I remember when I use to never sleep. Those were the days. I would spend hours trying to sleep but never be able to. I'd have all the energy in the world and be up all night doing stuff and wake up bright and early to start it all over. Now all I do is sleep. I really miss the old days. I know a great deal of the reason is stress and I'm trying to not stress out as much but it is hard. There is so much to stress out about everywhere you look.
I'm starting to think the key is to just let go. Take control of the things you can control and let go of everything else. Trying to control everything is just going to send you to an early grave and that doesn't help anyone. Let go of trying to make everyone do everything perfect and just focus on yourself and your projects. If other people are bringing your project down, you don't have to ride their ass about it, just remove them from the project and take over. Don't be rude about it but don't baby them either because truth be told holding other people's hands while they mess up is a big part of my stress. I don't know why I thought I'd share this with you guys today, but stress has been eating away at my life for a while now and I can't imagine I'm the only one. We can all get through this together, we just have to be strong and keep moving forward. We can do it!
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So last night I caved and joined the 1 month trail of Youtube Red. Now I only did this for one reason and one reason only. iiSuperwomanii. Her new doc about her world tour came out and I really wanted to watch it. I can't tell you how amazing it was. If you haven't seen it yet, go watch it now!
She is so inspiring. Just listening to her talk and watching how hard she works makes me want to work harder. I always thought of myself as a hard worker, I really did, till I saw how much time and energy she puts into everything, compared to her I'm downright lazy. That needs to change now. I'm going to start working my ass off twice as hard as ever before to get Bluerroof Productions off of the ground. To create the company that I know this can become with just a little hard work. Hopefully my friends come along for the ride but even if they don't I'll go it alone. This is something that I need to do, I don't know if I'll ever be happy being anything other than a story teller. It's always nice when you have a very simple idea that turns into something crazy. I'm a big believer that you should chase your dreams where ever they may take you, no matter how crazy or unattainable they may seem.
As I told you guys yesterday, I'm trying to get my youtube channel back up and running. So one of the ways I was thinking about doing that was to turn Uncanny Fans into a video podcast as well. I thought Fatman on Batman had a good formula, breaking the show into smaller episodes and putting them together for the podcast. So I came up with a few ideas for what I wanted the show to be. There will be a show called This week in Marvel; where I talk about Marvel's comic this week. This week in DC; where DeVaughn talks about DC comics. Next up is an episode all about the silver screen (No title yet) where we talk all about that weeks TV shows. DeVaughn will do one where he talks about Anime. I'll also do a This week in Comics history show. A Character spotlight show. And the mack daddy of them all, the return of Jon's Corner; me, DeVaughn, Ashley and sometimes other people will talk about that weeks entertainment news. Once I started talking to DeVaughn he is going to add a show where he reads comics the way he would write them. I you have ever listened to The Uncanny Fans you know that is going to be too funny. It seems that if this goes well then my plan to get my Youtube channel back off the ground just turned into a network. Now I'll have a youtube network right along side my podcast network. This is a great time to be a fan of the Blueroof Nation! So last night I finished Mario Chronicles #3. I'm going to start editing it tomorrow and have it up hopefully Wednesday. It's only taken me about three years to get out 3 issues of what was supposed to be a monthly series. I'm working really hard on trying to speed up the writing process. I just have so much other stuff getting in the way.
My personal life is starting to level out so that should free up some time. School is going ok for once so I think that I can have more time free from that as well. I am really starting to think that 2016 could be my year in a way that no year has ever been my year. I also finished Crusaders #4 this past week and have outlines for the rest of this season and the first half of season 2. Once I finish this season I will start recording and editing them and hopefully start releasing them soon. That show is my baby and I can't wait to share it with all of you. Uncanny Fans has been taking a bit of hit the past few weeks due to timing and everyone's schedule. I am really trying to get it back on track as soon as possible. I love that pod and I want it to keep coming out on a regular schedule. Clean Jeans is recorded and just waiting on editing and we should have it out in the next few days. I've been brainstorming ways to get my Youtube channel back up and running. The last vlog was so much fun to make. I know it really could have used more light but I really enjoyed making it and want to start doing more. The game plan as it stands now is to do 2 videos a week. One on Monday and one on Wednesday. Jon's Corner is one that I really want to bring back. Just sit in front of the computer and talk about the stuff I love. The other video could be anything. Vlog, Skits, shorts or anything in-between. The last thing I really need to start doing better is this blog. I need to be writing one every day and actually have something to say. Not just a few lines and moving on. Make this blog something that people can enjoy. Maybe talk more about life on set. That's what I really want to do with it. So I guess what I'm saying is that there is a lot more to come. Stay Tuned Blueroof Nation! So yesterday was the first day of filming for my first class project. I had a very packed day planned for us. We had an hour to film a three page scream. Scary right? We didn't get it down. We finished about half of one page. We could have gotten farther along if we didn't run into some problems with the audio.
