An M.I.T. neuroscientist named Ann Graybiel told me that she and her colleagues began exploring habits more than a decade ago by putting their wired rats into a T-shaped maze with chocolate at one end. The maze was structured so that each animal was positioned behind a barrier that opened after a loud click. The first time a rat was placed in the maze, it would usually wander slowly up and down the center aisle after the barrier slid away, sniffing in corners and scratching at walls. It appeared to smell the chocolate but couldn’t figure out how to find it. There was no discernible pattern in the rat’s meanderings and no indication it was working hard to find the treat.
The probes in the rats’ heads, however, told a different story. While each animal wandered through the maze, its brain was working furiously. Every time a rat sniffed the air or scratched a wall, the neurosensors inside the animal’s head exploded with activity. As the scientists repeated the experiment, again and again, the rats eventually stopped sniffing corners and making wrong turns and began to zip through the maze with more and more speed. And within their brains, something unexpected occurred: as each rat learned how to complete the maze more quickly, its mental activity decreased. As the path became more and more automatic — as it became a habit — the rats started thinking less and less.
- Charles Duhigg, via How Companies Learn Your Secrets
[…] Tell me this doesn’t explain everything about everything. via alexbaca
Bingo. via the browncoat
I need to find a way to work this M.I.T. story into FToM :P I think it’s easy to assume that people get addicted to the freedom of travel and the romantic idea of new places; but, the truth is, at least on a cross country bicycle trip through the United States, things are flat and quiet… the small towns you see over and over and over again don’t look all that different than the small town you grew up in.
But, like this quote says, it’s all new to you - and it makes no difference if the fields of tall-grass look *exactly* the same as the fields of tall-grass behind your house, they are a new place, and although you can’t feel the furiously active neurosensors in your mind in the way you can feel the wind on your face, something is different inside you… you feel, not “alive”, because that can mean too many things to too many people, but you feel awake.
And that might be the hardest part of coming home… the winding down.
(via mikeambs)
Source: The New York Times
I need help with recommendations on people here in Los Angeles who do sound design. Much of For Thousands of Miles, of course, takes place outside, but it is also told as a memory, so there is a lot of room for subtle play with otherwise natural sounds. The foley work has been a part of post that I’ve been looking forward to for a long time, I need someone meticulous that I can trust. Any recommendations would be much appreciated.
Source: ftomfilm
In the midst of moving apartments, Erica found that we still have piles and piles of stickers, plus a box full of pins, and, lastly, a Kinko’s sleeve of film flyers!
We’re making care packages and mailing them out to *anyone* who simply emails their mailing address to info@FToMfilm.com - free of charge. Help us run out of stock!
Source: vimeo.com
photo and caption via Vu Bui
Watched mike’s film rough cut For Thousands of Miles. Made notes but wow great stuff!!!
Lan and Vu talked me - aka, peer pressured me - into playing the current edit of FToM. Vu had just purchased a brand new Moleskin journal, I guess he had never owned one before, and this page of notes on the film was the first thing he decided to write down. This brings the total number of people who seen a fairly close-to-final edit to: 7. I’ve received some really terrific feedback from these small mostly one-on-one screenings and I’m excited to make a handful of changes to the timeline before opening up screenings to other people.
Trying to pick myself up and get a grip on my to-do list. Which, as of tonight, looks something close to this:
- The film: editing (feedback), archival fill-in shots, sounds work, coloring, music.
- 64 Days: Revisit remaining scripts / outlines, music. Countdown / build-up.
- Connected site.
- FToM trailer.
- Player research.
I know some of these are more vague than others; but, all the same, I’m personally trying to highlight which are doable in the next few weeks, which need to wait for hired…
A bit more details on the recently posted yet overly-vague to-do list; I’ve been in a state of limbo for the last month, I’ve exported the film as-is and sent to someone for feedback, this someone has quite a bit of experience with filmmaking and the editing process, I feel that their advice on anything from the technical to story will be a big help in my gauging where the film really stands. As anxious as I am to share the film with others, I need to take these next few steps one at a time.
It’s Sunday, meaning that this entire weekend has gone by far too fast, but the holidays are coming up and I’ll be able to squeeze in some time to prep’ the archival shots I need. Two things I have currently been preparing: the film trailer and what will hopefully be a nearly 10 minute prologue release. I’ve been looking for sound people as well, as one of the first things I’ll do once I hear back on the feedback I mentioned above, is making a decision on who will or who could start helping to build the two distinct sounds within the film.
Source: ftomfilm
Feeling a little stressed tonight. Actually, I’m feeling on the verge of a week long sleeping-binge. Trying to pick myself up and get a grip on my to-do list. Which, as of tonight, looks something close to this:
- The film: editing (feedback), archival fill-in shots, sounds work, coloring, music.
- 64 Days: Revisit remaining scripts / outlines, music. Countdown / build-up.
- Connected site.
- FToM trailer.
- Player research.
I know some of these are more vague than others; but, all the same, I’m personally trying to highlight which are doable in the next few weeks, which need to wait for hired help, which will cost what, when I’ll have x number of dollars set aside, etc. To run through the list: I can’t emotionally get wrapped up in the remainder of 64 Days without first hiring the necessary help in sound and finalizing, so that’s going to need to wait until I know FToM is in motion. I can schedule and set-up the archival fill-in shots, so that’s high on my list. I’ve written a team earlier today about the connected site, though I’m still not sure I want separate people building the connected site vs the player, but those details are for another update. The trailer is coming along in notes - I’m closer to getting a better idea of what clips I want to pull and how I want to present the film.
If anyone has questions on the list, let me know in the comments, I’m always happy to answer in more detail. But for now, I’m falling asleep.
The idea of building a request tool for the film has been something I’ve wanted to do off and on for about two years - resources and especially time always pushed it back in priority; a lot has changed online in those two years, new tools exists for helping people build list, Google Forms as an example. The idea of requesting a film early is one that needs less explaining now that several larger films have successfully built request campaigns.
For the last few days, I’ve been thinking I would just use Google Forms to start building a request FToM list, it’s easy to set up; I see it used quite often with beta sites, etc… at first my fields were: name, zipcode, email; then I changed it to just: email and zipcode, but I was sad I would have such little information to work with, and I was also sad the action of requesting the film would go straight to a private spreadsheet and not somewhere else online, where others might also find the film interesting. So…
Then I started to think about changing the purpose of the Facebook Like button on FToM’s website, redesigning the area around it for requesting purposes; this would, with one simple click, give me a name, a location, age, etc, *and* it would also be a social action, letting others on Facebook know.
Now, the main distribution for the film will be online - that has always been the idea and it hasn’t changed, but, say I have an exceptional amount of likes or requests for the film in Ann Arbor, that might be enough to convince indie-friendly local theaters to screen the film for two nights.
Of course, not everyone has Facebook, and I would have a smaller area of the request section linked to a simple Google Form as a backup for people. But anyway, that’s something I’ve been thinking about. Thoughts?
I’ll be looking at this for most of the day. Exporting the current version of the film for a round of selected feedback screenings - nervous, but feeling good about things.
After a 5 day straight holiday editing binge, the film is ready for the next stages of post-production! I managed to do everything I wanted to do with the timeline in the last few days. I might go into the details of those fixes at a later time, especially if anyone has specific questions, but!, for now, it’s getting past my bedtime and I do have work in the morning. I just wanted to say that I am very excited and feeling great tonight.
