I found these lights at The Home Depot the other day. Hampton Bay White Under-Cabinet Linkable Fluorescent Lights (3-Pack) We actually used them in a shoot inside a van to add a little warmth to the shot. It also helped boost the glow from the dashboard.

Yes these fluorescent lights are a little on the warm color side but they came in pretty handy, their small and we use 12Volt DC convert to plug them in. Their 110 volt but because they are so small and fluorescent they didn’t use much power and they stayed pretty cool. But as you can see from the video they could be a used as a fill light in a pinch. This was shot with a pocket camera and we didn’t color correct.

You’ll have to come up with a clever way to mount them depending on your use but where we were using them, in a van. They easily stuck to doors and other surfaces with gaffers tape.

I’ll have another post where I’ll talk about their use when we post the final video.

Thanks Tony for being my subject!

As a teen I spent so much at Radio Shack they offered me a job. I learned a lot about customer interaction and building a reputation. One of the most important lessons I learn back in 1986 was my first “Long Tail”.   I wish I would have understood the importance of that day back then.

I think back to what the 80’s brought us, that miracle technology that now fits into our pockets. That’s right the cell phone.  Some of you might not remember back then they were as big as cinder blocks and weighed as much.  It would have been hard at first to have envisioned what they would become.

So what does “The Long Tail” have to do with Radio Shack?  While my Manager spent the entire day working on a big sale. Know this, one cell phone back then that was a big sale. About $1500 worth. Not to mention the cell service, installation and all the add ons! Well, while my Boss was working on that sale he kept taunting me with the idea he was going to break the sales record that day. While I toiled away on the writing sales tickets for capacitors, solder and blank tapes and the occasional free battery, he was full of pride at what this sale was going to bring him.

Here’s where the “The Long Tail” comes in. While we sat there counting the days sales I had a very large number of tickets way more than usual. The whole time the boss was entering the data the taunts became less and less as those tickets started adding up…  Well…

Clicking away he soon realized that I beat him by about 20 dollars. I know that’s not a lot but by the end of the day I had made more connections with people and moved more items. While he spent the entire day with that one costumer. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing. You have to nurture those good customers and hold their hands sometimes. That’s what keeps them coming back for the big ticket items.

But while I thought it was cool that I sold more, it didn’t really make an impression on me till about a 2 years ago when I read Chris Anderson’s book “The Long Tail” and I started using iTunes extensively to start consuming media that really focused on my interests.

As an artist and sometimes filmmaker I very much see the importance of this lesson. Back then in 1986 it was much harder for me to try to make an impression. I had to work the entire room to make things happen. That was very time intensive and a lot of hard work. But today it’s not that hard to work the room or the world for that matter. What’s hard is making a good or dare I say great product. But it’s not hard to get it out there at least not anymore. The more you can get out the more you will learn about making a great product.  This can be anything, photography, e-books, cartoons, films, webseries, insert name of your product here _____________.

To get my films out there back then I had to go through the system of gate keepers.  Now the system is wide open for content creators of all kinds any kinds.

One of my missions with this blog will be to convince other people like me, artists, filmmakers and the like to forget about the system. Sure it would be great if they see your talents and some how bring you into the fold. But I say forget it those day are fading away.

I had recently picked up an issue of IndeSlate. Which is a great magazine about the Independent Filmmaker.  I enjoy reading it. What I don’t like reading is story after story of filmmakers holding on to their films for years. I’m not talking 1 or 2 but 5 or 6 waiting for that right studio deal.  I got news for you it might not ever come but it’s well within your power to make it on your own with blogs, re-cutting your film to be a webshow, digital distribution through Amazon, Jaman or Hulu.  Soon it will be TIVO, Boxxy, your wifi enabled BluRay player. It doesn’t mean you will automatically or instantly make an impression with an audience.  But it’s got to be beater than setting in a box somewhere waiting for that right deal and run the risk of no one ever seeing it.

