December 9, 2007

• A MikeVideo Internet Movie: Big Wednesday Dreams

  

  Last Sunday, when I posted the Santa Monica series of photographs, I mentioned shooting video footage in Santa Monica. This video doesn't contain any of that footage. When news got to me that last Wednesday was going to bring some of the biggest swells of the year to California beaches, I took the day off and took my camera up the coast. I've spent most of this weekend assembling the following video masterpiece, "Big Wednesday Dreams".  

  "Big Wednesday Dreams" 12:21

  The biggest surf in two years hit SoCal on Wednesday, Dec. 5th, 2007. This is a look at the waves in parts of Los Angeles and Ventura Counties, with surfing footage shot at Rincon Pt. and Stearns Wharf in Santa Barbara. The footage was all shot on Dec. 5th, on a road trip up and down the coast which took all day long and covered over 200 miles.

  EDIT: 12/10 5:12 p.m.pst. I finally was able to upload the video to Xanga so CLICK HERE to give the video comments and 5 star ratings! I've also got the video on  YouTube HERE.  You can also DOWNLOAD a high quality version of the video from my website by right clicking the word DOWNLOAD and saving to your computer. (If you have the time and the computer power and hard drive space to download, the download option gives the best quality image.)

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  DIRECTOR'S COMMENTARY: Last Tuesday (12/4) I read an article in the Los Angeles Times at lunch which announced that repurcussions from the winter storm which lashed Washington State and Oregon on Monday was going to hit the coast of California Tuesday afternoon. Surf conditions were predicted to be high and mighty, with up to 15 foot swells along most of the coast.

  Although I don't surf, I do like to make videos, and decided right then and there to take a vacation day off on Wednesday the 5th, and travel up the coast taking video for a new MikeVideo Internet Movie, to be called "Big Wednesday Dreams". For some reason, Wednesdays are usually the days when the swells are the biggest. The last time we had monster waves was two years ago, in 2005, on a Wednesday. In  1978, director John Milius titled his surfing movie "Big Wednesday". A lot of surfing folks were talking about a Big Wednesday on Tuesday last week.

  I tidied up my quotes, documentation , and panel testing at work, and let everyone know I would be taking the next day off. One of our Vice Presidents, whose sons surf down in Orange County, gave me the URL to the Surfline website, which lists surfing conditions, and I called up Surfline and other surfing websites Tuesday evening, looking for the biggest predicted swellls, and the best surfing areas. I only had one day, the surf was predicted to peak in the early morning, with the biggest waves around San Francisco, and up to 15 foot swells in Santa Cruz and Ventura.

  I contemplated driving up to Santa Cruz on Tuesday night with my camera charged and packing plenty of empty tapes, but I didn't want to drive that night after working all day. I do get into work at 5am and had been up since my usual 3am waking time. So I retired early, and figured on heading out early Wednesday morning, getting as far up the coast as possible while it was dark, and then driving south when the sun arose.

  The trip started before 6am. First I had to drive through Los Angeles, and then over to Santa Monica, where I had just been the week previous on a photo expedition. There shouldn't have been much traffic, since it was quite early, and the freeways were easy until I got to the 10 West on the way to Santa Monica. A truck had crashed into the center divider, slowing traffic for about 15 or 20 minutes. As soon as I passed the wreckage, which closed two lanes, it was smooth sailing all the way up the coast.

  Sunrise came just before 7am, and I was just past Malibu Beach and environs. I got out of the car first at Pt. Mugu, and the waves didn't look that fantastic. Only West facing beaches had been predicted to get the best waves, and as I drove north, I stopped at some of the beaches where I spied surfers parked along Pacific Coast Highway.

  The biggest wave footage, as promised in SoCal, was in Ventura. Early in the morning, a surfer had been thrown into the pilings of the Ventura Pier by the swells, so the city had banned going into the water by the time I got there. No surfers, but plenty of big waves. I spent about a half hour around the pier, taking photos and shooting video. There were a dozen or so photographers around the pier, and even a Channel 4 News Van. After shooting lots of footage around the pier, I got in the car and headed north again. The pier, which is wooden, was closed to foot traffic, so I couldn't walk out onto the pier to get waves crashing into the pilings.

  The best surfing footage I got was at Rincon Point, near Carpenteria State Beach. I stayed there for an hour or so, and then travelled to Santa Barbara, which was the northern most point of my trip, about 100 miles from my starting point. I ate lunch at 11am in the original Sambos Restaurant, on Cabrillo Drive, across from the Stearns Wharf, and after lunch, I shot some video of surfers around the pier.

  Since it was now noon, and I had already used up half my battery, and had shot almost a half hour of video, I decided to go back south, and catch some of the beaches I hadn't stopped at on the way up the coast. By the time I was back in Santa  Monica,  it was late afternoon. I shot footage in Manhattan Beach and Hermosa. The Hermosa Beach Pier, which is reinforced steel and concrete, was open to the public, and I got to go out to the end and shoot footage of the waves breaking against the shore from what looks to be out in the ocean. When in Santa Monica the week before, I couldn't get sunset footage because I ran out of tape. On Wednesday I ran out of batteries.

  With over an hour of footage, having travelled over 200 miles, I decided to call it a day. I downloaded the footage into the computer on Friday night, and spent most of the weekend constructing the video, which is slightly over 12  minutes long. I finished before 6pm on Sunday, and was not able to upload to Xanga until Monday night.

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  EDIT: 12/12/07 8:45 p.m. pst. From comments: "(Aren't you guys in CA on PST now?)" Posted 12/12/2007 8:02 PM by tongfengdemao - delete - block user

  YIKES! Yes, Faith, we've been on "standard time" since October. I'm not going to go back and change the text on the video (yet) however. Suffice it for now that I've added this disclaimer showing I am aware I made a mistake. Here's my attempted save: I guess since it's a movie about surfing in December, we're dreaming of summer all year long.

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