Gary Busey Makes a Deal with Satan

Serviced with a Smile

A Monster Mashup

Virtuous (the self-serving attitutdes of three cool dudes)

Table 1 Scale items for four virtue factor subscales
Factor I Empathy	Factor II Order	Factor III Resourceful	Factor IV Serenity
Empathy Concern Understanding Considerate Friendly Sympathy Affable Sensitive Charity Compassion Liberal Gracious Courtesy	Order Discipline Serious Decent Deliberate Scrupulous Earnest Self-control Self-denial Abstinence Obedient Conservative Cautious Careful Tidy Austere Clean	Resourceful Purposeful Perseverance Persistence Confidence Sagacity Self-esteem Fortitude Intelligence Zealous Independent	Serene Meek Forbearance Forgiveness Peaceful Patient Merciful

Table from article: http://www.ptypes.com/virtue_ethics.html

The Sprites - George Romero

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuzbUgiWI-Q&noredirect=1

Hero

The Happening

I watched M. Night Shyamalan's The Happening. After i had finished the movie I stared at the screen for awhile. Not in awe or shock, but in thought. Trapped in thought because i was surpised at how much i liked the film and was pondering of all the reasons i did.
The reviews that i had read about it were in-between and some critically low, but i had only seen a couple positive reviews for the film.
The reason the film works for me so well is because of Shyamalan's use of shock in the movie. There wasn't any fast shutter-frame photography, which is the rage and ads heightened-perception to disturbing scenes and chases. The shocks were all in the way the scenes were played out. So realistic, there were no close ups of the gore-actually alot of it happened off-screen. The scares that it instilled came from the presentation of the characters performances that were affected by the "happening," just really creepy to watch.
The atmosphere was great in the film, and the dialogue while at times was one of the best uses of suspense and sometimes a touch cliche, i felt that overall the function of the dialogue was played to maximum efficiency.
The movie moves at interesting pace. In retrospect you might say that kind of meandered in the middle, but the fact is that it gave you time to think and usually thats not a good thing for a story to do but with this excellent direction you will not notice that the plot points are a little farther apart than most movies in recent history. In the end, you expect some twist or some blatantly insulting diatribe of what really happened and how it all really makes sense, but it never comes, and we are resolved happily and rewarded with our own thoughts.
This was the best thriller/horror film that i have seen in a month. And i watch a couple a week.

The N Widget

Neil's Blog

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Neil's Blog

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Transient

Transient from Matthew Ballard on Vimeo.

An experimental film inspired by themes found in Francis Bacon's work

Urban Dictionary

A word i added to the urban dictionary urbandictionary.com

Wasp Hole

Video Collage

The 6th Floor from Matthew Ballard on Vimeo.

Done to be an example of a collage with emphasis on the notion of how we think about the standard "shot."
*Update 3/28 - Somehow this was chosen as a Staff Pick on Vimeo! http://www.vimeo.com/staffpicks

Scream

Scream from Matthew Ballard on Vimeo.

Multichannel interactive video that incorporates screams from popular horror films into an eerie rhythm.


12 films, 15 clips, and a hours of tedious syncing.
Initially wanted to make the clips move across the screen to build the illusion of lines but would have to created 254 different tracks instead of the 25. Will save that for later this week.

Stalling Suspense

Stalling Suspense from Matthew Ballard on Vimeo.

A look at the cliche "hiding in a the bathroom stall from the killer" sequence in horror movies. Illustrates how prolonged suspense in these sequences work to keep you on the edge of your seat.

Portrait

Portrait of self for the class Film Video Art. Extreme low light. all practical light/sources and it shows.I re-upped this version in the place of the other two. This is the original that i submitted to Vimeo before i realized that i should use standard definition.

First Post - Shitgun Funnel

This is the beginning of a new blog, Shotgun Festival.