Video Project Free-Write #2

Word count: 889

So here is the basic layout of how I believe my video will go:

The video will start with a shot of the white popcorn ceiling in my bedroom. In one continuous shot, I’ll go from the popcorn ceiling, to the window, to the door, and then to a black screen. It’s hard to describe it, but I’ve already recorded it and I swear it makes more sense when it’s played out rather than written out. This part will be like a “day in the life” from my point of view during the time I was sick. The first thing I would see was the ceiling, then the window, then I would turn towards the door, and finally stand up and lose my vision. This was due to the autonomic nervous system disorder (POTS) and the lack of blood flow to my brain after standing.

I’m not going to include any music in this scene because I don’t want it to seem overly dramatic. After the screen turns black, I would insert the sound of a racing heartbeat, ringing, and quiet labored breathing to simulate the entire experience of what I saw and heard while standing up.

This is an important part for me to include because so much of my disability stemmed from my inability to stand up without difficulty, but not many people understand what it feels like to lose your vision and hearing every time you stand up. I’ve described it a million times to many different people, but until someone experiences the actual vision loss and sudden silence paired with standing up, it’s a little difficult to imagine. Having a scene like this might clue people in, if I can execute it well. I also like the idea that while this scene is happening, the audience isn’t going to really know it’s significance. The audience will realize afterwards what that weird black screen and ringing was all about.

After this whole scene about standing up, I’ll probably jump into a voice-over narrative that would continue throughout the rest of the video. I started working on it a little bit, but it still needs a lot of work so I’m not going to share it just yet. I ultimately want the narration to be a piece that is able to stand on its own. Obviously the images, videos, and sounds would be there to make it better, but I’d like the narration to be a story that can stand alone without the video.

Over the weekend, I went through an old computer that I used to use when I was sick and accumulated some pictures and videos that I could include in my project. I only managed to find a few pictures that I think I could work with, but I also found quite a few videos. When I was sick, one of the main things I did to pass the time was play music. I have tons and tons of videos on my Photobooth of me playing covers of my favorite songs at the time. They aren’t good in the slightest, but they were enough to make me feel like I had something to work towards in my life. I wanted to become a better musician and I’m so glad I recorded those videos so that I could look back on them now and see myself at that point in my life. I’ll be honest, watching those videos back this weekend made me a little emotional just because I looked so young, but I remember making those videos as if it was just last month.

Here are screenshots from a few of the videos in chronological order:

I was playing piano in this one and I think it was within the first year of being bedridden.

I like that these show the changes in my bedroom as my illness progressed. Notice the orientation of my bed changed, my lap desk became a rolling tray table, my vanity stool broke, and the head of my bed is slightly elevated because I got a hospital bed instead of continuously packing pillows behind me.

My bedding changed and I got fancy dresser knobs!

We repainted my room and rearranged the decorations on my dresser here because I needed somewhat of a change of scenery.

Since it was a desktop computer that I was taking the videos on, you can see my room pretty clearly in the background. You can also see the evolution of the layout of my bedroom. I went from my bed facing my desk to my bed facing my dressers, from a small lap desk to a rolling hospital table, from stacking pillows behind my head to an adjustable hospital bed, among other things. So much time passed between the start of my illness and the end of it and I want to use some of these videos in my project to show that.

Like I said before, that time of my life doesn’t feel like it was that long ago, which I think is why I was shocked to see how young I looked in the videos. I’m hoping to use this as a sort of shock factor for the audience as well. I want to convey the message of how isolating chronic illness is and how unfair it can be. Maybe by showing myself in the actual moment of being sick and not just a reenactment of it, the viewer can understand the severity of the issue a lot better.

So overall, I feel pretty good about the direction I’m going in for this project. While I don’t have a solid outline of every shot yet, I have material I can use. It’s just a matter of piecing in together in a way that will tell the story the right way. This week, I’m going to continue working on the narration and gathering the last few materials I need so I can tie everything together this weekend.