Tarantino – Who Do You Think You’re Fooling?
If you remember recently I posted a video titled “Everything is a Remix” that showed a frame by frame comparison between Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill and some of the movies that inspired it. Recently an individual by the name of Mike White posted a comment on my blog that read “apparently you guys haven’t seen this.” along with a link to a film he produced called “Who Do You Think You’re Fooling?” This film was a frame by frame comparison between Tarantino’s breakout film “Reservoir Dog’s” and a film by Ringo Lam titled “City on Fire.” The similarities are amazing and leave little doubt as to where Tarantino found his “inspiration.” Judge for yourself.
As mentioned in my second “Everything is a Remix” post, taking something and making it yours is nothing new to art. However when the inspiration is obvious, not giving credit or acknowledging where one gets his or her ideas is at best in bad taste, and at worst downright illegal.
After watching “Who Do You Think You’re Fooling?” I checked out another video from Mike, this one an MTV news report on the controversial ban of Mike’s film from the New York Underground Film Festival. The MTV report ends with a Tarantino comment denying the plagiarism accusations and even going as far as saying that he would look forward to watching “City on Fire.” The MTV clip is followed with another side by side comparison with one of my all-time favorite movie scenes (the “Ezekiel 25:17″ scene), from my all time favorite film Pulp Fiction, which was eerily similar to the title crawl in the 1973 film ‘The Bodyguard’ starring Sonny Chiba.
One IMDB comment summed up this charade the best.
“Who do you think you’re fooling, QT? Yes, the teens who watch MTV News and haven’t seen “Who do you think you’re fooling?”. But anyone who did see Mike White’s short won’t believe you.”
Back in olden times before the Internet, it was more difficult to cross reference old films with new ones, so Tarantino took his chances. It seems that as time has passed and information became more readily available, more people got wise to Tarantino’s game. These days he readily reveals his sources and openly pays homage to genre films, even incorporating some of the stars from the movies that inspired him. However at the very beginning it seems that QT stole what he thought he could get away with. Well you know what Picasso said, “Good artist borrow, great artist steal.”
TreVZ
Tiny Feature Saturday’s – Shelter
This week on TFS we bring you a Jason Sussberg short profiling author, photographer, and pioneer of the green building and green architecture movements Lloyd Kahn. Lloyd is also the founding editor-in-chief of Shelter Publications, Inc.
“Lloyd has been grappling with the concept of home, physically and psychically, for over five decades. Situated in the financial and housing crisis, this film profiles Lloyd’s ideas on do-it-yourself construction and sustainability.”
This video shot in 16mm actually left me wanting more.
Enjoy
TreVZ
The Videographers Guide to not Falling on Your New Media Face | Chapter 2
Chapter 2: The Videographers Not To Do List.
In the Social Media landscape time should be measured in dog years. Six years ago (Forty-two in dog years) Myspace was all the rage, Youtube was just getting started, and being a videographer meant that you were either shooting corporate instructional videos or weddings. Today most serious brands have their own list of go-to videographers. Video on the web is today’s most powerful medium, and videographers are to social media, what photographers were to publishing. What is most exciting about videography now is that the conventions of old media film-making have been turned on it’s head. Just five years ago what took hundreds of thousands of dollars and several dozen crew members, can now be achieved for less than $10K and a small band of creatives. The biggest mistake I see in new videographers is taking this change for granted. They mistake low budget for cheap, and replace efficient with lazy. The result is a littered landscape of un-watchable, un-listenable, un-learnable videos that inspire more SMH’s than CTO’s.
In this Chapter I thought I would share a few of the technical and creative mistakes I see every day. Some of these very mistakes I made myself. Fortunately most of mine came at the dawn of the age of Video Blogging when the competition was scarce and second chances abundant. Make these mistakes today and you will find that your only gigs will be shooting parties for peanuts. Which I assure you will inspire a steady stream of FML’s.
