First Look at
Summer Glau
on
Dollhouse!

I repeat,
Summer Glau
on
Dollhouse!

( This lj cut cannot contain my squee. )

Summer Glau!

My life is going awesome right now with school, student teaching, and other stuff. This semester is the best one I've ever had so far. I'm a big ball of feeling great and enjoying everything, which is new for me. I'm not epically annoyed by everything and hating everyone in the world. It's nice.

My list of vids to feedback and rec is getting longer and longer. It still includes stuff from VVC. I'm working my way through the DVDs slowly and I'll have everything posted before the end of the year. Hopefully.

VID RECS (VVC disc 2 - premieres from themed shows):
dualbunny's I Want What I Want (Bionic Woman) - A sleek and beautiful exploration of Jaime and Sarah, how their characters weave around each other and show how their stories interact.

maichan808's Fun with Real Audio (The Girlie Edition) (Supernatural) - LULZ.

VID RECS (VVC disc 2 - premieres part 2):
jescaflowne's Go Baby (Charlie's Angels (films)) - So much fun and silliness in the editing of the clips. The editing on the dancing to the music is FABULOUS!

millylicious's In My Veins (Heroes) - Amazing use of building and releasing tension musically, great comparisons and contrasts, sense of mood, coloring, and lighting.

sweetestdrain's Keeper of the Fire not available online as of now (Multi) - Excellent stringing of so many different sources together. It's so interesting to see all the different kinds of narratives compared and paralleled. The editing of so many different shows is amazing because I can tell what clip is from what show, but it all feels like it fits together.

VID RECS (VVC disc 1 - also premiering):
keewick's Stars (Dexter) - My god, my heart aches when I watch this vid. I'm in awe of how it's constructed with only vague hints as to the true nature. It's the sweetness and love that Rita must feel and see. The vid is filtered through her and her life. She doesn't know what we know, doesn't see what we see. She sees a life that she's made with someone else that helped her come out of a protective shell that she made for herself when she needed it. The clip choice and editing is very restrained, which is a feat in and of itself. I can see how it would have been easy to let even more of the true nature of the show to creep into the vid. The first shot is like she's inviting us into her life to show us her world. The song choice is beautiful as well. I've watched a couple of times in different ways.

halcyon_shift's This Is The Place (Burn Notice) - The editing style is so perfect for the show, how it's well timed, yet jerky and stilted on the beat. I really dig how the scenes are paralleled amoung each other. The song choice is great too and I like how it plays into Michael's more manic moments.

obsessive24's Bachelorette (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) - Brillant editing, attention grabbing opening, epic and sweeping feeling, and amazing connections and concept.

keewick's Unforgivable? (Harry Potter) - The symbol use is amazing, especially the birds. The juxtaposition of the brutality of the Harry Potter universe coupled with the sweetness of Luna is jarring, yet lovely in contrast because it breeds hope. It's like her mere presense is calming in answer to the terrible nature of what surrounds her.

My class ended early today and I took advantage of the time to watch VVC DVDs, leave feedback, and make some recs. Look at my productive self. I'm all caught up with my college courses for today, but tomorrow is another story when we get more assignments. College makes me sleepy.

VID RECS (VVC disc 1 - premieres part 1):
halcyon_shift's VVC Premieres Intro 09 Star Trek In 60 Seconds (Re-enacted by Llamas) - Massive LULZ.

DC's We Are (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) - Calculated action, beautiful overlays, great pacing, and interesting lyrical interpretations.

bradcpu (and laurashapiro)'s Hard Sun (Firefly) - This is the vid that knows where I live.

