FISHING FOR AVOCADOS! –– C.A. BROADSTONE on FILMMAKING, WRITING, MUSIC –– POLITICAL HUMAN IDIOTS? –– and Other Things BCP/Texas POĒtrope! ***PLEASE SUBSCRIBE with your email below.
Well...hmmmmm...not sure the entertainment industry––movies or otherwise––is really going the direction I wish it was. Meaning, getting back to its roots in pure story versus letting technology reinvent everything and anything. Having said that, the film industry has always been that way––always trumping up the next latest hoopla (whether it be Technicolor, CinemaScope, Todd AO, or 3D) to pull in audiences. So, I guess nothing has really changed. Maybe my great sadness is that, simply, I can't even get my own little act going, let alone keep up with all the daily advancements in camera tech, software, and output. Below are a few things to to show the tip of the future-media iceberg. Enjoy! Or is it all really just a "real drag" disguised in high-tech? First up...
According to VideoEdge.net: "Shield 5 is a captivating new
thriller that follows a wrongfully accused man on the run, desperate to
clear his name. It has a lot in common with shows like Homeland and 24, except for one tiny thing: Each episode is only 15 seconds long.
"Shield 5 is a new dramatic and cinematic series being
released on Instagram in installments, just one recent example of what
is being labeled as "social cinema." It is the brainchild of British
director Anthony Wilcox, who was looking for a quick project to work on
while he finished developing a bigger feature. "I’ve done a few short
things online as a director-for-hire, and the fast turnaround of those
things excited me. I was looking for a way to do that, but telling my
own story," Wilcox told Fast Company.
"Wilcox began to look around for a platform that would work for his
needs and meet his very, very low budget. "Instagram just seemed to tick
a few boxes," said Wilcox. 'There’s a potential for a massive, global
audience, and there was something fun about the 15-second restriction
that weirdly appealed to me for some reason.'
"He wasn’t sure if the idea would work; 15 seconds doesn't give you
time to show or say much. "The idea stuck with me, though, and I
couldn’t quite shake it," said Wilcox. He started to study film trailers
and commercials and slowly realized how much drama you could pack into a
limited time frame. He slowly came up with a basic framework of a big,
cinematic story to be told on Instagram’s tiny screen."
Second up...hit the theater and strap on a Biometric Reader
so the studios will know if you really do like their new film or not...
According to VideoEdge.net:
"Lightwave measured how audience members reacted to the emotional intensity of Golden Globe Best Picture Winner, The Revenant, using real-time biometric data.
"Seeing films and stories on the silver screen allows us
to witness and experience gripping and harrowing tales of survival and
triumph. They allow us to experience wild highs and lows that we as
modern day city dwellers would never actually experience. Then when the
story is finished, the popcorn is eaten, the cinematic connection is
forgotten. Soon after watching a film, a viewer quickly gets emotionally
further away from how they felt while watching. That’s the problem with
the current moviegoing experience; filmmakers have no way to get real
data or evidence supporting how viewers actually felt during a movie.
"Lightwave,
a pioneering bioanalytics technology company, is in the business of
tracking how we feel in these micro-moments and has partnered with 20th
Century Fox to quantify the audience’s engagement to the action, drama
and adventure of The Revenant based on their physiological
responses, such as heart rate, electrodermal activity (changes in the
electrical activity of the skin), and motion."
Is this a great thing, or is it just another way to keep us at our computers,
instead of getting out of the house for a little art, exercise, and real social interactivity?
Well, who really has time to go to a museum anyway.
Now you can have your museum and eat it too.
According to VideoEdge.net:
"The idea behind the Google Cultural Institute
is to digitize the art experience—to make it virtual, as it were. The
platform allows users to virtually navigate and investigate art events,
museums, figures, and world heritage sites. For its latest entry, Google
Cultural Institute teamed up with the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation
to allow users to virtually experience the Guggenheim Museum’s iconic spiral ramps via Street View technology.
"Users can also explore 120 artworks in the Guggenheim’s Storylines: Contemporary Art at the Guggenheim, including Maurizio Cattelan’s Daddy, Daddy (2008), a sculpture of Walt Disney’s Pinocchio that floats facedown in the fountain, and Juliana Huxtable’s Untitled in the Rage (Nibiru Cataclysm)
(2015), which the Guggenheim describes as a “self-portrait in which the
artist interrogates gender norms and portrayals of femininity—to learn
more about the objects and artists.”
Especially to all you
poor, lonely slobs out there, like me.Even so, I've stumbled across
the perfect woman as detailed in the photo below. She's soooooo quiet, calming, and caring.Just one more arm and I get a half-hug.
Farewell Cupid, until next year!
