Garden Party

This past Saturday, March 21st, was one of our group’s most productive filmings to date. Not only did we get some of those suggested wide shots establishing the garden’s space from Nick’s ladder (Nick’s VW van is a virtural Mary Poppin’s style carpet bag of items. You can find everything in there. Twenty watering cans? Done. How about a wooden-handled child’s size shovel? A full sized ladder? No problem.), but we also collected several valuable interviews. We re-interviewed Johanna, a Kidworks employee and garden participant; re-interviewed The Grain Project’s Co-founder Lara; conducted a dual language interview with a women from the apartments next to the garden; and interviewed Bella, a regular garden participant. Bella’s interview may be one of our best so far, as she was able to articulate, from a participant’s perspective much of what we’ve been thinking and feeling over the best few months.

In addition to our “fruitful” interview, we collected a solid amount of action footage. There were far more people in the garden on Saturday than what we are used to. Several new families from the near-by apartments came by, so we were able to talk to people about their first garden experience.

Overall, we are optimistic about filming this coming Saturday’s 9th Annual Cesar Chavez Day of Service/the Jerome Park Garden’s one-year anniversary (March 28th). We hope to conduct more interviews with garden participants and document the movement toward service, dignity, and community growth that this event represents.


“From the depth of need and despair, people can work together, can organize themselves to solve their own problems and fill their own needs with dignity and strength.” Cesar Chavez

Louis Sheldon Visits a Shell Shop

On Sunday, our group had the pleasure of filming at Ferguson's Marine Specialties in Wilmington, CA. Ferguson's has been in Wilmington for over 40 years and were featured on Huell Howser's "California Gold" a few years ago. Louis visits this shop all the time. The founder Ralph, has been a mentor to Louis. Ralph's daughter, who is now the owner, is also a friend of Louis so we were excited to see the interactions and meet more people passionate about shells.

When I walked into the display room at the shop, I saw a small room filled with shells.
There where shells in shelves, in display cases, in baskets, in boxes and in decorations. There were shells of every size, shape, color and design. Along with shells, there were other marine specialties such as starfish, sea horses, and preserved sea life.
Behind the display room, there were warehouses of shells waiting to be cleaned (which they also have facilities for) and resold. It was incredible!
I have lived next to the ocean my whole life (in 5 different locations) so sea shells and sea life were an important part of my childhood. I had a small shell collection and did a science fair project where I identified my shells when I was in elementary school. Along with this, our house has always had shells and other seascape decorations in multiple rooms. When I saw the shells in Ferguson's I was captivated by the beauty and variety. I wanted to share this treasure chest with every one I knew. (After we left the shop, I called my mom and told her about the shells and if she ever needed any decorations, I knew where to get them.)
After being impressed by the collection, my second thought was how are we ever going to set up a 3 person interview in here with all these shells?? Luckily we had the help of Ryan (from the beautification team) to give his insight and suggestions. He and Donia set up a good interview shot despite the challenges. We had Louis sit in a chair next to Ralph and Lupe leaned on a display case behind them. In the background there were shells, which made an excellent backdrop. Donia and I set up our camera on a tripod and kept it at a wide angle with all 3 interviewees the whole time. Ryan moved around with his camera taking close up shots of faces, and other shots that looked very creative, which I am excited to see :) (THANKS RYAN!!!!)

The next big decision we had to make was who to mic? Since Ryan was there with his camera, we were able to have two lav mics and one shot gun set up. We decided to mic Ralph since he had the quietest voice and Louis, since he is the star of our film and we wanted him to always have a clear recording. I think this ended up working out, because Lupe talked loudly and the shot gun mic (which was pointed at her) seemed to pick her up clearly. The only thing that might be problematic from this set-up is some of the background noise. Right next to the interviewers was a fish tank and I could hear the motor running faintly in the background. This might be bad since Lupe's track might pick up that noise and she said a lot of good things that we probably will want to include. There is a possibility that her voice was also picked up on Louis' or Ralph's mic so we might be able to use that sound instead.

The interview material ended up being outstanding! Through the story of Ralph and Lupe we were able to meet two people who were also passionate about shells, but in a completely different way. Lupe kept talking about how her passion of shells came from within and it was something not everyone had. She loved shells because of the beauty (not science like Louis) and made crafts with shells. Lupe talked about the importance of hobbies in people's lives, including her own and her children's lives and how the hobby of shell collecting has been passed on to each generation. Ralph was quieter, but still some great things from the mind of an old man who has been collecting shells his whole life. We were also able to ask Ralph and Lupe what they thought about Louis and see some friendly banter and interactions. We talked about the shell club, the dying hobby of shell collecting, why people are interested in shells and so much more. All in all it was a great interview and a great day! I think it will be an excellent addition to grow the storyline of our film.

