Veronika Ballerina on Vimeo
Hello Friends and Family!
Veronika Ballerina (a musical I shot for Film 3) is now on Vimeo! Go check it out. It has a slow European old-school start, but make sure and stay til the end for the huge musical number!
Click here for the full short: http://vimeo.com/25200501
Filed under: Boston University, Cinematography, Helena Bowen Photography, Personal Projects, Photography, Veronika Ballerina | Leave a Comment
Tags: Black and white film, Cinematography, Comedy Musical, Film 3, Jon Z, Veronika Ballerina, Vimeo
No, friends and family, I didn’t secretly get married without telling you. This blog is about my first job as a wedding videographer and what I learned from it.
Ever since I got my first “real” camera, I’ve wanted to photograph weddings. Unlike most girls who look at wedding magazines and think “someday my wedding will be just like this!” I think, “I could shoot that.” After hearing Trevor complain and complain about shooting weddings (sorry hun, can’t sympathize), Peter and I finally got our first wedding videography job! Of course, what I’d really love to do is still wedding photography, but after graduating with a BS in Film Production, shooting a wedding should be cake, right?
Luckily Trevor (who interned for a wedding videography company) gave us tons of tips and advice before the wedding so we were well prepared, but looking back at the footage there are a lot of things I’ll do differently next time.
Here’s a list of things I learned from my first wedding. Hopefully any photographers or videographers who stumble across this blog will learn from my successes and mistakes.
1. Shoot with a partner! Working with another person was TOTALLY invaluable. Sure you make less money with a partner, but you get so much better coverage and are way less stressed. When I went to go shoot prep with the groom, Peter made sure we didn’t miss anything good with the bride. When Peter set up our third camera, I was able to shoot the Bride getting dressed. When Peter ran out of cards, I had an extra one. When my lens wasn’t fast enough, Peter had a better one, etc. etc. I can imagine being a solo wedding photographer, but I would never want to be a solo wedding videographer. More than anything, it’s just more fun to have you friend come along with you!
2. Shoot with a tripod or monopod as much as you can! After the Bride and Groom’s prep and before the ceremony, Peter and I walked around the hotel and got “details” of the wedding– the fountain with the guests in the background, the wedding cake, close-ups of the flowers, the ice sculpture, the food, the champagne, etc. Of course, I made the stupid mistake of foregoing my tripod for the convenience of handheld. Wrong! I should’ve known better, and of course all the footage I shot during and after the wedding (on my tripod) turned out much, much better. Stability is always worth the extra effort when you’re watching the final product. It just looks so much more professional!
3. Shoot the ceremony video true multicam style. Peter and I kind of shot the ceremony multicam (like they do in sitcoms). We set up one wide static shot on the Panasonic HMC 150 and each had a roaming DSLR to cover the bride and the groom (pretty standard video “coverage”). Unfortunately, DSLRs can only shoot 12 minutes of video at a time, so we couldn’t do true multicam, where all 3 cameras run the duration of the show and are synced together by a slate. What I wish we’d done in retrospect (not that we had the resources) was use three cameras capable of shooting for long periods of time (HMC 150s for instance) and slated our footage at the beginning. That way, in post-production, we could have synced all three clips together in Avid (the best editing program for multicam) and then easily cut back and forth between different angles for the duration of the ceremony. This would make our lives MUCH easier and result in a much better ceremony video. The only downside to this plan is that you need enough money and resources to rent three cameras.
4. Get a better microphone! One thing that I’m really glad I did was walk around after the ceremony and ask guests for video messages to the bride and groom. I was afraid that my internal DSLR mic wasn’t sufficient enough and it did the job, but I would’ve been MUCH better off with a mounted shotgun mic. For the most part you can hear the cute messages they left for the bride and groom, but sometimes the background noise from the hotel is overwhelming and you lose what they’re saying.
For the ceremony, we miced the groom so that we could hear everything he, the bride and the officiant were saying without dealing with the trouble of micing the bride in her beautiful dress. It is much easier to mic a suit jacket!
