Tapestry of Memories
Tapestry of Memories
A full documentation of a journey into Oneness.
A full documentation of a journey into Oneness.
I remember walking into my communal living area in college to one of my suitemates explaining about a man named Jay Alvarezz who travels the world living completely free.
In midair, a straight, blonde haired man unzips the suitcase to anothedr curly haired kid unraveling himself out the suitcase. They get paid to travel the world and to live happy. We were deeply inspired to create something totally crazy. Using my friend's GoPro, we decided to travel to local springs and create a video that could perhaps free us from the already seemingly chaining situations.
I had the suitemates number and on spring break, doing nothing but sitting in my office playing video games, (there was literally nothing to do in my small hometown) I called him up and told him how I felt trapped and wanted to do something fun. To which he mentioned that we need to go to Ginnie Springs in Orlando. The goal was to create an amazing video that would b e our first point of entry into living a life of our dreams.
So within a week we packed our bags and I convinced my mom and paps I should go. We recorded the whole thing on our tiny GoPro with some drone footage. It was my first video.
He had passed away in 2020 on the third saturday of July.
I remember having gone on a trip during the summer just months earlier right after school had ended in April. My friend Lee and I wanted to make a breakthrough video, deeply inspired by the freedom of Jay Alvarezz. He gets payed to travel the world and visit the most beautiful places. That's the freedom we wanted to create.
I called Lee. I remember feeling trapped at my house. No car or anything. I wanted to create and to be on my own. My father had just died. I told him the news. It felt like it was now or never. It felt as though my back was against the wall. It was now or never that we make this happen.
I compiled my footage to make my first video.
But it felt empty. It was a load of cool effects, but no story.
I wanted to document something that had a kind of an emotional value. That could bring others to the same understanding that I had about life, but through carefully crafted sound design, model movement, and music.
I needed to speak to the soul of the other.
I knew that my short films might be a bit lack luster at first. But I needed to start somewhere.
The weird part is...to speak to somebody else's soul, you need to do something first that inspires you. This is where I started to lean a lot towards eastern philosophy, particularly among effort.
How can you TRY to make somebody feel something? You cannot. The Tao says something similar. "When the wisdom of the Tao is present, action arises from one's own heart. When the wisdom of the Tao is absent, action arises from the rules of kindness and justice." In other words, you can't TRY... in the act of making an effort to do something, the wisdom of the Tao is not present. Osho's book the Supreme Understanding models something similar. With a foundational basis of belief based on Tantra, he states almost the same thing. noting the difference between Action and Activity. Action is done spontaneously. Activity is done because you "think" you need to do it. In other words, it's uneccessary to "work hard". Because when you work joyfully, it's not hard work, it because a moving meditation.
With artisty, To speak to somebody else, to move them as I was emotionally moved, you have to do something that emotionally moves yourself, and then allow them to jump on.
The point then becomes to have as much fun with it as you can, and share that. Sometimes it'll speak to others. Sometimes it won't. But to those who are receptive, they can absolutely feel the energy shared through the video.
I saw an instagram reel that said... "how much would you pay to see a video of your fondest memories?" So I wanted to take a crack at short films. To create and compile footage that could speak to others... who doesn't want to see their fondest memories?
It was at this time sometime in December that I met somebody who would introduce me to habits like journaling and back into meditation. This would allow me to heal parts of myself that I had left untouched or was too afraid to face. The energy from the interactions would allow me to move forward with the healing process on many emotional blindspots.
I still needed to practice however...
In order to make my dream realized, I would have to create a portfolio. But where would you start? I was in College at the time, and decided that in the midst of being in a fraternity, I would just start compiling footage and see what ideas unfold then. This is where the portfolio started to come alive.
I wanted to create a rush video for my fraternity... but would only find I would have 3 days to do this. I organized unique personalities to come out, with Dario's racecar outfit shooting and some sports clips. Shooting would be within 4 hour spans, and I would bring the camera out to every event I could.
I began to document activities with my fraternity, and a lot of theseevents were at sorority philanthropies.
I was late to this entire event. It wasn't a paid gig, but I did it because I knew that over time I could gather footage that would be useful later. I only got but maybe 30 minutes of action in the event, but I thought of this as a challenge. Sometimes you have to make due with what you got.
Here's another crack at practicing new technical skills learned such as Color Grading in Davinci and Printer Lights. This was about the time I had switched to using DaVinci Resolve for Color Grading. Even with my 8-bit footage I pulled some amazing color :D
Interestingly, word had spread I was the local videographer. DG was so impressed by their video done previously, I was hired to do their spring event just a year later.
It seemed to all go full circle. I was struggling to find how I was going to pay rent for the month, and my mom was a long time alumni of Delta Gamma. It felt as though they were here to help.
These videos highlight the most notable events. I was constantly busy. In between classes, I was editing while charging my batteries, managing storage onto my cards, and then visiting another event to go to. There was always a philanthropy to support, a fraternal sports game, as well as my own personal projects.
With all the events I had and a year more of practice with my camera, I compiled all my footage to create an extremely solid video of Sigma Alpha Epsilon... one that would last them for years.
I would finish my degree at home. But even this had it's turmoil.
While I was away my mom had been battling stage 4 breast cancer.
One day at a time she kept going. But her condition kept worsening. Little by little would things grow worse.
(insert video of her of the video of you driving away in the car.)
That day was the day I said to her... choking down everything I could... "I feel like i'm watching you die."
When my father had passed, I remember seeing him looking forward into the corner of our living room. Something felt off. But he and I were having trouble getting along. I was afraid of it being another fight. So I said nothing. Had I known that would be his last day, I would have said something.
Seeing my mother in her condition... I had to tell her. To jump over the choking fear of telling my own mother I was afraid I was never going to see her again. \
When I moved out she would fall periodically. She was crippled by the cancer. I was hours away. It wouldn't do any good to drive over. She had to call for help.
This happened repeatedly, and eventually she had to stay at a hospital where they would take care of her
PARAPHRASED
She would be at a hospital
Hurricane swept Sarasota and took out power for a time
I couldn't reach her or didn't know where she was.
But I recieved a phone call on October 5.
She was gone.
Now show this is where I'm at now.
A journey into Oneness
Name of project
Name of video