Week 7 Prgress

I spent my time this week doing research and contacting people to interview. I spent two hours re-watching Julia Dengel's film "Cowboys, Indians, and Lawyers". I contacted as many people from Dengel's film as possible. One guy still lives in town so i sent him a message and am awaiting a response. Another was part of the Southern Ute Grassroots Organization which im not sure is still active or if their contact information is current, but i sent messages where i could. I pretty much spent the rest of time watching the film "Cadilac Desert" and reading the book of the same name.

Week 5 Progress report

This week I spent time contacting a few more sources and trying to arrange interviews and continuing research on the Project itself, I also did a practice interview with a friend to help prepare for my interviews. I used the majority of my ten hours preparing for my work shop.

I contacted Tom Yoder and Sarah Wilcox of the SWCA Environmental Consultants. This is the orginization that handled the excavation of artifacts in the Ridges Basin site. I am awaiting a response on whether an interview is possible. I was contacted by and given a lot of good information from Dave Gates, the Public Outreach Team Leader from the A-LP. I spent about three hours going over this info and cammunicating with Dave. Unfortunatley the Project Manager of the A-LP informed me via Dave that there will be electrical testing this weekend so my tour will have to be rescheduled.

I spent threehours conducting several practice interviews practice interview with a friend. I practiced setting up all my equipment and seeing how long it would take. I used a couple lamps i had around the house in place of real lights and C-stands and experimented with different lighting setups. I used an old tri-pod to tape the microphone to and practiced aiming it properly.

I worked for about four hours on creating a power point for my lighting workshop, researching lighting techniques, and experimenting with diferent improvised gels, diffusers, and techniques.
I used a digital SLR and the Panasonic video camera to test the results of different set-ups. I found a couple good videos on you tube on lighting and watched several movies for inspiration. American Beauty has great lighting so i spent time trying to mimic the quality of light in certain scenes of the film.

These area few of the better lighting tutorials i found on youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bwsi9NQWen0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82w7zixCDJo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6yRQnFD-_8

Week 4 Progress Report

I spent this week continuing my research and getting b-roll footage at and around the Dam. I'm still awaiting interviews from the A-LP Project Manager, Brad Clark, and spent time revising my proposal, in order to make it presentable to different sources.I also spent time watching a documentaries and taking notes.

I spent three hours filming and taking stills at the site of Ridges Basin Dam. I was able to get up close to the dam and i think i got some good shots. While there, I discovered several signs indicating that the site is used as a Uranium tailings repository. Two of these signs stated that the amount of radioactivity is 1,400 curies. I thought this was very interesting, and somewhat worrisome, so upon returning home I spent two hours researching The sites use as a Uranium repository. I found that the site had been used for this purpose before the construction of the dam and the dam was placed over this site for the purpose of further containing the hazardous materials beneath.

I took an hour to revise and shorten my proposal and make it more presentable to a variety of sources. Once finished I sent it to the Project Manager at the A-LP and am awaiting a response. I also spent about an hour and a half researching the Animas. I was particullarly interested in its origin and end.

I spent about two and a half hours watching two documentaries. The first was Dark days, directed by Marc Singer. I really liked how the filmmaker got close to his subjects and was able to get some extremely personal moments caught on tape while maintaining a level of objectivity which i think was necessary to effectivley tell the story. the second doc i watched was Out of Balance, directed by Tom Jackson. This is a doc about Exxon Mobil and the effects of fossil fuels on climate change. This was a pretty basic documentary in terms of style and subject but it was helpful to see how another filmmaker presented an issue somewhat similar to mine.

Week 3 Progress Report

I spent this week spending most of my time on just a few things.

On Monday I took a some digital stills for my proposal at a spot on the river just opposite the ALP diversion site. The weather and light were lousy and I was not very satisfied with the results but it helped me start to get into the right mind-set for the project. I spent about an hour doing this.

I worked on writing and putting the rest of the proposal together for about five hours. Most of this time was spent going over some of my earlier research and thinking about what this thing was gonna look like. I feel like i have a pretty good idea now of the what the focus and look of the piece will be.

I spent the remaining four hours of my time taking video of the river at various points for B roll. I walked up and down the river trail near the 32st Bridge and got a lot of wildlife footage that I think will be useful in the film. I was also taking stills in the same area. After this I drove down to ALP diversion site and tried to get some new and more interesting footage. This was only moderately successful but I was then able to get up pretty close to the Ridges Basin Dam site and got some good footage and shots up there. It was muddy and snowy and I didn't have my girlfriends 4x4 so I could not get as close as I would have liked but I think what I got was fairly decent. Next week i'll head back up there with Jeep and get some better stuff.

Week 1 and 2 Progress Report

I spent my ten hours these last couple weeks designing my blog page, doing preliminary research for my project, and reading the Critical Thinking and Semiotics texts.

I spent about an hour designing my blog. I tried to make it easy to read and understand, and chose light green to make it easy on the eyes and inviting.

I spent three hours doing preliminary research for my project. I chose to do a documentary on the Animas-LaPlata project and spent time at http://www.usbr.gov/uc/progact/animas/ reading about the project. I also spent time on the Durango Herald's site (http://www.durangoherald.com/sections/News/2008/10/17/ALP_project_97_complete/) researching.

I spent 96 minutes watching D.A. Pennebaker's documentary on Bob Dylan entitled "Don't Look Back" and taking notes on the style of documentation. I also spent about an hour on YouTube watching as much stuff on water as possible. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YgKsZr6-YC0.

I spent my remaining four hours reading and trying to digest the Critical Thinking and Semiotics texts.

Wood Cut Research

This is a video that really inspires me. I love this type of art!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25P__4fHfLA

This one too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gz0Zadr0_Kc