5. Make conversation with the guests. As I walked around the champagne reception and got video messages from guests, I usually introduced myself by saying “Hi, my name is Helena and I’m the wedding videographer. Is there anything you would like to say to the bride and groom?” This worked very well and most people were excited and wanted me to record their message. However, in retrospect, what I wish I found out who the guests were (and wrote it down) so that I could’ve included that information in the edited video. Also, it would’ve been nice to know which people were more important than others. That’s not to say I would’ve skipped “less important” guests, but it would’ve been nice to know, for instance, when you’re about to shoot a message from the groom’s sister or the bride’s grandmother. If I had known who they were before they said “Hey Kristen it’s your Grammy!” I could have situated them in better light, gotten a better angle or made sure the location was better for the sound recording. I realized this immediately after I started shooting one of my last video messages, a charming old woman who turned out to be the Bride’s grandmother. I introduced myself and she nodded that she wanted to leave a message, but immediately after I hit record and she started talking, her teeth were totally covered in lipstick! In retrospect, I wish I would’ve stopped her and politely told her she had lipstick on her teeth, so the Bride’s grandmother wouldn’t be immortalized (in close up) with pink teeth, but I was inexperienced and shy enough not to know what to do. If I had a better conversation with her beforehand, the problem would have arisen before I clicked record.
6. White balance is gonna be a bitch! So make sure and bring something to help you white balance on the fly! The first room we were in– the Bride’s room– was a mess of many different light sources with many different Kelvin ratings (wah wah). I tried all the presets on my camera and nothing looked right but I couldn’t miss any of the good action, so I rolled with it. Still photographers have the luxury of A) Shooting in RAW, which makes it easy to adjust white balance in post and B) Flash, a controlled source of light. Unfortunately us videographers get screwed by low lighting and gross color temperature so we have to be prepared to compensate. I’m sure all of the Bride’s prep footage will turn out well with a hefty amount of color correction, but it would’ve been much easier if I got the right color temperature to start with!
7. Bring fast lenses! Of course, to bring fast lenses, you must be able to afford fast lenses (my problem). By the end of the night, the hotel was very dark and my f/2.8 lenses wouldn’t cut it anymore 
Luckily Peter had his f/1.8 lens for the last hour of the wedding. Of course, if we were still photographers this wouldn’t be a problem because of flash and the ability to drastically change shutter speed without affecting picture quality.
That’s all I can think of for now! Now that I’ve shot a wedding, I’m hoping it will be easier to get more wedding jobs. My next camera-related investment will probably be a f/1.8 lens or a flash, so that I can start getting stills jobs. That would be awesome!
Filed under: Cinematography, Helena Bowen Photography, Photography | Leave a Comment
Tags: Advice, Canon 60D, Canon 7D, Color Temperature, DSLR, Microphones, Monopods, Multicam, Panasonic HMC 150, Tips, Tripods, Videography, Wedding Photography, Wedding Videography, White Balance
Trip to NYC
Now that I’m back on the blogging train, I might as well post some pictures from last weekend’s trip to New York City. Trevor and I decided to go down to New York to celebrate his 23rd birthday, to say goodbye to some old friends before leaving the East Coast and, as it turns out, eat more than is humanly possible.
On Friday, we had the extreme displeasure of taking the notorious Fung Wah train to New York. Six hours later, a well rested Helena and a very un-rested Trevor showed up in Chinatown. I have the wonderful ability to sleep pretty much anywhere, anytime, and Trevor has the not-so-desirable qualities of not sleeping on buses and easily getting car sick. Luckily, the second never came to fruition thanks to his William Gibson Neuromancer audiotape.
Trevor’s priority-numero-uno was to go to Saint Alp’s Teahouse near Union Square. Little did I know or realize how strong Trevor’s love for bubble tea was, until we repeated our trip to Saint Alp’s multiple times throughout the weekend. For those of you non-trend-oriented likely-Colorado-folk, Bubble Tea is an Asian favorite that consists of tea, milk, sugar and Boba (“Bubbles”), aka little black pearls of tapioca that are pretty disgusting and not at all what you expect when you first try them but that eventually grow on you and you start to appreciate their clam / muscle-like texture and flavorlessness. Here is a picture of some bubble tea at Saint Alp’s, which yes, Trevor was right, is the best bubble tea I’ve ever had in my life.
