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 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).

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)

I read on TMZ that Jeffrey Donovan (Michael Weston on Burn Notice) was arrested on suspicion of DUI on Sunday and my first thought was, "he didn't twitter that."

My neighbor's dog got out through a giant hole in their fence and the mail lady brought him to me, so I have a furry little ball of "OMGZIWANTATTENTION" licking at my fingers while I try to type. He's cute, but I don't like small dogs.

I've been cooking and baking a lot lately. I mean more than never when I say a lot. I made bacon and cheese stuffed beer burgers this weekend, which turned out well. I made ice cream cone cupcakes to take to a party too and they turned out freaking awesome.

ice cream cone cupcakes by ~miserychic.

I've also been making my own cold-brewed coffee, which is so good that I think I might like it more than Starbucks. I know, I know, blasphemy, but it's true.

I've been using twitter instead of LJ for little things I find interesting. I used to make posts about little things, but now they're all on my twitter and never make it to LJ. This is probably a good thing because it spares everyone my squeeing over Eliza Dushku, Zachary Quinto, and Olivia Wilde; linking to pretty photographs; laughing about how I set off the smoke alarm baking; and mourning having deleted the Torchwood Children of Earth miniseries only to get a vid idea 3 days later. Link to my twitter.

VID RECS:
newkidfan's Blood Makes Noise (Lost) - A gorgeous layering and coloring that is lush and full with jumpcut editing and wavering images. The interesting framing choices feel like the zeroing in on a microscope that amps up the intensity and tension along with the effects. It doesn't hurt that I gave her the musical prompt because I've wanted to see this song vidded well to Lost for as long as the show has been on the air.

danegen's Down by the Water (Southland) - I've never watched Southland, but that didn't matter because I was able to plug into the more emotional aspect of the vid. I know I'm missing the depth and understanding that would come with knowing the source, but the vid is still terrific in the use of imagery. It feels like a great study of objects and how people can become objects in that sense. I think my favorite aspect is how a woman's dead body is transformed into a landscape.

WashingTones' Dr. House is a wicked cool music video that uses footage of the band performing and source footage from the show, House, too. The end result is an engaging music video that has me bopping around and singing the chorus in the shower.

COOL ASS NINJA VID REC:
balistik94's Onslaught (Ninja Scroll vs. Afro Samurai Resurrection) - Detailed editing that is so detailed that there's no room for anything else with all the amazing use of movements and the motion, especially in the second half. Dude, Bill is a vidding ninja.

( ficlet for the prompt: Terminator:TSCC, any/any, Things Fall Apart )

FIC REC:

daria234's You catch more flies - Dollhouse, Mellie/Paul, The Penelopiad.

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.)

It's been a while since I've done a recs post. I had some ridic computer problems, then I was vidding non-stop and I don't watch vids while I vid. I have this deep fear of ripping someone off without realizing it. I've missed a ton of recent vids and these are a few that I've enjoyed.

VID RECS:
aycheb's Nobody loves you (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) - Amazing structure and use of the black and white. The change of pace and flow into Weaver is glorious, especially with the added layer of it being her voice. I really like the way the vid takes time with clips and allows them to breathe. I love how long and drawn out it feels. The doors opening is brillantly edited. Coming back to Ellison as the focus with Weaver and then John Henry brings Ellison into focus and the things he was faced with and how he reacts and interacts with the new information. This vid connected me with Ellison in a way I didn't in the series. Beautiful plays of light too. And the use of the graves with "all humans die eventually."

kuwdora's Here I Dreamt I Was an Architect (Heroes) - The movement and meticulous nature of the clip choice is thrilling. The song is so perfect for Sylar. He's right there in the lyrics and in the feel of the song and Abbey was able to pull him out and calculate him exactly. Sadly, there are some amazing Heroes vids that are underappreciated because of the lack of interest in the show, but that shouldn't hold anyone back from enjoying this vid. It's so freaking good. My reading of the vid is colored by my view of Sylar, so I see Sylar trying to change for other people, but ultimately rejecting it. He's so many different people and things, but some of them were forced on him instead of a choice. He's a watchmaker's son, then he was a Petrelli, then he was an orphan, then he was a million other things. But in this vid, he dreamt he was an architect instead of fixing the work of someone else. Death is his art and he makes it with his hands day after day.
With bonus vid commentary.

mithborien's Goodnight, demon slayer (Supernatural) - Extremely well edited with how Sam and Dean as grown ups are barely in the vid at all and their adult faces are obstructed or distorted when they are. Very cool idea of keeping the on them when they were younger, yet still hinting at their grown up lives within the show.

Macro rec for obsessive24's Fall of Man (Supernatural)

sol_se's So What (Prison Break) - I want to know this Gretchen character. She looks like my kind of woman. I stopped watching Prison Break before she was on, but I'm able to get the gist with clip choice, parallel clips, interesting interactions and connections, facial movements, and narrative. I want to be her PIC because Grechen is in ur show, brakin' up ur sausage fest.

winterevanesce's Like a Boss (Supernatural) - Oh shit. Great clip choice and sync. HI-LARIOUS lyric use too.

