Opportunity Knocks

But I can't find the door. I didn't realize the consumer video business was so cutthroat. My buddy got a gig following a high school dance team through their season. The coach is a friend of his and when she found out he was doing that kind of thing now, she called up the company the school has always gone through to tell them she was no longer in need of their services. "You know you have to buy the state competition video from us, don't you?" they shot at her. "Your guy won't be allowed in there." We all scoffed at that. Who would keep a couple of guys trying to make an honest buck out of a state dance competition?
We're not laughing anymore. Apparently this other company has a monopoly. No one else is allowed to do business with any of the high schools in the state. How is that possible? What happened to the great American capitalistic concepts like competition and free trade? It looks like the only way we're going to be able to shoot the state comp is to sneak our cameras in and look like proud parents. I didn't realize there was a consumer video mafia in Utah.

Then there's the wedding video crowd. Weddings are huge business in Utah and it seems like everyone and their pet poodle is doing the video thing. There's a wedding expo every year here that costs $700 for a booth. That's understandable. I can deal with that. What I can't deal with is the fact that only five videographers are allowed in, and there's a waiting list with 85 companies on it.

Every novel idea I come up with already has 50 people doing it. I'm not into this struggling for the legal tender thing. Why can't making a living be easy: I do a video that I think looks good and people pay me. What's the matter with that business plan?

The Snow's Here

And I'm going to pummel the local weather man who said we wouldn't get any down here in the valley. Yesterday my buddy and I were cheering him on like he was playing in the Ute game against Pitt. Then today I get up and there are three inches of snow on my car. Lying jerk. If you're going to make that much money to prognosticate, you'd better be right.
And why are there so many accidents on the roads when there's a snow storm like this one? Why do people who live in Utah, whose license plates say "The greatest snow on earth," think they can drive the way they would if the roads were spotless? I don't mind a little slowing--in fact it's necessary. But the roads become shopping mall parking lots because a most of these idiot Utah drivers think snow isn't slippery or that having four-wheel-drive will help them stop when they gotten themselves in deep crap. One guy hit the wall on the side of the freeway and another had stopped in the middle of the right lane and was standing outside talking on his cell phone. OK, that's enough of that.
Princess Rufflebutt is eating again! She'd lost two pounds last week, which, for a twenty-two pound kid, is a lot. That's almost ten percent! We found out that we've been exacerbating the situation by giving her milk. The throwing up stopped and was replaced by the worst case of diarrhea I've ever seen and we were making it worse with the milk. But she wasn't eating anything. I don't know how she's been surviving. The doctor told us to give her anything she'd eat and drink, even soda and cookies. We are and she is going to town on those things. I'm afraid she'll never eat real food again. She's her happy, chatty self again, though, and for that, I'm grateful.

Still on the Road

Another mile marker passed. There's a theory circulating among a few of us at work that time seems to be speeding up lately, and it sure seems to be true. It seems like the millenium came and went just a few days ago.

2004 leaves us with a tragedy that boggles the mind. I can't believe that so many people have died in the Asian tsunami. It's hard to watch the images depicting all of the carnage. I can't imagine what it must be like to be there.

We're a little worried here at home; Princess Rufflebutt acquired some kind of illness a few days ago. For about three days she's thrown up everything she's eaten or drunk, and until today she hasn't wanted to eat anything at all. It's as if her tiny body has developed a sudden disdain for nourishment. All she wants is to be held by me and me alone. She doesn't want her mother, just me. I like the attention, but it makes it hard to get anything done. She's getting better though. She didn't vomit as much today as she has been and she's been playing and bringing me books to read to her. It's a relief. There's not much of her to waste away by not consuming anything.

The rest of the family is doing well, though. We had a great Christmas--Santa was very good to us--and I think 2005 is going to be wonderful. Happy new year!

Let it Snow

Odin pointed out that my pictures of Downtown Salt Lake just before Christmas don't have any snow in them. Wow! He's right. I don't know why that didn't cross my mind, except that maybe I'm getting used to the drought here. When we first came to live here ten years ago, the winters were more like they were where I grew up: Snow that buried our car completely and took hours to dig out. I don't miss it. I like not having to shovel the driveway. When it does snow, I just have to wait a couple of days for it to melt. But, like I said, it wasn't always that way here. When we managed apartments, I broke my back shoveling the yards and yards of sidewalk. On the freeway, watching everyone else drive at insane speeds, it was I, the safe driver, who spun out, ending up facing the wrong way in oncoming traffic. Of course, I've never ended up at the side of the four-lane road, my car stuck in the white stuff, waiting for a tow truck.

