001: Another Starting Point
or, Who is this Guy?
This is a new copy of another post from back in June. I didn’t know what I was doing with Substack then, not sure I do now, but no one saw it, so …. here ya go.
I find myself reflecting on beginnings as I embark on the latest shift in my platform endeavors.
Since the dawn of the internet 30+ years ago, I’ve had any number of websites, newsletters, blogs, and anything else that came along.
Most of them were very niche, specializing in reports, rants, tips, and techniques about various technologies.
They almost always required learning a host of technologies to talk about other technologies.
I tended to shy away from the simple way of doing something because, for some reason, I felt as if it was cheating or somehow not real if I didn’t take a long, arduous path.
I freely admit that they weren’t set up as profit centers, but rather as Feynman Technique exercises that I had hoped would catch on or lead to something else.
As a result, I got really good at diving into the latest and greatest. I also became really good at teaching people about gear, gadgets, and software. I was a natural. It was easy.
Most were folks who had no interest in learning anything about “these g**-d***, m*****-f****** stupid things,” as they often called them.
I never thought a 78-year-old grandma would use language like that… But she had to become a grandma somehow…
The goal with any of my gigs was to make cash to fund my creative projects, initially music, then writing, and eventually films and theater.
Life then said hello, derailed that which I dreamed, and I stopped completely.
I didn’t know what it was called then, but I now know it is what Steve Pressfield calls “Resistance.”
I ignored my call to the creative life for years. I dabbled with various blogs, nothing to write home about. The call, though, nagged at me.
I’m from a family of writers, so why wouldn’t it?
It got so bad that I eventually took a couple of English and theater classes at a community college. My English instructor wrote on my final paper something to the effect of, “A++. You’re a good writer. Now go get yourself published!”
Now, despite having a journalist grandfather who was the actual guy who broke the story of the Hindenburg explosion to the world, a mother, a father, and both sisters who were all writers, I barely graduated from high school.
My father died in the fall of my sophomore year, and I became “attitude boy,” and not in a good way.
I failed English 10 twice, English 12 once, and had to repeat both in summer school AFTER I graduated. I can still hear my mother saying, “Oh my Gawd, what is wrong with you. It’s your native tongue!”
To say I had trepidation about returning to college after all those years would be an understatement. It was, however, a decision that would change my life. That English instructor changed my life.
I wrote my first play in theater class. That instructor gave what I’d come to discover is the worst writing advice one can ever give … “write what you know.”
That fall at Burlington County College, those two courses, changed my life.
Since then, I realized my boyhood dream of becoming a writer, photographer, and filmmaker. I’ve written short plays, multi-act stage plays, short films, feature films, documentaries, training videos, and numerous promotional materials for non-profits.
I have planned and shot single-camera shoots, as well as solo-run multiple two- and three-camera shoots, recorded sound on all of them, edited, color-corrected, and delivered the final products.
Somewhere in there, I became a BlackMagic Design DaVinci Resolve Trainer, passing all five end-user tests AND all five significantly more complex trainer tests, even though only three were needed.
I am nothing if not a craftsman. I love the intricacies and minutiae of writing, cameras, and software. I love rummaging through my gear closet to find the little bit or bob that went missing, and if I don’t find it, inventing another way to do what I need to do.
I love the producing, entrepreneurial, and business side of it.
I love it all!
For the past eight years, I’ve run Raindance New York, hosting a variety of filmmaker events and seminars, and, for the past three years, an annual short film screening in New York City.
I fully believe in and am committed to NonDē, Ted Hope’s Non-dependent cinema ecosystem movement.
I am nothing if not optimistic. I will never say “we’re in a unique time in the film business” or “Everything is imploding.”
It always is.
My hope for this industry and life stems from Billy Joel’s “Summer, Highland Falls,” about 50 years ago. Back then, everyone was saying how horrible things were and, near as I can tell, they never stopped saying that. (The video isn’t hot, but the audio is!)
Even though the major studios have abandoned theatrical distribution, and God-knows what will become of the WBD-Netflix-Skydance thing, I believe the overwhelming evidence is that the global market is still there. All that is needed is for people to create good movies and films, and put them in theaters; the audience will show up.
The film market is now very much open. I see it as shooting fish in a barrel. All we need is some moxie, entrepreneurial spirit, good films, and, well, cash to create an end-to-end NonDē infrastructure.
There are distinct differences between “making content” 🤮, making movies, making art, and crafting artistic and transcendent films that are also commercially viable AND entertaining.
As William Goldman said seven times in Adventures in the Screen Trade, “Nobody knows anything.”
I am no different, but it has been said to me that I know a lot of stuff about creating stuff. You might call me “the fountain of useless knowledge at the intersection of art and commerce™️”.
We can look at all the bits and bobs that are out there and figure out our own path forward.
In many respects, I’m bubbling over and have to organize my thoughts. This is my attempt to do that.
It’s my sincerest hope you find something useful here.