Holy Boners

Version 1.1 February 01, 2012
Version 1.0 January 31, 2012

I have to evaluate interns at the end of the semester using CTC’s form, so let’s look at the categories that are most important to Trickster Pictures. Read everything, there will be a test!

4. Communication / Social Skills

Since we are all working remotely, extra effort has to be made to stay in touch. Take the time to appreciate that this internship is actually more difficult than going to an office somewhere – working on our own requires that we concentrate,  stay motivated and keep organized. Though we’ll be building technical competence, learning to thrive as a member of a (remote) team is our first priority.

Check in – whether you have questions or just want to make a progress report. This includes talking to the other interns too and being receptive when they check in with you. Keep the team in the loop.

How?

We’ll usually meet on Wednesday face to face. The rest of the week you should…

phone and text 231 882-0460
email doorbell@tricksterpictures.com
ftp (cyberduck, filezilla)
ftp.artisthouse.com (get login – username and password)
post to your new wordpress blog

Text is the best for me, it’s the least invasive to my focus and reaches me quickly. If I don’t respond to text within 3 minutes, phone.

For more complicated questions, email me a detailed explanation including illustrations, screen captures etc. Then text or phone to let me know there’s an email. It’s helpful to be looking at the same thing if we have to problem solve.

FTP is the best way to exchange biggish or proprietary files – movies, work files, etc. Learn to use Cyberduck or Filezilla, know your login.

Everyone now has a WordPress blog to post notes on. See Organizational Skills below.

Facebook is not an effective way to reach me. I don’t check it very often and I don’t want Facebook corp being able to peek at my projects and business. Keep Trickster media and projects off Facebook and such-like social media unless I authorize postings.

When?

Whenever you have questions, need advice on how to approach a problem, have a breakthrough or just want to share an insight – check in. If I know what you’re working on / thinking about consistently, that’s solid communication. Even if I don’t have the answer to a question right away, I may have a brainstorm later. Sharing daily emails or blog posts will keep our inspiration up. That’s the basis for great collaboration.

On the CTC evaluation form, everyone’s Communication/Social Skills starts with a D and that’s only because I am assuming I’ll see your smiling faces on Wednesdays – otherwise you’d start out as an F. You are guilty until proven innocent. The more you check in with me, the better your evaluation will get. Any questions?

10. Follows Directions

The internship tradeoff goes like this – you help me finish my projects and I help you get mad skills – in VFX, production, editing and maybe even life. If you don’t follow my direction, not only will my work not get done but you’re not going to benefit from my experience – so why are we working together? Your job is to pay attention and follow through. If you are confused, I expect to hear from you with questions, (see Communication/Social Skills above).

When I give you direction verbally, via email, text, etc. you should…

1) acknowledge
2) if you do not understand, ask questions until you do.
3) when you do understand, reflect the direction back in your own words.
4) make a plan to act – what do you need, when, who’s help, etc. and share your plan with me.
5) act
6) report on progress

Usually you’ll receive written direction via email or text whenever possible – so if you don’t follow through there will be a record, (dun dun dunnn!)

So let’s say you didn’t follow through, why not? You must learn to overcome setbacks and obstacles by documenting what happened and then assessing what went wrong. To be effective, an assessment has to go deeper than the following…

I lost it (the directions, your hard drive, etc.)
I forgot
Wha?

Why did you forget, were you too distracted? Why did you loose it, do you need to implement better organization?

This is better…

I deliberately poured Vernors on my keyboard because I was unable to pull a bezier handle off of the x value in the graph editor to tweak a curve between two position keyframes – Agk!

Whenever you run into an “issue”, ask yourself – What has to change so I can realize my dreams?

A Corollary – are interns worth the trouble?

I am into making movies… but I don’t want to spend more time staring at screens than I absolutely have to. Dan Kelly is about plenty of RL with friends and fun. That means when I am on working I want to spend most of my time creating cool stuff. As an artist using computers, lot of things try to get in the way – software/hardware glitches, arcane reference and technical resources, social media distraction, loosing the objective of the moment by chasing after tangents, re-inventing the wheel, corporate malfeasance, energy attacks from the spectral dimensions… As interns, if you are paying attention and following through, then you are NOT getting in my way. That should be your mantra.

1. Quality of Work

Why do something if we’re not going to do it well? And yet, everyone has their own ideas about quality. What makes an effect cool, compelling, hilarious, believable? How can we tell when our work is good enough?

With Trickster Pictures projects, we are going for professional results. To properly track and roto, an artist must develop patience, perseverance and a discerning eye. Technical esoterica comes and goes – but patience, perseverance and discernment are useful forever. Think about roto as a method – a practice – for developing these more general skills.

Guy is lost in NYC, he asks a cop for directions…

Guy “Hey Officer, how do I get to Carnegie Hall?”
Cop “Practice, practice, practice.”

Get excited to do a lot of the same thing, over and over. Zen.

So how will Dan Kelly evaluate the Quality of your Work?

By developing patience, perseverance and discernment, you’ll get a solid evaluation. I’ll measure your progress through your blog posts (see Organizational Skills below) and by checking your roto.

