Bit of a good day today… Yesterday was just an absolute shit of a day were I was working at the video store and like some magical spark plug, just the right combination of customers put me in a really dark mood for the rest of the day. And it was only midday at that point. But today… today was absolute sunshine in comparison, and pretty sunny too. Actually, speaking of which, I meant to go see Sunshine on that Wednesday night, but it turns out the damn thing has already done its Hamilton run, that was a real downer for the rest of that crappy day, but yeah. Today. Good.

New rotation of students in VP1 and this time they were actually enthusiastic about film making, engaged in learning about some editing and responsive to discussions, which is just great and actually gave me a little hope for the future.

There were also some surreal moments seeing old friends around uni again. Craziest was (and Tanya you’ll dig this) seeing Kelly Williams at the grind cafe. She took off into the blue somewhere down south and wasn’t actually gone for long and came back. She’s just started managing the grind, so mucho coffee drinking shall be had there now.

And then talking to a friend in the carpark, I get a phone call from a Marie where, at first I thought it was a Marie that was giving me instructions on my filming job for next week, but instead talked about clients and deals and what nots to be done in Dunedin and Christchurch and stuff and it took me ages to click that this Marie has got the wrong number. And after much awkward silences and uh-huhs just trying to figure out how to break this to her, its like, we both just stop and go ‘hang on… who is this?’. Turns out it was a different Marie, but one I knew and she’d gotten mixed up and stuff, but we had a lovely catch up and all and it turns out she may have some video work for me soon. Which I’m just a whore for at the moment and loving it.

Even work was good and had some really nice customers and even the more annoying ones just didn’t seem to get to me. I have no idea why this was happening the whole day, but it was like nothing was really getting me down and I’m all about being down. And awesome.

Anyway, finished work late tonight and have picked up a class to take in the morning so sleep I must soon. Also realised a distinct lack of links and videos being posted recently, but that can wait til the next one.

Finally caught 300 and The Illusionist last night and they were most awesome. 300 was just so cool and full of gusto in its action and style, I wet myself many times in delight watching it. And The Illusionist so brilliantly captured an atmosphere and mystery of the period. Both highly recommended to all to go see.

It was originally planned to spend the whole day at the movies, but Pan’s Labyrinth isn’t on yet due to not enough prints nationwide (which sucks) and missed out on the time for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which would have been some plain good fun.

I amusingly got related to a story of how someone met me at uni during a marketing the arts class, where during a break in a lecture, I stumbled into the room drunk off my nut on red wine, declared myself so, had a cigarette with some others and then skipped out on the rest of the class to go drink some more. This apparently fact. I don’t even remember this.

Te he, got called into an emergency relief tutoring of VP2 this morning. Ended up rushing to the class and warping their fragile little minds with lots of mindless theoretical mumbo jumbo and crazy hand gestures, all to hide the fact that I was a little confused with the notes I was given and was pretty much improvising a great deal of the workshop.

But in the end I think (I hope) they got the general idea of what the point of the lesson is supposed to be… The camera being the audience’s eye and the world and verisimilitude created with the frame, along with the world outside of the frame to visually convey plot, character and emotion… blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…

At least, that’s what I think I meant. There were a few blank faces and I think one guy evaporated into dust, but that could have been from the heat too. Or he was a vampire. All the best to Marama in teaching them for the rest of the semester.

Also got another message at midnight from a friend about Jon, who has finally gotten his lung transplant operation approved and is probably undergoing surgery as of writing this. Its been a long wait and I’ve always hoped that this day would come and I hope he pulls through and in true Jon fashion. I know all us guys from high school are rooting for him and it’ll be an anxious wait for the results.

Now off to sleep for a bit, start a ten hour shift in less than five hours. Fun times.

So today was my first day as a tutor, which I still find hilariously ironic considering my past transgressions as a former student.

A little nervous at first with mild clouds of self doubt, but by the end of the class it was overcast with disappointment at only half the class turning up and blown away by the lacking empathy and response of students toward the wonderful medium of media.

But the chuckles are still there from being a tutor. I even prepared lots of stuff for viewing from really awesome music videos, to mock trailers, to really smart advertisements. Plus I finally get to utilise my Criterion copy of Brazil, all to show how the magical world of editing can be used to enhance, enrich, or totally screw up the intended meaning of a scene/film.

