Audio is always the killer. First shoot, good visuals, good audio. Now, a bit of a hiss. A friend who's still in the biz will check my cheap Chinese wireless mic to make sure the gain isn't too high. I'm used to the old tape days where you could see a level.
I also lost the tiny little clip that keeps the mic away from clothes on the body. Amazing what a difference that tiny little clip makes. Mics love picking up things the human ear can't hear or filter out.
I decided to create a CD that will go out with the third edition of my book, A Story is a Promise and Deep Characterization. I'll speak five minutes about the concepts in each section.
I'm expecting the book tomorrow or Tuesday.
Bill
Monday, April 14, 2008
Saturday, April 12, 2008
Oregon Writers Speak
I've started a new site on YouTube called Oregon Writers Speak. So far I've created three videos of authors talking about their work. I did industrial and some corporate video many years ago (writing and directing). This on-line editing is an all new world for me. So far the videos are mostly meat and potatoes, authors in a chair talking, with a few inserts. As I get the basics of editing, I'll do some more interesting work.
http://www.youtube.com/user/OregonWritersSpeak
http://www.youtube.com/user/OregonWritersSpeak
Friday, March 7, 2008
3rd Edition Off to Printer
A third edition of A Story is a Promise went off to a printer today. The book has a new subtitle of Deep Characterization. I wrote a new section to the book about the difference between telling a story to an audience and telling a story to oneself.
The printer I'm using is United Graphics. They've done some work for Dennis Stovall, now at Ooligan Press at PSU (Dennis was with Blue Heron when they published a first edition of a Story is a Promise). UG also did some printing for another author I respect, Doc Macomber.
I was going to mail out the manuscript yesterday but found a few typos after the index went wonky.
Now I'm in that post 'the big project is done, what now' state of mind. Back to work on my new play. I'm also going to Norwescon in Seattle in a few weeks. I'll drift around up there. For me drifting is a state of getting into a day or environment and just floating through with whatever happens, happens.
Tonight I'm General Tired Dog.
Bill
The printer I'm using is United Graphics. They've done some work for Dennis Stovall, now at Ooligan Press at PSU (Dennis was with Blue Heron when they published a first edition of a Story is a Promise). UG also did some printing for another author I respect, Doc Macomber.
I was going to mail out the manuscript yesterday but found a few typos after the index went wonky.
Now I'm in that post 'the big project is done, what now' state of mind. Back to work on my new play. I'm also going to Norwescon in Seattle in a few weeks. I'll drift around up there. For me drifting is a state of getting into a day or environment and just floating through with whatever happens, happens.
Tonight I'm General Tired Dog.
Bill
Saturday, March 1, 2008
Thoughts on Into the Wild
When I was young, I suffered from a black depression. It would last 2 days to a week a couple of times a month. When I got older, I stumbled across a yoga technique called bellows breathing. I ended up doing the technique three hours a day for a year as a way to end my black depression. Everyone around me thought I was nuts. For me it was an inner journey, where the young man in the movie goes on an external one.
What I discovered on this inner journey is that the energy in my body is a medium between my thoughts and my physical body. That the paths the energy flows through my body is a reflection of my thoughts, but also, as the energy goes out and fuses into the flesh, memories and states of feeling are held in place, in a sense, in the muscles of the body.
The cause of my black depression was that the energy flow in my body was seriously constricted, but I wasn't aware of the constrictions. If anyone has had the flu and had bodily aches, those aches are constrictions in the body's energy flow. Open up the constrictions, you don't feel bad; you just have a slightly running nose.
But, in black depression, the constrictions don't manifest as pain.
When I did the bellows breathing, in different parts of my body the flow of energy would increase. When that increased flow encountered a restriction, it would, over time, open up the restricted energy flow. Over that year I opened up restricted flows in my legs, arms, stomach, chest, lower and upper back, then my head and face.
After that year, I rarely experienced a black depression; I get a whiff of it once a year for a fews hours and it's a reminder that I need to meditate more deeply, eat better, get some mental rest.
When I went through this process, for the first time in my life I felt I really knew something; I understood how my body and mind and energy body functioned together. I knew something that no one could take away from me.
I've never run into anyone else who went through the same process, but Kriya Yoga does teach how to open up the major channels in the spine and brain.
