Doing Lots of Video Work

I wrote another script later that year, for a much shorter 15-minute narrative film, called Getting Lucky.  It may be one of the most complicated stories of its length ever, since I am a fairly concise writer.  It involved a group of individuals betting on relationships, and how those external motivations affected the progression of those relationships.  It was one of the scripts selected to be produced by the HD Video class.  After mapping out all of the plot points and story elements on whiteboards for hours, to prove that the underlying story DID make sense, I eventually conceded to simplify it considerably anyway, before we started shooting it.  I produced the film, but chose other people to direct and DP it.  I kind of wish we had filmed the elements for the more complicated version, for a "producer's cut," but that is just life.  We were nearly the only ones who actually finished our project before the end of the year.  Three of the five projects that were undertaken that semester took years to complete.

J had been on track to graduate early, so she finished at the end of the fall semester, and moved across town.  That obviously changed our relationship, since she wasn't right there all the time, but we survived, and saw each other to or three times a week.  I helped her get setup in the room she was renting, and taught her how to cook a few things, since she had little experience with that.  She had trouble finding work, but eventually ended up with positions at a pet store and a vet clinic, which were suitable since she liked animals.  She moved back to an apartment right near the campus by that summer, which made things simpler.

As the spring semester came to a close, I started to look for another internship, since I needed to do two to graduate, and the previous one had fallen through.  I interviewed at a relatively small production company that had pioneered HD video, which ended up being quite the experience.  The owner had an interesting attitude about things, and basically threw me out of the interview because I wasn't familiar with his work.  He told me to come back in a week, after I knew how important the guy I wanted to work with was.  There wasn't much to learn, but I didn't tell him that.  At the second interview, which was the Thursday before finals, he asked me: "what are you doing tomorrow?"  Luckily finals never really intimidated me, and I rarely had anything to catch-up on, so I was free.  He was filming an arena football game in San Jose, and wanted to bring me along.  The catch was, that was an eight hour drive each way, so I caught a ride in the gear truck at 5am, and started a very long day. 

We arrived in the early afternoon, and picked up my new boss from the airport, before heading to the stadium.  We unloaded the truck, which had a bunch of Sony's newest HD Broadcast gear, most of which I had never seen, let alone used.  After setting up most of the gear high up in a private box, I was setup to assist the other cameraman, providing him with fresh batteries and tapes, as well as carrying the 30lbs camera between shooting positions on the field.  We moved from one side of the stadium to the other every time the ball changed sides, running through the back corridors to get to the opposite side.  I was a lot faster than the older cameraman, and in good shape, so I usually beat him by about thirty seconds, which allowed me to capture a few shots that we would have missed by the time he arrived.  It was quite a day, and we packed up to head home before midnight.  We didn't get back to my car until after sunrise.  By the time I got home, it had been a 25 hour day, my first day on the job.  The next two days I worked were shoots on Venice beach, during finals week.  We filmed kite surfers, street performers, and a wide variety of other things.  I spent most of the time carrying around a tripod and taking care of batteries, but it was a good experience.