Art
Screening Room and Projection
Conference Rooms
Server Room
Digital Garage on First Floor
Hall Mirrors
Control Room 2
HINDSIGHT - WRITE SOMETHING WORTH READING ABOUT OR DO SOMETHING WORTH WRITING ABOUT
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Flashpoint Academy Construction Update - 9-13-07
Labs
Art
Screening Room and Projection
Conference Rooms
Server Room
Digital Garage on First Floor
Hall Mirrors
Control Room 2
Art
Screening Room and Projection
Conference Rooms
Server Room
Digital Garage on First Floor
Hall Mirrors
Control Room 2
Opening Blog on Flashpoint Academy by Game Development Department Head Simeon Peebler
WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 2007
Flashpoint Academy and The Hero's Journey
Well...TEMPUS FUGIT.
School opens within a few short days at Flashpoint Academy in Chicago. Flashpoint is a new digital media arts school featuring a brand new curriculum centered on the production and development of game, film, animation, and recording arts projects.
At Flashpoint, we are about to embark on The Hero's Journey. The Hero's Journey, as described by Joseph Campbell, is a pattern that has followed humans throughout history. We live it now and we will continue living this journey for the rest of our lives. Every situation that confronts us with something new or that forces us to re-evaluate our thinking or behavior--this is part of the journey. It is a process of self-discovery, and it can be difficult. Through this difficult passage of time in this portion of our journey we can survive to develop a new perspective on this world. "Leveling up" is what I like to call it.
The Hero's Journey has many steps. Separation. The Call. Initiation and Transformation. The Challenges. The Abyss. The Transformation. The Revelation. The Atonement. The Return.
Once you step into Flashpoint on Monday, September 17th, 2007, you in fact are entering into this new journey in this new chapter in your life. There are many things you must do before you can reach The Return. You must break free of your old habits and preconceptions. You must adopt new ways of viewing the world and modify your methods of communication. You have to stand up. Or sit down. Or both. At the same time. You WILL do the impossible. Because you can.
On your Hero's Journey, times will get rough. It is inevitable. If you start to feel discouraged, please keep in mind that we are all on this journey together. You are not alone. We, all of us, are in this journey together for this incredible moment in history. If you are attending this school, please know that you are not just "going to Flashpoint" but that in fact...you ARE Flashpoint.
WE ARE FLASHPOINT.
I can't wait to see everyone there on Monday!
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Flashpoint Academy Installation Update - 9-11
LABS START TO COME TOGETHER
MORE ART
PROJECTION TESTING IN CLASSROOMS AND MAIN PROJECTOR RACKS
SOUND RECORDING AND DESIGN STUDIOS
MORE ART
PROJECTION TESTING IN CLASSROOMS AND MAIN PROJECTOR RACKS
SOUND RECORDING AND DESIGN STUDIOS
Nice Blog Post by Asst Film Department Head Peter Hawley
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Starting Up
Prior to Flashpoint the only previous experience I have with a start up venture was 20 years ago when I worked for the Museum of Broadcast Communications. Even then I was just a first generation hire, starting right around the day the museum opened the doors so I missed out on all the pre-launch chaos, business and excitement.
Comparing a museum devoted to archiving broadcast history to starting a new media arts college is an apt metaphor for my own experience, I think. I often say at Columbia I was teaching film history- the past and techniques of how things used to be done. Here at Flashpoint I am on the cutting edge. Not only am I on the cutting edge, I think I am actually one of the whetstones doing the sharpening.
It's heady stuff and something I don't take lightly.
Later this week we are going to shift our work space from a satellite office to the main campus in downtown Chicago. When we leave this office- and the Post It notes on the wall and the bad lighting and the spotty internet, and the iffy food place downstairs- I am going to be a little sad. Much like the astronauts of Apollo 13 who saw the LEM as their life raft, I see our temporary office as the mother ship where all the ideas we will execute over the next couple of years took seed. Soon we will jettison the space and gravity will bring us back to earth and the real world.
As comparisons go I think the opening of Flashpoint Academy, the first new college in Chicago in 40 years, is more like the release of a hot new product. Think of Flashpoint as an iphone or the release of the hot new video game or the Super Bowl or a new CD by your favorite musician. We are like that.
Ready or not here we come.
PeterH
Starting Up
Prior to Flashpoint the only previous experience I have with a start up venture was 20 years ago when I worked for the Museum of Broadcast Communications. Even then I was just a first generation hire, starting right around the day the museum opened the doors so I missed out on all the pre-launch chaos, business and excitement.
Comparing a museum devoted to archiving broadcast history to starting a new media arts college is an apt metaphor for my own experience, I think. I often say at Columbia I was teaching film history- the past and techniques of how things used to be done. Here at Flashpoint I am on the cutting edge. Not only am I on the cutting edge, I think I am actually one of the whetstones doing the sharpening.
It's heady stuff and something I don't take lightly.
Later this week we are going to shift our work space from a satellite office to the main campus in downtown Chicago. When we leave this office- and the Post It notes on the wall and the bad lighting and the spotty internet, and the iffy food place downstairs- I am going to be a little sad. Much like the astronauts of Apollo 13 who saw the LEM as their life raft, I see our temporary office as the mother ship where all the ideas we will execute over the next couple of years took seed. Soon we will jettison the space and gravity will bring us back to earth and the real world.
