Happy Anniversary! This is round about the one year mark anniversary edition of this column, so for any of you who have been following since the beginning, thanks! I wasn't entirely sure I had enough to last a whole year, but as it turns out there are lots of topics yet to cover.
The wonderful worlds of tangents and impulses can bring a lot to the table, so I expect I will wander back often to them. If something comes out that inspires a column, as long as it's worth talking about, why not? There are one or three (not two, that's cliché) pieces based on recent movies I have noodling around. Sometimes these start as being about a specific film then eventually lose even a reference to the original inspiration by the time I'm done. Isn't how GOOD WILL HUNTING was written?
I still have plenty of how-to columns to write, since there aren't really many I have covered so far. A few I keep putting off because I want to experiment. I have a few ideas about how to make a very fluid and controllable but dirt cheap steadicam. It's either going to be a lifesaver or a backbreaker. Tough call. I want to spend some more time playing with new sound equipment, recording, editing, cleaning up, and mixing. I'm trying my hardest to make a whole bunch of mistakes, jot down what went wrong where, and have it ready to pass along to you.
There are plans to cover a lot more genre theory, the romance, the documentary, action, porn (maybe not), and so forth. Take each genre, break it down, look at the core elements in pieces and as a cohesive whole. I would like to expose the formula so it ruins the experience of watching these movies. It sounds like a dick move, but if you can see how many movies follow the exact same formulas, patterns, or designs, it will help. Either you can be that much more aware of what is marketable, mainstream, or otherwise in the comfort zone of a distributor, or you can conversely work against the standards and try and be a different voice or vision.
My plans for the past year included a few projects that didn't take off. So too am I making a long list of projects for this year, including some holdovers from last year. Hopefully if a few of them go somewhere I can keep a running journal of the experience and post those as a series. Always a noble intention, until I remember how completely overwhelming getting low budget, short schedule works together can be. Time to sit down and write a few hundred words? Yeah, that might have been my lunch, sleep, or curl in the corner and weep time, but what the heck.
Actually, this is why I have a mini tape recorder. A great friend gave it to me years ago. She told me she knew how frustrating it was that i couldn't turn on or off my mind when I needed. When I was driving, at the coffee shop, taking a smoke break, or just not around paper or a computer, I didn't lose anything. Sometimes I will use it just to sound ideas out. Get a linear explanation, then listen later and see what questions I have.
As you can tell, this isn't the most thought out column I've done. I figured coming in and writing about the past year and the next year would be enough. As it turns out, I didn't have quite enough to fill a whole column. In the interest of trying to squeeze a point out of this, I'm sort of doing the same thing with a short I'm developing.
Over a few beers the other night, we came up with a great premise. We thought it through, looked for holes, looked for different angles to come from and which ones to avoid. We went over what might be seen as similar, and how to avoid it or address it. We thought of problems inherent in the nature of the story, as it involved a core hung on some science fiction. We worked the concept from most angles.
I was jazzed about it, ready to write it up. It's a two, maybe three location piece, so we could easily film the whole thing, location approval pending, in just a few days. The only problem was, we had not developed the story. How many characters were there? Who were they, what were their names, how did they behave, what did they do?
It sounds like we didn't have much of anything, right? Well, it's sort of like planning a cross-country trip. We knew where we wanted to wind up, all the places to hit, some things we wanted to bring, and why we were taking the trip. We just hadn't looked at the road map yet. There are definitely roads to get us to where we need to go. It's just a matter of finding them, stringing them together, and maybe keeping an eye out for a few extra stops on the way.
That's how I've been approaching this column, to a degree. I know where I want to wind up, and all of the sights I want to show as I act as tour guide through my thoughts and experience, such as it is. I just want to allow for the occasional detour. If I was told I had three months left to wrap up my column, we could skip some of the side stops and just hit the key locations. Until that happens, the fun is in the details. Do you go to the Grand canyon and just hit the gift shop, grab a post card, and move on? Hopefully you take some time and explore, take it all in.
So thanks again for taking this journey with me, and hopefully in the next year I will cover some more interesting stuff. Green screen is on the list, once I get good enough to do something other than "radioactive person" at any given location.
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| Make Me Proud |
Every other Monday
Exploring everything you should consider as you make your
indie masterpiece.
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| Patrick Storck |
Patrick hails from Baltimore, MD, where playing by the rules is frowned upon. Only average things come from playing it safe.
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| Contact |
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