Snow has always been a part of my life. I grew up on skis, though I don't do it anymore. I've never had to pay as my dad has always been on the ski patrol. Now that I do have to fork over the cash, it doesn't seem worth it.
Our yard was always piled high with snow in the winter. My friends and I would jump off the roof of our two-story house into the drifts and I would dig deep tunnels down in the trampoline hole and make forts. One year the tunnel collapsed on me and I spent nearly an hour digging myself out. Scary.

Now...I could do without it. I know I shouldn't say that, what with the drought and all. But there it is.

Merry Christmas!

Downtown Salt Lake City is pretty this time of year. The family and I went to Temple Square (where the Salt Lake Mormon Temple is) on Monday night and I took a few photos. Dinky Jr. got his mug in one.

The Humor of Sarcasm

Sarcasm as humor only goes so far. It's the staple of most of the relationships I have outside of my family, though. It doesn't carry much weight at home, but at work, an outsider could have no clue that my buddies and I love each other. We're constantly giving each other the bird and calling attention to each others' faults. It's all in fun. We know that. Until, that is, you add a few pressures to the mix. My last appointment of a long, migraine-inducing schedule today was a three-minute interview show--commercial, really--geared toward seniors. It's a simple three-camera live-to-tape shoot that I direct. Actually, I do a lot more than direct. Most shows have a director, technical director, cg operator, and tape operator. I do it all for this thing. It's nothing that will ever go on my resume but it makes money for the station so we keep doing it. It's one of the reason's I am known as the resident "Turd Polisher." We'll frequently have many starts and stops because the client being interviewed is so scared, or looks like a chipmunk. And today was no exception. The problem, though, was that I wasn't my usual professional self. I forgot to "black" the record tape all the way and when we finally finished the first good take, there was nothing to watch on the playback. So I blacked the tape. For your information, it takes more than three minutes to black three minutes' worth of tape. First of all you have to walk over to the tape machine and rewind it to the point at which you want to start recording. Then the machine starts a five-second preroll which takes a few seconds to set up and five seconds to roll. Then you have your three minutes. But you can't stop there. You need to lay some pad. Liking to be safe rather than sorry, as the adage goes, I like to give it a good chunk of pad. All told, it took about six minutes to get the job done. When I got back on the headset, and gave the standby, at least two members of the crew let fly with absurdities like, "how long does it take to black three minutes of tape?" and, "Don't you know how to do an assemble edit?" (I won't go into the the terminology here.) They were so persistent and insistent that my sense of humor vanished. Rather than letting go with expletives (I knew there were clients within earshot) I immediately shut down my emotions and issued commands in curt, daggerlike thrusts: "Standby. Ready camera one. One's up. Cue him. Two minutes." When it became apparent to the others how pissed I was, no one else ventured to say anything except twice, when I heard, in very hushed tones, "I love you . . . ." I didn't respond.
We finished the second take. I started playing it back. The video was great. The talent was talking. There was no sound. I had forgotten to route the audio back into the machine after blacking the tape. This time the cussing escaped before I could stop it, albiet it was whispered. After that there were other screw ups by the talent and the client, but they were all my fault, because if I hadn't screwed up before, they would have had the chance to now.
Finally, I was able to play back a whole take, audio and everything. I almost started bawling.
As for the crew. . . we're still friends.

Wedding Bells

I'm officially a wedding videographer. This is the first one I've done and I couldn't have asked for a better couple to practice on. They're both very laid back and accomodating. Whatever I choose to do is ok with them--so far, at least. The trick now is to find time to edit it.

There were a couple of funny moments. It was very cold--20 degrees, I think--when the bride appeared outside for her pictures just after the wedding, and someone noticed that her shoes weren't traditional. She hiked up her wedding dress to reveal a pair of pink sneakers and long underwear. Later, when she threw the bouquet, she put a little too much oomph into it and launched it into the light fixture about 15 feet above our heads. If it turns out, it might show up on America's Funniest Home Videos. She got a new bouquet and threw it.

Long Time

It's been awhile. I've kept a journal for most of my life and it seems like every other entry begins that way: It's been a long time, I should catch up.

