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Special Report |
LAST UPDATE July 12, 2005
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| site design imagesparkle.com |
| September 4, 2004 |
Media School Without Borders
Onboard project to document the Peace Boat through the eyes of youth |
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| Media School Without Borders Founder and Director Morgan
Paar |
Morgan Paar wasn't in the video club at his high school, but that didn't stop him from going on a
10-day Puerto Rico field trip with them, where he discovered his future career. Today Paar has been
working in video for the past 17 years, taking him to over 30 countries. But the real discovery for
Paar was when he realized average people could achieve a "film look" at a fraction of the
cost. "We're able to shot a lot more, because an hour of mini-DV costs $3.50, which is broadcast
quality. An hour of 16mm film costs thousands of dollars," Paar said. "Filmmaking is no
longer just in the hands of rich Hollywood executives." |
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| Morgan's portable video studio (Photo Courtesy Morgan Paar) |
For less than $3,000 anyone can have an entire portable production studio, that includes a laptop
computer, camera, external microphone, storage hard drive and other equipment. The revolution came
in putting a new medium of expression within reach of a large number of people, much as cameras became
an engine of mass media in the hands of individuals a century ago. Paar thinks we should take advantage
of easily learned editing software and the Internet to shift away from the uniform company-run media
that fills our daily life towards smaller sources of information. "Film has been around for over
a hundred years and its only been in the last seven years that its available to just about everyone.
So its time to make media, its time to get your ideas out there," he said. |
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| Morgan and video students from Rosa Parks elementary school (Photo Courtesy Morgan
Paar) |
This idea of people-based information and personal expression came when he was angry over the slashing
of arts funding in his community's schools and decided to bring media arts to youth in his city of
Berkeley, California. "I taught English to children in Taiwan and film-making to adults at the
University of California at Berkeley. I thought I'd put the two things together and teach film making
to kids," he said. People in the video industry said he was crazy to put a $2,000 camera in the
hands of young people. To balance that out, he kept the classes for his project, Media School Without
Borders, limited it to four students. "I knew there was an attention span I would have to work
through, but I was amazed at how they picked this stuff up. This kids are producing pieces better
than some stuff I saw in graduate school," Paar said. |
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| Nicola Michael-Tsai trying a coconut drink in Sri Lanka |
Nicola Michael-Tsai was in one of his first classes at Rosa Parks elementary school, financed initially
from Paar's own pockets and a small grant from Berkley Public Education Foundation. "I was into
photography with my mom, so I was really interested," Nicola said. Most of her friends didn't
know what to think about video. "To them it was just another after school activity." As
their first project, Paar proposed focusing on a new skateboard park in Berkeley, but Nicola pointed
out most skateboard videos focused only on boys and insisted on shooting women skateboarders. "Nicola
liked the class so much that she convinced her grandmother to buy her a $800 video camera. And she's
told her mom she wants to be a film maker," Paar said. |
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| Tiana Leonard-Miller shooting in Massawa, Eritrea |
Unlike other after school programs, video work is very involved and complex. "The main thing
I'm trying to teach these kids is how to go through a many stepped process and come out with a finished
product," he said. That process got larger when Nicola convinced Tiana Miller-Leonard, her best
friend since preschool, involved in their next project travelling on Peace Boat. "I thought it
would be the coolest after school program," said Tiana, whose first chance to play with a video
camera was on the ship. On board from Japan to the United Kingdom, along with the girl's mothers,
the team worked on a project entitled Youth On Assignment : Sailing Towards Peace. Over five weeks
the girls shot material for two short films while Paar documented their process. Tiana, who learned
how to use some computer software by herself, focused on fashion around the world. "The hardest
part is trying to make the camera steady, but the best part is getting to watch it afterwards," she
said. |
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| Scientist Dr.Gordon Sato on board Peace Boat |
Carrying 200 hours of mini-DV tapes, Paar anticipates it will take around one year
to complete the editing process. More than just an end product, he sees film-making as the ultimate
teachable moment. The team had the chance to met many of the guests who come on board Peace Boat,
such as Dr. Gordon Sato, a prominent molecular biologist and cancer researcher who is quietly working
in North Africa to develop a sustainable economy using mangrove trees. Dr. Sato, as a Japanese-American
civilian, also experienced internment by the United States government during World War II in Manzanar,
California. "It's not just a story in a history textbook, but true learning from an actual
person who was there and they're going to bring that back home with them," Paar said.
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| Tiana and her mother relaxing on the ship |
With young people ages 2 to 17 watching an average of almost 20 hours a week of TV, according to Nielsen
ratings, Paar wants to turn passive viewers into active makers. Nicola's mother Cindy Tsai agreed,
saying video is a fantastic creative tool for youth's own activism. "There is a way things are
dumbed down for kids and I think that does them a disservice," Tsai said. Tiana's mother Jeni
Miller works with Tsai at San Francisco State University Health Department, serving low-income people
in California. Miller said media gets thrown at young people everyday in a one-way relationship. "The
idea was about kids taking control of media and to come out with a finished product that actually
gets seen," she said. |
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| Nicola talking to the audience while her mother watches |
Although the Internet as a video distribution tool is still developing, Paar pointed
out other technology that makes it easier to share self-produced media. Portable digital projectors
serve as mobile movie theaters, while DVDs allow high-quality copying. "You can stick a DVD
in the mail and you can mass produce these for less than five dollars," he said. Along with
using the Internet to introduce and spread their concepts, the Media School Without Borders group
plans to enter their work in ten film festivals across Canada and the United States. "It
gives us such an opportunity to learn so much about the world. Anyone's country, any group's story
can be told. And anyone can tell it - including kids."
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