Change in Money: It's Official, Google Paid Me!

Yes!  

I checked my bank account today to see if there was money in there...

And guess what?  Google Adsense deposited $108.43 in my account!  Heck yes!

It's OFFICIAL: I have finally made money off this blog!

This is the first compensation I have received since I started this blog at the beginning of the year.

And that's pretty awesome change.

I have to thank my readers and these little advertising boxes on the page.  Nearly every click puts $1 in my pocket.  That helps me put one candy bar or can of PBR in my stomach.  So thank you! (BTW, you don't have to buy or sign up for anything... just click.)

Now, really though, this is kind of a big deal!  I mean, I'm kind of getting paid to write this blog now... Does that make me a professional?  I don't know...  I'm not an expert on change nor am I making a living from it yet... [$108.43 / (26 Posts so far * Avg. 2 hrs per post) = Approx. $2.09 per hr]  But it's certainly a start!  Please share my blog with others and maybe one day I can make a living off of it!  And you could come live with me on my couch while I write!

Maybe I could still call myself a professional writer though... it's kinda like how every filmmaker is an "Award Winning Filmmaker" because they won a student film festival or something... By the way, I'm an "Award Winning Filmmaker."  I sometimes say that on resumes or job applications... it's kind of annoying... but I know if I say, "Hey, I'm a cool guy and I'll do a good job," it doesn't really work well... They want credentials!

Now money has the power to change people.  And I'm not denying its potential power over me too.  So I'm relying on you, dear readers, to keep both myself and my blog content in check.  I appreciate any comments and feedback.  Also, please "Follow" my blog if you're not doing so already.  Thanks! 

I promise that you can continue to expect change in myself, my blog, and the world.  But don't expect this new found income to bring about a new flashy change of wardrobe or car.  I'll still be wearing $2 flannels, I'll still be driving the Aveo, I'll still be living at my sisters for the time being, and I still can't afford a coke habit.

Still,

-Lazer

Change in Sleep: The Filmmaker’s Schedule + Dementia

It’s 1 am and I go to sleep. I wake up at 5 am to start day 4 of a short film I’m shooting (I'm the director of photography.) 5:45 am I’m loading my car with the equipment- over a hundred pounds of camera cases that I have to carry down 3 flights of stairs. 6:10 I’m in Ann Arbor on the road to set but first I have to pick up the assistant director to car pool and a production credit card at another location. 7:12am we arrive on location 12 minutes late. We’re shooting at a jazz club with a lot of lights, camera setups, scenes, live music, and extras (thanks to all the extras for coming out.) All of this leads to a long shooting day. I have a shooting schedule that has the day planned out with estimate times. Unfortunately, our original schedule accounted for optimism (or dementia) and not reality. Optimism schedules our camera wrap for about 11pm and leaving location with cars packed by midnight. But reality put us down for camera wrap sometime around 2 am with cars leaving location around 3. After dropping off my gaffer (car pool switch option) I return home at about 3:45am. Whew… the day is over! …not quite… At this point, I take the opportunity to carry the hundred pounds of camera cases into my apartment- why the hell did I sign a lease on the 3rd floor? It’s 4 am and I’m done…

I would tell you the rest of this story, which moves from logistics to dementia, instead of writing about it but there’s the kicker: It’s 1 am yesterday and I’m going to sleep with a soar throat. I wake up at 5 am yesterday with a horse voice. Optimism schedules my voice for the whole shooting day because communication is essential on a film set. But reality will only allow a few takes of my voice. After lunch, I’m whispering to all the crew as loud as I can. By the end of the night, I am MOS (for non-filmmakers: this means rolling only camera and not sound.)

It’s 4 am and I’m exhausted. I would jump in bed but I have to pee. I’m in the bathroom with my pants unzipped but my feet are sore, my back hurts, and I’m way too tired to stand up… So I have to pee sitting down.

It’s 4:20 am and I’m still sitting on the toilet. I sort of remember peeing but I’m not sure. I stare at the hair brush on the sink. I follow single hairs through the bristles as if I was in an intricate maze. A maze where the walls move if you jump up and down because the floor is a trampoline.

I get out of the maze and then try to figure out which hairs are whose: Kelly’s (my lovely girlfriend) or mine.

It’s 4:24 am and I convince myself that I’ll never have a hair solution. I justify my dismissal with the remembrance of an old Sunday School fact: “God knows every single hair on your head.”

My feet tingle sorely and I look down at the light blue shag rug, which feels extra squishy at the moment. The bathroom lights start a fluorescent like flicker even though they are incandescent. The light creates a texture on the rug that looks like ocean tides. My feet squish into the sand and the water is cold. I kick some sand on the back of the bathroom door when I realize the imperfections of the door's paint. I imagine a very tired painter who has to paint my whole apartment in one day. Struggling with lack of sleep, he paints the bathroom last. Anxious to be done and to rest he uses more and more paint that ultimately drips and bubbles. Whether or not he’ll redo it again is his decision.

