Category: Looking Outside

Interactive Devices and Practical Movie Effects

I’m a huge fan of science fiction movies and I think part of the attraction is special effects, more specifically practical effects.  CGI can be a tool for fantastic visions in movies (ex: TRON, Avatar) but a practical effect is a real, physical thing in an actor’s hands while they are shooting a movie.  One side of practical effects is the world of fandom and at the opposite end are the people who make movies like Blade Runner 2049.  (Probably some spoilers in this but if you haven’t seen 2049 yet now you have two problems.)

10 Rules For Students and Teachers From John Cage

John Cage, 10 Rules for Students and Teachers

RULE ONE: Find a place you trust, and then try trusting it for a while.

RULE TWO: General duties of a student: pull everything out of your teacher ; pull everything out of your fellow students.

RULE THREE: General duties of a teacher: pull everything out of your students.

RULE FOUR: Consider everything an experiment.

RULE FIVE: Be self-disciplined: this means finding someone wise or smart and choosing to follow them. To be disciplined is to follow in a good way. To be self-disciplined is to follow in a better way.

RULE SIX: Nothing is a mistake. There’s no win and no fail, there’s only make.

RULE SEVEN: The only rule is work. If you want it to lead to something. It’s the people who do all of the work.

RULE EIGHT: Do not try to create and analyze at the same time. They’re different processes.

RULE NINE: Be happy whenever you can manage it. Enjoy yourself. It’s lighter than you think.

RULES: We’re breaking all the rules. Even our own rules. And how do we do that? By leaving plenty of room for X quantities.

HINTS: Always be around. Come or go to everything. Always go to classes. Read anything you can on your hands. Look at movies carefully, often. Save everything. It might come in handy later.