A new obsession.

Just when my photography was getting to the point I felt I was pretty good, I got Robert Rodriguez’s book “Rebel Without a Crew: Or How a 23-Year-Old Filmmaker With $7,000 Became a Hollywood Player”.

We were in Disney at the Virgin Megastore. They had a whole aisle of filmmaking books. I’d ordered Rodriquez’s movie “Once Upon a Time in Mexico” when I ordered the new “Office Space and the “Buffy the Vampire Slayer – The Chosen Collection”, just so I could get the 10 minute flick school extra feature. So I was already trending back to filmmaking. But after reading the book I was totally inspired.

I was looking around thinking in terms of movies all weekend. At one point I thought about remaking a very cheesy comic/action short I made in college called The Great Video Caper. It was shot on video and edited between two VCRs. For a high school reunion a couple of years ago I “remastered” it using iMovie. It was seriously cheesy. As I was thinking about it though I started coming up with a new darker slant on the story. I was planning each shot in my head. Sunday night I downloaded the demo of Final Cut and wrote the whole 18 page script in a day. I’ve cast the villainous woman and hopefully my friends will take on their pervious roles. I’m one cast member short.

I plan on shooting it over the Christmas holidays. I really want to shot it on hi-def and am in total lust over the Sony HDR-FX1. Renting a pro level camera would cost $100-$300 a day. New this camera cost $3000.

I’ve pretty much decided I’m going to shoot a feature film next year. I’m too late to submit my short to Houston’s WorldFest film contest and too late for SXSW. So it will be next year. And if I’ve got a year, I might as well do a couple of shorts and a feature.

Stay tuned for updates.

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