ALL NEW from Feast
Frenzy @ The Horror Food Network!
Thinking I was alone on
Valentine's Day, I suddenly realized I truly wasn't. I had one of my most beloved friends with me:
my stomach! So I dreamed up something
special.
A large, fresh-Mex enchilada––one
flour tortilla stuffed with shredded, white-meat chicken, diced red onions and
fresh jalapeno peppers, shredded cheddar, and all spiced with oregano on a bed
of fresh spinach leaves. On top is La
Mexicana Hot Salsa, a sprinkling
shredded cheddar, and sliced black
olives.
On the side are fresh asparagus spears, two red
bell pepper rings, and white mushrooms, all brushed with canola oil and grilled
to perfection on my Nu Wave Oven. The
asparagus is sprinkled with garlic and paprika and the mushrooms with a bit of cinnamon. Then, as a side-kicker, three
pepperoncinis. I have to admit, this was
extremely dangerous in the super delicious department!
Saturday, February 13, 2016
Well, folks, the Summer of 2016 movies is already starting early this year. So hang on to your hat and look out for some of these...
Shameful as it might
be, I am a ROLAND EMMERICH fan. I own on
DVD and have watched DAY AFTER TOMORROW, 2012 and INDEPENDENCE DAY countless
times. Those films truly own my guilty
pleasure button and my desire to simply sit back and watch the world burn.
Thus, I'm very much looking forward to EMMERICH's new
film and sequel to ID4, INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE, exploding into theaters
this June 24th. It
shows great promise to somehow make it all blowup bigger-er and brighter-er and
more catastrophically-er than ever-er before! –er!
I'm very much loving the catch phrase for the new film LONDON HAS
FALLEN..."Prepare For Bloody Hell!" lol
Nice!
Yup, my apocalyptic-fetish, destruction-loving self will probably be at the
theater for this one at an early show on opening day this March 4th. Woohoo!
Not since Robert
Montgomery's 1947 noir LADY IN THE LAKE (see link to trailer below) bugged the
hell out of viewers with its extensive POV––subjective first-person
camera––telling of an entire film, has there been such a relentless
POV-perspective flick as the upcoming HARDCORE HENRY is likely to be.
Since I can't stand
most of the found-footage, run-with-the-shaky-video-camera movies out there,
I'm already opting out on this film. But in consideration of the modern-world
obsession with gaming, which is all POV driven, HARDCORE HENRY is likely to
cause the gaming generation to erupt in spasms of mental-masturbatory mayhem
when the film hits theaters this April 8th. Again, I think I'll be opting out.
At least until I get some solid first-person perspective opinions on the flick.
Nonetheless, check out the trailer and you decide if you're out too...or really
right-there, in-it-all, through thick and thin, with HARDCORE HENRY.
I quickly became addicted to MatM COLLECTION 1 and then became addicted to MYSTERIES AT THE MUSEUM: COLLECTION 2––which, once upon a time, had been streaming on Netflix. Currently, the show is airing new and repeat episodes weekly on the Travel Channel. At any rate, while binge-watching MatM: COLLECTION 2 on Netflix, I found myself deep into Episode 18, a portion of which elaborates on the somewhat bizarre instrument invented by Benjamin Franklin called the Glass Armonica. "Armonica" being the Italian word for "harmony".
At any rate, I first became aware of the Glass Armonica in the magical film MR. HOLMES, starring the always outstanding Ian McKellen as the super sleuth––and in this film, quite elderly––Sherlock Holmes.
Most certainly check out the film (based on the book A SLIGHT TRICK OF THE MIND by Mitch Cullin) and look for the Glass Armonica, which plays into the mystery unfolding, although quite subtly. But if you don't, here's some great info about how good ol' Ben came to invent the instrument, which even Mozart wrote music for. Interesting to think those two where hanging around Europe at the same time. Now that's a small world!
Here's a little history from PBS.org focused on the Glass Armonica:
"Of Benjamin Franklin's many achievements, probably
the least well-known are his accomplishments in music. Not only did
Franklin play viola da gamba and compose music, he also invented an
instrument for which both Mozart and Beethoven composed music—the
armonica, also known as the glass armonica or glass harmonica.
"In 1761, while living in England, Franklin heard a performer playing
musical glasses. Franklin wrote: 'He collected a number of glasses of
different sizes, fixed them near each other on a table, and tuned them
by putting into them water, more or less as each note required. The
tones were brought out by passing his fingers round their brims.'
"Franklin was charmed by the music, but felt that there was a better way
to create the same sound. He had a glassmaker create thirty-seven
hemispheres made of glass, with each hemisphere being a different size
and thickness to produce different pitches..."
