The Semester Comes to an End

Everything is finally done! I just need to get copies of our production stills from Kristin to put into my notebook. She has them printed for me.. and we are meeting tomorrow at noon to cue up our tapes to the footage that we want to show.

Unfortunately, we didnt get to take some of the sound out of our B-roll tape... so it may be best if you watch it without the sound... we didnt really know the sound was recording during our first outing... you know.. the "great" handheld work we showed in class the first time we showed footage. We made sure we used the tripod after that! haha

Anyways, I cant believe tomorrow is the last day of classes! YAHHHH!!!!!!!!!! What a crazy semester. I'm actually going to miss our class... but I must say that I'm sure ready for this semester to end. Now I have to move out of my house in this next week and then Dec. 19th I have to get all 4 wisdom teeth cut out! The things I have to look foward to... I swear my schedule never ends! Anyways, I guess I will see everybody tomorrow night! Until then...

Self-Reflexive Interviews

So, Kristin and I recorded our self-reflexive interviews last night. I never want to see myself on-camera again! I definitely prefer to be behind the camera. Anyways, everything went well... and we had like 3 minutes left on the tape... so, we shot some B-roll of my Christmas tree and the wreath on my door (possibly to use with our anonymous interview #1).

We ended up not going to the editing lab to work on the archival tape... just because we didnt feel like dealing with those computers again. We figure that the first few weeks of class in advanced editing next semester we will have time to print an archival tape. Especially, since we will have an external hard drive by then... and we can ask Monahan about formatting different videos. But, Kristin has all of the footage that we want to use in her journal... so you can check some of the videos out if you want online at archive.org. She has all the addresses written out. There's this video of a party with girls drinking and a guy putting something in a girls drink.... so we have our party scene with drunk girls that we didnt get to get this weekend. Anyways, we also figure the first few weeks of editing, most people in the class are going to spend time watching footage... and we already know our footage... so we feel we will have some extra time.

We would still like to get Capt Matthews... its a shame that he cancelled twice, but we understand that he has to respond to calls. Also, we are still trying to get the Rape Crisis Center and Detective Lisa Savitts. These are the final 3 interviews that we are going to continue to work on getting this semester... and even the beginning of next semester.... because we know these people are all interesting in helping, its just a matter of them fitting us into their schedules. I'm still shocked that we were never able to get the Crisis Center, especially since everyone that we have interviewed said they would help us out with them.

We are turning in 6 completed tapes since that is the requirement... but we started a 7th tape last night in which we read some interesting facts from our notes and also read some news stories from around the US dealing with sex crimes. Kristin has alot of good stories in her journal. We kind of envision this montage of news stories at some point in our documentary of all these missing women/rape cases... For example (just locally) we have the Fibbers story, downtown at the federal building, Jessica Faulkner story, and the Duke Scandal. We want to create this chaotic world thru these images. There has to be some way to format this videos for Final Cut... right?

Anyways, we also have our personal release forms from all of our interviewees... we were just going to hand those in (in one of our notebooks)... not unless we need to make copies. It seems like our binders are almost complete. We made copies of our video logs this morning. I guess now we just need to figure out what footage we want to show on Wednesday night.

Nothing Accomplished Today

So we accomplished pretty much nothing today. We got in the editing lab at 2pm... and didnt find a computer that worked properly until 4pm. As we started to capture footage, after 20 minutes, we realized that there wasnt enough space on the computer. So I guess we need an external harddrive.... but we are both so frustrated at this point and were thinking is it absolutely necessary that we copy all of our tapes, considering that we will be editing it next semester?

To be quite honest, I dont understand why they still havent got better computers and equipment in the film editing lab. It pisses me off that the Communications Dept has 2 editing labs with brand new iMac computers, and the students dont even know how to use them. Trust me, I know... Ive dealt with alot of incompetence the past few weeks. They dont even have "editing" classes.... and we do! Also, the theatre dept... why do they need better computers than us???? It just doesnt make sense to me. It seems like they would want to build up the Film Dept. Anyways, I'm asking for an iMac desktop for Christmas, so that I dont learn to hate editing just because of the schools' crappy computers... that dont work. Seriously, half of the computers in that lab have something wrong with them. Kristin and I both left today with a headache!