I was shopping last week when someone from high school kept staring at me and squinting. I loath seeing most people from high school to the point of lying about who am. It's stupid and childish, but it works. So the girl is squinting at me like she's trying to figure out who I am or something, so I casually said hey. Her repsonse was "I thought you were dead!" Turns out some rumor has been going around that I died when I was in the hospital. I have no idea where, who, or how it started, but she heard from someone who said that someone found out I died in December. I should have kept ignoring her.

It's been a while since I've posted recs. I finally have my laptop back and fully functioning after a month of it not working properly. Most of the time was finding someone that could figure out what was wrong with it and waiting on parts.

VID RECS:
buffyann's La marée haute (Lost) - Perfect emotional song choice and clip choice. Desmond is a character that feels and projects emotions, which are captured very well. I always felt like Desmond was 5 minutes from breaking down completely in so many of his scenes. He grabs so desperately to things, while his storyline is so fractured. The vid does a stellar job of pulling him together enough to hold the viewer while he falls apart and tries to make the pieces fit. The barely contained energy is measured out with the cuts and clip choices. It's the emotion that carries the vid when the storylines might not. He's everywhere and nowhere at the same time, but it's Penny that tethers him.

talitha78's "White" & Nerdy (Psych) - I'm continually in awe of the quirky motion and movement, as well as the lyric interpretations. I love how witty the concept is and how there's different levels of interpretation.

tearful_eye's Day Carry Night (Criminal Minds) - The disorientation is beautifully done with the editing to the piano notes and the additional movements like a carosel when you want to get off.

The Fourth Wall 2008 winners were announced with their pretty awards and awesome reviews. I'm going to be pillaging the vids and such all week. I Want You (She's So Heavy) was winner for achievement in innovation. Wee! I has award and excuse to post this Ellen Tigh monologue from a cut Battlestar Galactica scene that Ronald Moore read on his podcast. Transcribed by beccatoria.

Self-awareness is not confined to the 'real world.' In theatre fictional characters are sometimes given a form of self-awareness. This is called breaking the fourth wall. The device is a form of metafiction, allowing characters to address the audience directly and comment on the narrative in which they themselves are participants. In doing so the characters transcend their fictive nature and enter into a dialectical relationship with the viewer, with each side seeking to persuade the other of the innate truth of their reality.

But does a character actually exist? Does it have form and shape beyond the page on which it is written? Can it ever truly break the fourth wall and address the unseen, undreamt of audience that watches its every move from the safety beyond the footlights?

The Lords of Kobol once felt that man could never break the fourth wall; could never look upon the gods with understanding and grasp the divine nature of life. They believed this until one day man stole their fire and created the first cylons the first artificial life.

And then man, in his arrogance, believed cylons could never break the fourth wall. And man believed that right up until the moment the first centurions rebelled and then the great exodus from paradise began. You see Boomer, we are not finite creations, we have the ability to evolve, you have so much more potential.

I should be vidding right now. Why aren't I vidding?

The internet is so dead you'd think it was a holiday or something.

VID RECS:
giandujakiss's Believe (Supernatural) - Amazing song choice with movement that makes me want to stop blinking.
giandujakiss's One War (Dark Angel) - Beautiful working of layering that adds meaning and communicates so well. The progression, structure, and focus are amazing.

gigglemonster's Be My Yoko Ono (Stargate: Atlantis) - Really cute and quirky clip interaction with a natural feeling pacing.

halcyon_shift's I Want to be Evil (Multi) - Great transitions and connections within multiple sources and many of my favorite characters.

heyiya's Exit Music (For A Witch) (Merlin) - Excellent subversion of the show and characters. The vid has a soft feel, then the hard edges start poking out.

maichan808's Kinetic (Supernatural) - Nice flow of beautifully understated images.

sweetestdrain's Empty Hearts (Merlin) - Great stucture and detail to relationship that makes the vid feel like a ballet of hope for all of them.

tearful_eye's Riddle in the Sky (Merlin) - Stellar editing, yet I can't really put into words how amazing this vid is. It's so rich and heavy, the weight of the visuals and music coupled with the editing and lyrics.

lim's Us is being shown as a single-channel work (which is a really interesting way to say vid) in the upcoming "Mediated" exhibit at the California Museum of Photography.

This is made of awesome.

