It's the middle of August, so guess which one we're going to talk about today?
It's been raining pretty much all day. Now, when I say raining, I mean it's actually been raining; not a slight drizzle, or one of my granddad's "twelve inch rains" (where the sprinkles are twelve inches apart, titty-boom), but real, steady rain.
It's been lovely, like petit fours from the sky!
Anyway, couple that involvement with my love of nature photography, and whuddaya got?
A well exercised macro muscle, and several mosquito bites (they love me, it's awful.)
Would you like to see a small sampling of what I shot?
Oh, come on, eleven photos out of the ninety-one I actually took?
Well, you're going to have to scroll past them, then, if that's the case.
Now, wasn't that fun?
Just nod and smile, it'll only take a few seconds.
Thank you.
And now, on to Annoyance Of The Week!
Today's subject? Concert/performance footage.
(You knew we weren't finished until we talked music, didn't you?)
Why is it that, during performance footage, if the camera man does a shot
of the guitar, he shoots the body only?
I don't understand it... it's like no one informed him that the action is up on the fretboard.
Remember the half-time show The Who did for the Super Bowl?
As quoted from that particular post
(for those of you who really could give a monkey's tit about the Super Bowl half-time show):
"...I would have sacrificed the shots of Zak Starkey
for a close up on Pete's fretboard during Baba O'Riley."
Not just the guys who run the football cameras are at fault...
even Paul's own crew have a tendency to make this mistake from time to time.
Some of the Space Within US footage I've seen of late show close ups of just the body
(though, since they're Paul's crew, they shoot at an angle,
so you get both body and neck, but it's not a close up):
'Till There Was You (at the 1:40 and 1:50 time stamps),
and I Will (1:09 and 1:16... which is such a pity,
as he was changing chords when the first body close up happened
[evident from that lovely squeal fingers make on the strings as they move
up and down the neck of the instrument])
are just the first two examples I thought of.
What brought this on, you may be asking.
The third video in this article (while you're there, check out their Dion and the Belmonts cover...
it's just gear to see kids enjoying actual music).
I had seen similar footage from GMTV last week, but it didn't intrigue me the way this one did.
Why?
In that third video in the article, you'll see that, most of the time,
the camera is focused on the body of the guitar.
This annoyed me greatly.
Why? (Yes, I'm getting 'round to that in my own mystical time.)
From what you can see of his left hand, there's a little bit of warble action
(I'm sure this has a more technical term, I just don't know it)
on a couple of the bottom strings on the chord right after the refrain.
It reminded me of the "Real Love" video for the Anthology series
(time stamp 2:23, if you don't care to sit through the whole song)...
I, being interested in such things, wondered which strings were being manipulated;
and I, having poor eyesight, couldn't tell if they were the B, G, or A notes.
Fortunately, there was another video (this one makes three) that answered my question.
(Because, really, what should you be doing at 3:30 of a morning?
Which brings up another question... why do we inherit all the terrible stuff from our parents?)
The point I'm trying to make is this:
To all camera men filming a musical performance... FILM THE FRETS, PLEASE.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Me
Oh, and, by the way, they were the B and G strings.
I'm gonna go put Bag Balm on my buggy bites now.
If you don't have a tin of this, do yourself a favor. Trust me, you won't be able to live without it.
I don't know how you've managed so long, actually. Go! NOW!
