Strictly Personal

K-I-S-S-I-N-G.

Article about my love for the Mac and my start in filmmaking.

I have been so tired of working as a freelancer for so long. It seems that I have spent too much time and energy in finding work. My work had no resemblance of structure and I was generally stressed out. However, my patience has been rewarded. On Wednesday, Oct 17th, I start on a full-time position with a company that couldn’t have better fitted my ideal work environment. Small to medium sized company that produces a lot of content. Very edgy content. It is going to be an education. Woohoo!

My wonderful Macintosh G5 finally became a villain when the main hard drive died on me. The SMART system provided no warning whatsoever. And I was hours away from making backups. I swear. So currently, Data Rescue, a disk recovery program, has been working for more than a week on my computer. It has a couple of more days left, it seems. Fingers crossed. I made a lot of writing notes, I hope that isn’t lost.

CovergeSouth is showing a bunch of my films. Ava Gardner Film Festival had a SquiggleBooth retrospective and screened Dear Stranger.

We finished principal photography for “Hello. Sorry. Whatever.” Kinda depressing in that it is over, a little relief, regrets on how some things went down and excited about what is to be found in editing.

The first day of shooting for my short film “Hello. Sorry. Whatever” begins tomorrow. As I sit here writing this at 11:46pm, I am pretty friggin’ scared. Hoping the extras show up, all the locations that committed remain so, that we are patient to get what we need, that we remain in the moment and so on.

But it is all terribly exciting, how will the process play out, how much did the process bring to the moment. What finds we will make. What works better than we originally planned. Looking for magic.

After almost 3 months of pre-production, it is time to shoot.

- Taking too long editing on Walkthru, a Kathleen Connally documentary that will be on Squigglebooth shortly.
- Finishing up my main site. Sometimes, with things that there is no pressure to finish, I will carry on and on with something. Currently, the only thing left is the “Hype” page but I keep procrastinating. It is simple enough but I am simply not interested. So…
- Checking out locations, finding actors for Hello, Sorry, Whatever — a short to be shot in August. Jim who is producing the short has been wonderful. Different mindset from me but it works.
- Writing for Ticklebooth and Scene Interactive blog. Takes most of my mornings.
- Thinking about starting to write a feature screenplay.
- Thinking about recording my thoughts on audio. Like an audio journal. We’ll see.
- Thinking about what to make for Kelly for anniversary. I usually make a video of some kind.

Got back from Alabama where Kelly’s maternal grandparents live. Apu got some kind of rash around his neck, took him to the vet. Man, is it expensive.

I will be on a panel on videoblogging at the PodcampAtlanta (Un)Conference talking about SquiggleBooth. If any of you live in the area or can drive up, please do come and say hello.

The videoblogging panel will take place in Atlanta on Saturday, March 17 at 1:45pm in the Governor’s Hall room. I will stick around after the session, if anyone is interested.

Besides me, the other panelists are:
Kary Rogers - Inside Mr. KaryHead and Good Commitment
Erin Nealey - Mom’s Brag Vlog
Chris Daniel - nTune.tv and Chris Daniel’s Video Blog
Grayson Daughters - The Spacey Gracey Review

A pretty diverse group, it should be interesting.

Directions and other info can be found here: http://podcamp.pbwiki.com/PodcampAtlantaSessions
Please register here: http://podcamp.pbwiki.com/PodcampAtlantaRegistrants

Dear Stranger got into the Annapolis film festival, a great festival but also it made it in the competitive section. I was just complaining about that. When I read the news, all this stress, all kinds of insecurities were lifted. I loved that movie but the whole festival voodoo made me resent it. Welcome back stranger.