First Shooting

I have gotten ahold of a couple of people who are willing to be interviewed for my documentary. One of them is Sharlynn Daun-Barnett, a tobacco specialist of UB's Wellness Education Services and member of the UBreathe Free initiative. She said she would be happy to meet with me sometime after October 17th, though I haven't heard from her since then.

I also haven't heard from a former UB student who I was supposed to interview this past weekend. She seemed somewhat eager to do it, but since then she hasn't been returning my phone calls or texts. Hopefully, I can still work something out with her, because I think she would be an interesting voice in the discussion. She has created artwork protesting the UBreathe Free policy, which would be nice to present in the documentary.

I did, however, go to UB and have quick interviews with random people on campus. Two of them smoked, two of them did not. I was surprised at how difficult it was to find smokers to interview--it seems like UBreathe Free is actually working! I also took a lot of photographs and video of cigarette butts on the ground and "UBreathe Free" signs that were throughout the campus.

The issue I'm having now is that I can't get my videos to import into iMovie. I don't know why--I was able to do it last time, and I think I'm following the same steps this time. I hope I can figure out a way before I have to turn my camera back in! The photos are able to be imported, but not the videos, for some reason.

What seems to be the case is that my video files are MTS format, and they need to be converted in order to work in iMovie. I tried to do this, but the free version of the converter creates a watermark on the video. I don't want this, but I also don't want to spend $40 on the full version! I'll try to figure out another way to do it.

Documentary Project Theme

For my documentary, I would like to explore the “culture” of smoking, and on-campus groups that are trying to ban it. As a non-smoker, I tend to be on the latter’s side, but this will give me an opportunity to see the positions of people on both sides of the issue. I thought this would be a particularly relevant topic to document since it was just announced that Buffalo State was taking steps towards eventually banning smoking on campus.

I think a majority of my documentary would focus on the University at Buffalo (which I attended for four years), for they have had a smoking ban for several years now. By focusing on them, I can investigate if the ban seems to be effective, what motivates the people who enforce it, and what student opinion of the ban is. I would interview the UBreathe Free organization, investigate what exactly they do, and what options they give smokers who are either trying to quit, or refusing to quit. I would also interview people who are against the ban. I would try to get in contact with a fellow art student I knew who created artwork protesting the ban, claiming that the ban was anything but “free.”

I would ask UBreathe what they think about people who think the ban is going against their rights, and ask smokers (or those sympathetic to their plight) if they believe smoking is infringing on other people’s rights to breathe clean air and have a cigarette butt-free campus. I would then turn to Buffalo state faculty and students, and see what they feel about the impending loss of smoking culture on campus. Possibly, at the end, I will compare these on-campus bans to national and worldwide trends of eliminating smoking in public places, and what this means for the smoker who is finding fewer and fewer places to light up.