Meryem, I'll trade you some Colorado snow scenics for some Iowa snow scenics? :)

We're supposed to get about a foot of snow tonight.

Went out again today in the snowstorm. The flakes were allot bigger today and falling much slower.

Witnessed a scene that took my breath away. Haven't looked at the footage yet but was so happy to be out there it really doesn't matter if I got it or not.

Once again, the silence was incredible. Hopefully tomorrow I can get out early and spend the day in the forest filming.

I guess it depends on how fierce the winds whip up tonight.

I used to live where it snowed, the silence during a snowfall was exquisite. I miss that about snow sometimes.

I have an idea for this and am in the process of shooting it now, I just hope I can get it all done and uploaded in time.

"silence during a snowfall was exquisite"

Hear hear !!! lovely :-)

Well this is it I have everything arranged for this weekend. The forecast calls for sunny and clear with zero cloud cover. However the woe is the temperature, at this moment it's -40F the wind chill is -69F the XL2's rating is +32F to +40F so needless to say that camera will stay at home.

The plan is to use one of my old Hi8 kits, if I destroy it oh well not to big a loss.

I don't know if my idea is an adventure or not but I sure as hell know it's going to be a challenge to keep from getting frost bite.

I'll let you know on Sunday if I'm swimming with the sharks or not.....

Brian

Brian, with those temperatures I would recommend this cover for your XL2:
Portabrace Polar Bear
I'm using one for my XM2, and even with temperatures of around -25C, the camera has been working in about +10C inside the cover.

Idea 1 scrapped, after about 12 hours of discussion with more intelligent people than I. Maybe another time. :\

Idea 2 brewing. =D

Carl,
Was that the timelapse idea that's scrapped for now?
Sounded like quite an undertaking but also sound very, very interesting as well. Hope you're able to shoot it sometime in the future!

Good luck with Plan "B" !

I find it interesting that if I leave my challenge film alone for a day, I find something I want to change when I take another look at it.

Normally I edit everything last minute and rush it in before the deadline.

This time around I'm actually almost done with the exception of a few more shots and the final shot which I won't be able to do until the day of the deadline if I can do it at all.

Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny which is what I need in case the day of my final shot is sunny. This way, I can cut in the final shot if it's cloudy or if it's sunny and it will match. Can't believe I actually thought of that. :)

Anyway, if it will upload, here's a still from the production so far. We were well on our way to getting 15 inches of snow and I had the wild places of Eastern Iowa to myself.

My tale of woe. Last week my Canon XL-2 went to Canon in NJ for a fixing. If need be I will have to use a back up that I am unfamiliar with. Oh well. No one ever said these would be easy. Bob

I'm still trying to come up with a story for my entry. I have a basic idea what I want to include, but still need to find a good location.
Hopefully I will be able to shoot it late next week.
Weather guys say no more rain, so that will help.
(It's allowed to be optimistic, right)

Finally had a chance to get out the camera.....big fluffy snow flakes comin' down.....
By the time the camera was set up....snow had stopped....did get 6-7 minutes of a squirrel, up in a tree, laughin' at me...
Don't know what I'll do with it, but at least I got something....

Still thinkin'......

I'm with you Bob. Spent seven hours shooting today. Got about two minutes thirty seconds of nice footage.

I said "Nice footage" though.... Not "Adventurous footage."

I had an idea going last week but it hit a dead end due to seasonal constraints. Plan "B" didn't produce much today. Working on plan "C" for tomorrow.

quick, what letter comes after C again?

Still just a supporter...
 

Hello!

Yes, - i'm still just a supporter of you, the uwolers. Sorry I'm not in. In fact I'm rather OUT. Really out. Running with those dogs all the time. And, as you may be know already, - my supervisor, mentor and genius videofilmmaker Per Johan is IN the contest, but he is OUT and absent all the time... Making great shooting, of course! I think he will be back today, - he spoke something about "...the Eagle has landed..." did he mean the space vehicle?

