SAR_14(/14)_epilogue_secured

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Above: Footprint after completion 32K SAR14

"We are human. When our ego is not engaged, we turn passive."  From: 'Forging an American Grand Strategy: Securing a Path Through a Complex Future. Selected Presentations from a Symposium at the National Defense University', chapter 7, 'GRAND STRATEGY AND HUMAN THINKING' by Evan M. H. Faber (link to full publication below)

"Abenteuer im Fleische und Geist, die deine Einfachheit steigerten, ließen dich im Geist überleben, was du im Fleische wohl kaum überleben sollst. Augenblicke kamen, wo dir aus Tod und Körperunzucht ahnungsvoll und regierungsweise ein Traum von Liebe er- wuchs. Wird auch aus diesem Weltfest des Todes, auch aus der schlimmen Fieberbrunst, die rings den regnerischen Abendhim- mel entzündet, einmal die Liebe steigen?" (Adventures of the flesh and in the spirit, while enhancing thy simplicity, granted thee to know in the spirit what in the flesh thou scarcely couldst have done. Moments there were, when out of death, and the rebellion of the flesh, there came to thee, as thou tookest stock of thyself, a dream of love. Out of this universal feast of death, out of this extremity of fever, kindling the rain-washed evening sky to a fiery glow, may it be that Love one day shall mount?)

From the epilogue of Thomas Mann's 'Der Zauberberg' ('The Magic Mountain'), published in 1924.

As posted along the way: SAR training is Kick-Ass-training, taking-over from previous 'management' (that led to overload and injury -- usually fear driven management) and re-establish control ("Get in, get it over with and get out!"). 

Change requires collaboration on all levels. Trough the creation of unity the runner leads/inspires/guides/informs/balances the transformation at hand. It requires growth from egotistical overload-behaviour towards- and transformation into- an Alert-balanced runner, who emphatically and sensibly controls his behaviour.

SAR training (bottom-line) is trail-training, focussed upon improvement of technique and effeciency. NO MATTER WHERE, NO MATTER WHAT: create optimum character-exposure and accelerated progression (run, built, jump, plunge, climb, fall, swim et cetera). Evolve alert and creatively and efficient and technically sound. Trough strategic use of available resources, including time, terrain, weather, technical-support (and injury treatment, food and rest).

And the ego better has some (controlled = trained!) kind of job in the accomplishment or it will (being bored) start to run things amuck, frustrate healthy control -- trough destructive, passive, negative, (self-)injurious and greedy behaviour. If the ego is a flip-side of the coin, money should keep on flowing, generating powerful results. Unmoving money stinks, but that is another story!

Our bottom-line-training gives us the tools to kick fat egos lazy ass. If it takes an injury to get us aware and start doing the work that needs to be done passionately -- we embrace that, doing so. 

Welcome to SAR training!

What is optimum (character-)exposure?

Let's look at the technique of motion-picture storytelling: it refers to the full use of the recording-system's latitude (film) or dynamic range (digital) to visualise the story at hand, from beginning to the end.

Roger Deakins, ASC, BSC: "For film I will take a meter reading to judge my exposure. With digital capture I will do the same but have the added advantage of checking that exposure on a calibrated monitor. I would surely do the same if I were working [with the Blackmagic camera]. I take a meter reading of a face, when I am shooting a medium or close shot of an actor, and I judge my exposure from the way I want that face exposed within the balance of the shot.

In a situation where sunlight is hitting a surface and bouncing light into a character's face, I will expose for the face to be where I want it to be in the final image. If the sunlight is in shot and it 'blows out' I am not worried by that. There are plenty of situations where I have lit a shot with a direct artificial source and where the highlights of that light source are completely white. I have lit like that when shooting film and continue to do so with digital capture. The idea of 'clipping' does, I think, come from a time when some cameras could not deal with extreme contrast ratios. The latest digital cameras can deal with extreme contrast in a far more natural (film like) way. That is why I was shooting film until quite recently."

See more: http://www.rogerdeakins.com/forum2/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2379

"Black is black and I am only concerned with exposing the 'bits' I want to be seen. The rest can go to black or to white when it feels right for them to go that way. For most of my time I struggle to reduce the light in a shadow, a task that becomes even more difficult [with a sensitive camera]"

See more: http://www.rogerdeakins.com/forum2/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=2938&sid=2381d5e2ee4c2edacb6c4e623c09e2ef

See also: http://278efy3ybwg25033p1al4ib176.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/fma/files/2011/07/Hirschfeldonmeters.pdf

SSI publication: http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pubs/display.cfm?pubID=1177

Great Black Magic camera test: http://bastiaanhoutkooper.com/blog 

Black Magic experience in Amsterdam: https://bartvanbroekhoven.com/en-US/running/166-25fps-black-magic-shoot-amsterdam

Related SAR post: http://bartvanbroekhoven.com/en-US/running/75-sar-9-injury-control-interim-management

SAR_sarsential™_toolbox_12/14

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Above: PGIA SAR training. Sarsential 12: Pit-Stop-Run™ (PSR) [ short, efficient training whilst on the road, supporting the blood flow and happiness of tendons, muscles and bladder ]

"We're in a car gotta get off the road, pronto!"

