In class today we tried to rush the Wesley image. Michael Wesely creates time exposures which last months, even years, and within them buildings get built so are seen as partial ghosts and the sky is filled with suns passing in different paths. These are 3 minute exposures.
I didn't watch any of the Academy Awards this year. I baked a blood orange cheese cake though. I don't think that is comparable, let alone a replacement. Reading week is over and I am only slightly rested. I think I spent all weekend worrying about the last voices I need for Sock-vile, sending out emails but without any success.
It was very cold again today, -30 and lots of wind to bring it feeling like -40. I managed to stay home all day. William had a friend over. This evening we played a short round of Carcassonne, using the new pieces I bought last summer for the first time. William built one of the best cities we've ever had, totaling 62 points. He was very happy about it.
Prepared for class, did some baking, ran some errands. Unfortunately, the recording session we'd arranged needed to be canceled. I spend a lot of time on email trying to recast but no luck yet.
This afternoon we recorded Paul Crepeau as Frederick. At first I thought he had a Tom Waits sort of thing happening but that didn't always seem right. Then I realized he was much closer to George Carlin. Wonderful.
I didn't leave the house today. I caught up on some grading and put some pin hole images up on my class Wiki. I've got one recording booked for Sock-vile tomorrow and potentially a second. Then in the middle of plunking away on my email, I got a message from my old friend and mentor from when I was in film school, Szymon, whom I've not heard from in 25 years. I was totally floored. I'm not really sure what to say about him, sort of feel like I shouldn't say anything as he said so little about himself in this message. To say it was cryptic would be an severe understatement. I am left with little doubt that this was a one time message to say some things he'd pondered for some time, perhaps looking for some sort of closure, and I won't hear from him again. If I do, I'll be totally pleased, but surprised.
This evening we recorded Rob Miller and Simon Moccasin as the narrators-in-conflict for the Sock-vile project. It took a bit longer than the others, probably because of the volume of material and the fact that we recorded them as a duo rather than in isolation. However, the outcome was really strong.
Today we recorded Marita Clark as the Baroness (she's in the class and did the role brilliantly with a British accent) and Jason Shabatoski as the Baron. I've wanted to put Jason in something for years. He acted in a dozen student films when he was a student nine years ago. I included him as a silent image as one of my Modern 15 Minutes of Famous series, but his talent is certainly in his voice.
We drove out to Regina Beach to see the opening of Jeff Nye's paintings at the Elsie Shirley Gallery. He did a talk in the basement while the various kids, including William, drew in the back row.
This afternoon we recorded Stephen doing the voices of the Hopstein Twins today after he finished working with Erik on the continuation of Erik's project (which Stephen co-wrote). It seems that I didn't take any photos behind the scenes.
The sound of jackhammering drove us out of our classroom a bit prematurely today. After discussing puppets for only a few minutes, we adjourned to the recording studio to discuss and demo the system we're using to record the voices (directly into the multichannel protools system). We ended up spending two hours recording Derek doing the Simon voice. All went very well.
This is part of the Common Weal community arts group installation in the park today to open up awareness of homelessness in the city. They chose an apt day for it, the weather was certainly cold and no one appeared to stop for long; the message was loud and clear. I stopped to see it on my way to meet with Ken and Gordon to talk about ideas of a Filmpool book. I also shopped for Sock-vile supplies. William and Margaret have been sick but William seemed more together and insisted on going to school. Acting class later on proved too much for him though.
This morning, after working until 2:30 on scripts, I listened to the radio and glued cloth onto a Barbie car. I've got to find some large buttons for hub caps. This afternoon I met with Evan and three students and we reviewed the method we'll use to record the audio. I got help from Darcy in the visuals arts wood shop to cut pieces of a computer board into inch square pieces for cyborg puppets, and had a meeting over at Campion after which I had a nice conversation with Philippe regarding gender stereotypes.
I stayed home all day and didn't see any snowmen. I did a pass over all 15 of the Sock-vile scripts. Every pass makes them stronger but we are simply out of time so we'll need to declare them done and start.
Had a nice supper. William got a gum factory kit and tried it out. He's starting to get sick. I'm barely hanging on. Lots of work to do but will relax rest of evening and watch Castle. 
Margaret had an opening at the Flatlands today for her collage collective work.They showed box-based pieces as well as a number of works from their personal collections. I attended for a few minutes before getting to the set and concluding my role in Erik's film. In this image I reuse my robot outfit from last year's student studio shoot, which I also used for a test shoot with Erik last summer, as the time travel uniform for my character.