I love the sounds in the beginning and how it just flows into the vid with all the twists and turns. Love the ivory tower. Love it like burning. It's amazing how well it all fits together and feels so right to me. It's like it couldn't be any other way than to see the lens flares at 1:09 blend together. The introduction of the rain is beautifully done and I love how the vid continues while the original footage is of walking away at the end. It's so full of love and appreciation that it bubbles up inside me and makes me smile and feel a bit better about certain things. There is sadness in the vid, like in the 2:20s when they walk away and the weeping, but I'm ultimately left with the crews and happiness.

jarrow's Learning to Crawl (Battlestar Galactica) - DAYUM, that's hot and I want to make out with it. There's so much tension and sexiness in the tight editing. Beyond the femslash and sexiness there's deep character beats within the vid and that's something beautiful.

mlyn and Jo's It Comes and Goes In Waves (Varg Veum) - Beautiful use of the source with the beautiful framing compositions and colors. I love the progression of the vid and how it changes into something so dark and violent, yet still beautiful with the changes in the music. The symbolism and emotions are so engaging that I connect with the vid without knowing the source.

hollywoodgrrl's Marble House (Doctor Who) - The editing and atmosphere is stellar. I think my favorite parts are the use of the watch in the instrumental section because it's so finely edited and heartbreaking. Honestly, the whole thing is edited with great skill.

At first I was reading as the Doctor has the choice to run off in the TARDIS, while the humans have to stay and face the fights. The Doctor plays with humanity, including John Smith, without having to face the darker aspects of it. He can go hands off whenever he wants. The Doctor can deal with aliens fine, but he doesn't stick around for humanity's darkness. That he leaves to us (and Torchwood I suppose). The Doctor leaves humanity to its own darkness. A darkness that isn't supernatural, but coming from within ourselves, which makes it all the more frightening, especially for The Doctor, who wants to love humanity. He just wants to run away from the darkness in our hearts.

dualbunny's Video Killed the Radio Star (Wizard of Oz - Elphaba [Wicked]) - I don't know Wicked very well, but I still was able to enjoy the vid. The motion and jumpcuts in the editing are great. I love how you take the footage and have us look at it from a bit to the left. The zooms make the footage more interesting and grabbing, while it also has me thinking about the scenes differently in my mind because they look different than I'm used to. It's so fun and even more fun with femslash goggles!

I made a Whiskey vidlet, The Night, with the prompts: Dollhouse, epitaph one, The Night by Morphine for the Itty-Bitty Viddy Ficcy Thon.

VID RECS:
danegen's Slobo Babe (Lesbian Vampire Killers) - Has me LOLZ-ing forever. The movie is complete crack and it's well used in the vid with good timing.

giandujakiss's A Charming Man (Supernatural) - Excellent song choice, interesting lyrical interpretation coupled with brillant musicality in the visuals.

newkidfan's Human & Monster (Supernatural) - A beautifully subdued pair of companion vidlets that feel bittersweet and sad.

FIC REC:
serrico's Primogeniture is a Supernatural fic of Claire, Castiel's vessel's daughter, set post-Rapture that hurts in a good way.

Lastly, I've become a resident of Zombieland by zombifying myself.

I started back at college and this is my last semester before I graduate with my Bachelor's Degree (yay accomplishment). It pretty much means the only thing I'm going to be doing for a while is going to classes and student teaching.

I've been meaning to make a post about vid_commentary, but never actually did it. I posted commentary for charmax's multifandom (Battlestar Galactica, Terminator: Sarah Connor, Terminator movies) vid, Unnatural Selection. Also, thuviaptarth posted commentary for my Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles vid, Ding! Dong!

I'm considering participating in Challenge 2: Combined Vidder & Viewer, but I can't figure out what I want to do for it. The idea is a comparison of point of view from creator and audience on a vid, which sounds like it could be incredible and enlightening.

Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes and the super cute virtual gifts (nursedarry, bop_radar, talitha78, and sol_se).

From the LEVERAGE #205 "The Three Days of the Hunter Job" Post-game from John Rogers, a screenwriter for the show:

@619: I personally HATE fanfic so I was wondering..... 1)How do YOU feel about fan fiction? 2)Does it irk you that so many people "borrow" your characters and use them in their own crappy stories? 3)Do you think of fanfic as a form of flattery? 4)Do the other writers and the actors feel the same way?

