Apple, Final Cut Pro Back On My Good Side

Sound editing tip: Keyframes are your best friend. Actually, The LA Final Cut Pro Users Group website is your best friend.
Where’d you hear that? 2-pop discussion boards, you know you’re my best friend.
Of course, using keyframes to adjust your audio levels and effects doesn’t make you a sound designer, any more than snapping pictures makes you a photographer.
[Note to self: Last time you had to do this, you linked to freakin’ Charlie’s Angels. This time, put it on your own damn website so you don’t have to ferret around for (seems like) hours trying to find the settings again.]
FCP settings for a telephone effect filter
There are two things that characterize a telephone sound: limited frequency range and harmonic distorion.
For frequency, apply high pass filter (about 300 Hz cutoff, high Q), low pass filter (about 3000 Hz cutoff, high Q), and maybe a notch filter at about 1000 Hz. Play with the cutoff frequencies…
I don’t think FCP has any audio distortion filters. If you’re not satisfied with frequency filters alone, apply distortion in a different audio program… Or play a clip and record it with a crappy microphone πŸ™‚
JM (Thanks, JM!)

Another note: I balanced half the audio levels last night (2AM), and finished this morning (11AM). As I listened to the whole piece through, the first half averaged about 3-4 dB lower than the second. The difference? No traffic or street noise last night. To a New Yorker, that’s interesting. To anyone else, annoying. (Which thought did you have?)

Dream Team-gate: WTC Architects on Charlie Rose Make White House Flak Look Candid, Honest

[2018 UPDATE: In 2018 The New York Times reports that five women who worked with Meier, either at his firm or as a contractor, have come forward to say the architect made aggressive and unwanted sexual advances and propositions to them. The report also makes painfully clear that Meier’s behavior was widely known for a long time, and that his colleagues and partners did basically nothing to stop it beyond occasionally warning young employees to not find themselves alone with him. This update has been added to every post on greg.org pertaining to Meier or his work.]

Charlie Rose Dream Team Pictures, image: charlierose.com
That guy on the left isn’t at all. He’s Dan Bartlett, flak for the Architect of the Axis of Evil (and, alarmingly, the most straight-talking guy on the show) image: charlierose.com

Just caught The WTC “Dream Team” (their quotes)–Charles Gwathmey, Peter Eisenman, Steven Holl, and Richard Meier –on Charlie Rose. [thanks for the headsup, archinect!] Preceded by an interview with White House Communications Director Dan Bartlett, Rose apparently chose obfuscation as tonight’s theme.
It was a lot of serious-minded awe eliciting empty comments about massive publicity (“How do you deal with being so great, old friend?”), one seemingly unintended admission, and an easy-to-miss editing mystery. (A coverup? If it were a coverup, I’m sure Charlie “60 Minutes2” Rose’d be on it, not in it…) What went basically unsaid (because unasked) was a discussion of the Dream Team’s actual dream. (Check the Day After the unveiling, where the connection between their grid/tower concept and the wrecked shards of the original towers is made clear.)
I am very unsettled by this team’s refusal to discuss what seems to be the guiding principle of their design.

Thumbnail image for dream_team_memorial_sq.jpg
Gwathmey: “It’s haunting…eerie”
Meier: “ix-nay on the aunting-hay, uck-Chay”
image: LMDC

Still, Charles Gwathmey came really close when he talked about how their plan addresses New York at both levels, “the pedestrian plane” (! Plane?) and the “sky plane.” (!! Two planes?) He said, “It’s haunting. It’s an eerie speculation about memory and presence. The image is incredibly powerful.” Gwathmey’s reference to the skyline rules out the possibility he was discussing the declared memorial aspect of their plan: street-level gardens in the shape of the Twin Towers’ shadows, which extend across the World Financial Center and into the Hudson.

There was no articulation of what this image is or why, no discussion of the form, no followup, no discussion about (this) memorial. Eisenman quoted Adolf Loos (again, also here, in relation to his Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe), “The work of architecture is monuments and graves, and in other words, the work of memory.” Even if I like their concept of a monumental shard taking over the downtown skyline (and I have to admit, it’s quite powerful), their conscious avoidance of expressing or acknowledging their clear intent is arrogant, verging on deceitful.

The surreal TV moment: a minute or so later, there’s a jump cut; something was obviously excised from the conversation. While Eisenman is talking next to him, an anxious Meier is slowly trying to drop some folded papers from view, and all the while he’s sending intense messages across the table with his eyes. To whom? According to that basic element of continuity editing, eyeline matching, it was Charles Gwathmey.

[2024 update: fixed broken links to charlierose.com]

Don Quixote? I Feel More Like William Tell’s Son

Apple is certainly on my mind, if not on my head. While Jobs is off announcing the next great toy, I’m here newly switched, on deadline, and the damn Powerbook keeps freezing up and opening in recovery mode-OS9.2. How many hard powerdowns and reboots does it take to get somewhere I can change the preferences? Oh, and am I not supposed to be doing touch-ups on audio and outputting at this point instead? I’m posting this from my Thinkpad, BTW.

based on the earliest known illustration of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza.  DMCA THAT, Mr. Valenti...