Pictures were borrowed from Ferguson's Website - Thank you Ralph and Lupe!

The Film God's heard our plea's...

I'd like to start this blog with a big THANK YOU to Dr. Schindler and to Krystal Long. Without the gift of their time, Tin and I wouldn't have been able to capture ALL of our footage this last friday. 17 tapes in roughly 8 hours, with no major problems. This has given us great peace of mind and allows us to breathe a bit. But, we still have a long way to go. We haven't done anything in regards to developing the film this week, but we'll start editing on wednesday.

I took part in a filming of the infamous Luis Sheldon (he's taller in person) this last sunday at Ferguson's Shell Shop in Wilmington. This place was cool, and challenging to shoot in!!! I enjoyed working with Donia and Rachel, and it was interesting to see how their interviewing style differed from our own. It was my first time doing extended hand-held work, and I will say that its difficult and extremely tiring. My right are was jello after the hour and a half shoot. It was overall a great experience, and I'm happy I was able to meet the one and only Luis, as well as the friendly owners of Ferguson's.

Louis talks about his life in Corona del Mar

(an apology: I had great visuals that I found online to post but for some reason blogger won't upload any of the photographs)

Rachel and I were able to set up an interview in Corona Del Mar with Louis this past Saturday. We have been doing our best to listen to Steven's criticisms concerning the storyline of our film and its lack of depth. Our time with Louis definitely got to a level of depth (or preciousness?) we were hoping for.

We listened to Louis as he defined success, shared his philosophy as an artist and how that translates to the rest of his life, how his artistic and scientific parts of his life clash or enhance one another, and he even shared his desire to find a special someone.

Louis discussed the part of his life when shell-collecting was an unhealthy addiction for him, his road to recovery, and all that he learned because of his obsession. Louis pinpointed isolation from relationships with friends and family as the most unhealthy part of his shell-collecting behavior. As Louis became self aware (and seems to continue to be self aware), he has transformed his hobby into something that invites people to be apart of his experience (i.e. shell club, Dad coming with him, not spending so many hours in his bedroom looking through a microscope).

Great words were spoken. I interviewed Louis while Rachel filmed and we haven't yet talked as a group about how that worked out for us. I am curious. We had about an hour worth of sound troubles as we were setting up the equipment. Eventually we got the levels on the camera in the right place and it sounded great in the headphones. We will be doing an interview at the Shell Shop this Sunday and will be doing another interview with Louis painting at the warehouse art studio he uses.

Praying to the movie gods.

We have an idea where we want to take this film. From what our previous interviews tell us, most people seem to be jaded toward the idea of beauty, and feel that the only reason that they do it is because they feel that they have to conform to society's collective ideas of beauty. But, there is another side. Those who actually enjoy it, feel better doing it, and appreciate it's ability to make one feel better. This is the angle we hope to get from the LGFB program. We think showing the contrast of the two and how it seems ok to regain what you lost, be it by surgery or makeup, but not ok to add to what you've already got. But really, is there a difference if it makes you feel better?

But, there is a rub. Tin is in full production mode for his UCLA film until next tuesday. This leaves nothing to do but capture footage for the next week, but my free time doesn't coincide with the lab times. So, we're not really sure how this is all going to work out. We have three interviews ready to go when we can get to them, and a Look Good, Feel Better event at UCLA next Thursday. This event (if we get full access that is) combined with the new interviews, will give us probably five more tapes to log, capture, and edit. How we're going to shoot, capture, log, and edit it all in seven days is a mystery to me. Perhaps we should hold a ritual sacrifice to the movie gods.

Louis Sheldon: Storyline

So we need one. For some reason the documentaries King of Kong and to a lesser extent Grizzly Man stick out to me as models for this story. But in both of those there is such an obvious conflict they are able to capture.

Until we figure that out, as the editor, I am mostly pulling out interview stuff I like that he says, rather than any actual events/crises/activities he participates in. I need something to drive this. The biggest points of conflict I see in this story as it is, is when hobby turns to science and when passion turns to obsession. Also the dying nature of the hobby, I guess.

Some encyclopedic references to reflect on....

Encyclopedia Britannica: "Shell collecting as it is understood today, in the manner of coin, stamp, and china collecting, is of more recent origin, reaching its apex in England during the late 18th and early and middle 19th centuries. This was the period of the burgeoning Pacific and China trade; new islands were being discovered, and the shells found there were first imported as curiosities, later as specimens for the collectors among the newly rich merchant princes. This period reached its highest point in the 1850s and ’60s, when shell auctions became a common occurrence and relatively high prices were paid for particularly rare and perfect specimens. There followed a period of relative decline, probably because many formerly rare shells suddenly became common as their haunts were discovered and exploited. Nevertheless, shells are so strikingly interesting and beautiful in themselves that the hobby was rapidly revived.




