In Retrospect and Rationale (Part 2)

I think the best way to sum up my very original story idea... was that I wanted to start with a very basic plot (I ended up with a party), something so basic it could mean absolutely anything or nothing at all, but something that if asked about, the audience could say "It was about this... I guess". Then I wanted to take that basic framework and throw every single bizarre image I could think into the mix, an idea so heavily influenced by Discordianism is makes me sick to my stomach. The ultimate goal there being to confuse and entertain the audience.

The binaural beats began to lose importance as the process went along I think. Mainly because I realised no one at a festival of sorts would be wearing headphones, let alone all of them. Also because after playing around with them I realised their effects didn't really sink in for about 10 minutes of listening, and it became evident early on that my film would not exceed 5 minutes in length. The theta wave pulses though, while they didn't have the desired neurological effect, still worked with the jerky visuals better than I could of hoped for.

I was happy with it, but there were many imperfections that bothered me. I should of directed my actors with a little more discipline I think. Obviously I was afraid of making them uncomfortable being that they were all friends volunteering. They would of been more effective if they all took a more neutral robotic stance though... In some parts at least. I think maybe I would of liked to have included some more complex sounds, some underscoring in parts as well, to give it some dynamics.

In Retrospect and Rationale

I ended up getting the editing done in the course of two days. On the Thursday and Friday before the film night. The stop motion shots worked out pretty well as I hoped. The idea of using short clips of moving film as opposed to still images had exactly the effect I was after, and one I wasn't expecting. With the plastic cups shot, being able to keep the audio in an essentially stop motion shot ended up being pretty neat.

Filming almost done

I finished most of my filming on the weekend. All but the last shot. I acquired the assistance of everyone. Well, 8 people. They were all lovely, although unorganised. I put pots on their heads instead of watermelons. A few things needed to be improvised. Mitchell broke my ironing board too. It's all good. I'm going to start capturing today hopefully, if I can get the last shot done. Then I'll start clipping together the "stop motion" frames. I'm excited. The end.