The video editing and filming process was mostly tedious work (as anyone who has done video editing can tell you). I ended up going to Fort Hamilton military base to take pictures of cannons only to get approached by security guards and told to delete whatever is on there. Fortunately, I didn’t do this but I was upset that I couldn’t take more shots, especially close-ups, of the cannons. I had to settle for the memorial parrot cannon set up in the nearby park. The scenes of nature were shot in the park and the nearby area.
As for the actual content of the film, I wanted to set up contrast between man/machine/war with nature in a similar fashion to how the Henry Reed did in his poem, “Naming of Parts.” The author envies nature for its “eloquent gestures” and its seemingly effortless harmony when he is in a military drill covering the parts of his rifle.
I used music to also stress the contrast. I thought Vivaldi’s spring-like music would be perfect for the role. Upbeat and full-of-life music was used for the weapons of war and the opposite for the footage of spring. I thought it was an interesting idea to explore the textures of the metal just as people usually do with nature. The effect of the film I hope shows how opposed war is to nature, as the author probably intended, but also I hope to show that the two are forever interrelated, one depends on the other. Although this is as subtle in the film just as it is in the poem.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lIkAdnuac5k