Most collectors tend to specialize, since there are about 100,000 shell species known. Some collectors limit themselves to particular localities. Such specialists frequently contribute valuable scientific data on exact locality and life habits of many mollusks. Some collectors gather only specimens of the single species of a shell that typifies a particular genus. Such a collection is a valuable lesson in taxonomy and evolution and gives an insight into the entire field of conchology, the study of shells.

The equipment of the shell collector includes some sort of tool to scrape away the sand or leaves; a knife to detach rock-clinging mollusks from their perches; a hammer and chisel to remove rock borers from their nests; a sieve to strain out specimens from shallow water; a notebook to record locality and ecological data; and a library of books on shells to aid identification."

Garden of Eaten

Last Saturday afternoon was a beautiful sunny day, perfect for gardening. It seems the community agreed on the ideal weather conditions because the turn out at the Jerome Park Garden was higher than past Saturdays. We were able to practice hand-holding of the camera and we used the lav mics. We put our new skills to good work for interviews of the Grain Project founder, Lara, and one of the cutest five-year-olds on the planet, Malachi. The sound came in clean and crisp and we now have two layers of audio to choose from, so that went well.

We also reshot some of the shots that we realized had too fast of motion or the zoom was incorrect, or shaky camera work. We are compiling a lot of footage and are preparing for our big event at the garden (Cesar Chavez day). That day will have many more participants in the garden and will showcase the true good that the garden has to offer those who are interested. So, find out whats in the garden next week, same garden channel same garden time.

Look Good, Feel Better

In our quest to find some sort of angel that holds some sort of intrigue, on the recommendation of a friend, I have contacted the American Cancer Society regarding a program called "Look Good, Feel Better". This program, run by the ACS, works in concert with cosmetic companies, professional salons, and Hollywood makeup and wardrobe houses to teach those undergoing cancer treatment techniques that can be used to help themselves feel more comfortable with their appearance as it is drastically altered while they undergo treatment. In short, the program helps to teach cancer patients how to beautify themselves.

This program functions on a base of volunteers and donations from cosmetic companies. Though the website appears to be solely focused on women, they do also help males, but only those under the age of 18 (which is interesting). I contacted the local ACS office and requested an interview, at first the woman I spoke with was into the idea. Then after emailing her, in which I made sure to mention that it was on camera, she declined and is now pushing my request on to the ACS public relations department in LA. Hopefully this will be fruitful and add much needed new life to our project. And to top it all off, LGFB is holding an event at the UCLA Medical Center on March 26th. Hopefully we'll be able to gain access and film this great event!!

This last friday we had a shoot with a man named Jeff. Jeff loves nature. So, in our goal to stylize our shoots and to create environments that show our interviewees personality, we wanted to shoot in a 'natural' environment. Since it was extremely windy on this particular friday, we decided to shoot inside Tin's house. I'll just say that it was a challenge to simulate nature inside a living room. Two hours, a plant, a green-screen, four lights, and a lot of adjustments later, we began our interview. This was the perfect example of how much work a team can put into an interview, and then walk away with a fruitless interview. Perhaps we're not asking the right questions. Perhaps something is eluding us. But we're not inspired in the slightest. Perhaps things will work out with the LGFB program and the film will take on new life.

We have a shoot at a barbershop in Long Beach scheduled for this friday morning, and perhaps something else will be scheduled for later this week. Till next time...cheers.

Current and Upcoming Production

Last week we hashed out what really needs to be done to get the ball rolling and the movie on tract. Our meeting with Pro. Schindler was purely a positive experience, one in which our roles became more clearly defined. Bahati came up with a great production schedule for the next two weeks.

Production Schedule – First 2 weeks of March

Wed., March 4 (4-6 p.m.) Interview with Alison Diaz, founder

Thur., March 5 (4:30-6 p.m.) Interviews w/ Green Ambassadors Sara Laimon (Director) and Tyler Garber

Fri., March 6 (8-3 p.m.) 1st Period- Simeona working with Betty Marshall in main office
2nd Period Advisory- David (Ms. Mc Cabe ) Room 141
3rd Period – Shamms (English with Ms. Hill) Room 142
4th Period- Interview Ms. Frame Room 145
Lunch
5th Period- Tyler (History with Ms. Frame) Room 145
6th Period- Open
7th Period- Simeona (Dance with Ms. Grace) Room 133b
*Afterschool – dance squad practice

Wed., March 11 (4-6 p.m.) 10th Graders class trip to Joshua tree (11-13)
Interview with David

