My Life is Complete

So I was coming back from lunch with Russ when we saw it.  I think I may have even peed a little bit.  That's how excited I was.  Ever since I was a kid, if there was one vehicle from a major motion picture that I absolutely needed to see close up, it was this:

Russ saw it a few car lengths ahead, so we sped up to try to get a closer look to see if our eyes deceived us. But it was real. Probably just some super fan of the movie that tricked out his car, but it looked so fucking cool you can't even believe it. We pulled up behind it, then we pulled up along side of it, and then we got in front of it. Here's what I saw in the rearview mirror:

How frickin' badass is that!?  I wanted to scream like a little girl.  Honestly people.  As far as I'm concerned, this is as good as it gets.

Also, for those of you that maybe assumed/hoped I was dead, I'm still alive and kicking.  Film school has been pretty non-stop and today was the first day I've actually had free, so I thought I'd try to fill you in.

So for starters, here is where I go to school:

It's called the Los Angeles Film School and it's located on Sunset Blvd (which is Hollywood terminology for "Boulevard."  Actually, it's just English terminology, but whatever.)  Before 1999, the building was an RCA recording studio for a long time.  Artists like Elvis, the Monkees, The Rolling Stones, John Williams, Eartha Kitt (the OG Catwoman), Jefferson Airplane, and others recorded there.  So it's got a pretty neat history.

Anyway, basically each month at the school we have two completely intense classes.  This first month was Film Theory (both a lecture and a lab) and Behavioral Science (or psychology if I'm not trying to dress it up).  There is a TON of hands on experience in the lab, which is the best part in my opinion.  We've learned how to operate a pretty simple camera, we've learned the basic 3-point lighting, we've learned how to line a script and how to set up coverage.  There's so much stuff!  It's awesome.

So far, we've had three filming assignments.  If I wasn't embarrassed by them (mostly because I appear in them), I'd totally post them up.  The first was a project titled "Lost & Found."  It had to be a single shot (no editing) about someone that loses something and then finds it again.  Also it had to be between 30 seconds to a minute.  It was basically to teach us how to tell a really basic story.  The second assignment was a group project titled "Painting" where we had to pick a painting with people in it and basically recreate it with a ten second static shot.  The goal was to recreate the lighting and get as close to the original painting as we could.  To give you an idea of how difficult this project was, for our final ten second shot, it took us a good four hours to get the lighting right.  I have a whole new respect for the gaffer at the end of the movie now.  The third project was titled "Working" and was all about subtext.  Again, it was a single, continuous shot.  We had to select a monologue from a book called "Working" by a dude named Studs Terkel (greatest. name. ever.) and then turn that monologue (about that person's specific job) into a dialogue that had a deeper meaning for the protagonist.  It was pretty tough, but good experience.  

So that's that.  Our first set of classes is now over, which explains this freed up weekend I've got.  But, again, in case you were concerned over my well being, I'm better than I've ever been.  I'm having a great time and finally understanding what it can be like when you actually enjoy school.

I'll try to be funny next time I post, but I just wanted to give a quick update.  Hope you all are doing well!

- The Bean