use Micro-Videos, which are very very short videos videos that are even 12 seconds long. Not only because short is good, but because with the attention spans of many people, and the busy lives that people have many people can’t sit and watch the 5 minute video blogs that people create. The article gives a few different sites that show video tweeting without the bells and whistles that can be used. Video tweets can be used to just stay current with topics and just give out a thought. The article then talks about how some video companies are trying to take advantage of video tweets, in creating small video cameras that will allow people to create high definition tweets. But at the end of the article it asks if it is really necessary for people to make these small videos and to tweet in this manner.

I honestly think this article was rather informative, because I didn’t know that people did these types of things. Maybe we can possibly do this as a class assignment? Make a quick weekly tweet about what we learned in video production, or learned in other classes. Then teachers can know what students are really learning, and if they are on track.

Yes, I know I did the same article as another student, but I’m writing a summary that’s more pro-video blogging, so it COUNTS!
I am not a Twitter fan at all. I do not see the point of wanting to keep up with a person every SECOND of their lives. Seriously, I don’t want to go home, open up my slow internet browser, and log into Twitter only to read: “1:00 – I’m going to the store to get toilet paper. 1:15 – Just got back from the store. Totally awesome! 1:17 – Crap. Just realized I left my phone in my car. Be right back. 1:18 – Just got my phone. Boy I was worried for a bit there.” Facebook does that enough for me. Please, people. Write things that will actually be of interest to me. However, you can’t deny that it’s fun.
Video-blogging (which most people call vlogging) is no different. There are a number of growing sites that now allow you to post Twitter updates in the form of vlogs. One site only allows you to do so for 12 seconds while other sites will allow you to post in high definition. With a wide variety of posting options, hardcore vloggers will be pleased.
Overall, this article was pretty cool, but the only way I can think to apply it to this class is by suggesting that we post vlogs on this blog every now and then. Hmm? Something to consider.

Samstar

Usually, I find the movies from Marvel Studios pretty enjoyable. This sequel was no different. I saw Iron Man 2 on May 7th, the day it opened in theaters, not because I’m a obsessive fan and just HAD to see it on opening night, but because things just happened to go that way. I saw the first installment of the series and enjoyed it a lot, so I thought, “Why not?”
The first movie ended with Tony Stark publicly identifying himself as Iron Man. We know see him battling a severe health problem, while also facing the consequences of refusing to hand over his technology to the U.S. government.
Robert Downey, Jr. plays the lead role of Tony Stark and does an exceptional job, just as he did in the first film. His character is at times annoying, pompous, and ignorant, but Robert Downey, Jr. was able to prove to the audience that deep down, he has the right heart and knows what he is doing. His main love interest, Pepper Pots, is played by the brilliant Gwyneth Paltrow. Paltrow is one of my favorite actresses; she’s versatile, funny, serious, and very talented. Here she shows that no matter how much crap she has to put up with from Tony and his actions, she can’t deny that she loves him very much. Also, I’m not a huge fan of Scarlett Johansson, but she has a breathtaking fight scene that definitely won me over.
Iron Man 2 will certainly keep you on the edge of your seat. However, there’s not much about this series that leaves me wanting more or wanting to watch it again. For this reason, I give it four out of five stars. Still, it is without a doubt two great hours of entertainment and definitely worth a trip to the movie theater.

Samstar

Yeah… okay, I’m stooping to a new low. Which I didn’t think was possible. I’m reviewing another parody movie- Robin Hood: Men In Tights. However, I’m reluctant to admit that this movie is actually an amusing one. Robin Hood gets arrested at the beginning, and is taken to an Arab jail somewhere in the Middle east. He escapes with another guy (whose name is Asneese, he has a son called Achoo [sneeze jokes abound]), and then swims to England. The humor in this movie is really consistent, with no exceptionally funny parts. It stays even throughout the entire thing, which isn’t a bad thing.
There’s nothing exceptional or groundbreaking about the acting or filming, and the story itself is definitely over-done (It’s Robin Hood), but the memorable characters and witty dialogue ensure that you’ll remember this for a good long time. Plus, it has the best usage of a chorus line I’ve ever seen.

In essence, made me laugh, kept the laughs steady, nothing ground-breaking. 4 out of 5.

With VIDEO TWITTER! That’s right, folks, apparently you can now take your idiotic, worthless opinions on everything in existence, and put it into video form! 12Seconds, Twitvid, Vidly, Twiddeo, BubbleTweet… all sort of crazy and stupid ways to spread your mindless drivel around the world. Now, granted, some of you have something useful and important and interesting to say… but you’re not going to be able to say it here. Because these are limited to around 12-15 seconds of video, similar to Twitter’s character limit. This means that nothing important is ever going to be said EVER with these sites. If you’ve got something useful to say… then BLOG it!!!

I have had the distinct pleasure to watch… District 9 on Tuesday. From the action packed scenes, to the underlying causes and overbearing feeling of everything being “messed up”. A movie based around the landing of an alien race on our planet in Johannesburg, Africa. The prawns mother ship has been disabled leading to the stranding of around 2 millions of these aliens, mixing with civilians, tribal gang leaders and the alien/area police.

This is were Wikus comes into play, a great actor in front of the green screen. He is found in one of his first movies and he had the talent to make me literally angry at him through the movies, as at first he wimped out and than began to only care for self-preservation. A serious and self-inflicted mistake lead to a total character transformation seen solemly to those of great acting skills.

Between Wikus, squad military leaders and the commanders of MNU, as well as the local gang leaders, the acting was top notch, considering that almost half of this movie was presented with graphic design and geen screening. Not to mention the concept of the characters and the zeal they present is top notch.

Peter Jackson and Neil Blomkamp ded a fantastic job presenting this story, the writing and directing of these two provided not only myself, but millions enjoyment and excitment in many ways. From cross species jokes to action and a mix of emotions, it has just the right mix.

In conclusion, this is a must see hands down. Although one would say the acting is somewhat low, imagine actually doing it all in front of the green screen, acting emotionally and physically to objects and aliens that arn’t even present! 5/5 In my books and if you have an X-Box, it is currently found on Netflix, through X-Box so go ahead and watch it, bag of popcorn suggested though…

The idea of planning just seems wrong in the shoes of a teenager, but as we begin to learn and expand upon not only our lives, but our video making abilities, planning is crucial to success. In “The Perfect Plan: Storyboard and Shot List Creation“It does not give us new knowledge per say, but reinforces what we know. From writing a script that is exciting, riveting and leads to character names and scenes that are neither generic or repetitive.

The major idea brought up, is the use of image with writing to allow for a more precisely found image and to create a final product more closely related to the visions of the creator. Neither sketching, nor writing is enough, color is also just as important. The writing brings an idea to life, sketching allows for the vision to be brought into a visible form, but color knocks it out of the park. With color and sketch, scripts can be taken to a whole other level since it allows for better understanding when looking for actors and shot locations.

In conclusion, one will expand and increase their proficiency while making movies or videos if the plan out their scripts, write and edit it, but also adding colored sketches allows for everything to fall quickly into place. From knowing what camera angles to take, what shots to do together and where to shoot increases the speed at which you can produce your film more accurately to the creators first vision. Lastly Julia Camenisch (the author of this article) restates the old saying that practise makes perfect and by heading these ideas, you can become a better film maker!