THE LIST:
10. Don’t shake your cam
My old photo partners and I use to make fun of the event photographers who wore those multi-pocketed army colored utility vests and lugged around heavy tripods. We were young, we were the new school, we held our cameras like automatics, sniping shots at unsuspecting partiers, moving in, out and all around our subjects like photo/video ninjas. There was no room for tripods to slow us down. The resulting effect was an in your face, light streaked/shaky cam montage of images in which the viewer felt like they were a part of the action. As unorthodox as it was, it was new, and it was now. The novelty of that style has worn out a bit. Today’s new media artists exhibit a cleaner aesthetic. If you want to shake and bake, approach with caution and much restraint.
9. Avoid bad cameras
If the story is King, then the camera is his castle. Think about how your footage looks. If you think you can shoot on a 1 chip or One CDD camera as opposed to a Three CDD camera and attract good clients you are mistaken. I strongly recommend shooting on a camera with a good sized sensor and interchangeable lenses that gives you the shallow depth of field that is all the rage today. A great site for camera pointers is Phillipbloom.net.
8. Don’t Sleep on Audio
Nothing screams amateur like shoddy sound. It’s the easiest thing to take for granted, and the hardest thing to fix in post. If you are using a DSLR camera at the minimum buy an external mic. Some clients are so picky that you are probably better off budgeting for a sound guy.
7. Don’t flat line
Nothing screams “creatively challenged” like flat line edits. That is an interview that has no creative edits. A flat-line. We have all seen them. They look like long news interviews. When videographers do this I assume they don’t care or can’t create a compelling edit (and adding a soundtrack does not count). I understand that the short story format is challenging, but that is why we get paid the big bucks (yeah right). One trick I use, is to closely mimic the storytelling arc of a song. The bottom line is, if you want to make the cut in this competitive field, than you need to make the cut on the timeline first.
6. Lazy Montages
Even the most talented amongst us (present company included) have fallen into this trap door probably more than once. That is the lazy montage. It is so easy to find a dope music track and chop together a compelling montage around this. The problem is that it is a short term solution to what is a long term challenge. The truth is that montages are really easy to create. It’s an in the moment edit that leans heavily on a music track. If your lucky enough to slip this past a client, or avoid repeating yourself quickly, chances are that you will be competing with the Trust Fund, Too cool for school, Party Videographer kids mentioned in Chapter 1.
Next Friday I will list the top 5 things on the “Not To Do List”
Thanks
Trevor “Trevz” Bayack is a Brooklyn-born filmmaker who approaches his web pieces as mini documentaries. Recognized as a member of the 2008 URB magazine Next 100 for pioneering the “video blog” Trevz continually makes his pieces shorter, sharper and ever more shareable” Follow thenewpop twitter feed for more.
CK one SS11 – Pretentiously Good
As I move up in my years, my tolerance for pretentious pointless eye candy has grown thin. However every now and then I see something that despite its obvious attempt at appealing to my desire to stay hip, over-rides my too easy to trigger cynical meter, and finds its way onto this blog. This Calvin Klein teaser video by Steven Miesel, for what is described as their biggest-ever digital initiative to date, has put the New back into my Pop! Log onto their Facebook link for more info.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Running a Design Business
This video by the Design Council of the UK discusses what type of skills and experience one needs to operate a design business. I found that most of what is discussed in this video also applies to Videography.
Enjoy
TreVz
Lost & Found | The High Line
Here is a video piece courtesy of Lost & Found Films and commissioned by the folks at Wallpaper Magazine about everyone’s favorite new public space, The High Line Park.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Artist Wanted | In Focus – Surabhi Saraf (Lo-Speed)
Here is another video from Christian Schneider and the folks at ArtistsWanted. It documents Surabhi Saraf who is an audio/video artist working out of San Francisco California. Her work combines complexly layered sound and video expositions that play out on a grand scale.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Tiny Feature Saturday’s – The Rise and Fall of the Boombox
Check out this really cool piece titled “The Rise and Fall of the Boombox” written and edited by Roy Hurst for NPR.
Enjoy
TreVZ
The Videographers Guide to Not Falling on your New Media Face! | Chapter 1
I thought I would share some of my experiences navigating the New Media landscape.
Chapter 1: Don’t Shoot Parties!