Well, - I whish all of you good luck with your filming and editing. I think I will remain as an uwol-supporter. Following all your Tales of Wonder and Woe!

i'm going ADVENTURING tomorrow. or, later this morning, i guess, since my ADVENTURE is triggering my insomnia...

...i'm pretty excited. i've been kicking around five or six ideas, and this one finally landed. running UWOL gives me less time than i would like to develop my ideas! so i usually have to come up with something that i can do in a day or two, so i'll be shooting today and tomorrow. here it comes!

just hope the weather cooperates....keeping my fingers crossed, it has been a rather unfriendly winter this year.

and eric, just a word of advice, i wouldn't over-interpret the theme...we're quite loose around here, unless you're in it for the faaaaaabulous prizes. any day that you're out shooting interesting stuff in the world is an adventure.

Well, I haven't got anything on tape yet, but on wednesday I'll be heading for the mountains together with my family and I guess I have to shoot my adventure then. My first uwol film outside "my" territory. Just want to mention that on my way to work today. I discovered snowdrops in a garden. The spring is on it's way but my adventure will be a winter theme, say no more :)

Wish everyone good luck.

Geir Inge

Aye, though it's definitely stuck in my mind. Darn huge undertaking that it would be. =D

Perhaps it would be more appropriate for a different UWOL, any which way. I have a feeling it'll get done one way or another. :D The technical details had me and the video guru I work with/for (with 20+ years in broadcast, and film) bouncing around going "Well WHAT if you!...." and trying to piece it together. We stopped and talked about this project for at least 12 hours over 5 days when I was sitting in front of FCP and supposed to be editing corporate stuff. =D Shoot me an e-mail and I'll tell ya what the subject was, as it's the main hurdle. Still don't want to spread it around, in case Meryem throws and appropriate theme for that next time. :) Gotta be a surprise! It's definitely a brain teaser though.

Plan B involves roughly 1 1/2 hrs of battery power, 1 Z1U, half a day of sunny skies and a steadicam that I am horrid with. There's my adventure - to try not to suck with a steadicam, in the middle of nowheres. We shall see. =D

C

Good Morning,

Well, it is a scant -26 this morning and -40 out in the prairie air!! Uggg.

good news, Not as cold as Brian!!!!


I have assembled my 2:59s video. Burnt a rough and watched it on the big screen. I will haver to go back and reshoot a couple shots for sure.

I shot the entire sequence with my gl2 not the xl2.

I had composed some music, played it and then resynthesized it in audition. I was very pleased with it but found it doesn't fit the mood!!!


Ironicly, both my cameras need to go out for repairs after this one!!!


still some refining to do!!

OK...that makes me feel better :)

Yesterday it was 32º F when I was outside shooting....this morining -4º F....
No chance during the week as the sun is going down by the time I get home...
So maybe another chance next weekend, the 10 day says high 20s....

We've got -6 temps here with a blowing and drifting snow advisory and a windchill warning but I'm going out in a bit anyway since it's actually sunny for the first time since the challenge started. :)

The forecast looks like more snow and dreary skies all week.

just got back from my first round of adventuring...pretty cool! i think i got some decent footy, very interesting and unique, i hope. another day of good weather and cooperative prairie wildlife and i should have it in the can and ready to edit. reliable weather, hm, that's asking for a lot lately!

The Eagle has landed!
 

Well, as Anne-Kari correctly stated earlier - the Eagle has landed!

I'm back from one of the most exciting journey a wildlife photographer can experience. I was able to get real stunning footage of one of the most wild and shy creature we have in Norway - the Golden Eagle.

The footage was shoot in one of the most wild area of our country, hours and hours of waiting for this beautiful bird of prey was at last successfully.
I'm very happy now, this has been a real ADVENTURE and I can promise you some really, really exciting scenes!