Over the course of the weekend, I had butterscotch bubble tea once (so-so) and coconut bubble tea twice (delish). Trevor stuck with old-fashioned black bubble tea.
At Saint Alp’s, we met up with two of Trevor’s friends, Joe and Italo, who then accompanied us to The Strand, aka the best bookstore in the world, whose only possible rival is the Tattered Cover in Denver on 16th Street. If you’re ever in New York, go to The Strand, and if you’re ever in Denver, go to the Tattered Cover. Especially now with National Bookchain numero dos collapsing, it’s more important than ever that we support local bookstores (cough cough parents).
Then, our weekend of extreme eating really began. Italo mentioned that he knew of a delicious all-you-can-eat Sushi restaurant nearby (called Funayama) and we decided that was the perfect option for Trevor’s birthday dinner. We were even more excited when our boat (yes, really) of sushi arrived and the feast began. Mmm sushi.
The night ended with cards and sangria in Italo’s Times Square apartment.
Day 2: The Best Laid Plans…
And so, day two of NYC food fest began with pastries at a Greek Bakery on 9th… and then cheeseburgers and fries at Five Guys in Brooklyn Heights… and then more sangria at our friend Andrea’s house in Brooklyn. Andrea has a great apartment in Crown Heights with an amazing roof top view. All of us got excited by the sight of the Crown Heights Armory, one of many old WWII-era armory’s across NYC, and we decided to go there and check it out. Luckily, someone had the foresight to investigate on their phone (me) and found out that the armory is now, unfortunately, a homeless shelter that houses many dangerous sexual predators. Plan ruined.
Instead we opted for cheesecake at Maxie’s in Times Square. Maxie’s has always been my g0-to cheesecake place in New York after its fortuitous discovery on my 11th grade Carnegie Hall trip. Maxie’s has the best cheesecake EVER. And, like 20 different flavors, all for $7.95. Much to my despair, we showed up at “Maxie’s” and surprise, it had a different name and although the unique architecture of the building was instantly recognizable, the interior decor was different. As it turns out, Maxie’s has recently been replaced by a new restaurant. We paid $10 a slice for shitty cheesecake… with only 3 flavor options. Boo, new restaurant.
Day 3: A Celebration of American Obesity
Italo and Trevor spent Sunday morning investigating the best plans for the day, and of course all of them revolved around food. Upon the suggestion of our friend Dmitriy, we hunted down the famous Wafels and Dinges food truck at Columbus Circle and started our day with hot Belgian waffles with spekuloos spread. I wasn’t sure I could eat anything ever again, but Trevor and Italo’s 2nd part of the plan was a Food Truck rally at Prospect Park in Brooklyn. Luckily, I had a few hours to walk off the waffles before getting delicious Greek food and frozen yogurt. Here are several pictures of Trevor and Italo resting off the Greek food at Prospect Park.
Italo and Trevor in Prospect Park, post-feast
Trevor
Italo (love the bokeh in this picture!)
We met up with filmmaking co-conspirator Kathy and decided to walk around Greenpoint. Little did we know that it would take us nearly 2.5 hours to get to Greenpoint (thank you, MTA, for all your subway closures) and that we would end up taking a cab out of frustration and exhaustion.
Trevor and Kathy in a G train subway, desperate to find out way out of Brooklyn
We discovered that near Greenpoint there is a Saint Alp’s Teahouse in Williamsburg. Lucky Trevor! So we went there, again, for bubble tea and met up with Dmitriy.
Just when I thought I could never eat every again in my entire life, our friends Maya and Lynn got out of work and decided we should go to a hipstery restaurant near their house. Trevor and I split some macaroni and cheese, and although it was very good, my poor stomach had a hard time appreciating it. We spent the rest of the evening in a nearby park:
Kathy and Jed in Williamsburg
Williamsburg at night
Believe it or not, we got pizza after going to the park. Sorry, Michelle Obama.
