Smoke on the Water
So either I’m not understanding how to change my blog layout, or Squarespace sucks. In Google Sites, it’s so easy and intuitive to change the layout of a blog. I don’t even know what a meta position is. All I want to do is put a picture on the left of the blog, and the content to the right of the blog. What’s going to happen is I’m going to get some huge picture at the top of this entry, which is not what I want. Argh.
The above is a picture I shot while in Ossining, New York. I’m trying to get better at photography to gain more of an understanding of elements like lighting, composition, and framing that serve to enhance a movie.
Inquiring minds may have noticed I haven’t written in this blog in two months. Yes. I moved to New York, PA’d two NYU shoots back to back, then moved back home temporarily to help take care of my stepfather, who’s been having some health issues. And I think I wore myself into the ground, because I now have this weird cold that doesn’t feel quite like a cold. My nose isn’t as stuffed and my throat isn’t as sore, but I feel so unusually depleted of energy. My body aches all over. I have no appetite. And it’s like, when I’m sick is the only time when I’m available to write in this blog. Grah (another expression of frustration).
Another development is that the latest short film is finished. Stephen the Fantastic Editor and I finished it last week. Interestingly, I’ve been so sick and busy helping to take care of my stepfather that this accomplishment hasn’t really set in. And I think this may also be because I have a good idea as to what’s going to happen, if PreGame is any indication: I’m going to submit this to festivals, it may get into a few good ones if I’m lucky, though it will be a crapshoot as to which ones. And more than likely, nothing will happen. I will have spent a total of $70,000 on two shorts, when there’s a very plausible chance that the only thing that will happen after this is that I’ll have two films made and a couple more worthy film festival acceptances to my name, and that’s it. I wish I could find that page I read a long time ago that said the average budget for a short film is around $35,000. And this is because I spent about a fourth of that on equipment, and about a third of that budget or more on paying professional rates for the fifteen crew members and three-person cast members I had hired for the three day shoot. And yes, I could have saved money by hiring people with lower rates. But I’m not 22. I don’t have the kind of time to build connections in the hopes that they work for free on a project I direct down the road because we’ve been in the trenches together or whatever. The money I paid is at least some insurance that whatever happens with me in the director’s chair, I’ll at the very least have some semblance of a quality product at the end of the day. I could afford the people I wanted to work with, which is a luxury you’re incredibly fortunate to have. That doesn’t necessarily mean I’d work with everyone again, though. The interesting disparity that happens when you hire someone and what they’re like when they actually show up on set (or not) will have to be for a future post.
Please know that I’m not bitter, and I’m trying to process all of this as learning experiences. And hey, I was able to make a movie with (for the most part) cool, knowledgeable, skilled people! Shoutout to every single member of the crew and cast anyway. Thinking of all of you right now; I hope you’re doing well and having success this year.
My road trip screenplay is coming along slowly. Due to what’s been happening with my family and with my cold, I’ve barely had the time or energy to write at all. I wrote about four days last week and was really proud of myself, and then got sick. Since I want this to be my job and all, I feel like I should be doing this every day. Right now, it surprises me that I even have the energy to type a coherent sentence. I really, really want the screenplay to be done by the end of the year, though. I’ve written about fifty pages or so, just trying to crank it out as a first draft with no filter or censorship on my part. And while I like the looseness of some of these particular moments that I’m uncovering as I go in this first draft, I’m wondering if I’m really building a foundation for this project. I’m trying so hard to develop a particular process so I can ask the right questions for each screenplay, but maybe each project has a particular process of its own that I can’t know until I finish writing it. Anyway, it would be really, really nice if I could have a draft by the end of the year that I’m satisfied with, even if it’s not perfect.
Really sick and feeling like I want to sink into my bedsheets. That’ll have to be it for now. Don’t even have the energy to make recommendations.