1.) I think fanfic is the sign of a healthy show. Here's what it boils down to: you're telling me that in today's crowded media space, our show made someone love it so much they take time out of their own life to talk about it? Holy. Crap.

To be fair, I have a somewhat different attitude toward media/fans than most people. I think what TV/corporate media had wrong for a long time was how they understood the idea of a "water cooler show." They saw it as making the audience talk about their show, on their terms. So any fan-created media is them losing control of their material. I see this more as the natural evolution of culture in a shared digital age. I will be blunt -- other than the satisfaction of our own creative urges (and all that entails: the quest for perfection, artistry, craft, etc), our job in media is to give you stuff to talk about in your conversations, to integrate into your social circle in whatever way you see fit. I doubt that's TNT's official stance, btw, but they are much cooler about this stuff than most companies.

2.) As far as "borrowing" our characters -- to paraphrase Alan Moore, they didn't go anywhere. There they are, sitting right up on the shelf. Waiting for us to let them loose again. Besides, how many people read a fanfic story? A couple hundred, tops? We have, on average 3.5 million viewers, well into the 4 million range when you get the DVR numbers in. I just don't see someone taking control of our Ideaspace through sheer force of Slashfic.

Sure, a lot of fanfic is crap. Of course it's crap. It's written by people who are not professional writers. If I paint, what I paint is crap. Does that mean I should give up painting and displaying stuff in my neighborhood art show?

3.) Is fanfic flattery? Again, depends on how you define flattery. If someone's writing fanfic with intention of currying favor for some ... er, frankly unguessable benefit, then they're really engaged in an exercise in futility. If you mean flattery as in: it's flattering to think someone is so entertained by our work that it inspires them to talk about it and create around it, then aces.

4.) Most writers and actors don't feel this way. Some, including writers I both like personally and greatly admire, hate the idea of fanfic.

Look, end of day, you should always be trying to create your own material. But fanfic, etc, is a different process than original creation -- which I think is the source of a lot of the controversy.

People who do original creations assume the fan is taking some sort of unearned ownership, somehow implying their act is the same/as difficult as the original act of creation. Which, of course, tees them off (doesn't tee me off, but I'm a very relaxed and often drunk guy).

And some fanfic humans are under the impression that creating fanfic is the same creative process as creating original material -- and are sometimes frustrated that they're not accorded the same respect as the original creators. That's also wrong. Fanfic to me is spiritually much closer to the fan-created music videos.

The basic rule I follow here is one I learned in stand-up comedy: Always punch UP. I am a relatively successful typing human whose words are physically produced using millions of dollars and is distributed nationally by a massive billion dollar corporation to millions of people. Exactly how is a free web page with a 1000 word story about Eliot and Hardison fighting a trans-dimensional incursion of Elves hurting my brand, exactly?

Tell you what -- if some fanfic writer is so good they manage to amass a million-person audience with their web-distributed free stories using my characters, I am going to consider that evolution in action and hire that bastard. Or, at the very least, urge them to go create their own show. But odds are it ain't gonna happen. And that's okay. We write for different reasons.

Wow, that response could be its own blog post. I may break it out later, and shine it a bit.

People in fandom tend to forget that there's a person behind the anon submitted vids. They think it's an excuse for them to rude about a vid because their friend's name isn't on it.

VID REC:
Right in Two (Supernatural plus additional source footage) - I'm not seeing the vid the way that a lot of people are. I see it as a genuinely thoughtful and thought out vid.

I read it as the angels come down to earth (Castiel mainly for the vid), looking down on the human "mud monkeys" as lower beings. The news clips seem to come from human events that show the worst of human behavior, like race riots, deaths during civil unrest, riots rising from rallies, racial tension from gang rape, protests turning violent, and police shootings. Castiel takes this all in from the world that's all around him, noted by the tv. The use of the sequence of Dean's death in the 2:20s and the eye zoom makes me think the vidder is implying that it's like hell on earth.

