Thursday, March 19, 2009

Running Free

Eventually my focus around here will shift back to writing, but I've been consumed over the past week with the possibilities of moving pictures. When summer rolls around and I'm actually doing something interesting on a weekly basis, I'd really like to make short videos about it. I promise I'll never do it more than once a week, and hopefully I'll figure out how to make them entertaining.

In anticipation of leaving Knoxville soon, this time for good, I've been documenting the places around town that I'd like to have a record of, mostly in still photographs. Yesterday, though, I went to Ijams Nature Center with my new mini tripod and collected a bucketful of funny looks from people as I ran back and forth like an OCD idiot if front of the camera. I've found that my impending move to the other side of the continent has seriously curtailed my generally over-active self-consciousness. These people, strangers to begin with, will never see me again. Free at last, free at last...


Running at Ijams Nature Center from dennyswaitress on Vimeo.

Isn't that song great? It's The Shaded Forests by Deastro.

Really the point to the exercise (the movie-making, not the running) is figuring the whole process out, mainly editing, formatting, and compression. If you click the link to my Vimeo page, I also redid that bouldering video from last week and added music.

In the future these video posts (again, I swear I will afflict you with them at most once a week) should even feature dialog and other people. Wouldn't that be something?

And in trying to think of a title for this post, I was reminded of the Kids in the Hall sketch Running Faggot. All time classic. Probably not okay for work, but then videos of any kind generally aren't.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ahhhh....go ol' Knoxville. Home of Buddy's Bar-b-que, watered down beer and enough road repair to keep highway construction companies in business until the end of time.

Unknown said...

You looked like Rocky! But without the ugly face.

Allie said...

That was really neat! I had to bail halfway b/c I'm one of those losers who needs motion sickness wristbands to watch handheld camera work. I suck.

Courtney said...

Nice video! You even managed not to capture any rapists hiding on the side of the trail at Ijams!

"He's a running faggot, he fed a puppy ..." Makes me laugh every time.

Julie said...

So I'm curious... did you get a better workout because you had to run everything twice (once for camera and once to go back and get camera)?

I think this is brilliant. Please continue. I expect you will take me to places in Wyoming I will never see otherwise as I am lazy and out of shape.

p.s. - I liked the song

p.p.s - I liked how you put "Running by Mickey" in the credits.

Jacob said...

Yeah, the running camera gave me a bit of a dizzy spell, but good editing work. How did you get it to work. I know last time you mentioned you couldn't get the Windows movie editing software to convert into a usable file.

Cool song.

Jacob said...

And one of the better Kids in the Hall bits, and that's saying a lot.

shelleycoughlin said...

Hey, you're really good with the editing! That came out really well. Except the parts when you're running with the camera, I had to stop watching those because they were making me motion sick a little bit. But still, totally entertaining!

A Free Man said...

Dig your video, great editing. I wish I could do so well. Particularly like the hand held jobby.

Anonymous said...

The videos won't load on my computer right now; I will have to wait until tomorrow when I have better (not stolen) internet.

I was thinking about Mrs Heavyfoot today. I have one of my own now in my apartment building. SUCK!

Chris said...

I'll agree with those who had a hard-time with the handheld, running-with-camera footage. I'd keep that to a minimum, if it were me.

Otherwise, I feel honored to know someone who can actually film and edit video and post it to the Internet. You could be the next YouTube sensation.

The Modern Gal said...

And I'm guessing by the number of times you seem to have set the camera down only to run by it, you ran at least twice as far as we actually saw. Bravo.

Jacob said...

I've been thinking. If you edit your future videos as well as this and you do make them at least as interesting as your normal posts, I don't think you'd offend anyone (at least those of us able to view online video) by posting them more than once a week.

Now, having the time to do it more than once a week could be a problem.

Fantastic Forrest said...

That is one fine video! The song is my new favorite. You didn't overdo the handheld motion thing; you really achieved the goal of giving us the experience. Sort of like in Soderbergh's Che, only without the shooting and coughing.

It was nice to be in the woods. Tennessee sure has skinny trees. This inspires me to try something similar, only I'll be walking, because my butt is too big to move that fast. It's proportional, though, because our trees are way bigger too.

Sid said...

I have a video of me doing some "extreme sports" ... still trying to figure out how to pu it on my blog.

Meaghan said...

Good job, man! I'm impressed with the camera in the tree looking down on you. BTW, your running form is great - even though I'm not a big runner, you at least don't look like Phoebe on friends!

Jacob said...

There was that one scene where the camera is on the railing of the bridge (or bridge-like structure) and it started shaking as you ran by. I half expected to see the image of the camera's view as it tumbled down a hill.

Anonymous said...

Well, I'm very excited for you that you are moving west! But enjoy the green while you have it there. That's the only thing I miss -- lush vegetation.

Before I moved west, I took a bunch of video of my old town with the old boyfriend. He edited it and posted it here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lq82M6i3lM4 As you can see, it's way less jubilant than yours!!