Also, I guess all archival footage that we use must be in quicktime format in order for it to be useable in final cut. So, that definitely cut down alot of the footage that we have found previously. The ones that were .mov we were able to import into Final Cut... and we plan on making our archived tape tomorrow. Just not with all the stuff that we thought we were going to be able to use because some is in windows media format. And I guess Google videos dont work as well? Or do they? Or is it the school's computers? Sorry, I'm just really pissed off after being in that editing lab!

So, I guess my biggest question is do we really need to make copies if we are going to edit anyways next semester? we are both already signed up for the course and we are not going to drop it. So is it absolutely necessary... and if it is I guess we have no choice but to go buy a hard drive tomorrow and just deal with the crappy computers in the editing lab (well the few that actually work, that is, if no one else is using those).

A Weekend of Editing Lies Ahead

I just got done typing my Internship Paper for Cucalorus. It brought tears to my eyes thinking about all the good times I had interning this semester. I must say that this has certainly been my hardest semester yet, but I have accomplished ALOT... and it can all go on my resume! And I found out today that the 30 minute game show that I produced for my television production class is getting aired on UNCW television next semester. Its a movie trivia show... and Joel is the host. Its worth a watch... Joel does a GREAT job as the host! haha... and now onto the documentary....

So I went by the Film Studies office today to get access to the Editing lab. I know I will be spending a significant amount of time in their over the weekend. Unfortunately, I don't know if the party that was going to take place at my house this weekend is still going on... Well, it may be happening, just not at our place. And if it is happening, I'm probably not invited. There have been some roommate issues... needless to say, it has been a tense week in my house and I think I will be moving out by the end of this month. So, we may have to find another way of getting drunk girls for B-roll.

Tomorrow we get equipment at noon and we are getting our establishing shot of the UNCW library... or an establishing shot on campus somewhere. And ofcourse we have our interview with Connie Jordan. I'm super excited about this one!

We are also going to be working on getting our binders together. I have tons of notebook paper with notes and interview questions and ideas written down on them... so i am going to try and type up as much stuff as I can so that it can be nicely organized in our binder.

Take The Road Less Traveled

That's great news that we can get access to the editing lab! Me and Kristin will go by the film office tomorrow. And now for an update:

Capt. Matthews never got back up with us yesterday to reschedule once again. He knows our deadline, so he should. However, we did hear back from the DA Connie Jordan who specializes in sexual assault cases. She is going to be able to give us the stats that we want. Anyways, we have an interview with her at 2pm on Friday! This is a BIG one!

Today we interview Beth Deaton at the Carousel Center on Market St. They specialize in child abuse cases and adolescent sexual assault. This is a different way of looking at the subject... but she is also a nurse and administers rape kits. She also has worked with girls our age... not only children. Anyways, she brought up some good percentages and statistics in her interview. Especially specific facts about sex crimes in New Hanover County. She then took us in an exam room, where we got some B-roll of her explaining the process of a rape kit. She went through it step by step with her. We got footage of it all! She then gave us a rape kit to take home with us, so that we could get even better close-ups. She was a very nice lady, and ofcourse, gave us numbers to 2 more contacts. She also told us that she thought the girls from the Rape Crisis Center were going to come to the meeting. When we first got there, she gave them a call at the office. Unfortunately, they were not in. But, she said that she works closely with all the girls at the Crisis Center, in particular, Jennifer Stansell... who is the head of SART... Sexual Assault Response Team. This is one of the ladies up there that we have been trying to get in touch with. Hopefully, tomorrow Beth will give them a call. She sounded like she really wanted to help us. She also gave us some websites to visit to get some more factual information.

After Beth's interview, we went back to Kristin's apartment and shot some B-roll of a drug test. She got one from her mom this weekend. We were going to shoot some close-ups of the rape kit, but we got in touch with Noelle Spurrier. Noelle is the girl that lives in Holton Place and has dealt with peeping toms again and again... and now owns a gun. She also lived with a girl in the dorms who was drugged and raped. She spoke about all of this in her interview. She also let us get B-roll of her gun. She held it and talked about how it works. So, we had a pretty successful day.

