What do you do for a living?

[Jim Burnes]

New member here. Just starting out.

I'm the lone engineer in a family of artists, writers and businessmen. I've always loved films and from the time I first saw Star Wars (the real one, not the ret-conned, re-sequenced, prequel-full silliness) I wanted to do Computer Graphics. At the time I was a 16-year-old super-geek programmer getting started in the burgeoning world of microcomputers. Went to engineering school, got my Computer Science degree and got into programming operating systems instead of Computer Graphics.

Jump cut 30 some odd years.

My son, who is a film geek as well as an excellent writer wants to join the rest of the starry-eyed kids who want to write/direct/produce their own films. From seeing my own brother get swallowed up by LA trying to start a screen writing career, I knew that if you didn't own the equipment to make your own films you would always be subject to the whims of those that did.

So I told my son he could go to LA and take his chances or I'd finance the camera / lighting / editing equipment and we'd make a little film right here in Colorado. He was more than happy to and I can say that it's been a kick ever since.

Right now were about to start filming our first short feature. It's a little scary, truth be told. We were lucky to attract some very good young actors and the short script that my son wrote is actually quite good, even if he is my son.

We have a nice DSLR film rig, acceptable lighting kit, good script, good actors and we just took care of finding our last location. Finding the right location was unexpectedly hard. Something that I couldn't imagine. How hard would it be to find a Victorian house where someone would let us film? Harder than you'd expect. As Robert Rodriguez says, write not just what you know but what you *have*. I tried but couldn't find a creative solution to get a free house for filming so I hosed the problem down with money. One week worth of filming in a large, furnished, historic Victorian almost-mansion = $1000. Ouch, but it would probably be a lot more expensive in LA.

So if everything goes according to plan we start filming on Dec 28th. (crosses fingers)

We have some outdoor scenes that we film in mid-Spring 2011 and then it all goes into post, where hopefully after a couple months of editing / ADO / sound etc we get ready for the early film festivals.

Good luck in your endeavors....

[Heath McKnight]

Welcome aboard, Jim! I'm really excited to hear more about your short. Make sure you visit our Techniques for Independent Production Forum at DVinfo.net

I'm from Denver, so it's nice to see more filmmaking action out there!

Heath

[Caleb Reynolds]

I've always been in theatre classes all throughout middle and high school and I love stage acting. But even more so, I love directing and editing. I attended Austin Community College for an Associates in Film.

After that I made a couple short films and helped make one that even won and award. I've always wanted to be a star, revered for awesome art films with great stories. Not some b.s. like *inserthollywooddirectorhere*. Dreaming of one day making millions of dollars, I started teamkproductions.com | About 2 years later I started taking things more seriously.

I still have a dayjob/career. I am a Service Advisor at First Texas Honda. I've been working in the dealership enviorment for the past 10 years. That job pays me well enough to cover bills, but not well enough to pay for ALL the startup costs I'm encountering.

[Heath McKnight]

I left video production last year to pursue a writing career at TopTenREVIEWS.com, but I still dabble in video, doing small freelance gigs here and there. In South Florida, the rates for production dropped so low, that I was hired as a one-man band doing commercials for Comcast Spotlight.

No film work since April/May 2008.

Heath

[Wayne Reimer]

I only just now noticed this thread, and thought it would be a good time to add my story.
I worked for 36 years in the aviation industry, and retired last summer at 55.

I'd never had any intention to retire at 55. 2006 changed that for me. I was diagnosed with stage IV cancer in my jaw, and after many surgeries, radiation and chemo over the course of a year of suffering, I realized that life was far too short to put things off.

So, retire I did. Two weeks later, my wife was promoted and transferred to a new city where we knew no one, about 500 miles away. My retirement plans had photography and videography in them, jsut not in a brand new city in the middle of the Canadian Prairies.

I finally arrived the beginning of October, only to leave 5 days later to work on a humanitarian/medical/dental aid trip to central America. I was the trip photographer, and one of the "gofers"

Returning to Canada, I was told that the Dentist I had gone down with was being given a humanitarian award, and since I had just finished shooting one of his trips, would I be interested in producing a tribute video for the awards presentation.