From 'Pulp Fiction, a Quentin Tarantino screenplay', last draft, scene 72, page 119. First published May 1993. In 1994 re-issued by Miramax books and Hyperion, New York.

"Hollywood has learned by trail and error to respect our 90-to-120-minute ultradian rhythm. If movies are too long, the audience will get restive and bored. The acute master of mood, Alfred Hitchcock, once wrote: "The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder." […] In baseball or football, we see the same ultradian need reflected in the seventh-inning stretch or halftime break, when fans get up and move around. […] That's what feeling good together means: being in synchrony with each other."

Ernest Lawrence Rossi on page 171 in 'The 20-Minute Break', first published in 1991 by Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc., Los Angeles

"One of the movies of which I'm most proud is Peter Bogdanovich's 'Paper Moon'. We wanted to evoke the classic b&w Hollywood tradition pioneered by cinematographers like Arthur Miller, John Alton and Gregg Toland. 'Citizen Kane' was our biggest influence; I had seen it for the first time in Budapest in 1948 and it had made an indelible impression. Orson Welles and Peter were very close friends, and I got to meet my 'god' while we were preparing our film. I'd been testing b&w film with various filters but still hadn't found the right look. Orson said, "Use red filters, my boy." And I did, because although the filters reduced the film speed and meant I had to use big arc-lights to achieve the deep-focus look Peter wanted, the red filters created incredibly beautiful, dramatic skies and gave us exactly the expressionistic look we were after."

László Kovács about shooting Peter Bogdanovich's black-and-white movie 'Paper Moon', from interview 'The Storytelling of László Kovács, Cinematographer' by Jason Whyte, as quoted on http://www.cinematographers.nl/PaginasDoPh/kovacs.htm

See also: http://bartvanbroekhoven.com/en-US/running/134-sar-sarsential-toolbox-10-14

Reflections

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Kennemer Dunes 360° today. Spring [ birth of a nation ]

Min/max temperature: 4°C/23°C; humidity: 76%; precipitation: 0 mm; sea level pressure: 1031 hPa; wind: WSW 5.0 km/h; visibility: 14.0 kilometres; Clouds: few 2700 m.

"Our preoccupation with numbers, preferably growth figures (polls, ratings, stock market figures, budgets, salaries, penis length et cetera) hides the underlying fear to actually having to think. Before people start a discussion within a so called consultation council […] at first figures need to be produced and made visible; once read, every discussion is unnecessary. The figures are supposed to tell the truth about a certain supposed transparent reality automatically. Equal fear for the process of thinking appears in the well-meant suggestions to people 'in trouble': 'You just do not have to think about it too much, it serves no purpose, it makes matters only worse.' The next logical step is towards thought-restricting drugs of which the French designation -- 'des stupefiant' ('stupefying') -- speaks so much more clear than the semi-soft name calling 'tranquillizers' […] What we experience today is the degeneration of the importance of language on a broad social scale. When thinking can be understood as an externalised act, then the inability to think must lead to the occasion to act in itself. In this area infantilization takes place, which does have an effect on the aspects that characterises being human, namely the delusion of providing meaning. In this case: the effects of the inadequacy of providing meaning. The consequence then becomes agitation and acting [ that ] out. According to the classic formula, taking action will elicit a reaction."

Paul Verhaeghe in 'Het einde van de psychotherapie', page 222, 223, 224, 225, first published in 2010 by De Bezige Bij, The Netherlands (unauthorized translation from Dutch)

"Movies are written in sand: applauded today, forgotten tomorrow. […] I foresee no possibility of venturing into themes showing a closer view of reality for a long time to come. The public itself will not have it. What it wants is a gun and a girl. [on sound movies: ] It is my arrogant belief that we have lost beauty."