2. Knowledge of Required Tasks

The required tasks are becoming a competent rotoscoper on the Trickster Pictures VFX team. We’ve already established that consistent communication and the development of patience, perseverance and discernment are essential to that outcome. Doing the tutorials will build your theoretical foundation. Working on actual Trickster projects will hone your chops.  Carnegie Hall. As long as you follow through on all of this, you’re good to go.

3. Organizational Skills

Being some kind of media genius means squat if you are unorganized. If you’re unorganized, you’ll show up on sets unprepared, you’ll loose files you spent hours (weeks) on, deadlines will be stress feasts, your collaborators will curse you, clients will fire you, your hair will fall out and you’ll develop strange rashes… and you certainly won’t score. I know what it’s like to be < 21, you’ve got time on your hands, right? Who cares how long it takes or whether you actually accomplish anything at all? Somebody as to feed you – right?

Ok, welcome to my world. Remember that bit about not getting in my way? If I have to work harder because you’re my intern, you won’t be my intern for very long. You WILL get organized when working with me. Comprende?

Fine, Dan Kelly, I want to be organized. I’m a tabula rasa, an empty vessel, TEACH!

You are going to start by keeping a notebook that we can both see. It’s called a WordPress blog. Here’s what you post there…

when doing video tutorials or reading manuals, take notes
when you figure out how to do something complicated, write a detailed recipe for how you did it that other VFX artists could follow
ideas about future projects
links to movies you post on youtube, vimeo, etc.
insights about current projects, improving workflows, flashes of insights
challenges you are facing
thoughts on why is Dan Kelly so amazing
progress on current assignments
log of hours and activities spent as intern for Trickster Pictures
other

See the bold stuff? That’s mandatory.

Posting to your blog is how I know you’re not dead. This is important because I am investing in you, and I need to know that my investment is going to pay off. If you’re dead, then I’ve got to train another intern – and that will make me very angry. So, not only do I advise you to stay alive, but you had better prove you are breathing to me at least once a day – more often if care about your evaluation.

Summary

• Check in often, at least daily and whenever you’re working on any movie in any capacity

• Take notes and post hours on your blog. Wax poetic about your discoveries, be detailed and specific about what you are working on, whether you are enjoying the process, what you need to remember, ideas, etc.

• When I give direction, immediately acknowledge. That means replying via email, text, calling me back, etc. If you don’t understand, ask questions. If you do understand, reply with a plan.

• Following through means that you are not wasting my time, getting in my way. It also means that you’ll be moving toward the manifestation of your wildest dreams, which is also a good thing.

• Mastery comes from practice. Do the tutorials and get ready, you are about† to become amazing…

†about = ~3 months

Recent posts explore the motivations behind finishing / not finishing Daughter of God. Dedicating an hour to daily introspection makes sense, meanwhile the urge to edit builds. If finishing is really so important, why don’t I just finish? Rather than trying to hack the running time in half, we could go with the working episodal version, running time 26:40. At 1:15 the ending credits are way too long and stripping away unsightly scene fat could even yield another minute or more. That means there’s room enough to wedge in a just enough background / exposition to sew the story tight. So let’s have another look.

There are long takes of Christina from only one camera. We’re stuck with the pacing (plodding in parts) unless we can devise cutaways to tighten her delivery. I’m actually looking for opportunities to lay in backstory so maybe (maybe) there’s an opportunity here.

Revising the script might be more efficient than actually trying to edit the pilot on the fly with placeholders.

Another cool thing about staying with the episodal length is that it’s closer to a feature than a short, which is more of where I want to be anyway, far as directorial experience is concerned. Course, this creams my festival strategy but maybe it’s better to just finish than try to make my first movie into some sort of multi-tool. I started out with a 10 minute script but when the ship came into the picture, I welded on a wad of backstory and business that took it way over 10 minutes. Ask for pensive and slightly hesitant performance and the whole thing sort of stretches out. Now we gotta make those choices fly. I accept that it’s gotta be long, if the blueprint specifies a motorcycle, I can’t very easily build a bicycle instead. I’ve gotta accept that DOG is a motorcycle and just move forward. Originally I thought that making it shorter would mean less VFX hours, but it’s a much bigger hassle to slash away chunks of dialogue and still have something coherent.

Here are elements.

PKD

At the end with G and C there’s the Philip K business, why G decides to go ahead. It’s all out of the blue unless we get some reference early on. I just thought it could stand alone, but it wants to be part of a round trip. Therefor, Christina as a child being read PKD by Uncle Joe in early scene. This could be over shots of still life apocalypse, Christina’s reverie. Nice passage from Radio Free Albemuth, prologue.

Shortwave

It’s in the phones, it’s how the world communicates. We have plenty enough recorded. I like the changing sequence and it wouldn’t hurt to have an introduction to shortwave up front, at the start. How does that square with PKD bedtime story? Two audio tracks that fade in and out of each other? Keep it simple. Could we start with radio broadcasts that take us around the world, the different voices (ethnicities) suggesting shifting geographies? Then how do we get into bedtime story, is it a flashback? Antennas in varying locations, we hop around to different refugee locations until eventually landing on our boat. This is all in Christina’s head?

