This video was filmed on a Long Island City rooftop one 95 degree afternoon in mid July. It was photographed with two cameras, a Panasonic Af100 and a Canon 7D. The technical crew consisted of the following people:

Dance Performance and Choreography : Melissa Garcia Velez
Film Direction, Editing and Production : Damian Calvo
Assistant Camera/B Camera Operator: Samantha Pyra
Artistic Director: Everett Weng
Makeup Artist: Swain McCaughrin
Dance and Production Consultant: Danny Murillo

There a a few things I’d like to note here as a background to this project. First, I met Melissa at the UN where she was giving a speech about the issues faced by undocumented students. I learned from her how undocumented students like her are treated by our system. How someone could spend their childhood growing up in this country, be educated through middle school and into college, and still remain an anonymous 2nd class citizen was baffling to say the least. The nightmarish experiences lived by immigrants from student deportations to the abuses of the sex trade were a serious concern. But here was Melissa in contrast to corrupt politicians and general apathy over human rights. Here was hope for a generation of smart, politically active, positively motivated people. Here was a person crucial to a county steeped in confusion, dejection and negativity.

Before the speech she performed a dance before a room full of diplomats and policy makers. For a moment everyone was transported to another place that seemed far away from a conference room.   I believe Melissa’s dance was poetry in motion, and spoke volumes about her personal struggle.   I was motivated to see this dance reproduced in a way that fit with the energy and emotion it expressed. With Melissa’s collaboration, our skeleton crew, and simple means, we put something together I hope you will enjoy. For me, seeing Melissa dance in front of the skyline of Manhattan with the wind billowing the red fabric around her becomes a symbol for strength and true freedom–Not unlike seeing the Statue of Liberty herself.

Here is something Melissa wrote about her dance.

Unity and Understanding Through the Beats of the Universe
by Melissa Garcia Velez on Wednesday, July 27, 2011 at 4:17pm

I can’t explain why an eight-year-old Jewish boy was inhumanely killed by another human being who lost his conscious    and humanity. I can’t explain why another man, in Norway, decided to kill around seventy-three people because his ideologies got the best of him. I can’t explain why Andy Mathe was deported yesterday against his own will to South Africa, where his life is in danger because of the tribe he belongs to. I can’t explain why our government has failed once again to protect a human being’s life and chose their laws and policies above the value of a life. I can’t explain why we are still in two wars across seas, rather than actually using that money to build schools, provide food and shelter. I can’t explain why here, in the United States of America, we have youth living without status, undocumented, being deny basic human rights.
Why are we spending so much energy, money, resources, intelligence and humans to implement negative laws, to create guns and bombs, to kill and dehumanize our human brothers and sisters, when all of those beautiful resources could be use for bettering our world, nuestra Madre Tierra?

We must face these hard times with optimism and a critical mind even when all the negative energy invades our systems with brutal intensity and we can’t explain el porque de estas atrocidades. Let these atrocities unite us, rather than divide us. Allow them to make us reflect and rethink our values and who we are as humans. Let’s learn something from everything that is happening because nothing occurs in vain.
My dance, titled Hope , like Andy’s Mom, reflects my hope that we haven’t lost everything yet. We still have beauty in our universe and I call all to appreciate, love, embrace, adore, and take care of that beauty, before it’s too late.
I dance for Hope, Unity, Peace, Understanding, and Love.

For me one of the best discussions was presented by Brian Newman who called for more activism and social political awareness in narrative films. He pointed out that in a year when we’ve seen revolutions topple governments, a film about a stuttering king wins the award for best picture. This contrast extends itself into the realm of independent cinema. While I see some very well made films, narratives seem to be out of sync with many of the biggest issues we face today.

Newman tuned his focus to rally the troops behind net neutrality, an issue I also feel strongly about. I think filmmakers in particular, but all content creators should be aware of the implications of this issue.

Maybe you have to take a hit with viral unpopularity, But have patience and take solace in the fact that you are saying something meaningful, revealing an angle, an argument, an emotion that differs from the mass media. It’s why many pioneers got into filmmaking from the beginning. And people like Rupert Murdoch and the rest of the bunch that own the media monopolies want to control image and sound and therefore, ideas and perception. They want to control the filmmaker as artist and member of a larger community. They want to control the community itself. This is really bad.

Newman closed with an entreaty to get involved. The activists don’t have the proper tools to fight this battle, but filmmakers do. Information and points of view that are independent and unique must flow through the larger context of the world. When there is someone hiding, twisting, rewriting history and science there must be the opposite point of view. The truth needs a place to ‘leak’ out if you will. I mean, how does health care become a bad thing? How does a US company become too big to fail while 99 percent of Americans are sucked dry. None of this could have happened without the complicity of the media.

The battle is here and playing on a Mac or PC near you.
Here are some examples given in the presentation of how to get involved.

savetheinternet.com
freepress.net
publicknowledge.org
do something creative about it

cinematography reel2 from Damian Calvo on Vimeo.