Pictures below, show some screen capture of the Golden Eagle, to the right from a distance of approx. 15 meters the Golden Eagle and it's pray!
Left picture show the Golden Eagle in an amazing morning light, that momement was like being into a fairy-tale!

Well, I'm back!

Woe -
Around 6 hours in a state park with a steadicam J R. My arm is in pain. All batteries are dead, and my AC is on location. I stopped by my boss' house to swap batteries, and he handed me another dead one. Grr.

I get back to the house, my borrowed steadicam breaks, again. This time, a pin comes out of the gimbal! An hour later, relocated and replaced. (Earlier, a snap-into-place thingie broke on the counterbalance, so it no longer locks in fully-engaged mode.) I'll explain this to him AFTER our early-morning shoot tomorrow.

Wonder-
But, I've got some footage for you guys! I hope, seeing as how I CAN'T LOOK AT IT. Argh. :) Also, some pretty cool pictures, which I will send a link to. I really should start a flickr account. Maybe I'll do that tonight.

C

Mostly done...
 

A guy who had an acting part in a previous project was intrigued with the idea I had for this one, so Thursday (4 days ago) we did some short test sequences to try some ideas out, and the next day put in all afternoon on a small (very small) mountainside.

(OK...It was a very little mountain, but at my age it doesn't take much.)

Footing was very loose rock, leveling the tripod was almost impossible and even working with a very light weight tripod was...Well...A bit of an adventure in itself.

Shot about 25 minutes of tape and as of now I'm 8 seconds over and looking to begin chopping 1 second off of some clips to get it down a bit.

A bit more work on smoothing out the music score and the serious work of compression begins. Biggest hurdle there is that Windows Vista "broke" my workflow. I've been rendering to an HD MPEG4 and converting that to .mov with QT pro and Vista makes QT choke and die on MP4.

So I'll have to move that part of the process over to an older machine with XP.

But...I'm close..."Vision Quest", opening at a UWOLchallenge.com theatre close to you soon.

Hi Per,

Can't wait to see your entry - I am a big fan of birds of prey and can really appreciate your excitement at capturing this footage.

I'm sure it will be absolutely breathtaking - knowing your standards.

Wonder AND Woe, thoughts of the day...

I hiked 14 miles with 60lbs of gear strapped to my back today - and my back's been broken in seven places.

I drove to a place 60 miles from where I've lived for four years now - yet I'd never been to before.

I stayed two breaths from anaerobic for two hours straight - yet I never realized I was working out.

I learned why a particular bird has a particularly long beak - just by watching him through the glass.

I turned back for three shots I never would have turned back for before - once even from ten minutes out.

I realized I'm nuts, all by myself - and then I laughed out loud.


Sure glad I finally gathered the courage to join YouWoll...

Things I'm learning...
 

I learned that my little camcorder's lens stinks at full zoom when I captured some really fuzzy footage of a coyote hunting right near my house. I learned that my cheap tripod is very inadequate. And I learned that there are more different kinds of critters living near me than I realized, until I went out and really started looking at them! Someday I'll save for a new camera and tripod but for now I'll keep using what I've got. More importantly, I'll keep looking at what's crawling/flying/walking near me, keep looking & learning; maybe I'll get something useable!

Hey Eric,

Yep, there definately the symptoms all right - UWOL captures yet another victim!

Great shot - looks like your ADVENTURE is well underway.

My weekend trip has been cancelled, so I'm now starting to think of a plan B.

Looking forward to seeing your entry.

All the best and keep laughing...

wow Per....great, great stuff ! I still haven't had the pleasure of seeing one of these amazing birds and I've wanted to for a long time. Loooking forward to your footage fella!

That's an awesome attitude to have! It's amazing when you first realize what is around us, that we as a people ignore every day... I've heard it said more than once that cinematography is the art of looking, really LOOKING at what is in front of you. :)

Hello All:

I survived, did a count on fingers and toes all are accounted for. The images are on tape if there any good well that remains to be seen....hell is it even an adventure I'm not sure but we had fun pulling it all together. It was a two camera shoot so it will be fun to cut from one to the other and so on.