Creaks

The creaking cabin when Christina open for Joe is great, the squeaking bed, every moving thing could have an over the top squeak, there’s nothing slippery any more, end of oil. Maybe folks like the creaks and squeaks because… Add squeak to PKD drawer. It’s random business, but maybe it will find a home.

Crashing glass

This really isn’t doing much for me and I wonder if perhaps it’s better off cut. What’s the point, what’s it saying about Gerry? Shouldn’t we see more glass around him in the cabin? What does breaking glass have to do with Gerry, anything? Sure he’s a maker / chemist / engineer/ electro geek but we can build up more? Can we hint at his imminent translation? Perhaps even the grandma china in the tea ceremony fits, but what does all this glass tell us? Is he fragile? Why does he keep breaking things? How does crashing glass relate to squeaks?

Other

Bra schtick has got to go
C’s fade on in turn away to abrupt (?)
Gerry silhouette on top of ship when she approaches – we can see but she can’t
Apocalypse – What do the shots tell us? What do we want to say?
The earth makes everything right. Healing power of wilderness. Leave it alone.
Water and bricks = buildings submerged
Cruise ship on canyon = tsunami, time passage
highway =  civilization grinds to a halt
old school post industrial shots  can be fast forwarded with relevant graffitti

Heal back/pelvic basin stiffness, reveal cause and discover / implement protocol for repair.

physically robust, feeling/looking svelte and yummy.

Daughter of God is finished.

Ultimate Around Lake Michigan Expedition.

Science Fiction Musical script and score/lyrics.

6 new feature scripts.

Feature well into production / completed.

3 sets of 15 handstand pushups, all the way down.

3 sets of 20 pull-ups.

Flying roll, horizontal.

Sword form, ru yi form. Life arts fully integrated.

Gorgeous and conscious women delight in sharing life with me, especially consistent deep intimacy and affection. raise my sights.

Production/VFX crew established and working.

M3 thriving and delegated – I have the ideal role.

Memory sharp and quick.

Festival awards.

Global presence and project distribution.

Profound yoga and tai chi practice.

On December 28′s M3 meeting, we asked everyone present to talk briefly about their top three accomplishments for 2011, and it was darn inspiring. I think it’s valuable to do a more extensive list for myself, so here goes…

With James Weston established a regional production affinity group, the Michigan Movie Makers.

Launched the Biannual Micro Movie Marathon, a festival of shorts up to 3 minutes, including all genres and levels of experience. Intended to be a fun way to inventory who’s doing what in the region.

Volunteered as an adhoc editor for the Traverse City Film Festival video team to create an awards montage.

Dede Alderman instant music videos, 3 camera shoot at Point Betsie, 5 songs recorded within an hour before sunset. Joe Cissel assisted. Posted within 2 weeks.

4 kick ass parties – Year of the Rabbit New Year Party, Not So Good Friday Party, Secret Party and Why Atheists love Christmas, a Party. Parties combine community building with an ongoing exploration of the spontaneous social arts. What do beings do when they are just being – together?

Posted version 0.9 of the Trickster Pictures VFX reel. This is the beginning not only of the completion of DOG, but establishing the chops for more ambitious projects.

An expanded VFX team is coalescing – including 2 interns at TBA CTC and 2 promising contractors. This is in addition to myself and Jonathan.

Proposed collaboration with the TSO (Traverse Symphony Orchestra). Although no action has been forthcoming, it was a worthy and visionary idea.

Submitted a bumper to the TCFF (rejected) and did titles for Lesley Tye’s bumper that got honorable mention. Another amazing trailer by Jamie Barnard was also rejected, so obviously the judges were either drunk or not drunk enough.

Abrupt cessation of progress on DOG points to deeper personal issues. Blog posts explore the inner landscape and reveal the way – November, Desire, Emotional.

New snow tires make Odyssey viable for heavy winter weather. Jaunts to the east coast are more viable than last winter.

Fabrication workshop nearly completed, stone cutting, fiberglass, welding, miniatures, sets…

Consistent year of yoga and tai chi practice with mostly Patrick and Liz, including cameos by Dwayne, Joe and James on occasion.

Explored a collaboration to produce dance teaching videos with Mykl, James and Jamaica.  After extensive communication and research, we could not agree on a profit sharing scheme so the project was shelved, demonstrating that solid pre-production reveals the viability of a project sooner rather than later.

Got to be great friends with James Weston Schaberg.

Dance on ice project with Weston, Patrick, Erin, Tiffany and Gretchen, research for Science Fiction Musical

Improved as a partner dancer and danced with a lot of lovely women.

Acquired mats for combat mime / parkour and trained with Patrick and Joe, after initial instruction from Josh. Started diving rolls.

Estate simplified, steward of 4077 Crystal Drive.

Grew a garden and conceived the greenhouse. Spontaneous tomatoes from composted poop!

Swam lots. Freediving at the blueline all summer.

Indoor bathroom with sink!

Initated prep for the crash of consumer civilization.

Smattering of new songs and lyrics.