Wil the director?
Yes, it's true. Back in 1993 or so, while in high school in the remote state of Indiana, I got a hold of my dad's unused video camera, and began making short "skits", using my brother George as a victim/star. Perhaps it was because of this that George went on to decide that he wanted to write and direct his own films. Perhaps not. Either way, I made about two VHS tapes worth of ridiculous crap for no reason other than we lived in fucking Richmond, Indiana and there wasn't a damned thing to do otherwise. At first, I played with just doing basic special effects like making things disappear by pausing the recording and then moving it out of frame before restarting the recording. Of course, the camera itself wasn't exactly of professional quality, so all cuts like this happened with a jolt of static on the screen or a twisted snaky ribbon that runs through the scene for a few seconds afterward. But still, it was fun to do. I experimented with filming while aiming the camera at a television screen that was connected to the camera to show what it saw. What I got was a crazy tunnel effect that was pretty cool to look at, but ultimately useless, as nothing could be placed in front of it or it was lost.
Years back, the tapes got into the hands of my sister and nephews, and my nephews, who were little kids at the time, watched them avidly, to the point where they could quote these terrible skits, and tell you exactly what order they were in on the tape. My sister loaned me the tapes, which I then digitally transfered to my computer and produced a limited number of DVDs for my family to watch and reminisce with. So, this past weekend, the subject came up of the old home videos, and I just happened to still have the AVIs on my machine, so I showed them to the group, and they suggested putting them up YouTube.
So I did.
Or, at least, I've put one up on YouTube for now, with the others to go up as I review them and decide how embarrassing and reputation-destroying they are. For one thing, I was this gangly, near-anorexic teen who bossed his kid brother around ON SCREEN, or just kept filming because it amused me to watch him get flustered, unsure what to do. Also, there's the prancing around in bathing suits in a sprinkler on our patio that might bring my sexuality into question. And to top it off, these videos are just plain BAD. B-A-D. They are of little interest to anyone who isn't in my immediate family, so really, feel free to not watch them. This is mainly so that my brothers, sisters, mom and dad can watch and laugh at how retarded and boring my youth ultimately was. Also, when Katie grows up, she can watch them and cover her face in shame!
That said, here is the first video to be put up:
Years back, the tapes got into the hands of my sister and nephews, and my nephews, who were little kids at the time, watched them avidly, to the point where they could quote these terrible skits, and tell you exactly what order they were in on the tape. My sister loaned me the tapes, which I then digitally transfered to my computer and produced a limited number of DVDs for my family to watch and reminisce with. So, this past weekend, the subject came up of the old home videos, and I just happened to still have the AVIs on my machine, so I showed them to the group, and they suggested putting them up YouTube.
So I did.
Or, at least, I've put one up on YouTube for now, with the others to go up as I review them and decide how embarrassing and reputation-destroying they are. For one thing, I was this gangly, near-anorexic teen who bossed his kid brother around ON SCREEN, or just kept filming because it amused me to watch him get flustered, unsure what to do. Also, there's the prancing around in bathing suits in a sprinkler on our patio that might bring my sexuality into question. And to top it off, these videos are just plain BAD. B-A-D. They are of little interest to anyone who isn't in my immediate family, so really, feel free to not watch them. This is mainly so that my brothers, sisters, mom and dad can watch and laugh at how retarded and boring my youth ultimately was. Also, when Katie grows up, she can watch them and cover her face in shame!
That said, here is the first video to be put up:
Click to view