We feel like our biggest problem is deciding when to stop shooting... we just keep getting more contacts... which is a good thing... but at the same time we feel like we have this obligation to get interviews with all these people, especially for the sake of our documentary. We are definitely in this whole new network. Plus, we want to make everyone who has helped us out happy with the final product. The CARE office has even asked if we would give them a copy after its finished, because it might be something they would like to use as an educational tool... to show classes. So things are good... we just need the Crisis Center and a cop.... but I think we are going to be able to get these interviews eventually, I just hope before Dec. 6th. If not, we are still going to see if we can schedule an appt later... because we are so close to getting them, its just a matter of them fitting us into their schedules. But as of tonight we have 6 completed tapes. We still have to get archival footage, our self-reflexive interviews (which we have purposely been saving for last so that we can say anything else that needs to be said), vox pops tomorrow, and B-roll of Paige's party, as well as the interview with Connie Jordan this Friday.

I cant believe the semester is almost over. It sure has been a crazy one. I never realized how consumed I have been with this documentary until now. Its going to be weird being done with shooting.... what am I going to do with myself? Me and Kristin went out to eat dinner tonight (dollar tacos) and were talking about how much time we have put into this project... and also how far we have come... especially since our meltdown when we almost changed our topic! Atleast we can laugh about it. Also, its been a very rewarding experience meeting all these new people and for them to open us to us like they have. I now know what documentary is all about. As much as we have stressed, its been all worth it in the end. We have been really good about staying on top of each other... and making sure we get things done. I just hope we can make it all come together in the editing lab.

Thanksgiving break is over... back to shooting!

So this morning I met Tony at 8:15am to check out equipment. We interviewed Rebecca Caldwell at 9am. Unfortunately we had some issues with the first mic that was given to us, but we were able to get back in touch with Tony... and he met us back in the equipment room to change out mics. Anyways, the interview went well. It was about 30 minutes. We were supposed to interview Capt Matthews at 3:30pm today, but he said that something came up and would call us back because he can do it later on today.

Tomorrow we have Beth Deaton at 4pm and Noelle at 5:30pm... so everything is coming together. Over the break, Kristin heard back from the Crisis center... they said they would call this week... hopefully, we can get them this wednesday! We should probably call up there tomorrow to confirm. It just seems like we continue to go in circles with them. They may be afraid to take us seriously, since we are students. I just wish they would be as willing as everyone else we have come in contact with. Like I said before, it seems like they would have been the first ones willing to help us with our project.... basing this off of all the wonderful things everyone else has said about the Crisis Center.

Oh, and as for the editing lab. Both Kristin and Joel got back later than expected on Sunday... so we didnt get around to it. But, Joel said that he would let us in! So, our game plan is to edit this Friday and into the weekend. Along with shooting B-roll of Paige's party.

Bad Weather... Good Interview

So today we couldn't get vox pops due to the weather. However, we did get another 30 minute interview with a college student who was date raped. It is a totally different take on rape in comparison to our first anonymous interview. By the way, this one is anonymous as well. We think that its even more powerful having them anonymous. As we were waiting for our interviewee to show up, I recieved a phone call from Beth Deaton... she works at the Carousel office (next to YMCA)... she's the nurse that I was talking about. Anyways, she said she could get us a rape kit and would definitely let us interview her. I went ahead and set up an interview for next Tuesday at 4pm, since we will already have equipment. I also told her about what we are doing and stressed that we have so many great interviews that refer to the Rape Crisis Center, but we have yet to hear from them. She said that she could help us out with that... so how we have like 5 people on our side trying to help us out! Oh, and by the way, Kristin made another phone call today before our interview to the Crisis Center and this time she left a message on the director's voicemail. Captain Matthews was supposed to be calling today for us as well. We are still hoping for next Wednesday.

We were also thinking that we may end up having 7 tapes... because after today's interview, we only have 6 minutes left on our fourth tape. We still have Caldwell, Matthews, Deaton, and hopefully the Crisis Center.... Along with B-roll of the party and our seperate tape of archival footage. There seems to be alot of stuff, so we will most likely fill a whole tape for archival footage. Oh, and as for Joel... I ran into him today in the library before our interview and forgot to ask him about his card, but I know he will be in town over the break, atleast by this weekend. It shouldnt be a problem. But, I'll let you know if we need help to get in there. Well... I think I am going to do some laudry and start packing. I'm heading back to Gastonia for Thanksgiving. This is the first year since I have been to college that I have actually been home sick. I havent been home since Christmas... so I am so ready to see everyone... and eat plenty of food. Hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving! It will be nice to finally have a break.