Audio is one of the most important parts of a film. An audience is more likely to forgive a problem with the video than they are to forgive something wrong with the audio so always, always make sure that the audio is on point! If you don't you will live to regret it! Trust me, go watch my video Brother's Keeper. It's a good video but the audio has problems and you can feel it! Once we got out of the first location and made it to the second everything started to go swimmingly. We started blowing through the scenes and had a lot of fun doing it. I haven't seen a set run so smooth, well ever. It was great. Ashley and Esau were on top of their game as was my crew. My DP couldn't make it so I had to pick up the camera, it's always fun to be on camera. I remember when I first started back at NLC I hated being on camera, now I really like it! This film is trying to be very Birdman like. Where everything kind of flows into each other. In my head it looked amazing. In real life, it looks good but not half as good as I was hoping. I think part of the problem is I need more steady hands. I also need more selection of lenses. I'm working only with 18-55, which is good but could be better. I think that is part of the trap of film making. You can always have better. Better lenses, better cameras, better lights, better everything. When it's time to be on set you just have to do the best with what you have. That's what I'm trying to do. I can only hope that all of our hard work and dedication pays off when we see the end results. So we are in the third week of school and I am already counting down the days till Spring Break. School is a horrid place that kills the soul faster than you can rebuild it. Sometimes it is nice to just sit around and relax. I woke up this morning at 8 and stayed in bed till 11. How is that for sitting around and relaxing? True it means I am missing my acting class today but that was already in the books.
Me and my mom have been having car problems, to the point where it just won't start. I've been walking to and from class since they started. Acting class has been a problem. Walking to class, spending a 3 hour class running around and then walking home. It is starting to take a toll on me. I can't have that when I am filming a 9 page script in the next two days. It is a short film I wrote for my friend Mickendra last semester but now am directing with her working camera. I made a shot list that I am beyond proud of. I can't wait to see if we can really pull it off. Hopefully we can because it would show everyone in class and at this school what we can really do. The project has already run into some big problems, it wouldn't be a Blueroof Production if it didn't. For starters we only have one of our most important locations for only an hour. Its about a 3 page scene being set up and shot in an hour. AHHHH!!! But I have faith that we can pull it off. We also lost our original lead actor and almost changed it to a lesbian couple to make it easier to cast but the woman we were trying to cast also dropped out. So now we have another man in the role. Esau is back and is going to be dating Ashley in this film. I can't wait to hit the set tomorrow. I couldn't be more excited. Life is never simple. Every time you think you have everything locked down and running smoothly something has to go wrong. It has to blow up in your face and make you go blind. The true test of character is what you do when everything blows up. When the chips are down and you don't think you can go forward, when all seems lost, what do you do?
So I'm back in workshop 2 this semester. Yes it is the same class I took last semester. Why am I taking it again? Well I think I've gone over this before, about how the teacher approved my first project and then lied about it. Or about how the second project fell apart and the three people who did nothing passed the class. It was bullshit but that is life. So how is this semester going? All three weeks of it? Well just like last time I had the first project in the bag. Had everything locked down for a one weekend shoot. And once more things go wrong. My DP had to move around her trip to make it work with our leading man. I felt bad for her but the project has to come first. Well guess what? Today, the day we were supposed to do the read through, well the lead actor, the one who made us all change our schedule, just told us he is out of town till Friday night. He said he would be here today and now he is not. Even without the read through Friday night doesn't work. The hardest location to lock down is only open to us this Friday from 2-3. It happens to be our longest scene as well. We have to film our longest most complicated scene in one hour and are now running around like a chicken with it's head cut off looking for a new actor. Isn't life grand? Enter Esau! He said if we pick him up he will do the part for us. So we might be able to pull this out. We'll just have to wait and see. Wish us luck Blueroof Nation! |
AuthorJonathan Gutheinz vents about everything under the sun. Archives
August 2022
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