When I first started shooting for the web I did it because I had a passion for documenting New York culture. Very quickly I found that documenting events was a way to gain access to, and increase my status in the downtown scene. I got to hang out with musicians, go to cool events, get free drinks, build a little fan base, travel and even get paid! In the five years that I have been shooting, I have seen the landscape change drastically. Five years ago I could go a year or two before I ran into another videographer at an event. Today I can’t walk to the bathroom without running into some kid doing it for free. At first I tried to tell myself that they can’t possibly keep it up. Sooner or later they are going to have to make a living, right? The sad and unfortunate truth is that for every kid that gets burned out, three more jump in.
My advice to those of you interested in video blogging is “Don’t Shoot Parties!? Not if you want do this for a living. Yes a large part of TheNewPop brand was built on shooting parties, but as I mentioned five years ago the landscape was very different. These days there are a dozen trust fund kids waiting outside every cool event offering free coverage for drinks and access. Good luck competing with them if you have rent to pay. The way I see it there are two roads one can travel. Shoot parties, or don’t shoot parties. One will have you competing with these kids for bad clients who pay very little if anything at all. The other will reward you with a slow but steady increase in wages, professional clients and mostly great gigs. And trust me, in the end these better gigs will be allot more fun than the low hanging fruit that is the party scene.
The “Parties can build my fan base” argument:
Even if you have somehow managed to build a loyal fan base that brings you thousands of video views a week, you may still find yourself on the outside looking in when it comes to getting the good gigs. Depending on the client unless you consistently and without co-signs bring in between 1 – 5K on a video, you will find that clients won’t care about your numbers. Artistic vision, professionalism, and good production is the one thing you can give them that they can’t get cheaply. More often than not they will already have an established audience that can match or supersede yours. The following Desigual video I shot got almost 60k views during it’s first week due to a brilliant marketing plan that appealed to their already established fan base. My job was simply to deliver a solid video. Unless you are specifically skilled in Social Media Marketing and have the numbers to support this you should focus on your production. Next Friday I will give some tips on avoiding bad video.
Trevor “Trevz” Bayack is a Brooklyn-born filmmaker who approaches his web pieces as mini documentaries. Recognized as a member of the 2008 URB magazine Next 100 for pioneering the “video blog” trevz continually makes his pieces shorter, sharper and ever more shareable” Follow thenewpop twitter feed for more.
There’s No Place Like Here: Hindsvik
This video by Pascal Perich for the website Etsy.com, documents the humble and majestic home of Daniel and Valeria, also known as Hindsvik. Located a few minutes from Lake Erie in Port Colborne, Canada, it is just the kind of place I hope to purchase one day to get away from the grind that is NYC. Hopefully I can find one not to far from my roots, somewhere Upstate (NY). I love the pacing of this piece, it is the video equivalent of one of my favorite sites The Selby is in Your Place.
Enjoy
TreVZ
New Pop Vintage ’07-’08 – Mean Red
The years between 2007 – 2008 were particularly great for the downtown scene. Everything seemed new and fresh. The music, the fashion, the photo/video blogosphere, the art, even the promoters were thinking outside the box finding some of the coolest and most unique spaces to hold events. It was as if everyone was feeding and informing each others art. At the center of this new raw energy you would more often than not find the ladies from Mean Red. They held events at some of the most interesting venues in the city including the legendary now defunct Yard located in Red Hook Brooklyn. It made for some of the best times during those early New Pop party years. The following video first published in 2008 highlighted some of those great photo/video moments. To this day no one could cover events like our crew.
Enjoy
TrevZ
Cargoh Artist Profile – Indigo
Cargoh recently did a profile on a Vancouver based artist Indigo. She currently works in many mediums including stencils, posters, acrylics, oils, photography, printmaking and more. Her artwork is an exploration of human emotion, personal story and the weight of memory. After you check out her profile you might want to check out the Cargoh site. It is a community based website for artist.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Uncontacted Amazon Tribe – First Ever Aerial Footage
This footage of one of the last remaining uncontacted tribes on earth is simply amazing. I can only imagine what the people in this tribe are thinking when they see the plane fly over. They probably think it is some iron dragon or some god of some sort. That plane is as mysterious to them as a visitor from another world would be to us, even more so. Observe the tribesman pointing his bow in the plane’s direction. Illegal logging in the Amazon is driving these tribes away, violence from loggers or even the common cold can wipe out an entire tribe. For more information on this story and more videos including one that asks, “What would have happened if the plane landed?” log onto uncontactedtribes.org
TreVz
Tiny Feature Saturday’s – 80 Blocks from Tiffany’s
As magnificent a place as New York is today, it is only a watered down version of it’s 70′s self. It’s impossible to describe to people who weren’t there what NY was like in the 70′s. There was an attitude an energy an element of danger that permeated almost every inner city neighborhood in the 5 Boroughs. At the same time there was also an element of community and camaraderie necessary to survive or just stay out of trouble. Nowhere was this more evident than in the South Bronx, and no film captures this time better than the documentary by Gary Weiss, 80 Blocks from Tiffany’s. One sound-byte from a gang member featured in the the film sums up the South Bronx in the 70′s best.