Day 4: Walking Off Day 3
After Day 3′s craziness, Trevor and I took it easy on Day 4 and dedicated most of the day to sightseeing. We started off with The High Line, NYC’s renovated train tracks park. It was way more enjoyable to walk 20 blocks above the city streets in a beautiful park than on the hot, urine-stained sidewalks below, stopping every block for traffic lights. Here are some pictures of the High Line:
The High Line
Birdhouse art on The High Line
Flowers on the High Line
Then we proceeded to Ground Zero to see the in-progress Freedom Tower at One World Trade Center. The Freedom Tower is one of many construction projects going on at Ground Zero to commemorate September 11th.
Freedom Tower
Cool pic of the Subway
We grabbed some pizza and went to (you guessed it) Saint Alp’s Teahouse one last time before boarding our much more comfortable Bolt Bus back to Boston. Trev and I slept for an hour before having an EPIC Fruit Ninja battle for the remaining 3.5 hours. Trevor always beats me, but that’s because the iPhone scoring system is more lenient than the Android scoring system (and also because he’s better at it).
Fruit Ninja screencapture
Well, that is all for our epic NYC weekend. If you actually made it all the way through this super-long post, congratulations and thanks for reading.
Filed under: Helena Bowen Photography, New York, Photography, Restaurant Reviews | 1 Comment
Tags: Belgian Waffles, Boba, Bolt Bus, Borders, Bubble Tea, Cheesecake, Five Guys, Freedom Tower, Fruit Ninja, Funayama, Fung Wah, Greek pastry, Greenpoint, Ground Zero, Michelle Obama, New York City, One World Trade Center, Prospect Park, Saint Alp's Teahouse, Sangria, Sushi, The High Line, The Kindle, The Strand, The Tattered Cover, Trevor T, Wafels and Dinges, Williamsburg
Book Review: A Stolen Life
Over the past three days I’ve been completely consumed by Jaycee Dugard’s memoir, “A Stolen Life.” Jaycee was abducted by two strangers on her way to school in 1991 at age 11. For the next eighteen years, she was held in captivity by Phillip and Nancy Garrido until her rescue in 2009. She endured years of sexual and psychological abuse and gave birth to two daughters with her captor, the first when she was only 14 years old.
Phillip and Nancy Garrido
Jaycee’s memoir covers a vast range of topics, from her life before the Garridos, to her kidnapping, sexual abuse (including many gruesome “runs” when Phillip Garrido would get high on crank [meth] and rape her continuously for days), her 1st and 2nd pregnancies, daily life in the backyard compound, excursions out into the real world, Garrido’s printing business, using the internet to have “school” for her children, Phillip Garrido’s religious zeal and beliefs, dealing with her constant internal debate of fleeing or staying the Garridos, and her life post-recovery. The book is a mixture of 1st person narration and real journal entries from her time in captivity.
What interested me most in Dugard’s account was that in spite of being almost entirely isolated from the “real world” for 18 years, she lived vicariously through the TV and internet and many of her entries seem as if she had a relatively normal life. She talks about her love of Star Trek, watching the twin towers fall on TV, her favorite Kelly Clarkson songs and waking up to make coffee and watch the Today Show. But then she reminds her audience that she lives in a tent, pees in a bucket and eats fast food every day. What a bizarre existence! And most amazing of all– she says that in spite of the Garridos ruining her childhood, taking her away from her family and abusing her for 18 years, she isn’t full of regret and she isn’t full of hate– she just wants to get on with her life.
The most frustrating element of this book is just realizing how terribly easy it would have been for Jaycee to escape and how terribly the police failed her. First of all, Phillip Garrido was already a convicted rapist on probation. His parole officer showed up all the time, but never thought to look in the backyard. There were dozens of times when the Garridos took Jaycee in public and she could’ve easily escaped, but once her daughters were born, she felt she couldn’t leave without taking them with her. Also, most frustrating of all, Jaycee had internet access for a huge portion of her captivity, but Phillip warned her that computers tracked everything you did online and that he would check up on her. If only she knew how to erase her search history, she could’ve been freed in the mid-nineties!