I jumped on the opportunity, and over the course of three months met and interviewed a large number of people from all levels of business and government. During this shoot, I discovered that the area we were now living in had a huge hole in the videography market; hundreds of camcorder wedding shooters, a couple of full scale production houses doing T.V. work and no one doing smaller scale stuff.

By the time the first project was delivered, I had 5 additional ones signed. The day after the presentation was shown, I had increased that number to 14.

I developed extremely good connections throughout business and governement very quickly, and have been doing work for the Provincial Government, the Lieutenant Governors office and did a shoot last week for a federal agency. There is enough work around that I've started to seriously consider bringing another camera operator on board. It's funny how it's worked out so far....what initially appeared to be a sentence to purgatory is now looking more and more like a vibrant business opportunity. It's definetly a step away from where many videographers start out..with wedding work. Nothing wrong with it at all...it pays well. it's just not my thing, and I promised myself when I retired I would do stuff I LIKED to do, not HAD to do.

I like doing interviews, scripting, shooting, and editing...the full package stuff. I'm going to keep doing it too, until they catch on :^)

[Caleb Reynolds]

WOW! Congrats!

[Heath McKnight]

Wow, Wayne, what a great story! I'm glad you're doing well with the business and life! Congrats and welcome aboard!

Heath

[Lisa Maxwell]

Originally Posted by Wayne Reimer

I only just now noticed this thread, and thought it would be a good time to add my story.
I worked for 36 years in the aviation industry, and retired last summer at 55.

I'd never had any intention to retire at 55. 2006 changed that for me. I was diagnosed with stage IV cancer in my jaw, and after many surgeries, radiation and chemo over the course of a year of suffering, I realized that life was far too short to put things off.

So, retire I did.

I'm sorry to hear about your diagnosis. : (

The rest of your story is very inspiring!

To give my story: I'm a stay at home mom with kids getting a little older and I am able to do more with my small videography business. It's amazing how much stuff is coming out of the woodwork! I have a couple weddings booked, a video bio I'm working on, some music videos I do for my niece, and have recently been approached by a local mom's ministry group who want to promote themselves. I find it all very exciting and challenging. I am very blessed to be able to work on stuff I love slowly and in pace with making sure I'm here for my kids.

[Jeremy Cole]

I have been on the corporate, educational and marketing side of the video business for 40 years. Yes, a long time. I have done a lot of medical and corporate videos for fortune 500 companies in a variety of formats both for delivery as well as production. My career has followed the technology pretty closely. I have shot on 1/2 inch Sony and Panasonic BW reel to reel, 3/4 inch, 1" tape, Beta, Beta SP, DVCAM, P2, XDCAM. Have produced for multimedia slide shows, laser disc players, CDs, DVDs, and the web. You name it. Still do not get bored. Great business to be in. Back is still holding up. Gear has lightened up and the quality has increased dramatically.

[Roger Van Duyn]

Originally Posted by Wayne Reimer

I only just now noticed this thread, and thought it would be a good time to add my story.
I worked for 36 years in the aviation industry, and retired last summer at 55.

I'd never had any intention to retire at 55. 2006 changed that for me. I was diagnosed with stage IV cancer in my jaw, and after many surgeries, radiation and chemo over the course of a year of suffering, I realized that life was far too short to put things off.

What a fantastic story Wayne! I retired a few days before my 55th birthday from a cancer laboratory to start my business up. Well, the last five years or so more than half of my time at work was in the cancer lab, the other half in the main lab, but still getting work on cancer patients there too.

I'm so glad you managed to get your business going despite all the adversity. Perhaps that's why you were able to get your business going, you'd already dealt with real adversity far greater than that of starting a business in a recession. Good for you! Go get 'em tiger. It's wonderful to be able to enjoy your work so much.

[Robert Turchick]

Guess it's time for me to come clean...