Thur., March 12 (4:30-6 p.m.) Interview with Mick

Fri., March 13 (8-3 p.m.) Filming all day—schedule TBA

As you can see yesterday, Wednesday March 4, was our first shoot in a couple of weeks. There were no students on campus during the time of the shoot, the students had a half day, this made a huge difference. The usual chatter from the students was absent making it easier to control audio.
Our first shoot this week was suppose to be an interview with ECHS founder Alison Diaz. Unfortunately she was tied up with administrative duties, she was in a meeting, and had to cancel the interview. Bahati and I made the most of our time by shooting some b-roll of the main office. There were a couple of banners we shoot, a dry battery drop-off station, and an article about the school.
Today should be pretty exciting, we have two interviews, one with Green Ambassador Director Sara Laimon, and a student by the name of Tyler Garber. Sara is a very exciting person and has a lot of knowledge to share with us. We should be able to get some great ideas for b-roll from this interivew. The second interview is with Tyler, I do not know much about this person, all I know is that Tyler was part of the auditions and is a Green Ambassador.

"People who touch the ground, live longer...."

This phrase was eloquently put by our informant over the weekend at the Jerome Park Garden. Jose, a father of three, took his children to the garden for the second time this weekend. Our interview with him went very well and he gave us a true life stories about his father, growing up on a farm, and moving to the states. He shared personal moments of his life and expressed the importance of knowing about gardening and/or small scale farming.

Also, as a Santa Ana resident, Jose was able to tell us what it is like to be a part of the community and everything that goes along with that. The dialogue in the interview was very interesting and should make for great footage. We are also hoping to get permission to take a few shots of the garden from an interesting location. One family that frequents the garden live literally across the street on the second floor of an apartment complex. They have a perfect view of the garden and we really would like to get some footage of the garden from their daily perspective.

Our film is coming along and we are accruing more and more footage each time we visit Santa Ana. We have a few things scheduled such as an interview with Laura and also Cesar Chavez Day at the park which should really strengthen our film. We are optimistic and confident about the future of our film and are excited to complete it and show it to the rest of you.

Louis Sheldon goes to Palos Verdes

Rachel and I followed Louis to Palos Verdes for our first experience to watch him dive for shells. Despite getting stuck watching kids in baseball uniforms riding in the back of Ford F250's for 20 minutes, and Rachel locking her car keys in the camera case located in the trunk of her car, the day was exceptionally gorgeous and we hopefully got good footage.

Louis dove with his friend Alex who is a biology major at CSULB - they know each other because they share the same fraternity. Louis is still involved with the fraternity as an alumni. The hike was strenuous for me with the camera (I'm not going to lie, I was really nervous I was going to do some harm to the camera), but it was even worse for Louis and Alex with their 60-70 lbs. of extra weight from their dive gear.

Rachel and I mostly captured action shots and what will hopefully turn into good cutaways - hooking up a lav mic to a wet suit for an interview walking down a steep trail with the final destination being the ocean would prove too difficult. I am interested to hear the sound captured from Saturday - it sounded normal in the headphones.

While Louis and Alex were diving, that gave Rachel and I about an hour to film our surroundings. I asked Rachel to get a wide range of seascape shots - close ups of craggy rocks, long shots of the distant cliffs, shells in the tide pools, etc. Two highlights for me while we were waiting for Louis:

1. I was sitting on a rock enjoying the view and looked to my right only to find a colorful crab peaking out of a rock crevice...I quickly asked Rachel for the camera and filmed the little guy for 5-8 minutes.

2. There were 4 fishermen on the rocks we were filming from so I struck up conversation with them - one fishermen explained to me that he considers himself a hunter more than a fisherman because it is only in the off season that he fishes. His largest game he has hunted was a 600 lb. bear! If only we could make another documentary.

When the boys popped up out of the water, I got exciting footage of Louis almost being pounded into the rocks as he was coming ashore. It helped that on the climb back up the trail the boys needed resting points - that allowed me to run up farther and set up impromptu camera "stations" to capture their ascent on film. Once they reached the top of the cliff, Louis and Alex talked about the different world that only exists under water, how life is vibrant and all over, what they fear most when under water. Alex has an underwater camera and will be sending us photos and videos of their underwater dives together. All in all, a successful and beautiful filming experience.

Revamping Beauty

After our meeting with Prof Schindler last week, we've come upon some obvious ideas that were eluding us before. We think the lack of a third brain has limited us in our thinking on this project. Its quite easy for us to get stuck in a rut of thinking with just the two of us. But, now we're going to be moving in a somewhat new, but not totally new or story revealing, direction. Since our subject is truly something that is linked to imagery, we're really going to begin focusing on the tools that create the way we make ourselves look. We're also going to start taking more of a look at the male side of things, as we, and Dr. Schindler pointed out that it's a bit one-sided at the moment. We have an interview scheduled for this friday, and hopefully more will work out for this weekend as well. The logging of footage continues as we're still chipping away at it. It seems the underlying theme of the production of this film is "Slowly, but Surely". We hope that the coming weeks will provide us with captivating, visceral footage that we can add to this project.