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OPENING DISCLAIMER:

The following post is not intended as a critique of the Club Vivid Challenge currently underway (which sounds very exciting and I am eager, as always, to see what happens). The following post is just me, whining and navel-gazing. You know. The usual.

Right then. Carry on.


I'm a bit bummed about the Club Vivid Challenge this year. Not bummed like I am wailing at the walls or rending my garments, more like I would love to make a dance vid but I vow to not commit myself to making any vid this year (after my spectacular bailing on the AtS End of Days Challenge and I will feel better when I just *do* that vid) until said vid was finished.

It's not a matter of deadlines. I know all about the Escapade deadline and I am not stressed (well, I am stressed, just... in a different way). I'll have this vid ready by then. If I didn't - I'd have *something* ready by then or not - if I don't have a vid, then no one is the worse for it.

It is more about the *specifics* and the commitment that yes, "I will vid this song" - I can't claim a song with the intent to vid it and know that I can vid it. Half of my vid starts are just that anymore. Just a start. This of course does not stop me from perusing the list and going "OMG I WANT TO VID THAT" [the rest of this sentence is excised due to obvious attention seeking behavior]. And I am greedy and want all of the songs (ALL OF THE SONGS IN DE WORLD) to belong to me. So there is the letting go of that.

Then I have to examine my motivations for vidding anymore. I wanted to make a dance vid - why don't I just make a dance vid? Why does it have to be a dance vid that specifically *plays* at Club Vivid? When did "Oh, I will do this vid for my VVC premiere vid and I'll do this for Escapade and I'll do this for Club Vivid and I'll go ahead and post this vid and hopefully it can get into Nearly New" become how I vid?

And a corollary to that is me listening to a song that [livejournal.com profile] tzikeh gave me on a mix this weekend (and oh, the wacky on this MIX... requires its own post, actually) - the "Spiderman" theme song Big Band remix from the second movie and I really want to see that vidded to...Spiderman. And I could do that - I could make the vid I want to see to this song and I could do it to Spiderman and I would probably really enjoy it... but then I had to stop myself and ask "Do you really want to vid the movie song to the movie? Do you want to be that vidder? Isn't that like wearing the t-shirt to the concert?" And I stopped and then I thought that a Danny Ocean, Oceans 11 vid to that song would really work and be kind of sly, but it would lose a lot of the emotional impact the song has originally for me by divorcing it from Peter Parker. But it will play better at Vividcon if I vidded it to Oceans 11 and all of a sudden I was making a decision to not make a vid just for me but to possibly make a vid I am less emotionally invested in based on who I am going to show it to.

Why waste such a good song on a vid that is really only for me? But then, isn't the fact that I would even say that to myself incredibly stupid?

Because there is vidding for an audience and that is fine. This is good. But, I don't know - is it really the end all and be all of how I want to spend my time? Because I have had a blast with this last vid, the vid I'll send to Escapade, and I went into it knowing that the audience would be really small and maybe that helped me just loosen up and enjoy it. And lately, unless I am vidding something that I will never show to more than a few people, I just haven't been having fun with it (for the most part- there have been *moments* of fun).

And it actually helped me have fun on this vid, knowing that not that many people would be in the fandom or would want to see it or would know the context, or whatever. Right now the thought of a lot of people watching it is kind of filling me with a dread and a panic and dear GOD what was I thinking and I am trying to control that, but man. I am not confident. I was and then I wasn't and it happened so fast I could hear the audible hiss as all of the air went out of my float. I'm still sending it to Escapade, though.

But why?

And to be perfectly honest - I like attention. This is the only explanation. Why else would I be excited about making a dance vid for Club Vivid and then not excited about making the same vid just to make it? I am vidding for attention and this has got to stop or be controlled or something because it could actually, possibly, and I have no proof, but I suspect strongly that this might damage my soul.

So, what do I do? How do I get around this and figure out how best to make certain I am vidding because I want to vid and need to express something and reconcile that with the attention whore within?

Because not vidding makes me a bit nutty. Vidding also makes me nutty - but there is a difference in the quality of the nuts. One is Premium Mixed Nut cocktail with plenty of Brazil nuts and the other is mainly salted peanuts with a couple of cashews tossed in.

How do I get from here to macadamia? Mmmm - chocolate covered macadamias. I want to be the chocolate covered macadamia nut vidder.

Date: 2005-01-21 09:57 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] sisabet.livejournal.com
What is really bugging me is my complete deflatement of excitement about a particular vid idea with the realization that it *won't* be a Club Vivid vid. I was all primed to make it and then... I wasn't.

This bugs me. I think it is also indicative that I am letting the idea of the audience (This vid will go here and this vid there) drive me too much and this is possibly why I am not vidding like I was - why the rush of creativity just isn't happening. I am attempting to dictate when and where it happens and that is stifling. Maybe. Maybe I just need a candy bar...

I do think I need to step back and just stop. Stop thinking about what I am doing for any reason other than I want to do it. At least for a while.

Date: 2005-01-21 10:19 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] laurashapiro.livejournal.com
I think that's wise. It sounds as if you'll be happier, more focused, and having more fun.

I do think, too, that once you've been to a con and seen a vid play there (assuming it does well), it's easy to feel let down by an online release. You may get more LJ comments or email feedback when you post a vid online, but it's not the same as being there in the crowd with people clapping and cheering. For me, at least, that feeling can be addictive.

A candy bar sounds good. So does the not thinking too much. (:

::hug::

Date: 2005-01-28 04:19 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] elynross.livejournal.com
One of the things this is making me realize is that I may have some similar issues, w/ regard to my writing, but not *quite* the same. I'll have to take some time to think about how they're different, but I think it's wrapped up in my lifelong tendency to pursue some things purely for recognition. It's like... I don't write what I think will appeal, but I do fret about not writing fast enough, in popular enough fandoms, to be as interesting to people as that fame-whorish part of me would like. And I try and thwart that part, not by starving it, but by adjusting its expectations, somehow.

Date: 2005-01-28 04:41 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] sisabet.livejournal.com
Well, recognition can be addictive. I *love* it, but I also need to recognize that it, in and of itself, is not a healthy motivator -- for me.

But it is easy to say this and not so easy to put it into practice. And I do realize that my best work is done when I am *not* as concerned about audience - when my primary focus is just making something that I and perhaps a few other people, like. I have fun with that, I feel like I am truer to my feelings and I just... well the work *is* better. I am actively better when I am not concerned with being better.

I wonder how much of this is also rooted just in the desire to see my vids on DVDs... cause that is still kinda new for me. And so part of me is all "I want this to show at so and so" but then there has to be another part of me that also wants to vid something for a specific show (be it premieres, or the challenge show or Club Vivid) just because I know that the vid will then be on the DVD. I don't think vidding for exposure will work for me in the short run, long run, hell any kind of run. I am way to stage frighty for that and all I will do is suceed in freaking myself out...

And yet the cognitive dissonance of wanting attention and not wanting anyone to look at me continues.

Date: 2005-01-29 02:57 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] elynross.livejournal.com
And yet the cognitive dissonance of wanting attention and not wanting
anyone to look at me continues.


Absolutely -- and at 41, I'm *still* feeling it, and I just want to get a grip, dammit! I want that attention to be flattering, but *not matter*, and not figure in to my behavior, no matter how unconsciously. For me, it's wanting the attention, but not wanting to have the responsibilities that can come with it.

Sigh. But you're right -- it's not good for us, in any way, I don't think.

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