Black depression is a terrible ordeal. I used to describe it as fading to black.
What I discovered on this inner journey is that the energy in my body is a medium between my thoughts and my physical body. That the paths the energy flows through my body is a reflection of my thoughts, but also, as the energy goes out and fuses into the flesh, memories and states of feeling are held in place, in a sense, in the muscles of the body.
The cause of my black depression was that the energy flow in my body was seriously constricted, but I wasn't aware of the constrictions. If anyone has had the flu and had bodily aches, those aches are constrictions in the body's energy flow. Open up the constrictions, you don't feel bad; you just have a slightly running nose.
But, in black depression, the constrictions don't manifest as pain.
When I did the bellows breathing, in different parts of my body the flow of energy would increase. When that increased flow encountered a restriction, it would, over time, open up the restricted energy flow. Over that year I opened up restricted flows in my legs, arms, stomach, chest, lower and upper back, then my head and face.
After that year, I rarely experienced a black depression; I get a whiff of it once a year for a fews hours and it's a reminder that I need to meditate more deeply, eat better, get some mental rest.
When I went through this process, for the first time in my life I felt I really knew something; I understood how my body and mind and energy body functioned together. I knew something that no one could take away from me.
I've never run into anyone else who went through the same process, but Kriya Yoga does teach how to open up the major channels in the spine and brain.
Black depression is a terrible ordeal. I used to describe it as fading to black.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Impulse Control
I went to see a movie titled Trailer Park Boys tonight, about some low-rent thieves living in a trailer park. Funny movie; might be too vulgar for some. Apparently based on a Canadian TV show. One of the characters had a car with no passenger door. It triggered a memory for me. When I was a kid, about six, I was riding in a car with my father. We were getting close to home so I opened the door and stepped out.
Only close to home was about a block so I stepped out of a moving car.
Really, we were almost home.
I survived with just a few scrapes and bruises, but boy did my parents keep an eye on me after that, and I often had to sit in the backseat between siblings.
Flash forward many years... I'm in a relationship, visiting a friend of my girlfriend at the Oregon Coast. He'd come out to say goodbye and was hanging onto her window (a Plymouth Voyager). It was time to go, so I started driving down the street. You'd think he would have taken the hint and let go of the window, but no, he had to go along with us for several feet before dropping off.
My girlfriend was steamed. He should have taken the hint and let go. It wasn't like I smacked him to make him let go of the door.
Anyway, when it's time to leave, I'm on the move.
Only close to home was about a block so I stepped out of a moving car.
Really, we were almost home.
I survived with just a few scrapes and bruises, but boy did my parents keep an eye on me after that, and I often had to sit in the backseat between siblings.
Flash forward many years... I'm in a relationship, visiting a friend of my girlfriend at the Oregon Coast. He'd come out to say goodbye and was hanging onto her window (a Plymouth Voyager). It was time to go, so I started driving down the street. You'd think he would have taken the hint and let go of the window, but no, he had to go along with us for several feet before dropping off.
My girlfriend was steamed. He should have taken the hint and let go. It wasn't like I smacked him to make him let go of the door.
Anyway, when it's time to leave, I'm on the move.
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Orycon29
I attended Orycon29 this past weekend, a local science fiction convention that brings together around 1,500 people for a weekend. For the first time I was on some panels.
Science fiction was my first love as a reader; up until I read a book of science fiction short stories, I read books because they were school assignments. When I read that book of short stories, my eyes got opened that stories could say something about the world I lived in, or other worlds.
Science fiction conventions are a many splendered thing. There are panels of authors, some for science, others on how to create goth outfits, sing filk, etc. There are writing workshops, an art show, dances, a dealer's room, many people in costumes of all types.
If I ever had a kid, a science fiction convention is a place I'd feel comfortable about turning them loose. Very family-oriented people.
I was on a panel about reading fees (which are just about always bad), and two panels on movies. I expected to be on a film panel with Will Vinton, but he didn't show, so me and someone who was very knowledgeable about films chatted and let people in the audience talk about their favorite films. My time at the Clinton St Theater in Portland made me well-versed in the films of Takashi Miike, a Japanese director of odd films, and some very scary, like Audition.