Ok, I've watched this video about ten times in the last two days. I have no idea exactly what makes it and Sara Schaefer so great, but I've watch it so many times that I need to pass it off to my flist: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBzOfUTGTts]


VID RECS:
butterfly's Jacob Marley's Chain (Merlin) - A haunting Uther vid with simmer and barely contained emotions in the languid editing.

charmax's Smile (Buffy and Angel) - BEWBS ARE KEWL in this cute and fun vid.

deirdre_c's Supernatural (In My Pants) (Supernatural) - You haven't lived until you've laughed with this vid.

millylicious's Pandora's Box (Heroes) - She is a sick genius and I loves it. The vid is so creepy and amazing that I want to have it's scary Elle and Sylar babies.
millylicious's Soldier (Merlin) - Quiet sadness soaks this Hunith vid right along the sheer joy and beauty.

obsessive24's Love Lockdown (Battlestar Galactica) - An amazing destruction and construction of Gina/Cain that uses repeated imagery to give a more full representation with limited source.

COMIC/COLLAGE:
dogeared and aesc's Escape Velocity (Stargate: Atlantis) - This blew my mind with creativity and innovation. It's set before 5x16 with the Vegas!verse that pays such mind to composition and interaction between text and image that I could stare it at.

I had another doctor's appointment. She said I did a lot of healing this week and it's looking great. It's to the point now where I won't have to have skin graphs. Last week they mentioned that I might have needed it to close up the skin over the muscles at the bottom of the wound because it was tunneling. I asked about physical therapy because they mentioned it last week, but the doctor said it's difficult to tell right now because I still have a ways to go before we can discuss it. That pretty much ends the good part. There's a secondary wound on the back of my thigh now. It's not the exactly the same as the first; it doesn't look the same, but it hurts the same. They put antibiotics on it and a dressing, telling me to call if it got worse. The whole thing has me freaks out again. They didn't do any tests or take a sample, so it can't be that bad. I'm just freaking out because that's been my general state of being for the last month. Freaking out and terrified of dying some awful death.

Most of the doctor's at the hospital thought it was an insect bite, while some thought it was a puncture from a scrape or something else, but there was never a conclusive answer. It wasn't the original wound that was the reason it was so serious. The infection was the major thing. The MRSA was what caused the whole thing. I flipped my shit when I came home and had everything cleaned from bleaching my clothes, sending stuff to the dry cleaners, sanitizing everything, and everything, so an insect bite is unlikely if it's happening again. I would have sprayed a thin layer of Purell all over the house if it was possible.

I'm feeling really screwed up, more so than usual. Libby brought up that I haven't let many people touch me at all. Before all this I was weird about people touching me anyways. If I'm not expecting to be touched, I flinch. Libby said I've become every weirder about it. One of my friends made a comment about it a few years ago because I would shrug his arm off my shoulder and he took it personally until he finally asked me about it and I didn't even realize I did it. Lately I only let the nurses and doctor touch me and I snap at my family when they try to hug me or anything. For a few days in the hospital I was told not to touch anyone because they weren't sure what I had and they thought it might be contagious. I guess I took that a bit far, even after they said I was cleared. I haven't voluntarily touched someone else in a month. I haven't had anyone over to the house and I barely talk to my friends on the phone. I'm only really talking to Amanda and Cassey. I made plans to go to Amanda's and watch a movie, but now there's a second wound and the doctor said it would be best if I stayed home until everything was checked out. I've forgotten what some of my friends look like. I'm pretty sure whatever I had going on with J. is over because I didn't tell him I was in the hospital and he found out from someone else. He sent me a bitchy text message saying that he never felt close to me emotionally. In that whole string of texts he never once asked me if I was ok. He knew I was still in the hospital, but he thought it was a good idea to have a text argument with me. He knew how I was before we got together and I don't feel to bad about because he has another girlfriend. When I'm honest with myself, I didn't call him and I didn't even think about it, which says something. I don't miss him much either. I miss other people way more.

So now that I've puked my emotional guts out have some VID RECS:
charmax's It's Not Over Yet (Merlin) - Amazing construction and editing of motion with skilled implementation of symbols.

lsketch42's Crackdance (Supernatural) - A cute and fun vid that is extremely rewatchable.

obsessive24's Red (Merlin) - The imagery and feeling of predestination is startling with the tone of the vid and the tension.

talitha78's Creator (Chuck) - With so few Sarah Walker vids, this one says something interesting with the footage using the Intersect imagery and slight glimpses into her internal emotions.

tearful_eye's Dido's Lament (Stargate SG-1) - Sadly beautiful editing with swaying motion, like a quietly hard lullaby.

VID RECS:
bradcpu's Man in the Box (House) - A fluidly kinetic, energy filled, extremely well constructed look at some deeper parts of the show, character, and interactions. It's like the Teachings of Gregory House's Questionable Ethics When Getting the End Diagnosis Justifies the Cruel Means.

hollywoodgrrl's Run for Your Life (Ashes to Ashes and Life on Mars) - Creepy and odd vid to a killer remix with the right balance of cutesy music matching and serious editing mojo.

tearful_eye's Souvenirs (Life) - Great editing cues with the weirdness of the music and brillant clip choice coupled with a messily perfect vid of calculated choppiness!

untrue_accounts's Low Red Moon (Supernatural) - Such elaborate symbol use and connections with a sharp eye for quirky movement to the beats.