devils & dust

What Sharp Teeth You Have
Vidder: affablyevil
Fandom: Hanna (2011)
Music: 2-1 by Imogen Heap
Warnings: Violence, possibly epilepsy warning.
Summary: Once upon a time, there was a wolf.

Gift for eruthros for Festivids 2013!



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password: teeth

( Lyrics )

Dear Festividder,

I am so excited to be participating this year and I am thrilled that you are offering (I hope!) one of the fandoms I requested. I'm so sorry I'm putting this up so late; if you've already gotten started feel free to disregard this entirely, though hopefully my thoughts aren't too far afield of what you were considering, if you already had some ideas. You're welcome to read this and take it as a direction or you're welcome to ignore it entirely! Please take this commentary as suggestion only; if you were eager to embark in a different direction with the source, I promise I'll be absolutely delighted.

Brotherhood of the Wolf, Wall-E, Hanna, and Attack the Block are safety fandoms; only Batman Beyond and Caprica are not.

You'll note that I did not suggest music, because I find for myself that it is highly personal for each vid. Broadly speaking, things I love most are sweeping visuals, well-crafted VFX, and anything and everything eye candy, but here I'll go a little bit into the themes that I really loved in the fandoms I requested.

Generally speaking, I love narratives about self, identity, of friendships and found families, of one's place in the world, of believing in and being instrumental in the creation of a new future. I love the development of new technologies and humans interfacing with that, but I also love unusual heroes exploring familiar stories in new ways. I love love love pretty footage, and robots, and colors and interesting camera uses, of visual motifs, slow-mo and interesting CGI.

( My Requests )

A Conviction of Angels
Vidder: affablyevil
Fandom: Supernatural
Warnings: Some visual spoilers up through season six. Violence, character death. Possible epilepsy warning.
Summary: "This isn't the first planetary enema we've delivered." When Zachariah traps Sam and Dean in an alternate universe where they are not themselves, they seek help from an old friend they haven't met yet.

for spn_reversebang

Download: Please check back!

---

( Notes and Stuff )

The Life and Death of Amy Pond has been on playlist Möbius repeat, because it still breaks my heart and dazzles me with equal measure.

Sometime last night it occurred to me why I've been so disappointed lately with Supernatural's episodes and it's because of the recent trend of utilizing cases as device rather than serving them deconstruction or origin stories.

"Maybe. Evolution is about mutation, right? So, maybe this thing was born human but was different. Hideous and hated. Until he learned to become someone else." —Shifter!Dean, 1x06 "Skin"

Cases without context unfortunately fail to really engage my attention, because I'm in it for the metaphor narrated via CGI. Or even less than that, I'm not picky. Because Supernatural has always tried to flavor its monsters differently, tried to do new things with the metaphor to connect it with human experiences — through tragedy and trauma primarily. But after building an interiority like: the monster within, pedophiles, domestic abuse, years-dead secrets, being a POW, and so forth, well, just defeating the monster becomes not enough anymore.

Fringe's "monsters" trend towards "people who do insane things that cause unintended havoc for specific reasons," while Supernatural's has been more about how the monsters are connected to specific aspects of ourselves, magnified or distorted. I want to see how it, as a monster embodied, relates to other things in the mundane world — how it mirrors it, or subverts it, or how it feeds into the larger narrative, or how it changes the characters we are lensing through. Barring that, I want the monsters to have stories of their own — which is exactly why Gabriel worked so well for me.*

If you can recontextualize human problems into an internalized fantastic, then I will easily forgive a budget that doesn't deliver as dazzling a spectacle as I was hoping for — but in the absence of both, well. Character-wise as well, I've been feeling more off-balance and disconnected than I ever have, and it's been oddly disquieting not having that touchstone.

This has been a bit of a downer post. I still love the characters and spend a disproportionate time thinking about this show and all its little odds and ends, and even if I haven't been connecting to it the way I've used to I'll continue to watch with optimism for when I do again. I'm looking forward to this week's with a lot of glee, despite the miles of words above, so. :)

* Granted, sometimes the metaphor can go off the obnoxious deep end and/or is the Buffy episode "Beer Bad."

Since my creative ventures are busy foundering in the seas of development hell, I'm reinvigorating my love of vidding by watching awesome vids! So here, have a few vid recs!

( It's been so long I've forgotten how to cut. See them here! )

Cosmic Love
Vidder: affablyevil
Fandom: Supernatural
Subject(s): Castiel, Dean; free will against destiny.
Warnings: Massive spoilers for seasons four and five. Violence, character death.
Summary: What would you rather have: peace, or freedom?
( watch under the cut )

I hacked my program file on Saturday so that I'd be able to use Final Cut again, and since then I've been in the midst of working frantically to recontextualize narratives and try not to freak out overly much. However while my enthusiasm for it on Saturday probably helped power the entire coast, I got far enough into it that I started running into ideological balance issues and narrative congruity and unfortunately now I have to access my brain and make sure I'm saying what I definitely want to say. Too bad the ending of S5 is extremely frustrating in delivering a lot of the stuff I wanted delivered. But that's okay, because screw you I will take the text and run with it.

That being said, barring any fits of creative rage I have most of the structure worked out and the dramatis personae are all making their appearances, most of the music marked off and a general theme going on.

When the waveforms aren't cooperating or I don't quite have the right set of frames for a clip, at least I have Castiel's stupid mug to stare at. While he's staring back. Creeper.

all roads lead to the same destination. 1280x800 | 1440x900 | 1680x1050

"Destiny can't be changed, Dean."


I'd love some feedback on this, so please drop me a comment if you download!

I have no excuse for this.

My ability to exorcise this episode lasts for limited periods only; inevitably, I find my train of thought wandering back to it. I don't think it really counts as a "fan" mix, because it's not something I'm particularly happy about; it's just something I can't take my mind off of. It's about disenchantment, and heroism, and yeah, plenty of despair to go around. It's about being human and being at the end of days, so. About as cheerful as that would be.

Warnings: heavily implied drug use, apocalyptic themes.

( Like You Never Had Wings : a mix for Castiel at the End ( 8 tracks, 46.8 minutes, 68 mb ) )