I’ve been working with a collaborator to photograph ten years worth of huge oil paintings. We’ve been shooting with the Cannon 5D MII and the Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0 L. Both the camera and this particular lens have performed very well.  Shooting in tethered mode, we were able to quickly see the results on a laptop. Using Skype we were able to work with our sister studio Fotofuelle in Madrid who was able to see and interact with us while we worked. We used a mix of fresnels and open face 1ks and 250′s to achieve an evenly distributed light.

The poem obviously treats an experience in England and not Spain, but I felt that the Image coupled with the description in the poem had the desired effect. Words and images are part of a soul of a film and sometimes you have to go back to the roots

Share The Streets: Lighten Up! was chosen to screen at the Biking Rules PSA Festival premiering November 17th, 2009 at BAMcinematek.

The short was photographed with a point and shoot camera, and finished with titles and music in After Effects.

Along with the short to promote bicycle safety a selection of my photographs was also featured at the festival.

flickr.com/photos/damiancalvo/sets/72157622483859406/

I was inspired to share my filmmaking with a cause that promotes better living in my city. The music is NIN Ghosts 29 IV.

The event was really great. It’s both humbling and exhilarating to see your images so big.
I was impressed at the quality and creativity of the work presented. I sincerely hope that it will happen again next year.
Inspired by the theme of biking life in the city, I will continue to post pictures on flickr as possibly the start of a longer series,

Over 80 artists submited new and creative images, documentaries, narratives and animations that promote safe, civic-minded cycling as part of T.A.’s Biking Rules campaign. Come see the premiere of jury-selected PSA entries at BAMCinematek. The evening will include prizes and a special reception afterward with free beer courtesy of the Brooklyn Brewery. http://bikingrules.org/

Special thanks to Laura Hammer

http://www.laurahammer.com/blog/?p=85

Special thanks to Marin Tockman

http://www.youtube.com/user/BikingRulesPSA1

Check out Street Films

http://www.streetfilms.org/biking-rules-psas

Written and Directed by Aaron J. Wiederspahn With David Strathairn, Ian Somerhalder, Daniel Gillies, Jane Adams, Joseph Mazzello, Elisabeth Waterston, Scott Wilson. Executive Producer Buzz McLaughlin Cinematography By Christophe Lanzenberg Edited By Mario Ontal

The Sensation of Sight tells the story of Finn, a man who is overwhelmed by a tragic event, the exact nature of which remains a mystery until the end of the film. This personal storm destroys his inner compass and leaves him drifting without a sense of purpose. He resolves to leave career, home, and family and set out on the quest for Why?

Aaron J. Wiederspahn the American writer/director of this film weaves a tapestry of seemingly disparate lives, which are all connected just under the surface. The film is divided into 4 sections, called verses, plus a prologue and epilogue. Upon this loom the story is slowly woven until the final pattern is revealed in a powerful climactic moment. Throughout the film the director employs long takes and sustained moments, while he manages to eschew cliche and go against the audiences expectations. For any film, this would be its crowning achievement, but Sensation holds us close and thus gradually pulls the audience into its world and characters.

Each section begins with a black and white memory. These are not so much flashbacks as psychic imprints of moments too painful or joyous to forget. Without allowing us a crutch of information with which to protect ourselves and form judgments, Wiederspahn refrains from manipulating us, but rather treats us as equals–which may actually disturb the audience member who likes to get it immediately. But this isn’t the same old film stencil. We are allowed into a mans private thoughts, into his world, and through him, into the lives of others. However, structure alone could not sustain us through a prolonged period when we have more questions than answers.The characters generate the interest and therefore the patience to wait–the patience to be open and curious. Released from the understanding of the full context of the characters’ behavior we are free to admire the humor and strangeness of everyday moments.

David Strathairn [Academy Award nominee for Best Actor for Good Night and Good Luck ] develops a physicality for his character, Finn, that expresses thoughts that remain unspoken as effectively as it sustains the spoken dialogue. He is sure footed but burdened; meticulous and methodical but lost in his own logic. The acting becomes invisible, as Strathairn morphs into Finn. For Strathairn [Finn is] a bit of a fool”not a silly person, but a fool in the tradition of the great fools who are out there slipping on banana peels and laughing about it or like Becketts great image of a man face down in the mud laughing.

A Prologue to ‘Why’ begins with a blurry black and white memory, a sad dispute between a husband and wife. The audience doesn’t know why there is sadness and confusion, but we are allowed through an uninterrupted take, to witness the despair of these people without knowing why they are in distress. Finn says would you prefer me feigning some locked grasp on the Seed of Wisdom? Who ever understands the complexities of why asks his wife Deanna played by Ann Cusack. At moments the dialogue moves into poetry, where the context weighs both the specific and the universal.

