The Flashpoint Academy film students just finished production on their second films. This is a picture from the set one day last week. Before they embarked on these films I sat in on a series of production meetings and was
I Am Still Here
This has been the longest the dumb filmmaker has been away fom his blog since he began it. Things have been very busy for him, but there is light at the end of the tunnel, and he promises to stop
TW3…
…and we delivered a rough cut of the Teen Parent film to our client, and had four crews shooting across Chicago for this other top-secret project and time to go see Springsteen- another story for another day. PeterH
Plate Spinning
I am often asked about how I can juggle being a full-time teacher and a full-time filmmaker. Honestly, I don’t give it much thought, it is just something I do and have done for a long time. Ten years ago
Let’s Play Two!
With apologies to Ernie Banks, Jim and I played a doubleheader today. At 7:00 this morning we shot one of our Teen Parents as she spoke to a group of high school students about the choices she made and how
Collaboration part 3
We made it. Flashpoint Academy opened its doors on Monday and welcomed their first class. Monday was orientation and as part of it we screened Dean Paula Froehle’s film, “The Collector,” and our “making of The Collector” documentary. The similarities
Hard at Work
Labor Day got me thinking about hard work- something I try to avoid at all costs. Aren’t p.a.s and t.a.s supposed to do the hard stuff while directors and “professors” do the “Big Picture” work? One of those cliches (if
Shout it Out
Yesterday I shared a tale about a company (General Mills) that was too cheap to send us enough product for their own TV commercial so we had to go out and buy Raisin Nut Crunch and sell it back to
Clients…
…you can’t live with ’em, you can’t shoot ’em. The number of odd choices and decisions clients make never seems to end. Most of the times they do something because of how it affects (effects- the dumb filmmaker never remembers?)
Selling Funny
For a lot of reasons- none that make any sense to me- advertising agencies are loath to sell commercials using humor. Jim and I have directed some mildly humorous spots that perhaps generate a grin or a smile, but nothing