To properly appreciate A Stolen Life, you have to be an animal lover. If I hadn’t grown up with many pets, I’m sure I would’ve been bored by half of the book. She spends so much time detailing all of her different pets, because aside from her children, that’s all she had for 18 years. Of course, this was all part of Garrido’s method of manipulating Jaycee: Jaycee wants a cat, Garrido gets her a cat, she spends every day for months playing with it and Garrido takes it away; Jaycee gets a new cat, Garrido takes it away; Jaycee finds two cats, neighbor dogs kill the cats; Jaycee gets a pet bird, Nancy Garrido leaves it out in the cold and it freezes to death, and so on and so forth. It’s actually very frustrating to read because every time Jaycee gets a pet and talks about the process of naming it and training it and loving it, you know its only a matter of time before Garrido takes it away or something kills it, and then Jaycee is heartbroken again.
The only part of the book that I found rather dull was the extremely detailed accounts of her equine therapy post-recovery. I appreciated all that Jaycee had to say about seeing her mom and family again, getting to know her little sister (who was a baby when she was kidnapped and is now in college) and becoming independent, but all the info on horse therapy almost seemed corny and dull. So a bucket of grain represents Jaycee’s story and the horse represents the media, so a shed represents the Garridos and a horse represents Jaycee– unfortunately all of this at the end of the book was rather boring to me after such an amazing and emotional recovery. In my opinion, she should’ve ended the book after reuniting with her family and talking about her new life with them– the dullest part of the book shouldn’t be the ending.
Jaycee today
At any rate, I highly recommend this book to everyone. It can be extremely frustrating and depressing at times, but it is an amazing first hand account of the best and the worst of humanity. What Jaycee lived through is completely unbelievable and her story is definitely the most interesting memoir I’ve ever read. 4.5/5 stars.
OH– and for those of you who were wondering, Phillip and Nancy confessed to their crimes in court. Phillip received a punishment of 431 years in jail and Nancy received 36 years – life.
Filed under: Book Reviews | 2 Comments
Tags: 4.5/5 stars, A Stolen Life, Animals, Cats, Child Abduction, Crank, Equine Therapy, Jaycee Dugard, Kidnapping, Meth, Nancy Garrido, Phillip Garrido, Pregnancy, Rape, Sexual Abuse
Road Trip to LA
Hello Friends and Family!
It’s been a while…
Right now Trevor and I are planning our move to Los Angeles in August. We purposefully planned it so that we hit some cool destinations, but that we’re sleeping in a city with friends every night so that we don’t have to pay for hotels or sleep in our car. This is our route:
Boston > Elverson, Pennsylvania (Trevor’s hometown) > Columbus, Ohio > Chicago, Illinois > Encampment, Wyoming > Fort Collins, Colorado > Colorado Springs, CO > Grand Canyon > Casa Grande, Arizona (Trevor’s sister) > Los Angeles!
Approximate map:
If any of you have suggestions to cool things to see or do along this path, let me know 
We greatly appreciate the suggestions.
Filed under: Road Trip | 1 Comment
Tags: Casa Grande, Chicago, Colorado Springs, Columbus, Elverson, Encampment, Fort Collins, Grand Canyon, Los Angeles, Road Trip
I found this little gem on TED Talks this morning and thought it was worth the repost:
Filed under: Random | 1 Comment
Tags: Diane Savino, Gay Marriage, Marriage Equality, NYS Senate, TED, TED Talks
More Basque Facts!
Hello again! You may recall I posted about a fascinating book, The Basque History of the World, a few days ago. I’m back again to share some even more amazing Basque facts for those of you who haven’t bought the book yet:
From Chapter 3, The Basque Whale:
- If you look at a map, all the Basque-land borders the ocean, and it has always been a very important source of resources and pride for the Basques.
- Until Basques over-hunted them, a variety of large whales, porpoises and dolphins lived off the North coast of Iberia.
- The “Basque Whale” as it came to be known, was particularly unique because it floated when dead. An average of 50-60 feet in length, the Basque whale weighed over 60 tons and yielded over 30 tons of blubber, which could be boiled down into oil and used for fuel. The whaling industry was also particularly important because aside from beaver tail (yes, really) and porpoise, whale meat was the only red meat permitted for consumption by the Catholic Church on holy days. The ivory from whale bones was also very profitable.
- In the 9th century, the Vikings arrived in the Basque lands and inspired them to start building boats of an even more durable construction, which allowed them to start venturing North up to Iceland and Norway (summer whale habitat).