It’s 4:28 am and I let out a weak cough which hangs in the air creeping around the bathroom as if it was a smell from a cartoon. I follow the cough to a small cup on the counter with a candle in it. I wonder if I can make fire by rubbing my hands together. I wonder how long it would take the candle to melt and whether or not my throat would feel better if I gargled hot wax.

I shudder from a cold breeze that puts the candle out. My sweatshirt is on but I don’t know how it works. I’m still cold even with that.

It’s 4:34 and I cannot remember how long I’ve been sitting on the toilet. I’m still not sure if I went so I’m not sure if I should wash my hands. Then I realize I’m really sick and need to wash my hands. I wonder if I could gargle the antibacterial soap and kill whatever bacteria that is inflicting this awful amount of pain on me.

It’s 4:35 and I’ve been sitting on the toilet so long I probably have a ring around my bum.

Yes, I do have the toilet ring around my bum.

It’s 4:36 am and I can’t remember if I’ll remember these interesting shots of words so I get up to go get my laptop. I pull my pants up without wiping- hopefully I didn’t forget that I pooped and thus skipped a wipe. Should I go back and do one for safety?

I return to the bathroom with my laptop and sit back on the toilet. I try to recall my thoughts while typing and keeping up with my fast flow of current thoughts. I certainly could have typed this one from my desk… I’m not sure why I came back to the bathroom. I wonder if anyone else is sitting on their toilet with their computer at this exact same moment. I consider signing on AIM to see if anyone is available to video chat and witness my state of exhaustive sleep deprived dementia.

It seems as though a still camera appeared on the bathroom counter. I pick up the camera and try to take a still photo of myself. I push a triangular button to review it and it turned blurry. I thought of taking another one but realized this was the most accurate self portrait and document of my current state.

I start to doze off for a second but wake to myself deficating. Good thing I’ve been sitting on this toilet for nearly an hour. Otherwise, I could have made a real mess.

I continue to type in hope of completing the record….

I’m not able to right this all down before falling asleep. Hopefully my dreams are as interesting as my blurring thoughts.

I proceed off on a tangent and write a quick poem after staring at my computer for a solid five minutes:

Finder the Universe

Floating hands on the keyboard

The Universe at my desk 

The digital screen of my eyelids 

Drips like plasma 

But to touch is to believe 

Tangible and reality differ 

So can we believe the digital screen? 

When I’m dead I’ll leave a screen saver

[I woke up @ 3pm and discovered that I actually did write all of this… I’m not sure what it all means… P.S. My voice is still lost.]

Change in Film: Purpose, Value, and Waste

[WARNING: The following may only interest filmmakers or critical thinkers.  Basically, I consumed a ridiculous number of awful films that made me seriously consider the production of my own films and others.  This is a long rant that is partly analytical, theoretical, critical, philosophical, and self-reflecting.]

This past week marked the end of my pre-screening process for the Ann Arbor Film Festival. Over the last two months, I have watched 320 films, narrative and documentary, that were submitted for consideration in the 48th AAFF which will take place March 23-28, 2010 at The Historic Michigan Theater. Of those 320 films, I recommended approximately 40 to the next round of screening with only five or six films that I really liked- thank you to those few filmmakers.

This long exhaustive process has changed some of my ideas about filmmaking and the types of films I want to make.

First off, I don’t think the majority of filmmakers ever intend to make a bad film. But let’s face it: bad films happen. It’s really hard to make a good film and it takes almost a miracle to make a great film.

Regardless if it awesome or god awful, a majority of films take a lot of time, money, and energy.

So before funds are raised and the camera starts rolling, filmmakers should ask themselves, “Why am I making this film?” It seems self-explanatory but I’m not so sure after watching hundreds of films made within the last year.

After some contemplative thought, I have devised a few main categories that describe the purpose of the filmmaker to participate in film production along with the purpose of the viewer or audience to participate in film consumption. [For this discussion, the filmmaker is the primary person responsible for the creation of the film. The categories can be extended to additional filmmakers and crew members necessary for film production but it is not the primary interest of the discussion.]

These categories are interchangeable in many cases and most filmmakers, films, and viewers have multiple purposes although there may be a primary purpose.  For example, the purpose of a film like Farenheit 9/11 may have been political, but it also made a ridiculous amount of money.  Who knows whether or not that was Michael Moore's purpose too or just an accidental end?


