Tag: Jacob T. Swinney

  • FF: Quentin Tarantino’s Best Visual Film References… in 3 Minutes!

    FF: Quentin Tarantino’s Best Visual Film References… in 3 Minutes!

    Welcome to the very first Flick Friday post for 2016 – a series that will motivate you, supercharging your creativity as we delve into cinematography and videography together. Today, we’re sharing a great video montage by Jacob T. Swinney on Quentin Tarantino’s Visual References.

    There is lots to be said about this great montage, but we will leave it to Swinney himself to entice you: “It is a well known fact that Quentin Tarantino is a self-proclaimed cinephile. But the writer/director’s love for cinema is most obviously expressed through his own films. In addition to showing his characters spending a great deal of time discussing cinema, Tarantino’s films are jam-packed with homages and visual references to the movies that have intrigued him throughout his life.

    Many filmmakers pay homage, but Tarantino takes things a step further by replicating exact moments from a variety of genres and smashing them together to create his own distinct vision.”

    With over 30 of these visual references to be had, in a word – it is simply brilliant.

    https://vimeo.com/148955244

  • Video Essay: Fade to White (Swinney)

    Continuing with my new series of resource links – from video essays, to cinematographer interviews, how-to tips and the like – today I want to take a look at a short video essay by Baltimore-based editor, filmmaker, and fellow cinephile Jacob T. Swinney. For a wide range of cinematic reasons, the “fade from black” and the “fade to black” are ubiquitous in film and television. As such, the less frequent use of a “fade from white” or a “fade to white” makes for quite the visual impact upon a viewer. Where black offers transition and/or closure (and additionally these effects are subtly controlled by the amount of time taken to complete the fade) – Swinney has postulated in the description of today’s video essay that “the much less common fade to white seems to create a sense of ambiguity.”

    The fascinating thing for me is that doing a Google search of the term “film fade to white” predominantly returns various bloggers sharing this very clip. Prior to its release last week, it seems that about as many people were talking about this film-makers tool as those who happened to use it. So it is excellent to see such extra interest being generated for a simple – albeit quite evocative – effect! Without further ado then, may I add to the conversation by sharing the same video that many others have already shared. 🙂