On other fronts, not a helluva lot going on. Been a little apathetic on things that I should really be doing and mixed in with working the mega-uber-dumb number of hours at the video whore, achievement points are at an all time low for the first time in a while.

Realising to myself I haven’t updated the blog in several days, which is pretty slack by recent standards, but I have been a tad busy lately… And its starting to get very cold around now, really quickly…

Picked up a ridiculous amount of video store hours this week which is almost killing my social life if I actually had one. Though there are some small drinks planned this weekend, which will no doubt feel very deserved.

Editing on Pictures of You continues and starting to take shape and form more and more. A minor set back of hard drive space happening when it was realised the external purchased by Ben was a USB and not firewire… silly, silly man.

Spit-Takes: A Mouthful of Comedy is almost done shooting! After much shooting over each other’s clashing schedules, there just remains voice overs, a cafe scene and miscellaneous montage shots to be done. It’s good considering daylight savings has kicked in and that leaves a lot less time to shoot during the day by our timing of things. Editing commencing soon too.

In negotiations for a job for the museum, but that’s at a really early process and not much can be said about so.

Oh, and I’m now a paid tutor at Uni starting Thursday. Which just gets the mega lolz from people considering I dropped out of that place years ago. It’ll be interesting to see how this situation will turn out. No doubt it’ll involve masses of students, things on fire, a small child saying “don’t drink the water” and me riding a rhino into battle… Awesome.

But not quite as awesome as blowing up super-huge sand sculptures and playing them backwards, in reverse…

There was also a really cool Stardust trailer-of-sorts up on Youtube over the weekend, but it looks like that’s been taken down. It was very loose in how it was put together and obviously not the proper final trailer (much like the first 300 one), but the film looks really good and with such an awesome cast and being based on one of my (if not the) favourite books, it’s gonna be great. I always dreamed I’d adapt or be involved in adapting it into a film, but it looks like they’ve done it right with this one and besides, I’ve still got my plans for that Tolkien rings thing book and that one about that English boy and magic school… Oh… wait…

Got back today from a rather brief visit to Auckland. Took a semi-impromptu trip up Sunday night and drank somewhat and got to finally catch up with a lot of friends I had not seen a long time (and film them spitting like crazy). There were also many I’d not managed to catch up with, but that’ll have to be for the next time, which will hopefully be not as long of a period as the last one.

Had quite a few things to mention and talk about, but its been a rather long day, and my mind is currently drawing a blank on a lot of things. Tomorrow I’ll be making the first (and with luck not the last) trip to Uni to give a helping hand and special guest tutoring a Screen and Media class. Thoughts of totally screwing with first year students are currently revolving around my head and I like it.

If I’ll have time tomorrow, I’ll be starting the capturing and editing of footage for Spit-Takes too. Gonna fast track its production and hopefully have a decent cut set and ready by next week. Of course, there is a lot of work and things like saving people from burning buildings to be done this week, so it’ll be a little small mission to get done. After defeating the Martian-Walrus-People that is.

And now… here’s a silly fun office related ad that I really liked…

A fucking short version of the Departed…

And finally, another 300 trailer, this time its extended, uncut and probably uncensored. Plus, if you pause it at the 1:52 mark, there is a flash frame of a test shot from Watchmen… Frank Miller, Alan Moore, lots of blood and nipples, what more can you ask for?

Oh yeah… Hot Fuzz coming out Thursday, I’m so freaking turned on now.

Got to the location on time, just not the right part of the location. And stood around wondering where the hell everyone was. Got a little of that on tape. Still yet to finish capturing all of the footage.

But I totally did it, running around, up and down a rugby field, shooting a game and getting totally owned by the sun. Still got some very nice shots, though I left off the color grading for today, so that there are maximum possibilities to tweak them in post. Meanwhile, I’m sunburnt, depressed and totally tired. But that can mostly be resolved with a venture down to the S&M reunion shindig. Going on now as I type, I’ll make my way round there later on party and drink it up some. Also, Sohl bar closes down tonight and us faithful patrons are sending it off with a bang with drinks, drinks and more drinks.

I’d type and elaborate more, but I’m tired and need booze. Early start tomorrow as well.