Long story short, even if I do get done in time, I don’t know if I’ll be psychologically ready to go to the Apple SoHo store tomorrow night (Thursday, Dec. 9, 6:30PM) to hear directors Louis Pepe and Keith Fulton’s war stories from Lost in La Mancha, their hi-larious-looking documentary about Terry Gilliam’s Don Quixote (a phrase as redundant as they come), but it sure sounds like fun. [Some of you may already know my production company is called First Sally, so I know from errant adventures and self-delusion. Trivia: First Sally’s logo is derived from the earliest known Quixote illustration, from a 1618 Paris edition of the novel. DMCA that, Mr Valenti…]

ugh. rough cut done

S(J03) is done. at least the first cut is. 12’30” is a little long. I watched it all the way through once, and there’s definitely a minute I can trim. The rest, though, it’ll be tougher. Maybe 10 minutes isn’t so bad after all. Wed AM is trimming, audio levels (just for the rough cut; I’ve got to get it to the real sound editor before locking it) and output. There may be a Quicktime version available for a while online. If you’re interested in seeing a rough cut, gimme a holler.
I gotta go to bed. Weblogs weren’t even invented the last time I stayed up this late for so many nights in a row…

S(J03) Editing, Day 1.5

Day 1.5 is complete, and the first cut is about half done. Never mind that it’s five minutes long, which is about what I’d imagined the finished cut to be. I got the first act laid down and that was about three minutes. With that pace set, I blocked out the rest of the film; comes to around 10 minutes (10:20 with credits).
The first cut of S(N01) was about twice as long, but with that one, the target length (15 min.) was less flexible (it was the requirement for Cannes, which I knew would show it, even though it wasn’t quite done). Let’s see if this one settles in around 8 min.
Here is a quick html version of the outline I blocked out on paper this afternoon.

Overview: Powerpoint as Creative Medium


Bright Glow Tube (all images, powerpointart.com)

Slide 1 – Background:

‘Lost’ Swedish Soap Commercial Director Ingmar Bergman Finally Gets Recognition

The Surgery, Bris soap commercial, dir. by Ingmar Bergman image:bizprocessdesign.com
The Surgery, Bris soap commercial directed by Ingmar Bergman

See, if you stick with it long enough, recognition will come. When his commercials for Bris soap were shown in 1951, Ingmar Bergman seemed to be living the admaker’s dream: “He had final cut, he had free hands, he could do whatever he wanted,” says director Anders Roennqvist. Inexplicably, though, the promising young director soon vanished into ad-biz obscurity; I searched Adwik Svenska‘s 80-year archives using my mobile phone, but found nothing.
Well, thanks to Mr. Rosennqvist, you can see all these forgotten classics in Bergman’s Commercials Preceding the Play, a documentary which provides an “aha-feeling of why and how Ingmar Bergman made soap commercials” (and without that annoying abba-ring around the tub!) The collection is screening this weekend at London’s National Film Theatre, along with a bunch of other Bergman-related junk. (At least it is according to the Guardian; I can’t find it on the NFT schedule. Why don’t you all stop texting for a minute and figure out what the hell’s going on?)
In addition to the aha-feeling, seeing it will “make you feel free, well and fresh,” just like the Bris brand itself. (Frankly, those were not the qualities I had previously associated with bris, but then I live in New York.)

Editing, or Not

Editing, here I come. I finished logging and capturing all the footage I’ll use in S(J03); it seems like it’ll be tough to get it down to 5-6 minutes. The last tape I captured was all the ironing (three white dress shirts’ worth). As I mentioned before, the third shirt has such great, engaged shots, it almost doesn’t make sense to use anything else. The result: I’m going to try two different editing “tones.” For the ironing scenes, there’ll be long, continuous takes, maybe with a few dissolves; the car and cleaners scenes will have quicker cuts, jump cuts, a slightly more dynamic feel. That’s the plan, anyway. I start tomorrow (Sunday). ND/NF deadline is four days away.

Russian Ark, dir. Aleksandr Sokurov, image:guardian.co.uk
Russian Ark, dir. by Aleksandr Sokurov
image: guardian.co.uk

We just got home from seeing
Russian Ark, the single-take epic poem of Russian history directed by Aleksandr Sokurov. It was quite stunning for a while, then normal, then stunning again at the end. The Hermitage itself is the real star. Even without the tour de force (or gimmick, depending on your cynicism) of shooting with no edits, the film’s exploration of the centuries of momentous people and events witnessed by the building would be worth seeing. The insane staging (the credits list six stage managers and twenty assistants) required to pull the thing off in one 96-minute shot is just a layer of gold leaf on the film. And as the Hermitage demonstrates, everything’s better with gold leaf.
The impact and resonance of the continuous Steadicam/tracking shot seems to be changing, though. I have a theory, which I’ll try to expand on later, that the emergence of first-person shooter (FPS) video games is changing the meaning of the visual vocabulary for both film and games. When I play a Vice City for an hour, it’s a continuous take, visually, even if it’s not as bravura as Sokurov’s, Welles’, or Scorsese’s.
Comparing the edits in classic movie musicals (3 or 4 per number) to, say, Moulin Rouge (120 per minute in some songs), it’s clear that the meaning/significance of the long take has changed before. Technology is changing it once again.
Some links I’d start with: Machinima.com, turning “first person shooter” into “first person cinematographer.” A broad article at Polygonweb about cinema-game influences. Game Research briefly discusses point-of-view in games and film.