My degree is in music performance/music production. I started working right from my internship at a recording studio in upstate NY recording and producing albums and commercials along with the occasional audio post for video. As the studio grew we veered more heavily into post and even leased a chunk of the studio space to a video production company. I kept peeking over the video editor's shoulders thinking, "that looks like fun!"

After twelve years of that, I moved to Phoenix to become production manager and chief audio engineer at a commercial studio. After a few years, the boss and I didn't see eye to eye so I started my company yipDog Studios which primarily focused on audio. I also got my real estate license (while the market was hot) and gave that a go for a couple of years.

To complete a simple video for a friend, I decided to purchase FCP after a week of torture in iMovie realizing I couldn't do half of what I needed. I read the entire 10 pounds of printed manuals in one week and BAM! I was a FCP user!

One week later a head hunter called and noticed I had listed that on my resume under skills and there was a position available at a company which was a startup. I interviewed, did an audition, interviewed some more and became employee number 4 in the company and was now one of three "senior video editors" on staff.

4 years later, when the economy went south the owner let us video editors go to refocus the business but kept using my company to do various custom projects and all the advertising work which allowed yipDog to grow to what it is today! Through word of mouth and some well placed ads, I've been able to grow enough to build my own studio/edit space right next to my house.

So officially, I've been in the "production" biz for 23 years with the last 7 heavy into video. As several people have mentioned, the variety of work is what I love...no two days are alike! And my motto of "Never say no" has forced me to learn new things very quickly and also has built up a large circle of talented experts I can call on as my "virtual staff"

I'm pretty darn lucky to be able to do this for a living and being my own boss allows me to spend plenty of time with my family which is invaluable to me!

[Kevin Lewis]

Great story Robert. I recently commented on one of your other posts. I also checked out your website. Looks good!

[Christopher Glavan]

I've been around these forums for two or three years now, and I finally have a reason to post in this thread!

I've been a server in a restaurant for almost four years, making short films in my spare time. In 2009 I started my own company on the side doing wedding and event videography, but with this economy I've found business difficult to drum up. I've done videos for friends and family for little or no money to try to build up my reel. In fact this fall will herald my first wedding where my client will pay full price for my services.

I've invested significant time making connections in my area, and it's started to pay off. I was recently asked to intern at a cable access station here. Little did I know their production manager was leaving and they were vetting replacements. Can you guess who landed the job?

ME!!!

Now I'm extremely busy trying to juggle three jobs and have very little time to make movies, but I'm hoping this will be an extremely educational experience that will prepare me to move forward in making independent features, which is the path I'd eventually like to be on.

[Ryan Sutherby]

Hey all,

I've been interested in video production for a long time, pretty much since my senior year in high school when I took a video course. At the time, I borrowed my parents monstrous video camera that recorded directly to vhs tapes. Things have come a long way! Back in 2006 or so I bought a Sony DCR SR40 so that I could film live concerts of bands I love. Then , when Sony released the HDR SR12, I moved up to that. Last week, I bought the Sony NX5, and it's a HUGE step up not only in quality, but the learning curve. There's more buttons and dials on this beast than I know what to do with, but I knew that going into it. I'm learning more about it everyday. I plan to film as many concerts as I can with it, but I bought it mainly so I could start work on a small documentary of my favorite band.

I don't own a company, I barely know anything about making a documentary, but I know I love what I'm doing right now and that I can make it happen. My full time job is as a Signal Maintainer for the BNSF Railway here in Portland, Or. I basically test, maintain, and fix things like crossings, signals, switches, and bridges. It's a good job, and it pays well enough that I can buy things like the NX5 and try to make my dream a reality.

[Heath McKnight]

Thought I'd update what I'm doing these days. I now work for doddle, which has an excellent iPhone and Android app for filmmakers and video producers, with a directory and interactive call sheet maker:

Doddle - Production Guide and Directory

I work on the news side. I still do some video production; I have two clients that I shoot and edit commercials and YouTube videos (one went viral), and the other company is strictly corporate video. Film? Well, not much of late, though I finally finished my first short in years, Hellevator:

Hellevator, My New Short Film Written By Comic Book Legend David Michelinie | heath mcknight dot com

heath