Throughout the movie Finn pulls a wooden box ferried on a child’s wagon. The box contains the only worldly possessions he has chosen to take with him on his quest. Among these is a set of encyclopedias that he sells one by one to each of the supporting characters in turn. Ironically, the encyclopedias are of no use to Finn because they do not hold the answers to his questions. In this sense they are a meaningless burden. However, they do serve the purpose of giving him a reason to get up in the morning and an activity to carry him through the day. They are also a link to the past, an anchor, an inheritance, a promise

We meet each of the characters in beautifully composed single takes absorbing their lives through the spaces they inhabit, and all the while gaining an intuitive sense of these people, of a connection, or commonality that is present and accessible but never obvious. We meet Dylan, Daniel Gillies , (Spiderman II, and Bride and Prejudice) surrounded by American floral patterns in a house where the objects have accumulated over time; The Drifter, Ian Somerhalder, (Lost, the Vampire Diaries) and Tripp, Joseph Mazzello, sitting in front of a fireplace listening to a record; Tucker, Scott Wilson (In Cold Blood, Dead Man Walking, and The Last Samurai.) saying goodnight to his daughter, Daisy, Elisabeth Waterston; Alice, Jane Adams , (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Little Children ,HBO series Hung) playing with her daughter, Ruthie, Cassidy Hinkle. Through these full figured portraits we form a first impression of these characters and their individual joys and struggles.

Dylan (Daniel Gillies) sees Finn at the local dinner and invites himself to sit down. His manner is bitter, confused, even blatantly cynical and condescending. Are you still having trouble figuring things out? He asks Finn. Dylan speaks of everything Finn is trying to avoid–his teaching job, his wife, and painful memories. This interaction deftly exposes their failure to communicate or understand one another in spite of a common history in the same hometown.

Even the minor characters in the film are played by talented actors who contribute greatly to the tone of the film. Dylan asks a Police Officer played by Lisa Bostnar you wanna box? Leaning in slightly, she replies with a cold deftness you don’t want none of this son As outright annoying to his fellow man as Dylan can sometimes be, his haphazard lack of tact provides a pivotal comedic counterpoint to the film. Simultaneously his tragedy, his estrangement from his wife and child, is at the root of the film’s central dialogue and exploration.

A young boy coasts through the landscape on his bicycle. He’s alone and out of sync with the world ”a world that isolates the lonely even more.” Although the film focuses on themes of loss and isolation, it also explores a diverse array of human interaction: Mother and daughter, husband and wife, father and daughter; and centrally, the relationship of a father towards his son. It’s a story that manages to deal with tragedy as well as find sweet redemption for it’s main character. The ending doesn’t pretend to universally cure the loneliness of all the characters. Instead the satisfaction comes from a plot that has been intelligently tied together and characters that continue to live on in our minds far after the screen goes black.

Rent it, buy the DVD http://www.thesensationofsight.com/buy-the-movie
Read more about the movie and watch the trailer. http://www.thesensationofsight.com/

I’m proud to announce the first version of the official site for Independently Blue .  We did the first version ourselves focusing on content and leaving the flashiness we all know and love for a future update. Making this site was also a good jumping off point for experimenting with the marvels of CSS, and XHTM, offering ever new and exciting possibilities for design. Elizabeth Castro’s book was an invaluable resource as was Web Designer Magazine which we scoured on rainy days for new ideas.

Lets Sleep On It from Damian Calvo

“Lets Sleep On It” was a weekend project. The city has a quality when it’s raining, or just after. I decided to explore the streets of midtown and flatiron district with a small digital camera (with rain cover). The camera stayed dry but I didn’t. After roughly arranging the material I decided to join Vimeo and post this quick work in progress. I was impressed with the resolution on the site although it can stutter on older computers. An artist I’ve collaborated with wrote the following as the beginning of a voice for the movie.

Written By Carkiss

White-hot electric city–

Powered by dark cravings and laser quick thrills.
Alive in chaos, never stopping, never sleeping the same raw, awake dream.
There’s rain in the atmosphere. Every moment smoke and mists descend.
She’s half-lit, and I have to save her from the shifty people.
Ever since I was a little girl, I had this gift…
I can smell people’s bad intents, not just
the ones flushing through bad cravings, but the ones
with nothingness in their souls.

Go Away! Go Away now!
Malice! Murder!

I love to travel, but she stays in the same state.
Sweet, dreamy, sexy Chelsea doesn’t seem fazed by all
the creeps and crazies trying to suck her dry.
The big blocks of power with hundreds of eyes
stare down at us with stone cold contempt,
while symbiant beings live among us like garbage bags.

It’s almost time. I always jump the gun.
The torrent is about to come, and when it does it will wash
the tired dry concrete and electrify the electric city.
The trees are still a thin veil without their summer coats.
The dark owl is the only one who can truly see who I am.
It’s in the atmosphere tonight. There’s a flashy party not far from you.
Your plastered neighbor is bustling, teeming with trillions, burning, consuming.

Serenade me with your melancholy–the blues, the jazz, your 2 AM taxicab flights
through smoke and mirrored streets.
There’s still memory, a warm touch pulling you back.
She uses her curves almost like weapons, invisibly slipping through.
The grid and the colors march in time.
We wait together, under shallow covering, waiting for the fire
in the sky to strike and turn the night into day.
Your embrace is warm, even if you’re distant and inaccessible sometimes.
I don’t take it personally.
I am so many people without identities worth stealing.
And yet, I’m the magic minx that conquers pricks.
Fill me with your words and pictures,
of all your suffering dreamers.
For all your glow and grace, this spring storm comes anyway.
Let’s sleep on it.