maurajasper's blog

I am re-considering the way this work functions – how can I make it more dynamic, and how can I streamline the work flow.  Some aspects of the work-flow are less of a concern to me – in part because I can’t streamline much until I really understand how I need each component to function – first I want to be sure what information I am going after:                                                               What do I really want to know? What do people really want to talk about? What questions can I ask to best get that information? How can I get more specifics from the people I am taping? How is that information going to be organized later? Some of this is getting more clear but I almost feel as if I am in Prototype version 2, an attempt to solve everything that wasn’t resolved the first time around.  Painfully slow, but good ultimately.                                                                       Secondly I really want to make sure that I have chosen the right tools.  When I had the crit with Liz and Matt, Matt tells me that I can be doing all of the work in Final Cut, eliminating one step in the process  I spent all of Friday playing around with Final Cut for my animation – but I hated it.  It felt clunky – like I was trying to tap dance in clogs.  I understand that sometimes you need to go backwards in order to go forward but in this case I’m not sure.  It might be a better solution for the long term, as my skills get better in Final Cut.  I also tried different versions for keying the video footage.  There are some big problems, some I can live with –others –no.  The green spill is my fault and I now know how to prevent it in the future, but in the footage I have I am wondering how (or if) I can make it work.  I tried to fix what I could in After Effects, and I hate the way it looks.  In fact I don’t like the way any of the After Effects keying looks.  This could be my ineptitude but everything looked kind of grainy and electric- little dots around the figure.  On the flip side, I have Final Cut keying that is so bad that the top of Natalie’s head looks as if she fell asleep next to three mile island.                                                                       Right now I am thinking that maybe I want to stay in Final Cut for the animation, unless the animation is degrading noticeably by importing it between 2 programs.                                                                     I am in the process of building a list of how these components function and what I need to get/do from each:  The shooting, the animation/editing, the navigation/interface.                                                                     I am also changing the way the central questions of the piece are re-phrased for people who I am interested in recording- and reducing the main question to the past, present, and the future.  If there is a fourth point to address it might just be like a “wild card” – an extra tip, story or message for the viewer.  I also think I am going to de-emphasize “weather” in pre-shoot conversations- it’s a great starting point for the conversation, but not the focal point- I’ve known this but it can be hard to undo when people get in front of the camera- if I am unclear, they will be too.