“I’ve seen … 57s … I’ve seen 12-gauge shotguns, I’ve seen 12-gauge pumps … I’ve seen a .45 military special with a clip on the street … I’ve seen fuckin’ Thompsons. A damn Thompson! I’ve seen it! I’ve seen hand grenades, I’ve seen damn beer-can bazookas getting made. That thing hit you, just the same as being hit with a gun! I’ve seen .22 zip guns, I’ve seen .38 zip guns. I see things you never think you’ll see on the street. I’ve seen dynamite. I’ve seen all this, man; you’d be surprised. Pretty soon, they’re going to steal the damn atom bomb!”
If you are interested in the contemporary history of New York you should watch this film. 80 Blocks from Tiffany’s has more of the original fabric that made up NY in the 70′s than any other fictional or documentary film to date. It makes cultural references long forgotten by the NY of today. You feel the grease, you see the grime, you feel the first beats of today’s urban art and music scene pulsating through every frame. If you want to lay claim to being a true New Yorker you should learn it’s history, and there is no better history lesson than 80 Blocks from Tiffany’s.
This fall, the film is seeing a reissue on DVD, making it available for the first time in 25 years. It is available below in it’s entirety with the exception of an 8 minute section in which there is no audio due to youtube restrictions. For more information about this remarkable film log onto the Guardian.co.uk
Enjoy
TreVZ
Street Art and Reality on Hanbury Street London
The main difference between Graffiti and Street Art is that while the former often rebels, degrades, and lashes out against it’s environment the latter almost always merges, comments and even contributes to it. The following video by Shafiur Rahman is one of the better examples of this. This video documents the making of a piece done by Joseph Loughborough and Ben Slow on Hanbury Street in London. The piece called “Ma o Shishu” was found in a book about photography. Ironically the video also uncovers a hidden story of squatters living behind this work of art. This is why street art is my favorite genre of art. It isn’t about hanging art on walls as an excuse for exclusive audiences to drink wine and socialize, the purpose of art is to comment on the world we live in, and to beautify it. As the artist stated “Their piece changed the street. Everyone who passed – young and old, local or tourist – responded very warmly to it.”
Enjoy
TreVZ
Fashion Designers Take on Film
Connecting to audiences via social media is a vital part of any relevant marketing strategy. Branded video on the web is arguably the most effective way to do this. Anecdotal evidence suggests that more and more brands are slowly but surely coming around to this realization. Some may argue that no one has embraced web video like the world of fashion. The following video from the folks at Wallpaper Magazine investigates the fictional often melodramatic films that tend to emerge from the world of high fashion.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Artist Wanted: “In Focus” – Pete Eckert
Here is a cool piece from Christian Schneider for the folks at Artists Wanted. This video profiles Pete Eckert who is blind but refuses to allow his handicap to prevent him from doing what he loves. When asked about his process Pete says that “sounds gives an image just like light gives an image, sound wraps around images… my artwork is a byproduct of my perceptions,” Truly inspiring.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Top 3 Superbowl Commercials
Another NFL season has come to an end with the Green Bay Packers defeating the Pittsburgh Steelers 31 – 25. As a die hard Jets fan this Superbowl was particularly hard to watch since the Steelers defeated my Jets in the Championship round. As a result I found myself rooting against the Steelers as any good Jet fan would. The game was a good one, but somehow the FOX broadcasts made the entire experience seem less than Super. CBS is king when it comes to game analysis and putting the audience in the moment. In comparison FOX comes across as very hoakie. Maybe it is my Northeast bias.