As comparisons go I think the opening of Flashpoint Academy, the first new college in Chicago in 40 years, is more like the release of a hot new product. Think of Flashpoint as an iphone or the release of the hot new video game or the Super Bowl or a new CD by your favorite musician. We are like that.
Ready or not here we come.
PeterH
Nice Description of the Workflow Process at Flashpoint Academy by Animation Department Head Perry Harovas
Monday, September 10, 2007
...while you work!
The thing that makes all of us so into what we do for a living
is the actual "doing" of it. In deciding to take a full time
teaching position, I wanted to make sure that the
"doing" would be a large part of it.
Boy, is it ever!
Today I got to spend time with John Murray, Chair of
Recording Arts at Flashpoint Academy while he worked
on the sound design for our summer film project called
"The Collector". The film, directed by our Academic Dean
Paula Froehle, was shot in August and has now been edited
to a fine cut. It's in post, with John working on the sound design,
myself working on the visual effects, and our Chair of Game Production,
Simeon Peebler, working on a game that will accompany the film's release.
It was great sitting in the sound editing room with John today, listening
to the beginnings of the sound design for the film. It's amazing what
just a little well thought out and subtle ambient noises will do to
make a film shot on a soundstage feel like it was shot in a house
in the 1940's. John played a section of it that used to be Paula shouting
instructions to the actor, but now included the humming of the actor
as he worked on his collection of Butterflies, and the sounds of a dogs
barking in the distance, mixed in with crickets. It all worked, and suddenly
made the images on the screen start to feel genuine. Not that the images
are not good, they are actually fantastic, shot by a really talented DP
by the name of Peter Biagi, with a Sony CineAlta F900.
It's just that they lacked 50% of what makes something read as "real".
That's John's job. He fills in the missing 50%, and makes the images come
to life. I can't wait to see the whole thing filled out with the music of life!
I also got to spend time with Peter Hawley, our Associate Chair of Film.
He's a really great guy, with a great sense of humor, and we have an
easy time talking at length about what it is we love about this business.
When we were done talking, he has work to do, which was shooting more
interviews for the "Making Of" documentary that he is doing to document
the creation of not only this film, but the building of a new way of teaching
students how to work in the media arts and sciences. Heady stuff! But Peter
takes it all in stride, makes people feel at ease, and gets to work.
He interviewed me for the doc, and made it quick, easy and not a big deal
(even though it is). I am sure the final doc will come together smoothly
thanks to how he makes it easy for everyone to just relax and talk about
their role in the making of the film.
It was after all this was over that I realized how great it is to not only
be able to "do" what I do for a living, and teach others how to do it,
but to be able to be around other people while they do what
they love to do.
Hey, it just doesn't get any better than that!
Posted by Perry Harovas at 8:01 PM
...while you work!
The thing that makes all of us so into what we do for a living
is the actual "doing" of it. In deciding to take a full time
teaching position, I wanted to make sure that the
"doing" would be a large part of it.
Boy, is it ever!
Today I got to spend time with John Murray, Chair of
Recording Arts at Flashpoint Academy while he worked
on the sound design for our summer film project called
"The Collector". The film, directed by our Academic Dean
Paula Froehle, was shot in August and has now been edited
to a fine cut. It's in post, with John working on the sound design,
myself working on the visual effects, and our Chair of Game Production,
Simeon Peebler, working on a game that will accompany the film's release.
It was great sitting in the sound editing room with John today, listening
to the beginnings of the sound design for the film. It's amazing what
just a little well thought out and subtle ambient noises will do to
make a film shot on a soundstage feel like it was shot in a house
in the 1940's. John played a section of it that used to be Paula shouting
instructions to the actor, but now included the humming of the actor
as he worked on his collection of Butterflies, and the sounds of a dogs
barking in the distance, mixed in with crickets. It all worked, and suddenly
made the images on the screen start to feel genuine. Not that the images
are not good, they are actually fantastic, shot by a really talented DP
by the name of Peter Biagi, with a Sony CineAlta F900.
It's just that they lacked 50% of what makes something read as "real".
That's John's job. He fills in the missing 50%, and makes the images come
to life. I can't wait to see the whole thing filled out with the music of life!
I also got to spend time with Peter Hawley, our Associate Chair of Film.
He's a really great guy, with a great sense of humor, and we have an
easy time talking at length about what it is we love about this business.
When we were done talking, he has work to do, which was shooting more
interviews for the "Making Of" documentary that he is doing to document
the creation of not only this film, but the building of a new way of teaching
students how to work in the media arts and sciences. Heady stuff! But Peter
takes it all in stride, makes people feel at ease, and gets to work.
He interviewed me for the doc, and made it quick, easy and not a big deal
(even though it is). I am sure the final doc will come together smoothly
thanks to how he makes it easy for everyone to just relax and talk about
their role in the making of the film.
It was after all this was over that I realized how great it is to not only
be able to "do" what I do for a living, and teach others how to do it,
but to be able to be around other people while they do what
they love to do.
Hey, it just doesn't get any better than that!
Posted by Perry Harovas at 8:01 PM
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