Actively Imagining

Using your imagination can open your mind to a whole new world of opportunities. As humans, we actively get to use our imagination everyday, whether doing it to create something or even just for fun. Actively using our imagination leads to a more healthy brain in the long run. Carl Jung realized that using our imagination is a great thing to do. By using our imagination, we can develop new ideas as well as envisioning future endeavors. When speaking about Jungian theory, one of his ideas dove deep into the idea of an active imagination. What he means by active imagination is taking an idea and fantasizing about it to discover the flaws and strengths of a certain idea. This could range from a project that you are working on or even thinking about what you want to be when you grow up. In his theory, Jung divides the psyche into three different parts. The first is the ego, which is the conscious mind. Secondly we have the personal unconscious. The personal unconscious can apply to his idea of an active imagination since it dives into ideas that we remember and some that we suppress for an unknown reason. However, Jung's third part of the psyche is what can relate to an active imagination the most. The third part is what he calls the collective unconscious, and this is what makes his theory stand out from others. In an article about Jung's theory Dr. C. George Boeree states, "It is the reservoir of our experiences as a species, a kind of knowledge we are all born with. And yet we can never be directly conscious of it. It influences all of our experiences and behaviors, most especially the emotional ones, but we only know about it indirectly, by looking at those influences." To me, this almost explains our imagination perfectly. We never really know where some of our ideas come from and those unconscious thoughts definitely influence our ideas. In popular culture, one could argue that we would not have any of the resources that we have today without people using their imagination. Computers, TV's, laptops, computer software, and the internet would not exist without someone using their imagination. All the videos and music that we see and hear everyday are a direct result of someone using their imagination and bringing it to life. For me, I like to make videos. If I never used my imagination I don't think I would even be making videos like I am today. You cannot beat the feeling of bringing and idea that you had to life no matter what form it is in. Using our imaginations helps us progress as a species because if no one had any ideas, how would we have created all the wonderful things we have today.

Conservation Film Festival

Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending the American Conservation Film Festival right here in Shepherdstown, WV. I only got to attend one of the blocks of the festival, which was hosted by the opera house in town. During the time I went there were four films that were shown, all having a nature theme to them. The first film was about a paleontologist who talked about some of the parks across the country that are great locations for digging. While this film was very entertaining, it was my least favorite out of the four that were shown. Secondly, we saw a movie that was about a wildlife photographer who traveled to different parts of Alaska to experience the natural beauty of the state. The film was broken into five different parts that corresponded to each area that he was filming at. The camera work in this film was incredible and some of the shots that he was able to get were amazing. We saw everything from bears playing to glaciers that were hundreds of feet tall. The third film that we watched was about a couple who had met through the National Park Service and through a mutual love of the outdoors. It begins by the couple explaining how they met in a specific park in Wyoming and ends with their wedding in the park they met in. While the film also had a lot of great camera work throughout, the story behind it was extremely heartwarming and that had a really powerful effect on the tone of the film. Lastly, we watched "Sticky" which was an animated short film about a type of stick bug that went extinct on an island off the shore of New Zealand. While many scientists believed it to be extinct, there was one group of scientists that visited the island and found a group of the insects still alive, the last of their kind. The film was extremely informational and taught me about a type of bug that I didn't even know existed. In addition to that, the animation in the film was flawless and extremely visual. After attending this film festival I felt inspired and even had some new ideas for ways to edit my final video. If you ever have the chance to attend this film festival I would definitely recommend it!

The Final Stretch

With our presentations coming up next week this past week has been a busy one. I have been editing my video almost everyday and working hard to make it exactly what I want it to be. Most of the footage I shot is turning out really well in post production which is extremely exciting for me! I have also finished up my audio track for the video which is definitely helping me along in the editing process. I have been heavily editing a lot of the footage and playing around with various effects and some of the plug-ins that I purchased. Messing around with a lot of the effects in Final Cut has actually been a very fun process because there are so many possibilities when using effects. Their was actually a point this week where I thought a lot of the footage for my video was destroyed. After a really long talk on the phone with Apple Tech Support, I was able to fix the problem. Hopefully this is the only speed bump that I run into before presenting my project! The presentations next week make me nervous but I am going to do whatever it takes to get this video done!

Artists Inspiring Artists

In September I also attended the Shepherd University Art Department Faculty Show. This was a great experience simply because looking at other people's art is what helps you become a better artist. Since I have a minor in Photography, it was great to see what some of the faculty in the art department was producing since a lot of them have been instructors of mine. This event was held partially in the library and another part was displayed in the new art building. Not only did I see some great pieces in the gallery, but some of them were incredibly inspiring. Some of my favorite pieces were done by Mike Mendez, who made photo-grams using different objects. The textures and compositions of his pieces were very intricate and interesting to look at. I was lucky to attend the gallery on the one day that it was open. Even the free food was great!

Hypnosis!

In the beginning of this semester Shepherd hosted an event that was really awesome. They brought in a hypnotist by the name of Kevin Hurley. I was immediately interested once I saw the posters going up for this event. In the beginning of the show he brought up a couple different students from the audience and sat them down next to each other in rows. As the show went on his was slowly hypnotizing them without them even knowing it. I will definitely say that the show was not what I expected at all. This guy really knew what he was doing and had mastered the art that is hypnotism. He even taught us a little bit about hypnosis as the show went on. The best part by far was seeing some of our fellow students fall asleep on each other and just acting goofy overall. He even has videos online where you can hypnotize yourself just by listening to them and following his instructions. Pretty neat stuff though!

Eat. Sleep. Edit. Repeat.

Continuing on with my capstone video has been going smoothly! Last night I recorded almost sixteen minutes worth of audio using the MicroKorg. With the help of some friends I was able to get a few tracks laid down that I feel will work very well with my video. My video was partially edited when we started recording the song, so for the first part we were able to actually edit to the video as it was playing. Other then that I gathered a little bit more footage that I thought I could incorporate well into the video. I still have one part to film and after that I will have all the footage I need. One other thing I did this week was develop some time lapses using a GoPro. Since time is one of the underlying themes in my video, I feel that time lapses are one of the most unique ways to capture time passing by. The GoPro makes it very easy to make these as well. With most of my footage already filmed the editing process has begun and soon that will be what I am focusing most of my time on. Here is a video of some great time lapses just to show how awesome they are!

Music Music Music

This week a lot of progress was made on my project. I gathered lots of footage in preparation to begin the editing process. Since we are now down to only three weeks until we need to present, I want to give myself plenty of time to edit and make sure everything comes together the way that I want it to. However, figuring out my audio track is one aspect of my project that needs to be completed before editing begins. I had some trouble finding some royalty free music that I enjoyed for this specific project. I wanted the audio to be very ambient, but also have the happy or sad feeling that I'm looking for in a song. After struggling to figure out my audio track, I came up with another idea. This week I will be working with some friends to create my own music for my video using a MicroKorg synth. I am extremely excited to be doing this because I have never created my own music for any of the videos I have made. Even though it will take some extra time out of my schedule I feel that this is going to be all the more worth it in the end. Not only that, but the sounds that you can create with this machine are exactly what I had in mind. Basically I will have an endless library of sounds to work with. Once I get a track done using this I can hop straight into editing the first part of my video. I still have a little bit of additional footage to gather for the second part of my video, but that will all be getting filmed this week as well. I have been carrying my camera around very frequently usually where ever I go to make sure that I can capture moments that may not be expected. I am very excited to start editing this project once this audio track gets done!