I'll start the edit tonight.....that is if I have anything worth editing.

Trond thanks for the link to the camera cover...it's now on my wish list.

Brian

transforming the way you see the world...this is the very essence of shooting nature and outdoors. even without my camera locked to my eyeballs, just when i'm out walking through the world, i see things that used to pass by unnoticed by me...i see more birds, notice more plants, am aware of more animals, and observe more insects. my experience of the world has been expanded and enriched because my camera taught me to see.

per, those are great shots, can't wait to see your video. there's golden eagles about 5 miles from my house, but every time they see me trotting around the open space with my camera, they flee. in fact, just this weekend, i missed shots of a kestrel and a hawk as well. i have some footage of all of these birds, but nothing that i would call *good* footage. it does take more patience than i have (or more time, i guess...), to shoot great bird footy....

Patience is one of the most important thing you need in wildlifefilming. These shoots was only possible by waiting for approx. 8 hours, then if you was lucky maybe 15 minutes of footage.
The smallest move with your body making noise or any fast movement with your lens and your baby are gone long before you hit the record button. And no more action for a day or two!
I think I wasn't breathing for several minutes when that eagle was sitting only 15 meters in front of me. He looked right into my lens and with my huge focal lenght I was almost immobilized when he was glancing at me!

hi Per

Realy nice photo,if it have some interess some photo from my cottage
last spring.Same eagel you see on NRK brodcast 3 week ago.
A good locacion tips Per.

VJV.

I just realized, that I have prioritized UWOL over moving this coming weekend.

I realized this after I told a friend I planned to edit evenings through the week, then hopefully finish with a good go on Saturday. Sunday I would throw all my belongings in boxes, move, and unpack, probably in a 6 hour window. =D That way, I would have time to pass an EDL and my files to the Macpro at work and do some finetuning in Color. =D

Here's to the UWOL Challenge. Worth living out of boxes for!

Raising a 7 year old is not conducive to patience and 8 hour waits...buy maybe in another 11 or 12 years or so....

Carl, that's a funny story...glad to see that you have your priorities straight! Another addict succumbs, mwahahaha....

Meryem, wait till you get into the teens. You think your patience are at their limits now?

Well this is fun, I'm well into editing now, but can't seem to drop it under 3m 8s. Also, there are of course a couple shots I wish I could get my "actor" to repeat and that's not going to happen. Ohh well, I'll make the best short out of it I can, at least the fun isn't lacking.

Some of the nature stills that get put up are breathtaking, I wish I lived in an area more suited to that type of shooting. I have the beach here and no water gear to play with so I stayed close to home for this one.

Good going Adrinn.I dont even have a plan yet....Oh well ,will get off my butt and get out later this week.In all the other challenges I competed in I had completed filming and editing within a few days.Think I need to put work off for a bit and get out and play with my camera again

More woe than wonder
 

Hi all,
Well my plan A has totally fallen off the rails. Now i need to go with plan B. I will be flying out of Melbourne Australia in about 14 hours from now, heading for Canada. Sure will be an adventure! Just hope i can put something together before the deadline. Sounds like some others have got their act together & still others like me have some catching up to do!
Good luck to all,
Bryce

Hi Bryce, sorry to hear about your plan A failed, but I'm sure your plan B will be great and Canada is a great country for wildlife filming.
Today I've packed my bags and we're ready to go on our winter hollidays in the mountains. It will be a great experience and something diffeent from what I'm used to - living by the sea. But I'm worried about the weather though, promissing heavy snowstorms, but there may be a slight stop in the snowfall on friday. At home it's +10C, in the mountains -10C. Never the less, here we go from the shore on to the mountains and close to the area where Pers Musk Ox live :) That'll be an adventure in it self.

Geir Inge