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51
General Discussion / Re: Closer bonds between Theatre and RTVF?
« Last post by Anon on May 01, 2014, 04:09:30 pm »
Hey, thanks for that detailed insight--I didn't consider that students wouldn't want class films or unfinished work publicly screened.

With that in mind, yeah, production should be the focus, on both sides, given that it's supposed to be a learning experience, not necessarily something to show off to peers. Even so, every theatre major who wants to act should know the value of a reel and has everything to gain from getting experience on set. To say nothing, of course, of the value of designers gaining versatility by working in both media.
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General Discussion / Re: The Role of Mental Health in Stuco
« Last post by JesseItskowitz on April 30, 2014, 11:55:37 pm »
I agree really strongly with the idea of tech week curfews, Jon. I say that having spent more than 24 straight hours working on a show. I'm not sure how I would have gotten everything done in time if I hadn't done that, but I also think it was stupid and unhealthy and I hope not to ever have to do that again.

In RTVF we have pretty strict curfews that are at least kinda-sorta mostly enforced. We aren't allowed to shoot past 2AM on Thursdays or Sundays, and there is a minimum rest time between back-to-back calls. (I think it's 8 hours between wrap and the next call.) Something like that should be adopted by STUCO.

I especially agree with rules for protecting freshmen -- there's a lot of pressure on freshmen to work a bunch of extra hours and prove themselves, and there should be rules in place to keep that eagerness from being unfairly taken advantage of.
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General Discussion / Re: Closer bonds between Theatre and RTVF?
« Last post by JesseItskowitz on April 30, 2014, 11:42:16 pm »
In truth, it's unlikely. The production process for films in RTVF doesn't lend itself to a distribution system analogous to the performance schedule that STUCO maintains. Of the twenty to thirty full-fledged productions each year, most aren't completely edited, locked, color-corrected, and fine-tuned until late Spring; it's simply a very time-intensive process. Of course it could be done earlier -- the Spring grants, after all, lock in a matter of weeks to be finished in time for the premieres in June -- but the editors of these projects are put under a lot of pressure, and I think most of them would be resistant to adding an extra time-pressure component to their work in the other quarters. Turnaround time is a trade-off of making films, unfortunately; the silver lining, of course, is that our projects have a longer 'shelf life,' so to speak.

Another significant factor is that the intended audience for most of the grant films isn't actually fellow students; many filmmakers in RTVF create their projects with the intention of submitting them to festivals around the country, whereas STUCO's mission, generally speaking, is to create theatre for a more directly local community. (I haven't even seen many of the films that I've worked on, because I missed the premieres last year to work on a theatre show.) Also, we primarily make 10-20 minute shorts here, which take approximately the same budget and manpower as a full-length play does in STUCO. So it would take several RTVF productions to make a 'night's entertainment.'

As for class projects, most RTVF classes are workshops, as are most Theatre classes. Although the films are usually complete by the end of the quarter, they're not finished works. They're full of experiments and mistakes, and we don't always want them to leave the classroom.

So in short, RTVF productions will probably never have the same presence on-campus that STUCO theatre does, though I think it's an equally important form of student artistic expression. (The same thing goes, in a similar way, for visual artists and literary folks, who haven't really been represented in this discussion yet. That said, the connection between theatre and film is more important to me because they have so much in common, as the two dramatic arts.)

So I guess that does present a really difficult gap to bridge. It seems to me that production is a much easier place than distribution to engage conversation between the two, because they're more similar in that respect, but I'm interested to know your perspective on it.
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General Discussion / Re: Closer bonds between Theatre and RTVF?
« Last post by Anon on April 30, 2014, 11:13:12 pm »
Hmm, I wonder if it would be possible to arrange a weekly (or monthly) RTVF event where people could submit the films they've been working on in classes or as grant projects or something--some way film projects could gain visibility on campus.
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General Discussion / Re: The Role of Mental Health in Stuco
« Last post by Jason Clark on April 30, 2014, 03:34:33 pm »
Quote from: jschneidman11 on April 28, 2014, 08:35:32 pm
I have a few unrelated thoughts on this topic.

1. I think Stuco needs to self-impose/police a tech week curfew. There's absolutely no reason why somebody needs to spend all night working in Shanley/Louis. We need to stigmatize staying up all night to make a show happen. It doesn't need to be that way. Another version of this is no freshman past a certain hour. My basic point is getting no sleep during a tech week should not be/is not a badge of honor, and I think a culture of taking care of oneself and prioritizing health needs to come from the upperclassmen. 

2. FBRs need to go. I am not on a board, but I would argue that they serve no function that could not be achieved by others. I understand the sense of "tradition" that this would eliminate, but I think that Stuco would be a far less scary place to a lot of freshmen if we did not denote a group of "cool kids" their first quarter here. Which leads to my next point...

3. StuCo's general social media presence is pretty focused on individual people and the "things" that they get. This needs to end. We create a culture of have and have nots, and make people sitting at their computer who didn't get the thing feel worthless.

Jon, I agree VERY strongly with your first and third points here. However, I disagree that Freshman Board Representatives.

Now, yes I was an FBR and am therefore a bit biased, however I've spent a lot of time trying to remove my own personal feelings from this issue and have come upon a vital function that I think FBRs serve. The first is that, without them, the boards would have absolutely no freshman voice. An entire class, a full quarter of the department, would not have a voice in the decisions being made throughout most of the year, which I think is not just incredibly unfair, but also unhealthy for StuCo. As people with little to no experience in the system, I think freshman bring a valuable outside voice that might be able to spot flaws.