Anyway for many of you out there the reason you watch the game isn’t the game itself, but the 2.6 million dollar 30 sec ads. Last year I listed my top three ads and I am at it again. I didn’t think this years batch was particularly good, and there doesn’t seem to be any instant classic candidates. But one did make me laugh out loud and there were a couple of movie trailers that got me really excited. So here they are. Like last year I listed my top 3 along with a rating in the categories of concept, photography & writing.
Enjoy
TreVZ
#3 Brisk Eminem : Concept 8 / Photography 6 / Writing/Editing 9 = 23
#2 Captain America “The First avenger”: Concept 8 / Photography 9 / Writing/Editing 7 = 24
#1 Bridgestone “Reply All” : Concept 9 / Photography 8 / Writing/Editing 9 = 26
Honorable mentions
Doritos “The Best Part” Concept 7 / Photography 6 / Writing/Editing 6 = 19
Skechers “Shape Up” Concept 6 / Photography 9 / Writing/Editing 5 = 20
Thor : Concept 6 / Photography 9 / Writing/Editing 7 = 22
Cowboys and Aliens: Concept 7 / Photography 9 / Writing/Editing 7 = 23
Tiny Feature Saturday’s – Everything is a Remix Parts 1 & 2
Yesterday I was introduced to an amazing series “Everything is a Remix” Produced by Kirby Ferguson and Robert Grigsby Wilson. In this episode they did a side by side comparison of the film Kill Bill and older genre films. This compelling view into the mind of Quentin Tarantino, Hollywood’s most prolific remixer, was insightful and entertaining. That video led me to Part 1 of the web series for further investigation into the recent history of remixing. Included in this episode are examples from the early hip hop anthem Rappers Delight, to the notorious Led Zeppelin plagiarism cases. Part 2 titled “Remix Inc” goes into more detail about the history of remixing in genre films. It is truly a joy to watch and I am looking forward to parts 3 and 4 from these guys.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Everything is a Remix – Kill Bill
This video courtesy of producer Kirby Ferguson and and editor Robert Grigsby Wilson does a side by side comparison of the film Kill Bill and the older movies it referenced. It is not a secret that Quentin Tarantino who worked in a video rental store before he got his break, relied heavily on old genre films to inform his work. Not being a film student or a indie art-house film buff I must admit that I either didn’t recognize or make the connection between many of the films referenced in this remix, so I was a little taken aback by the fact that my all-time favorite director would rely so heavily on older movies, even lifting scenes frame for frame to create what I considered masterpieces. My opinion of Tarantino as an “original” artist took a hit after viewing this edit, until one of the comments on the vimeo page put some perspective and historical context to this sampling technique.
“Tarantino truly is the first hip-hop filmmaker. He samples everything and still manages to make it unique. He frustrates the hell out of me because I can see him pulling from some of my favorite sources, but you can’t deny the end product, which is always entertaining as hell.”
On the Everything is a Remix website they provide us with scholarly insight into the age old question ‘Is anything Original?’ For those among us who hang out in indie art circles or were attentive in film class this site may seem a little passe. But if you like me have been raised mostly on pOp culture, music videos and blockbuster movies, this site will give a little insight into the mind of the indie art film buff. These guys really know their stuff.
Enjoy
TreVZ
Room With a View – 1 Year of Timelapses from Hotel Windows
Any serious DSLR filmmaker knows about Phillip Bloom and how he has pioneered DSLR filmmaking and social networking for the New Media filmmaker. Here is his latest video. It is a timelapse video shot over a period of one year taken in many locations over the USA, Europe and more. It is sure to go super viral in 3, 2,
Enjoy
Trev
The Video that Started a Revolution.
They say that this video by Asmaa Mahfouz originally posted on Facebook started the Egyptian revolution. In it she states “As long as you say there is no hope, then there will be no hope, but if you go down and take a stance, then there will be hope.” The power of Social Media never ceases to amaze me. Has there been such a trans-formative and empowering invention as the Internet and social media since the Gutenberg printing press?
Here is a NY Times article on Asmaa Mahfouz and the accompanying video embed.