Film Manipulation

At first, I had no idea what I was doing.

With this being my first ever REAL Film class, I had no idea what I was in for when our first project was to actually take strips of film and…basically destroy them. I scratched & etched & painted & etched some more onto the film; I didn’t think I was making much of a difference though. I didn’t think what I was doing could actually turn out the way it did. It wasn’t until I saw the art I had created played through the projector that I realized the effect film manipulation has & the appreciation I had for it.

It was so interesting to see how clips of newspaper & magazine are magnified; how quickly 24 frames that you put your heart & soul into, just flash by. As a filmmaker, I believe this experience was a great learning one & the best first learning experience I could get, simply because you’re free to express yourself as well as work directly with film. For this project in particular, we were to incorporate the elements of earth, wind, fire, & water into the film manipulation. On one strip of film, I chose to do so with color, while at the same time, on another area, I etched in the Japanese symbols for those four elements. I have a huge passion for all things Japanese, so being able to incorporate that into my work meant a great deal to me. I found myself becoming more & more creative within the limits of film manipulation & my eyes are now open to a new form of art.