S(J03) Update

I’m logging and capturing footage for Souvenir (January 2003). So far, I’ve completed two of three tapes, for a subtotal of about 25 minutes, which takes about 10 Gigs. Oblique Strategy: Just carry on.

I Feel Safer Already

Knowing that the imperialist ambitions, quest for cultural hegemony, and utterly misplaced sense of entitlement and infallibility exhibited by their leaders are not going unnoticed. Visit FranceWatch for the latest on this grave threat to world peace and stability. [via LockhartSteele.com]
the Mole, from South Park, image:spscriptorium.com And for reports from the front lines, or from “behind enemy lines,” to be exact, check out Merde in France (“Proud to be blocked by corporate firewalls across France!” Liberte, indeed.), a bilingual weblog from an ex-pat Mole (not the one at left) [via FranceWatch, bien sur]

Sharks sharks sharks sharks sharks. What about the Jets?

In “Living Here, But Registered There,” the Times celebrates all the “New Yorkers” with out-of-state plates. Harry is the story’s cowering Officer Krupke, on a lonely crusade against these scofflaws who clog our alternate street parking and–and don’t pay the $15 city tax and– From where I’m standing (off the curb, naturally), a New Jersey plate means you don’t know how to drive in the city; when you finally stop (in the crosswalk), I’ll still look down at your license plate before making dismissive eye contact.
2003, it seems, will not be the year that other gang gets lauded in the press: New Yorkers who register their cars here, even though they keep them somewhere else. And you better not be in my spot when I get back.

Yinka Shonibare, Norton Christmas Project 2003

Yinka Shonibare, 2nd Floor, Norton Christmas Project 2002, image:greg.org
Yinka Shonibare, 2nd Floor, Norton Christmas Project 2002, image:greg.org
Dollhouse, Interior views, Yinka Shonibare
for the Norton Christmas Project 2002

In lieu of Christmas cards, the art collector Peter Norton and his family began sending out specially commissioned works. [Inspired by the Nortons’ example, we began commissioning artist editions–albeit at a much smaller scale–to send to family and friends as a commemmoration of various births and anniversaries.]
In 2002, the British/Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare created a toy Victorian rowhouse, outfitted with his trademark Dutch batik fabrics, a photo of his own, and, for good measure, a Fragonard in the bedroom. Shonibare exhibited a sculptural installation based on Fragonard in 2001 and was in Documenta 11 last year.
Wink, Takashi Murakami, 2000, Norton Family Christmas Project, 2000, image:Toyboxdx.com

Wink, Takashi Murakami, 2000
for the Norton Family Christmas Project 2000, image: Toyboxdx.com

For the 2000 Project, Jap-pop artist Takashi Murakami made a Wink doll, which contains a happy little CD in its base. Read about it on Alan Yen’s ToyboxDX. And in 1996, Norton asked Brian Eno to publish an updated edition of Oblique Strategies, his highly sought after collection of question and idea cards, originally made in collaboration with the late Peter Schmidt. Gregory Taylor’s OS site includes Norton’s description of the Project and soliciting Eno’s participation.
My favorite Strategy (as I attempt to write and edit in public): “Give the game away.”

iBitchslap

Yeah, I love my Christmas Powerbook setup and our iPod (which we’re planning to jack into our 1985 Mercedes’ original stereo (which, unsurprisingly, doesn’t have a factory interface for mp3 players), and as soon as Final Cut Pro3 arrives (UPS.com: 5:03 A.M. ALEXANDRIA, VA, US OUT FOR DELIVERY), I’ll start crash editing S(J03).
In the mean time, should I interpret the use of Torx screws as anything other than kneejerk anti-duopolism (philips/flathead :: wintel)? We scoured NASA Goddard yesterday and couldn’t find a Torx screwdriver small enough. “Designed to install youself,” indeed. If your name’s Greg Torx.

About being right about About Schmidt

director Alexander Payne. image: wnyc.org, photo: Claudette Barius/New Line ProductionsA couple of weeks ago, I called About Schmidt the Thinking Person’s My Fat, Greek Wedding and linked both back to the 1955 Academy Award sweeper Marty. Now, after giving it some thought, Vogue‘s Sarah Kerr notes an “odd coincidence” in a Slate discussion of the films of 2002: “Did you know that Payne is of Greek extraction and that in his boyhood his father owned a Greek restaurant in Omaha? Ring a bell with another movie this year?”
[Listen to Payne talking about Omaha on Studio 360.]
[MoMA‘s Film Department will honor Payne with its 2nd Work In Progress Award in February.]