I got my own production company going. It's called Runaway Productions. I've got the professional equipment and the business license and even some cards. So now it's full speed ahead. Except that it's not. A friend of mine who's known as a cameraman got the same camera after I did and he's getting jobs all over the place. I've yet to bill for one project. I handed one of my cards to M ar|< Eat*n, the former pro baseke+ball player, and he laughed at them. "Did you make these yourself?" he asked. Then he pointed to the line at the bottom that says, "over 17 years broadcast television experience," and sneered, "Oh, look at that, 17 years experience." I wasn't sure what he was getting at. I wanted to tell the 7-foot-four-inch jerk to get down on his knees so I could kick his ass. But I didn't want to cause a scene by hurting him right there in the studio.

On the home front, Princess Rufflebutt is getting so grown up. She's about 18 months old now. The other day she saw one of her brothers lift up the toilet seat and pee. The next thing we knew, she was standing with her diaper off next to the toilet, the rim up to her neck, trying to take a leak too.

In other toilet-related news, my wife told me a while ago that she found my four-year-old bathing right there in the bowl. He's very small for his age--not even in the running percentile-wise--and I guess it was a good fit.

Have a good one.

Movies

My new favorite movies are, in order, "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" and "Shaun of the Dead." Wonderful. Just wonderful.

Video Student

It's been a while. Sorry I've neglected all of my friends in the blogosphere. I've been cramming, trying to learn all this video and graphic editing software I have now. I've tried the user manuals that came with the programs but they're useless, having been written by someone who obviously hasn't talked directly to another actual human being for years. I can't afford the "Total Training" discs, priced to put an independent startup like myself out of business. So I've been struggling. It helps that I have 17-plus years of linear editing experience, and that I'm a computer geek by nature. Slowy, surely, the knowledge is coming. I want to be ready for my first project, whatever that may be, but, note to the universe, don't let that stop the projects from coming in. I'll be able to handle them.

This is all pretty exciting. Now if I can just start paying for it.

Music and Video

Got the new Tears for Fears disc, "Everybody Loves a Happy Ending." There's a debate raging about it at the station. There are several of us who are consummate Beatles fans and for some of the guys, the extensive "references" to the fab four's music throughout the disc. Personally, I love it. I think it's a great homage, almost a new way to approach Lennon, McCartney and the others. But the other guys think it's too much of a ripoff, of blundering through sacred ground. I must admit that the orchestral wind-up on "Who Killed Tangerine" sounds almost as if it were actually sampled from "A Day in the Life." But the music is so good, I don't mind. Orzabal's lyrical prowess approaches genius. So get it, dang it!

I have my edit system all set up, the software all registered and paid for. Now I need a camera. In case anyone can help, I'm looking for a good price on a Panasonic AG-DVX100A. I was just in a hot auction fight on ebay over a DVX100 and I lost. Someone edged me out at the last minute and got it for a heck of a deal. All I can do is keep trying.

Quit Looking at my Cards!

Our family has discovered Go Fish. We all gather in the living room, the boys sitting across the room by the wall after attempting to sit directly behind my wife or me to see our cards. We've changed the rules a little. Instead of asking, "Do you have any fours?" we ask for the number and the suit. It makes it a little more interesting. During the course of the game, there are nearly-constant accusations of cheating. It's hilarious. Last night we were in hysterics. It went like this:

Six-year-old J: B, Do you have the A of hearts?
Eight-year-old B: Go fish. Ok J. (Dramatic Pause) do you have the A of clovers?

At this point J would start screaming, "You looked at my cards! He's cheating!"

This happened anytime any of us asked for a card he had. And you should have seen hime when he guessed correctly which cards we had. He'd dance around, singing, "I got the card I needed." Of course he wouldn't pursue the matches and lose them all the next round. We also had to watch him closely to keep him from asking for cards he already had.

I never knew go fish could be so fun.

Editing

I know, I know, I'm a slacker. Lately blogging has not been my top priority. Work is picking up and I have some added extracurricular activities now. After watching my friends who aren't professional video editors buy equipment and make gobs of money doing side projects, I figured I'd better get in the act. So I took a chance and borrowed some money and built a screaming Windows-based machine and editing software and a camera. So now I'm focusing a lot of my time to learning the software and figuring out how to make this equipment pay for itself. If anyone in the Utah/Idaho area needs a broadcast quality wedding video or anyone anywhere else who would like to send me their old home movies and pictures to be made into a fun DVD, email me. I can beat nearly any price.