The time you took looking for investors, distributors and the right deal you could be looking for an audience. Today those are your investors.  They are the ones that will keep coming back to buy your product.  Just like the relationships I built when I worked at The Shack. Those people came back.  Back then customer services meant something if you know how to treat people.  It’s the same with audiences.

What are you waiting for now?

If you want some FREE advice and ideas I suggest you go here and download the audio book you’ll find in the right hand margin entitled what else?  FREE

At first I couldn’t figure out what to do with this old shoe rack. No one wanted it on freecycle, so it sat.

After trying to sort though all my cables it dawned on me. Hang them up.

Stephen Knapp in the photo. Photo taken by Tony Gasbarro

I think all filmmakers, content creators and bloggers should have one in their bag of tricks. Well filmmakers should have 2. Why should a filmmaker have two? I’m sure there’s many times you have extra hands on set helping you out. This is a perfect time to hand them a camera and have them get behind the scenes footage or do a quick interview.

It could be used in your extras, blog or promotional material. The image quality will come closer to the look of the film you are shooting. Plus it won’t look like a completely different format which tend to make extras look like a after thought. IMHO

If you’re a hyperlocal news person or blogger this camera and future cameras like this will be the future ENG/EFP cameras

What makes this camera a great ENG/EFP camera?

1. HD Video, already off to a great start with full 1920×1080 HD resolution.
2. The mic input. With this adapter you can plug in any kind of microphone. Like a reporter type mic, shotgun(that’s the one I use), even a Lavalier mic (you could even plug that in to a wireless system). Don’t forget any extension cords you might need depending on what kind of mic you pick up.
3. Replaceable battery. If you do a lot of shooting you’ll want extra batteries. Get at least one extra but 2 are always a better bet. Here’s a charger for when the camera is in use. Want REALLY long life? Check one of my earlier blog posts.
4. SD Cards. Need more recording time pop in another card, up to 16 gigs!
5. Still images. Check out these, at 5 megapixel they are great for any broadcast situation

Macro setting

This one was aided with a wide angle lens, more on that in a later post.

Here’s a tip need to do a V.O.? Set the camera to a lower video resolution and use your external mic to do your V.O. That way you get a make shift audio recorder since you don’t need the video track it will just make it more manageable.

Kodak the only bit of advice I have is make the door easier to use to get the card out and you can drop the USB port. I’d never dangle that thing from my computer unless I was desperate.  Oh and maybe make an audio mode.

I’m sure the last thing you want to do is make more art work to promote your film. I wanted to show off the festivals I was accepted at but I found most Festival didn’t have their own Laurels to hand out. So I made some, now I figure other filmmakers can use them too.

Just click on the image or here to download your customizable PSD file. Yes you will need Photoshop to use this.

In the PSD you’ll find a black version and a white version.  But you can make these any color to match your website.  Here’s how use can use them.

1. Click on the text layers to change the name of the film festival, it’s subtitle, and year.
2. Then select all the text layers and recenter the text so they fit in the Laurels nicely.
3. Set background color.  There is a black and gray in there now but you can set those colors to anything you need.
4. Transparent background.  Turn off the background colors, then select “Save for Web” in Photoshop and select the PNG file format.  Then you won’t have to worry about color.

I tried to make the psd a nice size so it could be scaled down to any size for web and it should still be okay for print on posters or DVD cases.

Let me know if you find them useful.  If there are questions leave a comment.

The mystery box can be anything, the fun part is figuring it out.

Any content creators want to help make mystery boxes?

Hmmm… maybe I’ll give Felicity a second chance.

A friend of mine mentioned this to me and was surprised I missed it since I pretty much talk his head of about this stuff and he tends to get a glaze over his eyes every time I talk about “transmedia”. I didn’t have a name for it so maybe that’s why he got a glaze… But, that’s what they call it’s just as good as any. Thanks Fast Company!

