In fact, three of the four classes I’m taking this semester are film related. A fact that makes it a hell of a lot easier to wake myself up every day and walk out into the Artic winter of Blacksburg, VA.

This semester I’m taking two more classes with Paul Harrill, who was my professor for Digital Cinema Production. The first one I am taking is Advanced Cinema Production where we have been learning extensively about lighting recently. Along with more in-depth experience, we have access now to Arri light kits (they’re huge), cookies, flags, gels, HD cameras (you have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for that) and all sorts of crazy stuff. I am really excited about. I feel like between this class and DCP that I’ve learned a hell of a lot more than I ever would’ve if Tech never instituted the new school of cinema.

The other class I am in with Paul is called “The Movie Business.” While it doesn’t involve cookies and HD, it is very informative and I can’t argue when one of the first classes he shows us Lost in La Mancha. Basically, we’re learning about the non-exciting part of movies, which is essential to be able to survive doing the exciting part. Makes sense doesn’t it?

The third film class I am in is Literature and Film, of which I had to buy 13(!) books for. One for each movie we screen, essentially. So far, we’ve watched things such as High Noon and Shawshank. Movies to cross off my IMDB list of top 250 (I should do a post on that sometime soon…).

The last class I am in is existentialist philosophy. Not much to say about it here, except that maybe I’ll make a movie about what it means to be a question mark, or something like that.