So begins my first entry on the New Chud Site. NuChud?
I made a joke recently on twitter that if I finished all of my personal film and video projects this year, I would temporarily retire from filmmaking in 2012 to pursue competitive ‘old school’ arcade gaming.
Perhaps I’ve watched King of Kong a few too many times but what started out as a joke sounds like an interesting idea right now. Let me explain…
(Actually I should preface this by saying that I realize that some independent filmmaker in a nondescript part of the East Coast taking a break to play Galaga for 365 days is not the same as Soderbergh saying he’s done after he shoots his next two movies. I fully understand that, and operate under no illusions of grandeur. However, for my personal purposes, it of course matters.)
I mentioned before that I have a few projects going on simultaneously. To wit I am currently involved in 2 music videos, 1 Sci-Fi Short, 1 mixed media piece, and I’m serving as a producer on a feature in the early stages of development. This doesn’t include the normal creative services I do for my clients. I wouldn’t say I’m burnt out, or even approaching that yet. But, for my normally contemplative pace, I am moving along quite fast on things.
I will say that I am a growing weary of a few things within the business. I get tired of discussing/worrying about camera tech, when we should really be more worried about telling stories. Despite my sizable ego, I am not a fan of self promotion. Putting up your work for people to see is a good thing, but I get tired of managing sites, and social media applications.
Social self promotion is a necessary evil right now. It’s incredibly easy to get your work “out there” for potential viewers. However, attracting people’s attention goes hand in hand with this. I think we (we being the collective indie film community) are starting to put the cart before the horse. I’m becoming a part of it and I want to step back and clean my internal chalkboard.
Of the five major projects I’m working on, only two could be described as “mine”. The music videos are of course in service of the musicians and the feature is the brainchild of one of my creative cohorts. I’m happy to collaborate in these cases as there is a talented base of people I work with. I think the tendency to try to do too much work on one’s own can create unnecessary roadblocks and stagnation.
My resolution of sorts for 2011 is to continue on with guns blazing. I’ve got some great projects going and I think by 2012 I will have earned the right for a years break. I’m then going to choose a project not related to filmmaking and spend time on that. I want it to be something I normally wouldn’t do, hence the idea about playing Galaga and/or Rolling Thunder every night for 365 days.
I like to learn new things. I’m one of those people who can’t just watch something being done. I have to find ways to get involved. If I watch a basketball game, I want to go out and play basketball. Most of the crazy ideas I’ve become entangled in were because I thought I saw something interesting that I wanted to try as well. I’m sure someone will point to this as being some deficiency on my part, but I prefer to think of it as my actively adventurous side. There’s little point in life if we aren’t trying new things and testing ourselves in different ways.
Regardless, by the time I allow myself to resume in 2013 I should have enough creative energy to develop something on a large scale.