Hopefully I can find time to keep this going here. It's been a lot of fun. But duty calls...

Go Away, Frances!

I just wanted to say good luck, Florida. I hope Frances does an about face.

You Draw Some More

I'm really getting a kick out of this You Draw thing. My favorite artists there include E.D., Lamb, and nikki mk. They're just great. I wish I could draw like them.

You Draw

I've been dinkin' around over at You Draw. Click here to see what I've been doing.

A Blast on My Own Horn

Yesterday I edited some commercials for a well-known wireless cellphone company. I don't think I went over and above what I normally do. I just tried to get the job done as well (and as quickly) as I could. Today I got this really nice email from my boss:

Dinky,

I wanted to pass on the very positive comments which I just received about you from [the client's name] of [the cellphone company.] [The client] got my number from [the account exec] and said that he wanted to speak directly with your supervisor to compliment you on the fine work which you did for them yesterday. He said that he has now worked with you twice and is totally impressed with the job you've done for them on both occasions.

[The client] said that you are very personable, a tremendous listener, thorough and very quick and efficient. They have been very happy with the product which you have been able to provide.

While I know that this is the kind of work which you do for all of our clients, I appreciated hearing it very much directly from [the client] and wanted to be certain that you heard about it as well.


Thanks, Dinky for this effort and for all of the others which tend to go unheralded,

[The supervisor]

That was really nice of him, don't you think? I almost started bawling.

Party Time

Our station had its annual summer party today and I'm wiped out now. We went to the Olympic Oval to have our own little Olypmic Games. It sounded kind of lame at first but I sure as heckfire am glad I went. It was a kick in the pants! Our first event was curling. We had some instructors take us through the basics for about half an hour and then we had a shoot out. This was interrupted for some time, however. One of the sales associates was sweeping the ice to get the stone to go further when he went down, his face taking all the force of the fall. He cut his forehead open right at the eyebrow and a large puddle of blood formed on the ice. I think he also broke his nose, cut the inside of his lip, and nearly separated his shoulder. The paramedics were called and he went to the hospital to get stitches. I'm sure glad it wasn't me. Then we resumed our contest. Although my form was pretty good, I kept over shooting the target. While we were doing this, the U.S. Speed Skate Team as well as some Aussie Olympians were working out on the ice. They sped by us in tandem at unreal speeds.

Our next event was, of all things, dodge ball. Is that an Olympic sport? I was better at this. I helped our team advance into the semi-finals with two consecutive game-winning shots, each to the head. Apparently head shots are ok in the Olympics. After this we noticed the Skate Team was finished and a few of us went to talk to 1500 meter Olympic record holder, Derek Para. He was a very nice (and really short!) guy.

Our final event was the slap shot. We had to shoot at a target positioned in front of a hockey net. After a little coaching from my hockey-playing friends, I actually made a rather difficult shot.

After that we strapped on our harnesses and bungie-jumped on the trampoline the freestyle aerial jumpers train on.

In the end, our team won third place and each of us recieved a purple ball cap! Whoa, that's a little more than I can handle. We went back to the station to have a catered lunch and the prize give-away. The main course was a whole-roasted pig that they rolled into the room. It was smiling, wide-eyed, at everyone. The women sitting at my table were all disturbed by it. One of them, a reporter, had to change seats so she didn't have to look at it. Another one couldn't eat very much of it and got two desserts to satisfy her hunger. As far as I was concerned it wasn't great. I've been to a Tongan wedding and I used to have a Neighbor from Hawaii and they do the roasted pig thing much better. After I covered it with salt (which I had to dig out from my own stash) and spicy bbq sauce, it was tolerable. I had two helpings. I'm not going to let a little thing like lack of flavor stop me from gorging myself. After the lunch, they began drawing for prizes. The grand prize was a 21-inch tv. In the back of the prizes was a new golf bag ($199.00 retail value) with various drivers and woods in it. I have an instinct about these things. There have been three occasions in which I've known what I was going to win. Once in Idaho Falls I was at a company Christmas party. There there were about 3000 employees there. When they held up this stupid grandfather wall clock, I knew it was mine, and they called my name. Another time, at the place where I now work, there was a Chia Head in the prize stack. Something inside me said, "You're going to win that." I did. Today, I leaned over to my friend Di and told her I was going to win some of that golf stuff. I won the bag. Woo hoo, I guess. The only time I don't get the premonition is when I win something I want to win, or don't win anything at all.