I think you could do this with just about any show. There’s no need for shows to really go off when the season is over. It’s just more opportunity to dig your fans in deeper. They could have done with Gilmore Girls. Yeah I watched that too. They could have had a website that looked like Stars Hallow Village website and you could go to town meetings and vote on things thing in the town, or tried to vote certain Councilmen off the Village Board, you know who I’m talking about. Anyway I’m getting off track.

This is a tremendous opportunity for show to reach out and find new audiences not to mention bringing up talent that is just chomping at the bit to get the chance to create this kind of stuff. I don’t want to just say “new” talent. Because there are a lot of people in places that don’t fit into the age range of “new”. They are just talent and should still be looked at as a resource.

I suggest though when shows want to make this leap they should reach out to fans of the show that have the production skills to pull this off. Not only would they treat the show with respect but they already know more about the show than most of the writers I bet. And these days it won’t take nearly as many people as you think.

But I’m just going to toss this out there. This works with anything like theme parks and nature preserves as well. I’m picking them because it drive me nuts that they are missing such a great opportunity. But I’ll just stick with a Zoo for example. Last weekend the wife and I were at the St. Louis Zoo. I know they like to sell you over priced food and plush toys for the kids but every time I look around I see plants and trees I think are fantastic. Why don’t they sell those too? I’m sure some of them are grown there or near by. How else do they keep the park beautiful? Just grow a few more and sell them see what happens.

Since I’m not buying the food or the toys, why not the plants? It’s just another great way to spread the Zoo’s message and give me something unique to talk about and share.

If you don’t think you can do it with your show drop me a line. Chances are I’ve seen your show. I’m kind of silly that way. I bet I would have some ideas.

But what Celtx is really good for is writing scripts for web-fiction and mini series style scripts. It’s great for the whole project and keeping track of many scripts that will make up the many episodes. That was the main thing I wanted.

In the project library you can place all your assets, scripts, character descriptions, location descriptions, props, animals, stunts, effects, the list goes on and on. You can give as much detail about these assets as you want and it’s easy to manage. As you add them and you write about them you are prompted for those assets as you write. I’m sure that’s standard among other script tools.

I’m really only scratching the surface with Celtx and as I get deeper in to the stories I’m working on and the characters I’ll be using the asset generator to keep track of thing and help develop my stories.

One of the best features of Celtx is the ability to collaborate with other writers. I’m already using it that way and they even provide a server for the exchange of the project files.

If you want you can open it up for other people to read and get feedback on. Not sure if I’m ready to do that just yet but as far as sharing with my co-writers it’s great. There can be some issues when exchanging the project files but it’s pretty easy to over come so try saving different file names at first till you see how the different assets are merging.

If you are looking for a loaded script writing software this one is for you. Let me know what you think.

Now does someone has any ideas for getting older typed out screenplays into a digital format that I can dump into this or any text editing program I would appreciate any advice. My original scripts are not in a digital format. Sorry it’s very old school.

Celtx is available in Windows, Linux and OS X. It’s all open source and free! What’s stopping you?

Most good video podcasts last 3 to 7 minutes.  Then the next day or week you get another.  After all how many commercial breaks are there in an hour show?  About 5 or 6 and each show segment is already about 3 to 7 minutes (depending on how popular a show is and where they want to put a cliff-hanger.  Then there might be more breaks.)

But here’s the great thing about podcast and each episode only lasting say 5 minutes.  I could watch 5 or 6 different podcasts and get much more information and entertainment in less time.  Now if they will just make commercials relevant to my needs then advertising would be useful to me and to the advertiser.

When shows aren’t trying to fill an hour or umm 45 minutes because of the commericals.  They put more concise information in the show whether it’s plot or DIY information.  I’m finding myself more bored when a character walks endlessly down a hall, around corner, down stairs, down another hall, just to bump into a cat; I hit the fast forward button.  Oh yeah I feel the same way about DVD menus!  I’ll save that for later.

I know I’ve made this error in my own films, I won’t anymore or I’ll try not too.