I attended some very interesting panels about the physics of space travel (nothing in physics really suggest a 'doable' path yet.
My girlfriend had some work in the artshow so I helped set up metal and panels on Thursday. We stayed at the hotel, even though I live in Portland where the con happened. It's nice to have somewhere to crash during the day without leaving the hotel.
The local paper did a review of the conference that was nice and balanced, at
http://www.oregonlive.com/oregonian/stories/index.ssf?/base/
My writing weekend is still coming up, and I'm looking forward to getting some work done on my new play.
Science fiction was my first love as a reader; up until I read a book of science fiction short stories, I read books because they were school assignments. When I read that book of short stories, my eyes got opened that stories could say something about the world I lived in, or other worlds.
Science fiction conventions are a many splendered thing. There are panels of authors, some for science, others on how to create goth outfits, sing filk, etc. There are writing workshops, an art show, dances, a dealer's room, many people in costumes of all types.
If I ever had a kid, a science fiction convention is a place I'd feel comfortable about turning them loose. Very family-oriented people.
I was on a panel about reading fees (which are just about always bad), and two panels on movies. I expected to be on a film panel with Will Vinton, but he didn't show, so me and someone who was very knowledgeable about films chatted and let people in the audience talk about their favorite films. My time at the Clinton St Theater in Portland made me well-versed in the films of Takashi Miike, a Japanese director of odd films, and some very scary, like Audition.
I attended some very interesting panels about the physics of space travel (nothing in physics really suggest a 'doable' path yet.
My girlfriend had some work in the artshow so I helped set up metal and panels on Thursday. We stayed at the hotel, even though I live in Portland where the con happened. It's nice to have somewhere to crash during the day without leaving the hotel.
The local paper did a review of the conference that was nice and balanced, at
http://www.oregonlive.com/oregonian/stories/index.ssf?/base/
My writing weekend is still coming up, and I'm looking forward to getting some work done on my new play.
Sunday, November 4, 2007
A Writers Weekend
I've set up a writers weekend for the end of this month. Several playwrights will attend, gathering at a house near the Oregon Coast on Friday afternoon. After dinner there's a writing session, where everyone goes off to write. On Saturday, there are three more sessions of just writing. During breakfast and lunch and after dinner a scene or two might be read out loud. After breakfast on Sunday, another writing session. After that, people generally are taking off.
These writing weekends are great for focusing just on writing and getting a lot of work done. The conversations are also wonderful.
I generally take a lap top and laser jet printer and end up printing for people. I can write on a computer, but I really need to see something on the page to rewite.
My first drafts are generally quite rough. I generally know the direction I'm going, but I find out what happens when I get there. And what happens can be different than what I expected. In a writing class I would call this heading North, because I know that by going North a character will find something like redemption, etc. But what that redemption looks like, how it plays out, I have to go North to find out.
I've also written ten minute plays based just on an idea and a set up (two characters in the afterlife in conflict about X), but I've found if I don't have an underlying story to go with the idea and set up, no amount of tinkering will fix that lack of direction and purpose. I've tinkered with some ten minute plays up to a year before I finally got a deeper fix.
Deep meditation is another way I get to that deeper place of what a story is about. I try to lead at least one three hour meditation a month to get to a place of quiet, peaceful mind.
Bill
These writing weekends are great for focusing just on writing and getting a lot of work done. The conversations are also wonderful.
I generally take a lap top and laser jet printer and end up printing for people. I can write on a computer, but I really need to see something on the page to rewite.
My first drafts are generally quite rough. I generally know the direction I'm going, but I find out what happens when I get there. And what happens can be different than what I expected. In a writing class I would call this heading North, because I know that by going North a character will find something like redemption, etc. But what that redemption looks like, how it plays out, I have to go North to find out.
I've also written ten minute plays based just on an idea and a set up (two characters in the afterlife in conflict about X), but I've found if I don't have an underlying story to go with the idea and set up, no amount of tinkering will fix that lack of direction and purpose. I've tinkered with some ten minute plays up to a year before I finally got a deeper fix.
Deep meditation is another way I get to that deeper place of what a story is about. I try to lead at least one three hour meditation a month to get to a place of quiet, peaceful mind.
Bill
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