http://bigorangebox.com Creativity Within My Element Mon, 08 Sep 2008 02:36:31 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Another day of fun in Toronto at the film festival. Walked across the street from my hotel to see the stars walk the red carpet for the premiere of "Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist". The fans & photogs were all crowded near the entrance, so I headed around back near ... http://bigorangebox.com/more-fun-at-tiff08/ On my second day in Toronto for TIFF08, I decided to wander the city with camera in hand and hope for the best. After seeing a slam dunk contest and a pretty cool sidewalk chalk drawing in the Younge/Dundas square, I wandered up to Ryerson University and almost walked into ... http://bigorangebox.com/toronto-international-film-festival-photos-tiff08/ Tonight I head out to the Toronto International Film Festival. Going to cheer on some friends who have a movie premiering there during Midnight Madness. Should be an exciting weekend. More pics and stories to follow! http://bigorangebox.com/toronto-international-film-festival-2008/ Derek Sivers, founder of CD Baby, recently met with the guy who makes the decisions on which music gets "featured" on Apple's iTunes service. He had a telling experience that the "all digital all the time" world isn't quite a reality yet. In fact, sometimes physical media is the best ... http://bigorangebox.com/physical-and-digital-media-needed-for-serious-musicians/ I was sneaking around Stage A at DotLot™ Digital Studios this weekend and saw a whole bunch of scaffolding and riggings that have recently been assembled. Looks like they're prepping for a big video project. More details to follow... http://bigorangebox.com/somethings-in-the-works-at-dotlot%e2%84%a2-digital-studios/ The TNT network just tried a new experiment with broadcast television. They shot a full series in 2-minute segments (20 total episodes) that air during the commercial breaks of other shows. I recorded the show Bones because I know someone involved in the Lucky Chance project. This was the first ... http://bigorangebox.com/tnt-series-within-a-series-lucky-chance/ Just posted a new microsode of the "Leonard Who?" show. This one is called Under Construction and it was another great improvisational piece by Don Scribner and Bert Hinchman. This one was really fun to shoot. We set up a few concepts for each of the three areas within a ... http://bigorangebox.com/new-microsode-of-the-leonard-who-show/ This weekend we shot another microsode of the "Leonard Who?" show. What made this production unique was the introduction of a second Canon HV20 camera and a pair of wireless microphones to our shooting arsenal. Since the inception of the show, we have always had a single director/camera operator/sound guy ... http://bigorangebox.com/two-camera-shooting-with-two-actors-and-one-operator-the-good-and-the-bad/ Anaglyph, Stereoscoptic, and Chromadepth - oh my! Our Buddies at DotLot™ Digital Studios have written an excellent post on stereoscoptic (3D) imagery as they explore the possibilities of bringing 3D to the web. The crew at DotLot™ is actively testing 3D shooting to determine whether the technology has legs for the ... http://bigorangebox.com/our-buddies-at-dotlot%e2%84%a2-look-into-3d/ The technology isn't necessarily groundbreaking, but with the wide audience YouTube has their new "Annotations" feature has some potential. In a nutshell, YouTube Annotations are overlays that appear over your videos that can include text and links. At this time you can only link to other YouTube content. They currently come ... http://bigorangebox.com/youtube-introduces-annotations-and-interactivity-sort-of/ This weekend I built a simple wooden camera dolly for filming stop motion animation (photos of the dolly in upcoming posts). Also began painting the residential street set. Many details remain to be added. The below video is shot on a Canon HV20 with a wide angle lens adapter. I didn't ... http://bigorangebox.com/stop-motion-animation-test-2/ I've just placed an order for a second Canon HV20. This second camera will allow me to shoot Leonard Who? microsodes with a bit more freedom on the editing side of things, since I generally allow the actors a lot of freedom to improvise. The plan is to do two camera ... http://bigorangebox.com/big-orange-box-now-a-two-camera-company/ Weezer's "Pork and Beans" video features a menagerie of top YouTubers lip syncing along to the song in their full regalia and in the actual (simulated) environments in which their original videos were shot. Good luck trying to think of a way to use YouTube folks in any production this ... http://bigorangebox.com/weezer-officially-reboots-youtube/ The first set is 80% built for the stop-motion music video I'm doing for the band Cars & Trucks. This residential set will feature about a dozen cardstock houses, very simplistic and childlike in design. The majority of action will be accomplished by camera moves and the movement of Matchbox ... http://bigorangebox.com/more-stop-motion-video-tests-upcoming/ YouTube-Link Shot a quick test today to evaluate iStopMotion software from Boinx for use shooting a music video in June. Set up the following gear on the coffee table in the living room: Canon HV20 video camera (plugged into MacBook Pro via firewire 400) Wide Angle Lens Sima rechargeable LED light (SL-20LX) Boinx iStopMotion 2 ... http://bigorangebox.com/stop-motion-animation-test/ Ten Things I Hate About Commandments httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1kqqMXWEFs This trailer & many othes recut by Mike Dow & Ari Eisner (AKA Smaky Productions) http://bigorangebox.com/cool-movie-trailer-recut/ Set up the Canon HV20 with a 75mm-300mm (f4-5.5) telephoto lens on DotLot's Orange County, CA green screen stage. I didn't light the set, just turned on the overhead fluorescent lights, as I wanted to simulate a run & gun type of environment. I'll likely run the same test ... http://bigorangebox.com/another-rng35-dof-adapter-test/ Shot some footage with the RNG35 adapter on my Canon HV20 HDV camcorder. I absolutely LOVE the results I'm getting thus far. Putting a telephoto lens on the HV20 made my day! Below are a couple tests I ran to get a feel for the limits of the adapter. YouTube videos ... http://bigorangebox.com/first-rng35-adapter-tests/ A big THANK YOU goes out to all the folks that have made the Leonard Who?™ show possible this year. We started this little project in April 2007 and in one year have crested the 10,000 download mark for our shows! In fact, we're on pace to hit closer 13,000 ... http://bigorangebox.com/leonard-gets-10000-a-year/ Just picked up an RNG35 vibrating (AKA "spinning") 35mm lens adapter for my Canon HV20 HDV camcorder. I'm currently running some tests with various lenses. I will post those tests and photos of my rig soon. Here's the first Microsode™ of the Leonard Who?™ show we shot with the RNG35 this ... http://bigorangebox.com/rng35-35mm-vibrating-lens-adapter-for-camcorders/