I have little choice. For most of every week, I am glued to a monitor. It’s been an important part of how I make my living for many years. Doing video production ensures lots of screen time.
A bit of history
It started when I was working as an anthropologist. I found that videotaping ( and it was tape in those prehistoric times) was a good way of preserving and presenting what was going on in the multi-ethnic community I was working in. Hours were spent in front of monitors as we “pulled down” edits on the now ancient editing machines. There was nothing digital about the process. A half-hour documentary could eat up a hundred hours of edit time. It was a time of sweet dreams, working in anthropology, and creating programs that benefited the community.
This all phased out as I moved on to working again as a woodcarver and at UPS. In those years, my only screen time was playing games and watching movies with the kids.
Then, for fun, I produced a short documentary on a dairy farmer I knew in the small community where I lived at the time. It proved very popular. Soon, I was approached by the local Access TV people to do some work for them. One thing led to another, and I eventually was offered a full-time spot with them. I didn’t waver long in accepting, and video and lots of screen time became a big part of my life.
Managing screen time
These days, I only work part-time, but it’s still a large dose of time three days a week in front of the monitors, recording, editing, reviewing, and doing downloads and uploads. I have my methods for dealing with it. I break the time up by going out for walks and working in the garden. This time of year, I am chopping wood for kindling and hauling wood in for the woodstove. My cats and my dog are big disrupters of screen time. The cats, Marcus and Sabrina, parade in front of the monitor when they want attention; often. They also jump down from the plaant shelf and make “edits” when they land on the keyboard. This results in a “keystone cops” sort of chase that gives me a break from work. Max, the dog, has his own methods of breaking into the work, which result in trips outside.
By nature, I am not a person interested in sitting for long periods of time, and I enjoy activity. So I don’t see the amount of screen time as a problem. Perhaps if I didn’t have so many physical activities to break it up it would be. For a more sedentary individual than I am, my amount of screen time would probably be an issue.
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You are such a creative person. This post is an example of what I mean when I say an artist isn’t defined by what people create, as much as it is by how they see the world. I love that, for fun, you created a documentary. <3
Well, for an anthropologist, it was like being in a candy shop. So much sweet stuff to choose from.
Back in the early 90s I made a video for the park I worked for/with. I used the equipment at the university where I taught. It was so much easier than the film I made in China, 8 mm spliced mechanically (now rotting in the go-raj) And then? Making videos for my classes using presentation software? Wow. It’s been a wonderful trajectory of technology.
The term “pulling down an edit” comes from the old film technology. It is impressive how far we have come.
Wow a film in China, that’s incredible.
Just a little project in 8mm that no one but me has ever seen. I did it when I was teaching there in 1982/83. If I had more courage I’d go dig it out and see what shape it’s in and see if it could be digitized. Courage or not being lazy, not sure.
I think you should have it digitalized, Martha.
It’s been stored for almost 40 years, Lou. Do you think there’s anything on that film?
It will depend on how it was stored. You’d need a competent film transfer company to do it. Not an amateur.
Yep. It’s been stored very carelessly, I’m afraid. BUT you’ve given me a reason to dig it out.