Hello!

I decided to start this blog about the Leaves of Grass Project for two reasons:  as a way to keep notes for myself as I put theses videos together, sharing the discoveries, research, frustrations, decisions, etc. that are involved with the production of each video,  and to invite engagement in the project from anyone interested in following along behind the curtains. 

Some background on how I started this project: 

I began this project in June 2010 thinking that I would post a few videos of selected readings from Leaves of Grass as a part of the 19th century poetry readings I was posting on PoemsBeingReadtoo YouTube channel. 
At that time YouTube had a time limit on the duration uploads could be.  For that reason I had to abridge what I read to offer even a sampling.  

As I began making these, YouTube increased the time duration limits, and with that increase I posted longer videos. Quickly YouTube again increased the duration to 15minutes and with that it became painful to abridge the readings.  It was at that point I also decided to expand the project beyond a few selections and thought I would post all of Leaves of Grass.  I kept no diary about the project, but it was well into it when I changed the scope to be to interpret the whole of Leaves of Grass as a visual presentation as well as a reading. 

Along the way, I began including flash animations and drawings along with mash-ups I made for the project, and I began to use these more frequently as I continued. 

Where this project is and where it is going:

Presently, I'm about two-thirds through Leaves of Grass.  My plan now is to finish this first time through (I will end without including the annexes.) Then I shall  start from the beginning and redo the early videos i made that were abridged and read and animate them properly.  Finally, I hope to make a third pass through and make a more polished presentation of the entire project. 

There's a long way to go! 

James