Wow, what a couple of weeks

Lots of good news...I am back in the MFA program. I had a huge epiphany, and finally came up with my thesis idea. The idea was so right on, that my previous committee chair agreed to stay on as my chair. That was huge! And the EDF fishery film for Sea Studios came in on time and under budget.

It is going to be one hell of a semester. I have to work full time (for most of the semester), finish my film, my thesis, my defense, and my comps by the middle of December. I have scheduled out my time to the T. There will be no time for procrastination. But, the good part of that is that I will have this master monkey off my back sooner than I thought.

This weekend I am auditioning voice over actors and composers. Then I will have a couple weeks to turn in my fine cut. Then I move on to my thesis paper. I am proposing a new mode of documentary called Audience Interactivity. This mode won't be perfected until interactive media technology can catch up (ie. video games, interactive tv, etc). But I am going to write about what is being tried. I am also going to use the zebra film as an experiment at interactivity for school kids. I will probably film the kids acting out scenes or moving the toys around to make their own film. Then edit something together for them to be able to download and show their parents how they interacted with a Zebra documentary.

I will be taking a little over 6 weeks off total from work. My bosses are pretty supportive. I will take one week of in Sept and one in October to get most of my thesis ideas flushed out. I will be working on it nights and weekends as well. Then, come the middle of Nov, I will take a month off to finish the paper and to dive in to intensive study for my comps. I bought about $500 worth of books last night off of Amazon. The book list is huge! Luckily, I already had about half the books. If I fail the comps once, I get one more chance. If I were to fail twice, then all of my work would have been in vane. They don't let you graduate if you fail more than twice. The same criteria goes for the Defense. So I need to study my ass off!

But, you wouldn't believe how wanky and verbose these books are. They are one of the only things that can cure insomnia.

But anyway, I will have to use close pins to keep my eyes open and make sure I have several solid weeks to write mock essays. Won't that be a hoot!

I will fly to Montana early December to take my Comps and sit for my defense. By then my film and thesis will have to completely done and approved.

Wish me luck!