Today, and much of tonight, I spent acting in Erik Sirke's film project. He had a few people drop out in the last minute so one principle concept, that my face is not seen until near the end because I'm too tall and that another person would be my stand in, didn't happen. As a result, I needed to actually deliver the dialogue. Added to that was that the location, an old church, has no running water and almost no heat. I'm not done yet, will have to go back at 2am with a refreshed hot water bottle to get my next (and not last) scene there. It is turning out quite good though and I'm glad to be a part of it.
Today I met with the Sock-vlle script team before and again after class (and all the way through class) resulting in numerous modifications to the scripts and concluding with me declaring that I'm finishing the scripts myself. I didn't do any of this this evening except begin to import sessions from PDF files to Celtx files.
This evening William was invited by an older girl to attend the school dance. It was a family dance so Margaret went with him as I stayed home to continue script editing. They had a good time. Everybody danced-- there were lots of younger kids and pop music, think: medley from Grease. & 1 song from AC/DC ...
Arrived at work before 8, left after 5. Lots of meetings. Sat down with writer team as the deadline for script completion looms and ran through a few more ideas and a couple of more chapters of the series. The timeline on Sock-vile is so tight that I'm getting more nervous every day. We'll try to record in about a week. Yikes. I found my camera in my suit pocket; had left it there on Sunday so now can go back and catch up on my blogs. I probably should have worked all evening but decided to take the evening off to watch tv (Nova Now with William and then a sizable "Republic of Doyle" and a Bunuel break.
This morning I drove around in the cold trying to find a variety of props for the Sock-vile project as well as a couple of things I want for some photographic effects for my other course. I had very limited success. I get this stuff done so much easier when the weather is nice. I'm cold all of the time now. I don't know if I'm sick because I'm cold or cold because I'm sick. This evening we had a big house cleaning session. Later we rewarded ourselves with the sixth (and final) episode of "Police Squad".
Today in class I had the students shoot with pin hole cameras made form coffee cans. I made a pin hole lens for the Canon camera which is approximately an F-300 so obviously takes a lot of light. We also played with the tilt shift lens I got for the class. Erik played with it over the past few days so I expect he is getting the hang of it. I've not done anything worthwhile with it yet, I think it requires patience and I certainly have less of that than usual.
Today we had our photograph taken. After weeks of debate, we finally settled on going to the university and having a photographer friend of Margaret's follow us around and do a series of scenes. We started off with the building of a snow man. Too bad the weather hadn't held out. It was too cold for anything to stick. William wasn't into it but eventually he cheered up so I think we got a few choice pix near the end. We moved around to various other spots. I have no idea how many photos will be worth looking at, but we had a different experience so I'd be okay with nothing more came of it. It is rather exhausting being in front of the camera for two hours, constantly thinking about what you are looking like.
Today is the day Margaret and I mark as our 20th anniversary. We all kicked around the house most of the day, had a generally good day off. Margaret and William started cutting apart the comics and making new jokes out of them. William used play doe on the comics but instead of the traditional stealing of impressions, he left the play doe on as new characters (see below). 
Later we packed up and went to The Mercury Diner for supper. Paul happened by and joined us. We started thinking about what to do with the summer but didn't firm anything up yet. The snow started up again but we didn't feel like going directly home so we ended up at Chapters. It ends up that Kevin and his wife were also there, detoured away from the out of town party by slippery roads. Chatted for a bit. Margaret and William even took a shot at the hill before heading home. The snow was fresh and even though it was too cold and we had no extra clothes, William thought the hill was perfect.
Built a snowman at work on my way to my car yesterday when it was warmer.
William wanted to do this thing where you cut citrus fruit in half, hollow out the fruit part, replace with jello, let set, slice and eat. Oddly, if you use grapefruit, the jello absorbs the bitterness from the rind and so it tastes bad and is bad for you, nice combination.
William was excited about this being Chinese New Year. I made fried rice and we watched Kung Fu Hustle. Afterward we lit sparklers and opened fortune cookies.
This evening was the opening for a show of works by those deemed by curator Jack Anderson to be Regina's up and comers at the Art Gallery of Regina. Include in the show were Erin Gee (pictured above with MacKenzie curator Timothy Long) and John Hampton who did a piece based upon scans he created with the 3D scanner in the NMSL.
According to the amazing film school thesis generator, "Through the prevalence of foreground obstructions, Life is like Lint demystifies socioeconomic ambivalence in American society."
