the wrong side

Today I found myself on the wrong side of a camera. That is, in front of the lens instead of behind it. Considering it was such a small shift in position it was quite unusual and uncomfortable and no, I haven't felt brave enough to watch it back yet.

This was a first attempt at capturing pieces of material for the doco.

I have been reading about tacit knowledge (Polanyi, 1966) this afternoon, that's the stuff we know that we don't necessarily recognise as stuff we know. I can recognise the use of a camera as a tool,

'we become aware of the feelings in our hand in terms of their meaning located at the tip of the probe or stick to which we are attending.' (Polanyi 1966, p.13)

Everytime I've picked up a camera in the past it has been to use it to take shots. Each of these experiences has built up over time to create a  tacit knowledge set. It is amazing to experience this same tool for something outside my experience, being filmed. It is like it is not the same tool at all, all of that tacit knowledge I have around the camera disappears when it is turned the other way. A sense of powerlessness arises when a) the camera isn't in my hands and b) the lens is directed at me.

Tuesday morning ramblings from the centre of space

Hey, that title would make a great title for my doco!!

Picking up on comments made 8th April 2010 re the Jabe Babe doco -

So what you're saying is that I need to die and then laugh about it for my film to be interesting or perhaps I should laugh and then die? Decisions, decisions ...

OK, yes, I'm being a bit ridiculous but I have noticed that it helps, in these kinds of docos if the protagonist is dying or has some kind of terrible disease that causes struggle that we, the audience, sit and watch in amazement of and ask, how do they do it???

What is interesting about a perfectly healthy person who thinks life is great?

Nothing. No struggle. No interest there.

So the second fall back in these documentaries is that the protagonist is slightly strange, unusual, odd - Jabe Babe just happened to have both working for her - for want of a better word, a freak, that the audience can sit in amazement of and ask, are they for real???

My thoughts then are that this doco falls into the latter category. The UB is quite unusual and if I'm interested in them then I must be quite unusual. BUT, is this all unusual enough for it to be interesting? This is the question. How on earth do I judge that?

Hoping to get a camera on long term loan beginning this week so that I can begin to collect the bits and pieces of life that will be stitched together to create this. I'm hopeful that this process will help to move this project forward.

I'm discovering how difficult it actually is to make a film that you are in yourself. If this was about anyone else, I would have had it nailed by now. I think that when I observe someone else, what I am actually doing is comparing their qualities with who I am through this contrast and I come to decisions about them this way. I think the same happens when we watch people in documentary, we're constantly measuring and comparing how the person on screen deals with their struggle with how we would deal with it.

Therefore, in my situation where I'm attempting to capture a part of myself that is of interest to others I have nothing to help measure up to or with and am finding it quite unsettling. It's like floating in the centre of space. I guess we need the contrast of others to know ourselves.

I think I'm understanding now that if I can capture parts of my life on camera then this will be enough to be able to separate and see 'Carolyn' a little more objectively, as a character in a documentary and as a person that may (or may not) be of interest.