I don't golf so if anyone wants to buy a new golf bag let me know.

In other news, Princess Rufflebutt's running a fever. She was sniffling a lot last night and she's really grumpy today. I've given her some Tylenol. I hope it helps.

My two oldest boys started school this week. I keep asking them what they learn but they don't say anything. Today I pressed my 1st grader and he said, "Either I didn't learn anything or I forgot it all." At least public school is free. I guess you get what you pay for.

Oh, one more thing. I stumbled on to this and laughed pretty hard.

Vacation

We just returned from our vacation about an hour ago. We left for my Parents' house in Idaho Falls on Tuesday. I needed to use my some of my vacation time. I get so much of it that I have a hard time using it. It would probably be easier if we could afford to go to Disneyland or Hawaii or somewhere, but as it is, we just don't know where to go that would be exciting. Then last week I had the brilliant idea of going to the lake I practically grew up at. About twenty minutes from my parents' place is a small manmade lake that's about thirty feet at its deepest and maybe 3/4 mile across. As a kid, my friends and I would go up there almost every day during the summer and float around on the boat dock we'd managed to unhook from the bottom, hurl ourselves from the rope swing, and dare each other to swim across the whole lake, an exhausting feat I accomplished twice. I figured my kids would enjoy it, so we packed up and left. The kids loved it. They splashed around and waded to and explored the small, wooded island. Rufflebutt had a blast, too. We went there two days in a row. The kids wanted to go today, too, but it was time to get back.

When we weren't at the lake, the kids were jumping on the trampoline. For some reason they didn't like me getting on with them. In fact they seemed terrified. I just can't understand it.

We celebrated Rufflebutt's 1st birthday while we were there, not that she noticed.

During my time away from the lake I was lazy as, well, heck. I revisited some of the reasons we don't have cable at my house. I'd be watching tv all day long. TCM is doing "Summer Under the Stars" which I could (and did) watch most of my waking hours. The first day was Edward G. Robinson day and I gained a new appreciation for his ability. I watched "Larceny, Inc." which Woody Allen remade as "Small Time Crooks" without giving any credit to the former. It was a fun little farce, but my favorite was "The Cincinatti Kid" with Steve McQueen. It's smart and intense and unappologetically ends the way real life would instead of giving us a fairy tale. It's one of my favorite films now. I also saw bullets or ballots, a typical Bogie film, which was fine, and his last film, the inane "Soylent Green", a Charlton Heston futuristic blunder (see "The Omega Man" for comparison.), a very unfortunate swan song for Robinson.

The next day I added another film to my favorites list. It was Bette Davis day. I've seen very few of her films and haven't really formed an opinion until now. I saw "All This and Heaven Too" which I enjoy in spite of some cheezy optimism, and the soap opera "The Great Lie." But the best one was "A Stolen Life", the only film she produced. It didn't have the ending I would have wanted, but its a wonderful film full of subtle twists and great performances.

Wow. Did I do anything this week? Not really, but isn't that what vacations are for?

What a Day!

The scheduler and my boss are both on vacation, so who does all the crap filter down to? You guessed it. First thing on the docket was a live production that I direct every so often. It's a three-minute commercial done interview-style and geared toward older people. It features products and services like hearing aids and assisted living, and the guy who hosts and sells the show works for a mortuary as his day job, so you can imagine how exciting the whole thing is. To top it all off, we had five shows, each of which had as the guest someone who is not used to being on tv. Imagine a deer...now think, "headlights." Great fun. That went for four hours. After that I had to field call after call about renting the sound stage and trying guess at what our rates might be. Then I edited a spot for a broadband company from footage that was shot in Georgia. That was actually fun. Tell me if you've seen the spot. I guess it has been running in other markets: A guy is talking about how slow dialup is and he crams a little kitten into one-inch pvc pipe. I don't care who you are...that's funny right there. So I got that one done and then I fixed another spot, and added a new logo to another one. Then I was on the phone again, giving people rates and our stage dimensions...I don't know how he does it. But I do know this: He can never go on vacation again!