I do agree very strongly that we need to do a significantly better job collectively making sure that we're emphasizing that being on a board is not necessary to have the full StuCo experience and that we're treating the entire petition process with much more kindness, but I think removing the institution of Freshman Board Representatives would do more harm than good.
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General Discussion / Re: Closer bonds between Theatre and RTVF?
« Last post by JesseItskowitz on April 29, 2014, 10:31:49 pm »
Cool. So I think the place to start then would be to propose opening up the Theatre Designers facebook page to Theatre and Film Designers.

And unfortunately there aren't very many public screenings of RTVF work. There are only really a handful of showings, all of which happen in late Spring. But I'm helping to organize one of them (the Senior Directing premiere), so I'll be sure to post that one, at least, to TWIST.
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General Discussion / Re: Closer bonds between Theatre and RTVF?
« Last post by Anon on April 29, 2014, 05:53:28 pm »
I think the e-mail thing is a good place to start. A united web presence, whether through e-mail or social media, where the theatre and film communities are aware of what's going on in both. Also, putting student film screenings in TWIST so that the actual product of RTVF is on the radar when people are looking for things to see on the weekend.
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General Discussion / Forum Etiquette
« Last post by hannahfisher on April 29, 2014, 11:35:15 am »
Hey guys!

I wanted to be proactive about creating a positive and productive atmosphere around the conversations on this forum. Instead of making this site about pointed criticism, we can talk about our shared community with mindfulness. Here are some suggested general rules of the road for commenting and sharing your thoughts. Feel free to add some of your own if you think our conversation needs them!

-Try not to point fingers or name names. Try to talk about issues that we face as a community overall instead
-Speak from personal experience as much as possible rather than theorizing and extrapolating
-Or try to be positive and speak in terms of what we COULD do
-Respect the perspectives of others when you're commenting on their posts

Thank you all for participating! I'm so excited to read more of your opinions!
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General Discussion / Re: Immediate Recommendations for Change
« Last post by hannahfisher on April 29, 2014, 11:17:52 am »
Hey anon!

As far as how these changes will be enacted, I think it depends on how much of the Stuco community ends up reading and engaging in this forum. Many of us (especially those on boards) have some power to try to change some of the issues brought up in the threads. Of course, some of the issues are bigger cultural issues that would take more nuance and time to change.
I think it's fair to say that even just reflecting on some of this may get the ball rolling. But if you have ideas for how we can compile the information from this forum and use it to make change happen, I'd love to hear! I feel like this thread is a great place to start thinking about that.
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General Discussion / Re: Closer bonds between Theatre and RTVF?
« Last post by JesseItskowitz on April 29, 2014, 10:17:22 am »
There is a STUCO-like group, actually, though it is not nearly as active. It's called URSA (Undergraduate RTVF Student Association), and it exists primarily as a liason between students and faculty in RTVF. The co-chairs for 2013-14 are Zach Lorkiewicz and Allie Romano. The URSA email is ursa.nurtvf@gmail.com. Perhaps a meeting between Amalie and Brandon and Zach and Allie could get a discussion going in the higher levels?

That said, I agree that it is a hard gap to bridge. I think you're right, that they do require slightly different skill sets, at least technically. But we're all, for the most part, trying to tell stories, and skills from one do carry over to the other, one way or another. Taking Lighting Design in the theatre department, for example, helped me hugely to conceptualize light and to think about it artistically, which helps me equally in both fields. The equipment doesn't carry over, but the ideas do, and I think that goes for many, many aspects of each field.

I guess the bigger and more frustrating / hard-to-resolve issue is the communication problem you brought up. There is, I would say, a similar pressure to do Film-and-Only-Film in RTVF. Or rather, to work on a certain number of films in a certain quarter or year to feel like you're really part of the production community. Not universal, of course, but  think it's accurate. Film people tend to look down on theatre as a simplistic, dying art; theatre people look down on film as a restrictive, technological spectacle. So people don't think they have much to gain from crossing betweeen the fields, but having done it, I think they do.

I don't expect the departments to open up their classes to cross-registration; there are such acute shortages of key classes as it is. So that's not really a solution, any time soon. Maybe a partnership between STUCO and URSA, but that would be fairly hard to achieve and limited, given the difference in influence and function each has within their respective majors. I feel like a good starting step would be to start with designers. Expanding the Theatre Designers page to encompass Film and Theatre Designers. Posting RTVF crew calls to TWIST, instead of just casting calls. Posting open design positions in STUCO shows to the RTVF listserv / facebook page. Actively recruiting within the other major for positions where there are personnel shortages. (RTVF, for example, is in dire need of production and scenic designers.)

On top of that, maybe something for STUCO and URSA to work on is hosting a series of joint panels and workshops. Dawn Mora taught a well-attended workshop for film students on working with actors earlier this year. I think that RTVF people would go to a Theatre Lighting for Film Majors workshop (and vice versa), and I bet that Theatre designers woud be interested in a Film Set Basics sort of workshop too. Film groups bring in professionals all the time to sit on panels; I'm sure there's a group of panelists out there that would appeal to both majors as a STUCO-URSA event.

At that level it seems doable to me. How do you get the ball rolling though?
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