the insanity resumes

Well, it was only a matter of time before I made my grand re-entrance into the land of academic blogging. Welcome.

Despite the trials and tribulations of last semester, I did better than I expected. The break has also allowed me to rejuvenate and I can honestly say that I am excited about continuing this subject and getting another chance to put together another production project - and possibly my last during my career as an undergrad.

The lecture I suppose covered a few of the more basic principles of documentary filmmaking. Although I don't have the background some of the students do (those who are majoring in Cinema and did Documentary Studies last semester), I feel pretty confident in tackling the format - mostly because it's what I have been interested in from the beginning, and because I have a bit of a background from doing Broadcast Media last year, in which my group emulated a Getaway sequence. And some very classic documentary-style editing went into practice there.

Most refreshingly, I think, is the fact that the sky really is the limit with documentary - both subject-wise and as far as pushing the boundaries of convention go. There is such a vast amount of information out there that few of us are privy to - I'm not even talking in terms of political exposes... I just mean in general. And now that we have the ground workings in our mind from putting a short drama together, we can really afford to test ourselves as far as this next project goes.

Excited? I think, very :D

coming out, not copping out

I imagine the feeling I get when admitting out loud that I want to work in film is somewhat similar to coming out of the closet.

I hear that it's not uncommon for gay people to tell friends and family that they're 'bi' first, to ease them into the idea. Which is kind of what I've done in the past, except 'media rep' has always masked my true desire to become a filmmaker.

Well, I'm over it. I'm in my third year of my degree now and I've basically thrown caution to the wind, finally allowing the eternal filmgeek within me to surface without feeling an inexplicable need to silence it.

I guess it's more of an insecurity issue than anything else. The moment you define your destiny - everything changes... And the sheer, fickle competitiveness of the industry, especially within Australia, is enough to shoot down anyone's meagre hopes of big screen success. However, it has been pointed out to me that that alone is not a sufficient reason to abandon my life dreams altogether, and 'copping out' at this point would be perfectly inexcusable on those grounds.

So. 'Ere I am. Enrolled in TV1 and utterly, utterly in love with the content and everything to do with it. This blog is going to be pretty discursive - and, at times I expect, self-deprecating. I really want to make the most out of this course though. I mean, it's pretty much gonna suck if I fail...!