Castiel figures that God is in heaven and has given up on the earth on the awful creation, so Castiel gives into the human nature of the vessel. Castiel and other angels become so influenced by the world around them that they seemingly participate in the reenacting out of the events, the stink of humans and earth having taught them racially modivated violence.

Concept-wise, it's like the vidder is saying that people are taught by the media to see people that are racially different as the "bad guy."

I don't know if this is the intent behind the vid or not. It's my interpretation of the vid, which I'm not going to try and say is the meaning. It's one person's opinion.

nightchik and I complied the Understanding Meta Vids (I C WHUT U DID THAR) vidshow (she ran the panel at VVC) for 2009 vividcon.

Vids that exist on a meta level, working in more ways than one, often suggesting a basis beyond the individual fandoms of the source andmore about a larger concept and/or fandom itself. Vids that go beyond the narrative of their source, commenting on the nature of that narrative, connecting with outside meanings, or placing the story in alarger culture context.

Everytime I thought we had a good description I'd realize it was excluding some type of meta or possibility for meta. I had no idea how tediously difficult it would be a write a definition for what meta vids are. We went for a wide range of meta topics, so I hope people didn't look at it and reject the vidshow in the basis that it's not what they consider to be meta. Meta has a wide variety of possibilities and these vids are some of them:

( On to the playlist! )

Questions? Comments? Suggestions? While this was the playlist for meta vids used in the vidshow, I encourage others to drop links in the comments to other meta vids. Feel free to spark discussions as well. I'm sure they'll be notes coming from the meta panel and I'd love for online discussion as well.

Do you want to see something cool?

The BAMF bradcpu has started creating monthly vidder profiles featuring an audio interview with the vidder over excerpts from his or her vids. I'm the August Vidder Profile, so watch if it so pleases you. I discuss my frequent use of sexual or violent source material, my take on vidding as an art form, my concepts, my influences and more. After watching the profile I realized how much a giggle when I talk. Weird.

In conclusion, I am a Disney Princess.

August Vidder Profile (kiki_miserychic)

Happy Birthday sol_se! Gretchen has decided to let you life another year.

( primary artwork )

Title: Gone
Artist: kiki_miserychic
Fandom: Firefly/Serenity
Pairings: Kaylee/Inara
Characters: Kaylee and Inara
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Nudity and implied sexuality
Spoilers: (if necessary) for the fic
Summary: Scene illustration, mood music fanmix, and fic banner
Story bluflamingo's Gone
Artist Notes: Also comes with a fic banner and mood music fanmix.

( secondary mood music fanmix and fic banner )

Echo Alert, Dollhouse podcast, is doing an interview with Miracle Laurie (Mellie). Anyone have questions they'd like her to answer? You can leave them here and I'll pass them along or you can e-mail them to echoalertcast [at] gmail [dot] com.

I've made a vow to cease with the personal posts, so you are saved from reading about my wreck of a personal life and how awful my job is. However, you are not saved from memes.

❝who do you ship me with?❞

I realized I'm terrible with words, so I started making book covers for the fics I enjoy as a form of feedback. I also made a little vidlet for one as well.

FIC RECS:

millylicious's The Music Box - Sylar/Claire, Nathan/Claire(ish) of Heroes. (Broken things need fixing.) -Download link for vid.

kuwdora's Through the Gates of Pandaemonium - Sylar/Mohinder of Heroes. (Abyssus abyssum invocat (Hell invokes Hell).)

dollsome's Lines - Sierra/Victor of Dollhouse. (Victor, Sierra, and crayons.)

raphaela667's the ups and downs of you - Kirk/Spock of the Star Trek Reboot. (Starfleet first officers did not regress to childhood without at least submitting prior warning to their commanding officers. They'd established that after the whole Pon Farr mess last year. There were rules about Vulcan biology and scaring the hell out of Jim now. This had to be in violation of at least three of them.)

beccatoria's The name of this story is your name. - Caprica of Battlestar Galactica. (What if Caprica didn't actually die. Ever.)

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles has been cancelled.
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles canceled.

This is me: