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“Down Town” – First shoot on Canon 5Dmkii

Well I finally got it… er, well, my employer got it…. but we’re attached at the hip.. MY hip.

The Canon 5D. Pretty much the first DSLR to change the term to “HD-DSLR” by some crowds. For those who aren’t familiar, it’s a full frame still photography camera that shoots video. 1080p HD video as a matter of fact. This camera has started a blooming trend amongst film makers who are on a budget but still long for the amazing quality and depth of field offered by higher end cameras.

There’s part of me that feels a little behind the curve when it comes to shooting with this technology though. Considering it’s been around for over a year or so, and the more I research about it and watch tutorials and read blogs, the more I’ve realized that there’s a LOT of people who’ve already migrated to this technology. I’m actually even afraid that the next model (the 5Dmkiii) might be released as soon as next month at the Canon Expo, which I only found out there was such a thing a few days ago. But oh well. We had to make the purchase for the church before the end of August for budgetary reasons, so it is what it is.

First impressions:

1  - The images are incredible! I’ve watched a lot of films shot with this camera and knew that the picture and depth of field was stunning before I got it. But it’s different when you’ve shot it yourself and can look at the results on a large screen and see it face to face. I’ve never been able to use a piece of equipment that makes such gorgeous pictures.

2 – I have no clue what I’m doing! I’ve never considered myself a photographer and have only tried on occasion to act like one. But every time all I do is turn knobs and twist dials until something looks good. Then I push the shutter and the result doesn’t look at all like what I set. So I try again. Video world is just different. The end result is meant to look the same, but the terms and workflows you use are night and day. So I’ve got a lot of learning to do.

3  - The 5D seems to be less purposed for being a video camera than the 7D(which I rented a few months ago). I think it’s safe the say the 5D simply has the feature to record your Liveview, whereas the 7D has an actual “video mode” switch. On the 5, you have to go into the menu and setup the video recording function. And when it comes to image setup, on the 7 it’s what you see is what you get. On the 5, you can put it in full manual mode and make exposure/shutter/ISO adjustments, but when you hit record it does an auto light adjust and changes to what it thinks looks good. It’s been kind of frustrating. Chances are this is just something I haven’t figured out how to fix, but I haven’t gotten to watch through Phillip Bloom’s beginner tutorial set yet. These are just my thoughts out of the box.

I’ll continue to post more thoughts as I shoot more. I’m taking vacation next week and will be doing plenty of experimenting I’m sure.

Let me know what you think of the film(more specifically the images). It’s comprised of the footage straight off the camera, no color correcting or anything. I just rented a basic Canon 24-105 f4 IS lens as all I had at the office was a 75-300 zoom lens that would fit it. As Phillip Bloom is arguably the worldwide leader of the HD-DSLR movement, my style mimics his for the time being(in fact I’ve been writing this blog in my head with a british accent simply because he’s all I’ve been reading/watching for the past 4 weeks). I’m sure I’ll be more creative in time, but I’ve got to learn the ropes first.

Enjoy…

Down Town from Evan Logan on Vimeo.

Aug 21, 2010 | Categories:Photography, Portfolio, Video | 3 Comments »

Just Like You – A Father’s Day Tribute

Just Like You from GBC Media on Vimeo.

We put this together for Father’s Day 2010. It was my first shoot on a Canon 7D, so there were/are still many things I need to learn. For instance the flickering in brightness particularly in the last segment. Guess that’s just a downside to using SLR lenses. Hopefully be able to purchase one of these soon and shoot more stuff like this.

Special thanks to Chad & Abby Carney, Monte & Miller Manguno and John & Katie Longworth.

Jul 14, 2010 | Categories:Featured, Portfolio, Video | Leave A Comment »

Prideful About Your Book Library? There’s an App for That!

New post at RevisionBlog…

http://blog.revisionchurch.com/?p=773

Jun 23, 2010 | Categories:All, Blog, Media, Uncategorized | Leave A Comment »

Revision Church

Some of you might have seen several shout-outs recently from my facebook and twitter accounts about Revision Church.

This might cause you to ask “what is this Revision Church? And what’s Evan got to do with it?”

Well Revision Church is a new church plant that’s starting in Olive Branch. Birthed out of a calling that was growing inside of some of my closest friends, as well as myself, Revision has evolved over the last few years from an idea, to a goal, to a simple bible study, and now to an official church start. These friends that I refer to are mostly seminary students/graduates that I have grown extremely close to and have found that we all share the same passion for the spreading of the true gospel, the raw teaching of the scriptures, and the growing of Christ’s Church. As we grew closer we started noticing a need in the area where many of us had close ties… Olive Branch. This need consists of the fact that the population of Olive Branch grew from 3,500 in 1990 to over 32,000 in 2008! And in the same time period only 1 Southern Baptist church has been successfully started.

However, the need we found in the Olive Branch area wasn’t the only thing that led us to our conclusion of planting our own church. We also realized over time that we each had a passion for the same philosophies of ministry, we learned and grew from many of the same pastors and church leaders, and we all had a heart for instilling solid, biblical doctrine and practices back into the local church. These, along with our belief that the local church is God’s ordained method of spreading His glory, helped us realize that this is what God was calling us to do.

Revision is still in the early stages of growth. We are currently just meeting as a core group on a weekly basis for prayer and bible study as we continue making preparations for a hopeful launch in January 2011. We are unique in that we already have a pastoral team built from the beginning as opposed to one pastor who starts a church and builds his team. Each of us have different ministerial roles but all have voices in the decisions and direction of the church. We also will continue to work on a volunteer/bi-vocational basis until the church can afford to support full-time staff.

As for me, I still continue to be fully involved with my family at Germantown Baptist. I love my job here and believe God has me here for the time being to help bring creativity and art to our worship services. My job description has broadened recently since graduating from college, and I will be more involved with website development/admin as well as video production. This is exciting for me and I’m thrilled about the direction we’re going from here and what God has for us when we find a new pastor.

My role at Revision is pretty much identical to what I do at G-town. Right now it weighs more on the web side of things as we just launched our brand new site and blog. For those of you who appreciated reading my more theological and spiritual posts, I will probably begin posting most of that content on the Revision blog and use this one for more creative, media-related subjects, as well as trying to keep my portfolio up to date.

Pray for Revision Church and our leaders, that we would be completely surrendered to what God wants us to do. These first few years of a church can be the toughest times as we gather support through finances as well as building our core group of believers. Pray for our endurance through the struggles and that we have joy in knowing our work will have eternal significance. Pray that our heart grows for the people of Olive Branch and that we would continually learn how to serve and love them.

I’m listing our leadership below for you to pray for individually if you’d like, as well as their roles in the church and their twitter accounts.

Ben Williams – Lead pastor

@theBenWilliams

Job Dalomba – Teaching/Community Groups pastor

@jobdalomba

Josh Kubler – Worship Pastor

@joshkubler

Garrett Brewer – Student & Children’s Pastor

@idonthaveatwitteryetbutimworkingonit

Evan Logan – Media/Communications Director

@evanlogan

Also, don’t forget to check out our new sites and find out how you can get involved!

http://revisionchurch.com

http://blog.revisionchurch.com

Jun 03, 2010 | Categories:All, Blog, Featured, The Church, Uncategorized | Leave A Comment »

Make War Promo

Make War Promo from GBC Media on Vimeo.

Teaser video for Student camp 2010… had fun with Andrew K’s Optical Flares…videocopilot.net/products/opticalflares/

May 06, 2010 | Categories:Featured, Portfolio, Video | Leave A Comment »

Art vs. Words

I was mulling about an issue tonight that surfaces in the church realm frequently. It has to do with using art in church and what it’s place is next to preaching and other methods of spreading the Gospel. John Piper said several months ago that they don’t use a lot of media/visual arts in their services for fear “It’s going to communicate that preaching is weak, preaching doesn’t save, preaching doesn’t hold, but entertainment does.”

The uproar from the Arts and Multimedia world was pretty widespread. This is because the natural tendency after reading such a firm declaration is to challenge it. And who can expect less from the group of people that the author is, in a sense, “attacking”. But my post here isn’t really a defense of either side. I’m a Multimedia Director who considers himself a “Piper-ite”… which, for me, is really nothing more than being a “digital” disciple. But through my mulling I had a little epiphany that helped me understand where the difference lies between preaching with art and preaching with words.

To me this issue really boils down to a core philosophy that has to do with the method which you express a meaning or idea. Your idea is the original thought before words, pictures or sounds are used to express it. The words, pictures and sounds(plus other methods I haven’t listed) are merely the means of translating your idea into something that others can comprehend. Now what I’ve come to realize is that each of these methods of translating fall on a scale with two ends. On one end of the scale there is the abstract way of conveying an idea and on the other end is the explicit, or intentional way.

The abstract way of expressing ideas leaves room for interpretation by the audience, the explicit way does not. The explicit way serves one purpose, to portray a specific understanding of the original idea with no room left for interpretation. My point here is to show that the two items being discussed, art and words- in their purest form, fall at different ends of this spectrum, and we can choose where to place each of our methods between the two ends.

Art at it’s purest form is meant to be interpreted by the beholder. It’s not explicit, not direct, not intentional of any kind of meaning. That’s what makes it art. Artists, when creating their works, don’t intend to express an explicit meaning. If they did, they would just write it out, IN WORDS. Instead they want the audience to take their creation and be free to read their own meaning into it. That’s what makes art so enjoyable, the less explicit the better. Words on the other hand, in their purest form, are the exact opposite. We have words and languages because it is the most direct, non abstract, method of conveying meaning. When you want to know the ultimate meaning of something, you ask for it to be conveyed in words. It’s why we use email in the office instead of pictures and pantomimes. The absolute ultimate method of conveying an idea clearly is through words.

Now, when it comes to which methods are acceptable to use in a church service.. the truth is, both your spoken word sermons and your visual art pieces will fall on the scale between abstract and explicit. Where you place them on the scale is up to you. Your (creative)videos have just as much ability of “preaching” as does your pastor’s sermon. But where it falls on the abstract/explicit scale is what determines it’s artistic value. So the question isn’t about method really. It’s about the amount of clarity you want to use in presenting your message. As in most situations, I believe a healthy balance is always important.

God, who is the ultimate Preacher, uses all forms to convey His message. In abstract ways He shows His glory through creation. All the way from the expansive galaxies down to the tiniest form of the double-helix, God has proved Himself to be the most exhaustive of artists. But He also expresses Himself in direct, explicit methods. Scripture is our prime example of how God purposefully wrote out a message for all humanity to hear. In it we have the clearest example of the character and nature of God that there has ever been, Jesus Christ. It’s God literally putting his message in human form for us to vividly understand.

In regards to John Piper, it’s pretty clear to me that he’s more of an explicit kind of guy. And in this I would support him in the sense that there are truths of the Gospel that should not be portrayed abstractly. They’re strict ideas that come from God and should be treated with strict methods of conveyance. And Piper has based both his church’s service-style and methodology around this principal.

Personally, I believe every church can choose where on this scale they let their methods fall when it comes to portraying the Gospel. But each will reap different benefits by doing so. I think Jesus used a certain balance of explicit preaching and abstract preaching by means of parables and stories. So as a church, find the balance that works best for your audience and go with it. But don’t forget that “best” isn’t debatable, because “best” means making your audience the most like Christ. That is the Church’s goal and as soon as your method of conveying your message hinders that, you’ve missed the point.

Mar 04, 2010 | Categories:All, Blog, Culture, Media, Spirituality, Theology, Uncategorized | Leave A Comment »

Deviate

Deviate from GBC Media on Vimeo.

I felt like painting one day. So I turned on the camera and went at it.

We also used it during our DNOW 2010 weekend… conveniently themed “Deviate”:)

Mar 04, 2010 | Categories:Portfolio, Uncategorized, Video | 1 Comment »

Vimeo Content

I’m starting to load some of my custom loops and backgrounds onto my church’s vimeo account.
These are free to download for all you video gurus out there.
There are several in triple-wide format and 16×9 as well.

The page is found here
And be sure to check out the WorshipVJ page as well for more free stuff!

Enjoy

Mar 03, 2010 | Categories:Blog, Media, Portfolio, Uncategorized, Video | Leave A Comment »

Ice pic(k)s

Just shot some photos with my iPhone this weekend during the ice storm in Memphis. Effects done in Photoshop Mobile and Tilt-shift Modulator.

Jan 31, 2010 | Categories:Photography, Portfolio, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

#Passion2010//Awakening (a skeptic’s 180)

awakening

(deep breath)…

Wow…

After already trying a couple of times to describe my Passion 2010 experience to someone, I’m realizing how inadequate all my words are. I’m either struggling to find enough words to describe it, or I’m using way too many. The closest thing I can come up with that somewhat gives justice to my feelings is to repeat the theme for the week… Awakening!

Let me see if I can explain…

When I heard there was going to be another Passion conference this year I wasn’t the least bit surprised. I literally thought to myself, “well… I guess they got off their little ‘world tour’ high and now they’ve got to come back to pay the bills”. The event really wasn’t a big deal to me at that time and I didn’t intend on going. My overall perception of the Passion “movement” was becoming more and more cynical ever since I went to their last big event in 2007.

I didn’t like the fact that they kept saying “the movement is turning into a global awakening”. I thought it was trying too hard to make itself into some huge thing that it wasn’t(at least in my eyes). And that view stayed with me for a while, probably because I had chosen not to keep up with what they were doing or attend any of the tour events. I thought they had pretty much passed their prime and most likely wouldn’t make it much longer.

passion-04802I considered myself a balanced skeptic because I felt like there were just things that the Passion guys didn’t “get”. I respected their heart and loved the music and messages they produce, but I couldn’t help but think they were more concerned with starting a movement and becoming(or staying) the “next big thing”. And God was showing me that it’s not about that. My view of Christ and His church has been so refined over the past several years and I just felt like the Passion crew wasn’t “about” the same thing I was “about” anymore.

But as you can probably already see…I went… and all that got blown away quick!

It started first thing too. In session one, Louie introduced the idea of being “awakened”. And the thing he wanted us awakened to was a true understanding of God, His plan, and how He works His plan. In his final session he rephrased it as having a “complete 180 degree theological turn around” and that is what produces everything else that Passion is. To which I gave a huge “right on!” in my mind. Because that’s exactly what’s been happening to me in the recent months and years! I was so glad to hear that preached out loud to these college students.

screen-shot-2010-01-07-at-123033-am

The rest of Louie’s first talk was about Lazarus and how the details in that story were so contradictory to what everyone else thought should happen. Lazarus’ family warned Jesus that he was sick and dying. Yet Jesus waited two days before going to see them. He LET Lazarus die. Why?

“But when Jesus heard it he said, ‘this illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.” – John 11:4

SO THAT GOD MAY BY GLORIFIED THROUGH IT! That’s why! To which again, I was like “Yes! That’s it! That’s exactly what I’m all about!”. I just never thought that these guys had gone that deep. I didn’t think they understood that God’s underlying purpose in saving us doesn’t have anything to do with US at all! It’s all about Him!

As the week went on God continually reversed my perception. Not only by showing me that the Passion movement had really been on this wavelength the whole time, but also by showing me that this wavelength was much bigger than I even thought.

So not only did I NOT get disappointed by what I experienced, but instead God glorified Himself in me far more abundantly than I ever expected. And he did it through the people that I doubted for so long.

wade_top25ish_daytwo_small-10The whole week reverberated with the message that the end goal of God is to glorify Himself and that we receive ultimate satisfaction in Him when that happens. I came to a stronger understanding of God’s universal plan that started in eternity past with His predetermining of our creation and purpose. Then because man fell away from Him, God sent Christ to restore us into fellowship with the Father. But I realized this week that so many times we stop with the crucifixion, as if that was the mighty climax in God’s story. But NO! That’s not the end! The end goal we strive for and look forward to is the glorification of God for eternity which will simultaneously overwhelm us with ultimate joy!

That’s the last act! That’s the climax! And that truth was the most important thing I was “awakened” to during the last 4 days. I just pray it happened for every one of the 22,000 students that were there also.

I’ll post more details about the different speakers/sessions in the next few weeks. I just wanted to attempt to convey the fact that God will always blow away your presumptions/expectations when you don’t see it coming. I’m so grateful for how He opened my eyes this week and can’t help but continue to seek His glory as my life’s purpose from this moment on.

I’m also grateful to hear that Passion is in fact becoming a movement that intends to help awaken young people the gloriousness of God! With a goal that is so God-centered, I’m am more than convinced that my generation has the strongest potential for grasping and spreading the truth than any generation before us. So bring it on God! Plant your spirit in us and work out your plan to the glory of YOUR name!

If you have anything to add or are encouraged by this at all I would love to share in that with you. Please either comment here or on my facebook or shoot me an email evanlogan@gmail.com

*photos taken from the 268 blog - http://268generation.com/blog/

Jan 07, 2010 | Categories:All, Blog, Culture, Spirituality, Theology, Uncategorized | Leave A Comment »