Middle Earth Ranger Forum

Alright, it's been a little while since this discussion got going, but I'd like to bring everyone up to speed a bit, and to make everyone aware that it IS still, in fact, being worked on, even as I type.

I have a small collection of video clips of myself, and I'll be doing a day trip with David and possibly one of his brothers shortly after christmas, so I'll have some stuff of them as well, in short order. To add to that, Ernildihir has sent me nearly a dozen awesome video clips of himself and TWO other rangers, together in the field.

Lastly, a HUGE thank you to Elegost, who out-of-pocket snail-mailed me a CD all the way from the UK with some stellar test footage for his fan film with some fantastic scenery which he's graciously allowed me to use in this promotional project.

The two of them have given me a good chunk of material, but I can't finish cutting this together yet. I still need help from you!

In order to get the message across of how diverse, skilled, and awesome you all are and how awesome this hobby is, we need to see more than just three different groups of folks tromping around in the woods (though I'll admit, there's very little "tromping" happening in the clips I've received...these guys REALLY went for it!) I need a few specifics.

If ANYONE has a spare moment, no matter the video quality, to do one or more of the following (don't feel constricted by the descriptions, of course...if you're able to go above and beyond, feel free!) it would be a huge help. I need a clip of:

- any old chunk of metal (a blade-in-the-works would be awesome, but not necessary) heated up and being hit on an anvil...just a few seconds would do. Wearing modern clothes is perfectly fine for this.

- ANY sewing/leathercrafting project in-the-making...even a few seconds of running a needle through some scrap fabric would work, or cutting some scrap fabric with scissors, tooling leather, punching holes, pounding eyelets or rivets...anything like that. Just up close enough so that we get the jist of what's happening. Wearing modern clothes is perfectly fine for this.

- ANY sort of WMA practice, from grappling to dagger to longsword to spears to i.33 and anything else under the sun. Test cutting water bottles is great! SPARRING WOULD BE AWESOME, preferably from you folks that have trained a bit, to show educated viewers that historical WMA is important to the community. Again, modern clothes are perfectly fine for this, and the clip need only be a few seconds. You can even film a few plays from a fightbook; doesn't have to be a free-spar.

- Fire-making. Still need one of these...broke my firesteel recently, haven't had a chance to get a new one, so I can't take care of this one myself. Just a few seconds would work, you don't have to be in kit...you don't even have to start a fire! Just hit your flint and steel together to make some sparks on camera with a chunk of charcloth, or get a coal in a next and blow on it for a few seconds.

If you would like to volunteer for any of these, please speak up and let me know. I'm not giving anyone a deadline, and I don't want anyone to feel obligated, but I really don't want this to be a ton of clips from 3 people...I really want to show the community for what it's capable of.

If there's anything else you can think of (anyone have nice Tolkien handwriting that wants to film themself writing a few words or drawing a map, for example?) feel free to volunteer it!

Thanks again to everyone who's submitted clips already...you've been a huge help! I'm looking forward to getting this going again, and hope to hear from a few of you soon!

If you can wait until January, I'll see what I can do--I'm swamped right now between the holidays and finals, but I could easily show some fire-making, bottle-cutting, and/or leathercrafting.

Greg wrote: If there's anything else you can think of (anyone have nice Tolkien handwriting that wants to film themself writing a few words or drawing a map, for example?) feel free to volunteer it!

It wouldn't take me more than a few minutes to produce a recording of myself writing out some Tengwar... I'll have to see if I can borrow a calligraphy pen from someone, though.

January's just fine, Chris! Thanks, both of you!

Depending on the weather this weekend, I can either film some smithing, or a little bit of leathercraft. We don't have a digital video camera, but our little camera will shoot short silent films if that's okay.

Perfect, Eric.

Greg, we can knock a couple of those out when i get home this month. We can spar (in or out of garb), and I'm planning on making the arms of my new tunic less... "poofy"; which will entail sewing.

Good point.

We'll hand stitch those sleeves, probably...it'll hold up better. John's volunteered to spar with us as well.

That being said, folks...we spar with modified shinai. This doesn't mean that we couldn't use some additional sparring footage from the lot of you. Especially since, compared to a lot of you who have trained under instructors rather than independently with the old fight manuals, we basically have no clue what we're doing.

Yeah, we just like to beat each other up with big sticks. Should get some more footage for this project this week.

Thanks Greg, Glad the Footage could be of use. I look forward to seeing the finished project!

Alrighty...major necropost here, but it's pertinent.

It's been four years since I first posted this project. I still am working on it, believe it or not, but I can honestly tell you, it hasn't taken that long to edit some video footage...it's taken that long to get a sizable collection of footage.

Here's where I'm at: I have enough footage to put together the length of advertisement short that I'd like to...but I do NOT have a wide enough variety of footage (particularly a wide enough array of participants) to justify finishing it up. If I do it right now, there'll be a heck of a lot of myself, and I don't want that. NOBODY wants that...


So here's casting call number, oh, three or four...

Read the first post, and get cracking on getting me some short clips of you doing Middle-Earthy things to help promote the site!

Still looking for clips of:

-Hot Forging
-Shooting
-WMA Practice (in-kit not necessary)
-Throwing
-Crafting
-Hiking
-Around Camp shtuff (smoking, cooking, whatever)

Ready, GO!

How did I miss this the first time you posted it? I think this is a GREAT idea! I would love to participate! The only two things I could document at the moment are shooting and crafting, but I'd be happy to put something together for both of those. I probably wouldn't be garbed for the crafting, but I may be able to get some video of me shooting in garb - especially if you don't mind waiting a little while for me to get out and shoot at an SCA event or two.

It might take me a few weekends but I can get decent video of almost all of those shots. I currently own and operate my own small fechtschule and have several advanced students that would look great on film. I will also happily take to the woods and get some good coverage on camp life and such. Also Ive almost finished a new set of double bellows for my forge at which time I'll take some forging shots as well. Good grief there just aren't enough hours in the day.

Indeed there aren't.

Thanks for being willing to pitch in, guys! Don't worry about kit for crafting photos, etc. I've got shots of Chris Russo in Pajamas crafting in a lounge chair with a woodstove in the background, so...yeah.

I know you asked me for some throwing vid, I will give it another go as the stuff from Thanksgiving was not very good. I really wish I had a better camera for the task.