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Jon's voice: Okay, welcome to the director's commentary track for "Is it a Good Idea to Microwave Dynamite?" This is actually the first episode we ever used the "do not try this at home" disclaimer on.
Something else you'll also notice about this intro that has been different than all the other intros in the show is that it was done with two separate cameras and edited together like an actual scripted sketch.
And the reason for this is because it WAS scripted and it was shot with two cameras. The "Is it a Good Idea to Microwave Dynamite?" episode was actually a school project of mine.
My junior year of college I was in Digital Filmmaking and Motion Graphics. I created the title sequence for Motion Graphics, and the rest of the episode was my final project for Digital Filmmaking.
I got an "A" in both classes, so I think it worked out for the best. So, that's why you see here this title sequence actually introduced some elements that we later on used, like the running Jory, where he runs across the screen...
and wipes the picture with him. That was something that I did as part of my Motion Graphics course. It was something I learned how to use. And we also, when we were in college, had access to greenscreen equipment and much nicer cameras.
Kind of like that wireless lab mic that Jory's wearing right now. That was a piece of equpment that we got through Emerson College. We borrowed all of the cameras, the microphones. All of the stuff we used in this episode we borrowed from Emerson.
We kept calling it a "device", because we were somehow paranoid that, if we said the words "dynamite" or "quarter stick", we would somehow get into some sort of legal trouble.
But really, it was legal to do it in the state we filmed it in, so I don't know why we were paranoid. It just seemed like kind of a dangerous act to be doing on the Internet, so we played it safe and kept calling it a "device." It was stupid!
So, this one episode of the microwave show is the only one out of all 200+ that was filmed with four separate cameras. We have the camera on the microwave, we have the camera on Jory.
We have THIS camera on the microwave, and then that wide shot way up on the hill you saw us zoom out of a second ago.
That voice you just heard was Joe Collesano. He was my college roommate, and he helped us film this. But this is the only episode of the microwave show he was ever a part of.
This is Joe here, on the left, filming with the other camera.
There he is!
Yeah, so we filmed this episode with two Panasonic DVXs, the camera we ended up using for pretty much most of the show, as well as an HVX200, which was an HD camera.
Part of this episode was actually filmed in high definition, but, as you already know, we never got a chance to post it in high definition.
That's our friend Ezra Horne. He was also there with us, because he was the sidekick for season 2. So, of course, he was there.
That's me wearing my favorite coat. Rebecka made me get rid of that last year. I was very sad. I loved that coat! It was in the family for a while.
So, this whole little documentary feature here was a *** to edit, because we were rolling with two separate cameras, neither was synched, one was on some of the time, the other one was on the rest of the time, and I had to piece together what happened.
But mostly, it was a *** to edit, because we were arguing over whether or not Jory would have enough time to light the fuse and run away.
We were convinced that my dad had bought the dynamite, you know, 20 years ago, wherever he got it, in New Hampshire somewhere, and he had cut it. And we were, like, "Well, how much is left? How long is that fuse?"
So, that's me and my father kind of arguing with each other, trying to figure out, "Wait- so, if you got it this way, then it MUST be safe!"
So, this is Jory running for his life.
And here's the explosion!
Of course, that scene of Jory behind the rock and him running for his life? That was actually a separate shot. We filmed that afterwards.
We filmed him running for his life and him ducking behind the rock, because we didn't have a camera there at the time. That would have been too dangerous, because it was right in front of the microwave.
But that wide shot you see of him running? That was, of course, real.
And that's also how we got that super slow-motion shot, that wide, wide shot, filmed with the HD camera. The HVX actually has 60 frames per second, and we rented it from Emerson College just for that purpose.
I should say "borrowed." We didn't have to pay money, because, you know, we were students there.
This part of the episode is kind of funny, because Jory doesn't know which of the two cameras to look at, since we were filming him simultaneously with both of the DVXs.
This episode is actually the only episode, because I did it for a school project, that I storyboarded and scripted out first. And if you stay tuned after the video, I will show you some of the storyboards.
And this credits sequence is actually the only one in the show's history to use the full theme of the microwave show. Usually, it's just a shortened version.
And there's the ideo Productions' logo that was used for the next few years.
So, anyway, here are the storyboards I promised. I had to write these for my Motion Graphics class, planning out the motions and the ideas I wanted to incorporate into my final project.
As I said, I did end up getting an "A" on that, so I guess everything worked out for the best. I got an "A" in two separate classes and made this awesome YouTube video out of it. So, everybody wins!
And Jory has said multiple times that this was his favorite experiment to film, just because it was a big adventure for us. We got to go out into the woods, my dad came along, Ezra and Joe were there, we had four cameras. It was a lot of fun!
Anyway, that does it for this director's commentary track, folks. Thank you for listening. My name is Jon, and I hope to talk to you in the very near future.