D.W. Griffith (January 22, 1875 – July 23, 1948)

"In a Hollywood movie, after the movie is over, there's nothing more. There is no relationship between the screen and the spectator. There's just a duration. If you don't like it, you go to sleep, the way I do. [ The ] movie is not on screen. The movie stems from moving. The movie is a mover. The move from the reality to the screen and back to the reality. And the screens are nothing, just shades. It's like a swimmer doing a crawl until he arrives at the end of the swimming pool and then turning and going back again. This is the screen. […] When you arrive, [...] the moviemaker [ is the swimmer ] ; and when you start, it's the spectator. […] I don't think you should feel about a movie. You should feel about a woman, but not about a movie. You can't kiss a movie. […] Let's have a look and talk about it, but certainly not feel about it. That's what the Church says, feel about God. [ I ] can't [ work for television ]. You get more mystified than ever. Unless you think you can address 20 million people and you have something important to say and think you can go through all this mystification to get to the people, it's very difficult. [ I ] make very small movies to show to fewer people more often. More movies to fewer people but much more often. So [ I ] can survive […] it's very natural. I couldn't do anything else. You have to know how to survive. You have to be optimistic, because the world situation is so bad. Marx said that. The very pessimistic situation makes me feel optimistic. I'm an optimist because things are so bad they must get better because they can't be worse than they are. It's the same today."

Jean-Luc Godard in 'Jean-Luc Godard: The Rolling Stone Interview A look behind the lens at the famed French new wave director of 'Breathless' and 'Band of Outsiders' by Jonathan Cott, first published in June 1969 by Rolling Sone, USA

"Trough the reading of the script and the impressions given [...] by the director, slowly one starts to realize what [ needs to be done ]. In [the ] hot Los-Angeles burning sun -- we had to make the [ 'Barfly' ] interior acceptable, though being able to look outside at the same time to see what happens there. You need to take that into account, it [ can be ] difficult to stack those small rooms up with light. They need to remain out of frame. And the interior scenes required a certain ambience. You need to take that into account. I had ordered these huge rigging-towers -- with reflection screens -- with 12Kw's that bounced inside. Always reflected, never direct. […] Would I have said in these multi-billion dollar film: 'guys here we should not use any [ additional ] light, it needs to be dark' -- then they would go with that. The hardest part is to get the team to go with that, they are all crusted heads. So when we arrive at a street-corner, daytime, to shoot a car driving by -- only that -- all kinds of equipment is brought in. The script car and electricity trucks, and they all stand in the way, they take a lot of space. I've experienced that! [ I ] have always said to students -- when I had them in a workshop -- : '… the case is, when looking at the rushes and everybody applauds you because they look so great, when you think for yourself that it is not so good, than it is not so good. Because other people tend to believe pretty quickly that things look great. They see a sunset and it looks nicely orange, but you did not have to do anything to accomplish that, it always works. But there are also more complicated situations. With Friedkin, that was good working. He knew how to listen. We then had a complicated shot, with a car. It arrives at a terrain getting into a hangar. Shot with a crane, from top to ground. I then said: '… but why cover it in different shots? It can just drive in and we pan with the camera and the car can drive trough. […] Theoretically there are three possibilities. Dusk is short. Shoot a shot at dusk with the exact perfect light. One before that in touch over and one afterwards, which will just be doing fine. In twenty minutes we have three takes to shoot.' He understood that, and then started to organise very strictly the whole situation. We then immediately shot the first take and you get it all within schedule. But you need people who know how to react."

Robby Müller in 'Interview Robby Muller (2007)' first published in 2008 on the Netherlands Society of Cinematographers website (authorized translation from Dutch)

" [ Unless ] you know how [ a style ] is done, you say, 'What the hell is the idea? Where is it?' You keep looking for some kind of justification. Our brains are designed to see signs and put them together into a story. [ The ] brain always tries to read stories into things, and as every edit is a story in its own right, the brain can't accept it and begins to link them all together."

Lars von Trier in 'Framing, A Symposium on Cinematography; On Random Framing -- Automavision', page 142, 143, edited by Andreas Fisher-Hansen, Igor Koršič and Tina Sørensen (unpublished manuscript)

Training/today_footprint

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Above: I prefer to have my training around sunrise: it multiplies the already good effects, stimulating results during the day to come.

Todays training was 'equal-as-usual' in distance and terrain. It was in the afternoon though, it had more wind, more blue sky, more tide; different training altogether, best suited for the day!

And dedicated to an excerpt, published today, from a (new) book by Mark Divine. His writings, courses and trainings are an inspiration to many people:

"Drive provides a lifelong source of energy if focused on a passionate and worthy end. But be wary, because drive can have a dark side, too. When you’re driven solely by “me” reasons and you confuse determination with stubbornness, you can easily lose sight of the “we” in your life, leaving your coworkers, family, or other teams wondering what happened to that nice man or woman they used to know. The type of drive that powers elite operators is a “me plus we” drive. It means you’re driven to grow and learn new things in a way that benefits yourself and your team, and that is balanced with the needs of the organisation."

Mark Divine: Excerpt from 'The Way of the Seal'.

More here: http://wayofthesealbook.com/ and here http://www.sealfit.com/blog/marks-blog-excerpt-way-seal/

Enjoy!