PURPOSES OF FILMMAKERS AND FILM PRODUCTION

1. Money. The purpose is to make money. The content of the film does not matter. The film can be Citizen Kane or really dirty pornography- as long as it makes money.

2. Entertainment. The purpose is to entertain an audience. The filmmaker may also experience pleasure and amusement in doing so and may experience similar pleasure in the making of the film itself. So there is entertaining the audience, and entertaining oneself. Entertainment can be commercial, artistic or both.

3. Art. The purpose is to explore film as an art form and push its boundaries.

4. Social. The purpose is to explore social issues. It may be the intention to raise audience awareness on the issues at hand. The content of the film can vary from private and personal to global matters. Social factors may also participate in film production and not just the film itself.

5. Political. The purpose is to explore, expose, or propagate political issues. It may be the intention to influence the political views of the audience.

6. Education and Experience. The purpose is to educate an audience. Also, the filmmaker will mostly likely gain knowledge and experience from the production of the film itself.


PURPOSES OF THE VIEWER, AUDIENCE AND FILM CONSUMPTION

1. Entertainment. The purpose is to entertain oneself. The kind of pleasure varies greatly from the type of film, the type of viewer, and the type of consumption. Pleasure may not even be dependent on the film itself, only the type of consumption. For example, teenagers may go to a movie theater to get away from their parents and make-out with their significant others. What is on the screen is insignificant.

2. Art. The purpose is to view film as an art form, see its boundaries being pushed, and enlighten one’s experience and understanding of film and art.

3. Social. The purpose is to gain insight, knowledge and/or understanding of the social issues the film addresses.

4. Political. The purpose is to gain insight, knowledge, and/or understanding of the political issues the film addresses.

5. Educational. The purpose is to gain general knowledge and insight of a particular interest.


VALUE

Each purpose for film production merits a particular value. Value describes the worth, importance, or usefulness of producing a film. Although value is somewhat subjective, most would agree that certain purposes have higher value than others. For example: a documentary may merit social value for raising awareness of a global concern. A simple comedy may merit value in its ability to entertain. Although the latter has an important function in society, one would not argue the greater value of the former.


FILMMAKER EXECUTION AND AUDIENCE RECEPTION

The purpose of filmmakers and film production should be distinguished from the purpose of the film itself. The purpose of the film itself is related to both the filmmaker and audience. If the filmmaker’s efforts are well executed, their purpose may continue with the film itself. For example, if a filmmaker’s primary purpose is to make an entertaining film, and the production of the film is well executed, then the film may be entertaining. There is then the possibility that the film, with its purpose to entertain, may entertain a viewer whose purpose for consuming the film is to be entertained. However, if the production of the film is not well executed, the film may not be entertaining and may not entertain the viewer. If the primary purpose for producing a film is not met by the film itself, it may have little to no value for existence or for an audience.


NARRATIVE AND DOCUMENTARY

Based on quantity and not quality, it seems the primary purpose of most narrative film production is to entertain while the primary purpose of most documentary film is social, political, or educational.

A poorly executed narrative film that does not entertain yields little to no value for its primary purpose of production. However, a poorly executed documentary film that does not adequately engage its topic still seems to yield some value. Perhaps its because the original purpose could be considered of higher value and the act of partaking in a documentary film production raises awareness, however small, to its topic or cause.


VALUE VS. COST

A film’s value should be weighed against its cost. It takes a lot of time, energy, and resources to make a film. If the end product has little to no value, then the film and its production is waste and the filmmaker could be considered wasteful for that matter. Filmmakers with a primary purpose to make money understand this concept quite well: if the cost to produce a film is greater than its revenue, it has lost or wasted money and was not worth the effort.


CONCLUSION

I enjoy nearly all types of films for a variety of reasons. I see value in each purpose of film production and consumption. I do not necessarily think particular genres of films have more value than others. I think creativity determines that. Unfortunately, a majority of narrative films are unoriginal and a waste of time and resources. The only time a cliché melodrama makes me cry is during the end credits, knowing that a lot of money, people and energy were used to create a lot of waste.

I’ve begun to think that I, myself, may have a greater purpose by pursuing documentary filmmaking whereas I once thought I would become a director of narrative features. The lifestyle of a documentary filmmaker seems more engaging, active, and appealing right now.  Especially if there are some travel perks...

Who knows what I'll ultimately do or become.  I’ve labeled this last section “Conclusion” but I have yet to get to the bottom of anything...

If you bothered to read all of this, thank you!  I would appreciate any feedback.  If you think this blog post sucks, let me know.  I apologize and will try better next time.  At least the production of blogs post uses little resources and only wastes my time and yours.  If I had produced a film about this instead, I would have wasted several people's time, money, and resources and that would have been devastating.