- Shipbuilding became one of the most lucrative Basque industries and they became some of the most experienced and successful mariners and explorers.
- In fact, it is believed that Basques actually arrived in North America BEFORE Christopher Columbus (1492) or John Cabot (1497) and visited it regularly. There is significant evidence to support this claim, including the fact that many fishing towns in Newfoundland still go by bastardized Basque names (and not the names Cabot gave to them) and the fact that when explorers arrived in North America, many native tribes spoke Basque! Upon further study, many native languages of North America (Canada) include elements of the Basque language and as we know, there are no relatives to the Basque language, which means the Basques must have already been there.
- Furthermore, many of Christopher Columbus’s boats were built and crewed by Basque sailors. In spite of the common notion that Magellan was the first man to circumnavigate the globe (which is clearly false considering he was killed in the Philippines on his voyage), it was actually a Basque sailor, Juan Sebastián de Elcano who took charge of Magellan’s boats after he was killed and brought them home to Sevilla, thus completing his voyage and truly becoming the first to circumnavigate the globe.
- Kurlansky writes, “Centuries later, when Spain lost its colonies and conflicting nationalisms divided the Spanish and the Basques, the angry Spanish military would no longer remember it was the Basques who secured much of Spain’s global empire in the first place” (64).
More Basque facts to come! If you don’t want to wait, buy the book!
Source: The Basque History of the World by Mark Kurlansky. 1999: Penguin Books
Filed under: Book Reviews | 1 Comment
Tags: Basque, Basque language, Book Review, Christopher Columbus, John Cabot, Juan Sebastián de Elcano, Magellan, Mark Kurlansky, Shipbuilding, The Basque History of the World, The Basque Whale, Vikings, Whaling Industry
A few days ago in Boston, there was a Rainpocalypse… It was nuts. My street was literally a river.
Canon EOS 7D w/ 28-135mm lens, f/3.5, 1600 ISO, 1/25th sec, 33mm
Canon EOS 7D w/ 28-135mm lens, f/16, 400 ISO, 1/60th sec, 28mm
Canon EOS 7D w/ 28-135mm lens, f/5.6, 1600 ISO, 1/25th sec, 90mm
Canon EOS 7D w/ 28-135mm lens, f/5.6, 1600 ISO, 1/30th sec, 95mm
Canon EOS 7D w/ 28-135mm lens, f/5.6, 1600 ISO, 1/30th sec, 95mm
Filed under: 365 Day Photo Project, Helena Bowen Photography, Photography | Leave a Comment
Tags: 365 Day Photo Project, Bokeh, Rain, Rainpocalypse
365 Day Photo Project: Day 116
The morning after I got back to Boston, me, Trevor, Peter and Padrick went location scouting for his film, Limbus, in at the Shore Line Trolley Museum in East Haven, CT. Here are some of my best pictures:
Peter sat behind Trevor in the car and we played Scrabble on our phones
Spying on Peter and Padrick with my make-up mirror.
Padrick yelled at us for taking pictures of him, so I have none. Haha. Just you wait, Padrick!
Adorable.
A glance that could kill 20 Joann’s at once
Trevor and Peter taking pictures inside one of the train barns
Trevor looking at the ads on our antique train. We’re renting one of the museum’s subway cars for two days for our film.
Awesome hand-rails on this old-fashioned subway car.
Filed under: 365 Day Photo Project, Limbus, Personal Projects | Leave a Comment
Tags: 365 Day Photo Project, East Haven, Limbus, Padrick R, Peter B, The Shore Line Trolley Museum, Trevor T
365 Day Photo Project: Day 115
A picture from my Colorado > Boston trip last Sunday. Ironically, just a few years ago I would’ve been tackled for trying to take this picture. But, I guess we’re far enough away from 9/11 that DIA no longer freaks out if you take pictures of their airport, which is definitely the coolest airport EVER.
Canon EOS 7D w/ 28-135mm lens, f/16, 400 ISO, 1/60th sec, 28mm
Filed under: 365 Day Photo Project, Travel | 1 Comment
Tags: 365 Day Photo Project, Denver International Airport, DIA
Welcome!
