Shakespeare Collaboration 101

I wrote a few days ago about Hit RECord, Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s effort to create a collaborative online arts community. I’m really enamored of the idea around this site, so I’m going to periodically share with you the coolest collaborations I find there.

This Shakespeare Sonnet Collaboration is a great example of how HitRECord works. One person kicks an idea off, lots of people make cool stuff based on that idea, and all of that is freely usable by other people to build on and grow. Here’s one I like quite a lot, that uses 13 “Resources” (stuff other people have uploaded) in creating a collaboration using Shakespeare’s Sonnet 130:

And here’s a really cool animated(ish) take on Sonnet 27, made using four resources:

Check it out, and if you make any of your own collaborative efforts at Hit RECord, let me know so I can post them.

Video of the Day: Train Now Leaving

From HitRECord.org, presented at Sundance 2010.

Image of the Day: Rails

From one of my fave curators of all things artistic, Liquid Night:

Rails

Seattle, Washington, 2010

[Shot with a Holga 120CFN using Kodak Ektachrome E100VS and Cross-processed]

The Sound the Universe Makes

“Black holes … bang on space-time like a drum.”

Fascinating TED talk by physics and astronomy professor Janna Levin about the soundtrack of the universe.

Reuse, Collaborate, RECord

Happy Tuesday. Here’s Morgan and Destiny’s Eleventeeth Date — The Zeppelin Zoo, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt (who, frankly, I would watch in just about anything) and Channing Tatum. The vid is from SXSW 2010.

Now probably, you are way hipper than I am and so you already knew about HitRECord, JGLs’ way cool collaborative art project, which you can check out over here. But if you haven’t heard of it, start by watching the video above. Trust me, it’s worth your time. There’s JGL in a fake mustache! And sepia tones blended with … oh, just go watch it. It’s creative. It’s cool. And it’s almost guaranteed to be better than doing whatever real work you’re supposed to be doing right now.

So the idea of HitRECord is that anyone, anywhere in the world, can upload digital bits and pieces — video, text, images, music, what have you (not naughty bits! get your mind out of the gutter!) — and then other people can use those bits and pieces in creating their own projects and upload those.

To get a better idea of what it’s about, here’s RegularJOE (that’s what the-actor-otherwise-known-as-JGL calls himself over here on HitRECord) in what he calls a “bare bones” video, explaining to newcomers what the site is about, and encouraging others to take his video and mix it up and add to it however they’d like.

Or, for you more visual types, here’s an effort called Brainstorm that explains it all in pictures …

… And if you want more? Head on over here, where RegularJOE has curated some HitRECord videos, many of which have screened at Sundance and SXSW, for your viewing pleasure. I have an interview request in to do a Spotlight on this site, so I’ll hopefully be telling you more about it in the near-ish future. In the meantime, if you make a video for HitRECord — or if you’ve already made one — drop a line in the comments to point us to your awesomeness, won’t you?

How Social Network Should Have Ended

Happy Monday.

Imagining the Future Through Film

The site Futurestates, part of ITVS, is a very cool site that challenges students to think about what the future will look like 25, 50, 100 years from now. The site combines films on pertinent subjects with lesson plans that tie in and challenge students to think about what they’re learning and hypothesize about what consequences might result decades from now, from choices they’re making today.

One of the Season One lessons, for instance, used Ramin Bahrani’s terrific short film Plastic Bag, narrated by Werner Herzog, to illustrate the relationship between humans as consumers and how we impact the environment without thinking.

One of the season two episodes, Exposure, which releases April 4, was directed by Mia Trachinger, whose film Reversion played at Sundance a few years ago. Reversion was a trippy film about a group of people who lack the ability to travel linearly through time. Trachinger used this basic conceit to explore the idea that if we don’t experience life linearly, we don’t ever see the direct consequences of actions, as an allegory for consequential morality generally.

Reversion had some flaws in the execution (Trachinger just told me she’s recut the film, though, so I am really interested to see it in this new iteration), but it was a really smart concept and Trachinger herself kind of reminds me of a sci-fi Miranda July … very smart and passionate, with a particularly interesting and engaging way of looking at the world.

Here’s the trailer for Trachinger’s film Exposure, which imagines a future world in which teams of government workers are tasked with the job of inoculating the population against disease by exposing people to contagions, and a group of people trying to avoid being exposed.

I’ll be keeping an eye on this project, now that I know about it, and maybe using some of the lessons with my middle school youth group at the Unitarian Church to kick off some discussions about some of the issues addressed. Pretty cool.

Help Save the Music

Yo, music fans. Today’s the last day you can bid on items in the Power Saves the Music Auction, the charity event being put on by filmmaker Ari Gold in conjunction with release of Adventures of Power on DVD. The film, which debuted at Sundance three years ago, tells the story of a dorky factory worker (Gold) whose passion for air drumming takes him from small town New Mexico all the way to New Jersey for a big air drumming competition.

The film features a cameo by Rush drummer Neil Peart (see, lots of drumming tie-ins) and the Power Saves the Music Auction has heaps cool stuff; here’s the roster of donors:

ADAM CAROLLA SHOW
ADRIAN GRENIER
AEROSMITH
AMANDA PALMER
ANNIE GOLDEN
ARI GOLD
BAD COMPANY
BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE
CHIU CHI LING
DAVID POE
DAVID WAIN
DRESDEN DOLLS
GARFUNKEL & OATES
GOGOL BORDELLO
JANE LYNCH
JIMMY JEAN-LOUIS
JOHN MAYER
JOHN WATERS
JUDAS PRIEST
KE$HA
MARKY RAMONE
METALLICA
NEIL HAMBURGER
NEIL PEART
NICK KROLL
OZOMATLI
PHISH
PINK MARTINI
RINGO STARR
SAMANTHA MALONEY
SHOSHANNAH STERN
SIMON KIRKE
SOKO
STYX
TERRY BOZZIO
THE HONEY BROTHERS
TIFF RANDOL
TIM & ERIC
WEEN
WEEZER
WILCO

Proceeds from the auction benefit the VH1 Save the Music Foundation, so it doesn’t even matter whether you loved Adventures of Power or hated it! You love music, right? Unless, of course you’re a music hater. Music haters wouldn’t be interested in SAVING THE MUSIC, would they? So don’t be a music hater, go bid on some drum lessons or cool drums autographed by your favorite drummer. Or both, if you’re really awesome and independently wealthy.**

**And if you are? Call me.

We Interrupt This Blog for an Important Message…

… my baby is all (sniff) grown up and blogging.

She’s also (finally) updating her web comic, Stick Figure Yaoi. It’s only taken a year to get a second strip out of her. Yeah, sure, she’s been busy, what with school, being in two plays, assistant stage managing a third play, and writing a novel and a graphic novel. Slacker.

That is all. Carry on.