Kate’s first videoblog post

I handed the camera to Kate today. We were in Burnham Beeches, just outside London (map/satphoto). The colours are incredible this year. Another thing I’ll miss in evergreen Vancouver Island.

I was trying to persuade her to sing her song The Falling of the Leaves (a Yeats poem she set to music – you can hear it on her Myspace page) so that I could use it as a soundtrack for the other moments I shot all around the woods. But this is better.

I think I’m going to give her the camera more often.

Alternative file types:
Quicktime / Flash (click to play if player above doesn’t work)

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Open reply to Josh Cohen of Tilzy.tv

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–update–
Hi to everybody who’s stumbled here from Blip or Mefeedia homepages (or wherever) wanting to know about NaVloPoMo.

NaVloPoMo is (Inter)National Videoblog Posting Month – a lot of video bloggers and artists making and posting films every day in November.

The site is at http://nablopomo.ning.com/group/videobloggers – you can see people’s films there, and also find a list of their blog URLS and feeds.

Twittervlog.tv is my video blog, which I shoot, cut and post, all with my Nokia N93 cellphone.

—
This is a rather fast but long and probably quite inarticulate reply to an email I got from Josh Cohen at Tilzy.tv asking about NaVloPoMo. I just riffed on his questions. They’re quite good questions for getting you thinking about NaVloPoMo. If you want to answer any of the questions yourself, or if I’ve missed something, or you’ve just got something else to say about NaVloPoMo and about personal videoblogging, reply in the comments or (even better) in a video.

– How’d you come up with the idea? And how’d you initially share it with the community? Did it take long to catch on?
– About how many vlogs would you say there are involved? (I think there’s a list on the Ning site, but was wondering if that was extensive)
– Why do you participate? What type of people should participate? Is it for anyone?
– What’s the best part about it?
– How do your videos for NaVloPoMo differ than your regular fare?

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My Office – the art of Getting Things Done

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Yesterday, I asked everybody to show their desks & workspaces, in response to Cheryl asking to see everyone’s Junk Drawers. And I promised to show mine today. So here it is.

Two years ago, a friend gave me David Allen‘s famous Getting Things Done. It changed my life.

PS
Dear Clients,
This is a work of fiction.

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Late night desk envy and Video Ideas For NaVloPoMo

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Two things:

Lauren’s “Video ideas for NaVloPoMo” is a great idea in itself.

You can see Valdez‘s attic here. You have been warned. I am not responsible for any night terrors or low self-esteem.

For contrast, see David Howell’s attic, posted on Day 1 of NaVloPoMo. But although that’s comforting in its chaos, it’s disturbing for entirely different reasons.

More! More workspaces! Feed me!

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Trip on the ferry to Dartmouth

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Just some moments from a trip down the river yesterday.

It’s a funny thing – I probably wouldn’t post this if it weren’t for NaVloPoMo. Because it’s aspiring to be something it’s not.

I wanted to do NaVloPoMo because I thought it’d make me feel more comfortable posting just *anything* without judging it too much. I wonder whether it’s having the opposite effect. Seeing all the amazing things other people are posting has made me dissatisfied with the kind of stuff I’m doing with this phone.

It’s made me realise that I’ve been getting increasingly frustrated with my mobile phone’s aesthetic limitations. It shoots good *resolution* for a phone but I don’t really like the colours, the contrast, the *character* of the video it makes.

So while it’s great for capturing personal human moments and posting them in the moment, without frills, it’s not so good for taking moving snapshots of *things* that I see and want to photograph. The images just look flat, and dull.

I know that making things on my phone has got me making things and posting more often, which is great. And the aesthetic limitation has stopped me getting too hung up about what I make, which is also great.

But in NaVloPoMo I wanted to post a whole load of different types of films up, and some of them just won’t work with this phone. I want to start playing with a proper camera again.

And the truth is, I haven’t got time to. It’s already causing tension at home, the amount of time I’m spending at my computer for NaVloPoMo – and all I’ve posted are simple single-shot nothingy little snapshots. The time spent cutting the San Francisco film last week and this film today are just *too much*.

So I guess I’m stuck with my phone and its boring image quality. And that’s what I’ve got to work with this month. That’s my challenge. Fight the aspirational demons that tell me that you’re all making more interesting videos than me. Fuck it. Just post stuff. And talk. Create and connect. Kill the artist. 🙂

And yeah, yeah, I know… a bad workman blames his tools…

File types: Quicktime I Flash

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Lumiere: Deliverance

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(Lumiere films have no sound, are 60 seconds or less, have a fixed camera position – see http://videoblogging.info/lumiere for more information)

This was shot and cut on my Nokia N93 phone. Not bad, for a phone.

I hate London.
Iàöâm in Devon, staying at my father-in-lawàöâs house on the River Dart.
This is a Lumiere that I shot when I was out in a boat with him earlier this evening. This is him, rowing. I’d love to share with you the sound of the oar, the boat and the water, but you’ll have to imagine it. Apart from anything else, what he was saying is unbroadcastable.

Earlier in the day, we went to Dartmouth on the ferry. I shot 120 clips, and cut them together as a little moving slideshow. But then I forgot my own rules, and cut them in Final Cut Pro instead of something quick & easy like my phone or Quicktime. It didn’t improve the quality of the finished product at all, I don’t think – and I forgot to compress it before I went out for a drunken dinner. So now here I am at 11.45, with the video still stuck compressing and my Day 3 deadline unachievable.

So it’s lucky I shot this Lumiere. In some ways, I prefer it to the video I was going to post.

I’ll post the Dartmouth trip video as soon as it’s done – which will be after midnight – and so maybe I’ll even end up posting 2 videos tomorrow. Or maybe not. There’s no need to show off, is there?

As I finish writing this, it’s 23:58 and the video is just about to finish uploading at Blip. Jesus. 23:59. Copied and pasted. Here we go.

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At my signal, unleash hell

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“Three weeks from now, I will be harvesting my crops. Imagine where you will be, and it will be so. Hold the line! Stay with me! If you find yourself alone, riding in the green fields with the sun on your face, do not be troubled. For you are in Elysium, and you are already DEAD!
Brothers, what we do in life… ECHOES IN ETERNITY!”

“Everybody walks past a thousand story ideas every day. The good writers are the ones who see five or six of them. Most people don’t see any.” – Orson Scott Card

“To be a writer is to sit down at one’s desk in the chill portion of every day, and to write; not waiting for the little jet of the blue flame of genius to start from the breastbone – just plain going at it, in pain and delight. To be a writer is to throw away a great deal, not to be satisfied, to type again, and then again, and once more, and over and over…” John Hersey

“Exercise the writing muscle every day, even if it is only a letter, notes, a title list, a character sketch, a journal entry. Writers are like dancers, like athletes. Without that exercise, the muscles seize up.” Jane Yolen

Join us – posting every day if you can – at http://nablopomo.ning.com/group/videobloggers

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Francis & Me, Part 1

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I’ve been meaning to post this all year, but I got too busy. Now I can’t wait any longer to share it with you.

Jay and Ryanne and GoGen and David and a whole lot of other people have inspired me recently with films of travels and faraway places. This is very different to the kind of quiet moments of beauty they observe & record – but watching theirs made me get off my arse and do something with mine.

I’m going to try to cut together more from this trip, maybe once a week – as part of my NaBloPoMo daily posting.

PS – Geek note – This wasn’t shot & cut on the N93, as the title card says, but shot on a tiny Canon Ixus/Powershot 900 pocket stills camera. Amazing. Gotta love those Canons for quality, low light & colour. (Cut on iMovie)

Formats available: Quicktime (.mov)