I recently shed a lot of inner turmoil. About 2 weeks ago, I decided that I wanted to focus on a few issues and not be worried about what may or may not affect me; let’s only worry about what is in front of me, not hiding in the bushes nearby. One thing at a time, that’s all I can care about. My time is getting more and more precious as I commit to gigs and projects. I don’t have time to be worried about little things. Surprisingly, I have honored that commitment, plus the one to get off my lazy ass and get more physical in my daily routines. 
I’m still on a high from this past Saturday’s shoot. It was exhilarating to shoot. The execution matched the intent, and with George, it surpasses expectations. I haven’t felt like this in a few years. Has it been that long? I guess so. I entrenched myself in HORRORS OF WAR for a time, then the marketing of it. Then for the past 12 months, I’ve been in money making mode more than personal storytelling endeavors with movies. As much as the itch was there, I could not scratch it. It feels as though the stars have realigned themselves and delivered unto me the will and the path to the future.
Sunday, as God’s day, was a day of rest. I did nothing filmmaking related, besides all my footage was digitized on the computer at the office in a codec that is hard ware reliant with the Matrox RTX2 card & software. I cannot edit this on any machine without the same hardware and codec. My obsessive compulsive disorder has gone crazy, although not on Sunday. I watched CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND on Blu-Ray in the original theatrical cut of the film. Then I made out with my woman when she got home from work. It was a great follow up day to Saturday.
Yesterday, after completing my meager editorial jobs, I plunged headlong into the edits of my latest project. Now, the original intent was to edit all the greenscreen footage raw, and worry about post production and compositing until after I had final cut the picture. That makes sense. I can surmise what I need for each background, any character animations, and even make DVD’s for the illustrious inner circle of people who will help me complete these mini-pieces of movie magic. This is the most efficient and logical way to do it.
So of course, I decide to go ahead and do an entire rough cut of the first piece, composite it with the test images I asked TJ to make, and then I added a temp music track along with a first pass at the title sequence. I chuckled to myself as I watched the semi-finished bit. My hopes and dreams are coming closer to being a reality with this.
Today, I had more edit jobs to do for work before I could start to tinker and play in the new world I’m creating. I diligently complete my tasks, complete with a spell check and verification on the 2 Suzuki spots I worked on, then I dived into the next clip. Again, TJ sends me backgrounds that match the piece I’m working on, so I composite and try to complete this 2nd one as well. Now I have 2 semi-finished clips.
Tomorrow, I intend to do the other 7 green screen clips and stick to the original plan. Edit for picture, composite and finalize later. I’m already in touch with a composer (Arya) for the score and my cousin Ian to do write and perform the theme song. Some of the remaining pieces will require character design and animation, so those will take longer to post. My impatience to want to share these ASAP kills my OCD, but it will be worth the wait for me to make them perfect before a public showing of any kind. It might take several weeks, but I don’t want to put something sub par out there, not where these are concerned. I have to learn patience, especially where film work is involved. My passion for getting things seen sometimes supersedes completion of said work.
If this is any indication of how the rest of the feature will be, I’m in for one hell of a year…
I feel like I’m on fire again. It was a cold day, but the flames of inspiration kept me so jubilant that nothing can stop me. I’m on top of the world and I love the view. I’m not going to let myself get dragged down; besides, my freelance has quadrupled this month. With the Suzuki gig, some high school basketball championship games, my regular workload, and a shoot in Birmingham Alabama – your faithful narrator will have to finish these new movies in between cat naps on the paying work. I may be able to get a new Mustang. I love the 2005’s and I found one used that I may snag up as the new Boo-mobile! If everything comes through, I will have made more in the month of March than I did in all of 2006.
I got another big royalty check on my short films today from cell phone distribution. That rocks. Whenever I get a check for over $1,000 for one quarter, I get blown away. I never planned on these things to make money when I made them. They were my self taught film school, nothing more. Now I’m raking in some extra dough from them and getting them seen by thousands of cell phone video watchers.
That’s all I got for now, my friends. Peace be with you wherever you go.
Peter John Ross
0 Comments