It's a Wonderful Life

Well. It's been quite a while since I last posted. My apologies. I have been pretty busy. After being turned down several times for an internship, I finally got one! And it's awesome. HPW has kicked off. We got our positions and what films we will be working on. Narrative Storytelling is what's really been keeping me busy though. We just completed one short film and are now in the middle of production of our second.

My internship is at Epiphany Space. Seriously, check out the website. It's really cool. The story of me being turned down is...interesting. My first pick was at a place called Trailer Park. They make movie trailers. Unfortunately, they filled up all their intern positions pretty quickly. Next on the list was Digital Film Tree. They make titles, which would have been pretty cool. However, they wanted an intern who they could hire next semester, which I can't do. So. Next was Happy Fun Time. They really wanted me, but they weren't going to be busy this semester and thus would have nothing for me to do. Around this time, I was beginning to feel like I would never get an internship, but also enjoying my free days while others didn't get them. Next was Sander Moses and Epiphany Space. Sander Moses called me back first and I was going to take them up on the offer, but I felt called to Epiphany Space. After my interview on Wednesday with Sander Moses, I was told I would get a call back by the end of the week. On Friday, I never heard from them and was going to call them on Monday. During that time, I also got an email from Epiphany Space wanting to meet with me on Monday. I figured I would take them up on their offer and then pick which one I liked better, which I believed to be Sander Moses. After talking with Epiphany Space though, I just felt a calling to work for them. Later that day, Sander Moses called me wanting to hire me, but I had to turn them down.

What our film WILL look like

In HPW, we finally learned our positions! Okay, so that was like a month ago, but y'all haven't heard from me in a while, so as far as your concerned, I just found out. I am a picture editor (as apposed to a sound editor for all those non film jargon speakers out there). I think we have a great team. Our story is about a boy who goes out into the woods to find his father. He has to get to the giant tree and light it before the beast gets his father...or the boy. It's going to be really cool. Oh, yeah. Did I mention that the entire film is in Italian? Yep. It's a foreign film called "Molte Lampadine" which means "Lots of Light Bulbs" That will be fun to edit... But seriously, it will. I'm super excited and I think our team is the best (Don't tell anyone else I said that.)

Location for my first video.

As I said in the short introduction, we have been quite busy in Narrative Storytelling. We just finished our first project and our now in full swing of our second. Yeah. They don't give us a break here at the LAFSC... Our first project was about a girl who wants to get the latest video game. She makes a bet that she can get the game first, thinking her mom will pay for it, but ends up having to raise the money herself. You can view it here. I wrote and edited this film. Hope you enjoy! Our next film (which we are filming tomorrow! Yikes!) is about a 30 year old man who wants to audition for a Broadway contest. However, he still lives with his mother, who is a Westboro Baptist-esque Christian, who hates all things musical theater. It's a really funny... well script right now. But it will be funny on film too! I will be directing that so that'll be fun. I'm pretty nervous though...

Seriously, our plate looks like this sometimes.

I do fun stuff as well though. We go swimming quite a bit... and by swimming I mean we sit in the hot tub for a long time. We get pretty pruny. We have a group that watches Saturday Night Live every Saturday and that's fun. We have also been having a HUGE Saturday morning breakfast. A lot of people from other rooms come to our room and everybody makes something. Matt always makes the pancakes. Emily makes the bacon (I know. Irony. Haha). Dori and Annie help with everything and make the eggs. I make coffee. Last week, Annie and I made smoothies, that totally failed but it was fun. I have been getting into a lot of shows this semester and luckily, there are people who watch them with me. Sundays will be Once Upon A Time, Mondays will be Revolution, Thursdays is Last Resort, and once Arrow premieres, that will be my Wednesday show. I don't know how I will have time to watch all those and work. I'm sure I can manage.

I'm learing a lot out here and I only hope that I continue to do so. Keep up with me on facebook, I'll probably post more there than here, so sorry about that. I look forward to sharing more with you!

Duck Soup

With orientation week drawing to a close, I figured it was time for an update. This has been a very busy week for all of us here at the LAFSC. We spent a couple of days trying to get our bearings, learning how to live on our own, and learning about life in LA.

The LAFSC is about a fifteen minute walk from our apartment complex. It's nice that all of us have the same schedule (at least for this week) because my roommates and I usually walk together. It took us a couple of days to figure out when we needed to leave in order to make it on time, but we finally got it figured out. I think I've finally got my bearings... for this block. Anything outside of LaBrea to LAFSC, I'm lost. Actually, even in LaBrea, I get lost. We decided to go on an "Adventure" today, since we finally had some free time. The first 15 minutes of said adventure was trying to find where Cory parked his car. The rest of the adventure including a lighting store and a grip store. We are definitely film students.

Tuesday, I discovered Ralph's... kinda. They told us where it was and that it was like Kroger. When Emily and I first went there, I walked in and said "It smells like Kroger!" I was really excited to find something that reminds me of home this far away. If you hear about me wandering the Kroger, it's because I probably got homesick. They have everything that Kroger had, which means every brand of all the foods (frozen dinners) I love to eat. Although I may not need them that much. My roommates have decided that we need to do family dinners, so we have. So far we have done three this week (which is more than I got at home). Turns out Christian loves to cook, and Matt's brother is a professional chef! At some point, it will be my turn to cook. That will be exciting... But if you have any delicious (simple) recipes, I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't mind sharing. I gotta bring something good to the table. Although, Cory DID only make hot dogs last night...


This week started with two classes a day. One from 9 to noon and one from 2 to about 5. The 9 o'clock was a ton of information about living in LA and how to be a good intern. The 2 o'clock was different every day. The first day we had a lesson from Karen and Jim Covell. Karen is the founder of the Hollywood Prayer Network and Jim is a composer (McGee and Me, Left Behind, Get Smart, etc.) They had a lot to say and it was very interesting to hear from Christians who work in Hollywood. Tuesday we had a class for Hollywood Production Workshop (HPW. Remember that, I'm not spelling it out again) where we learned about characters. I learned that my character/script is terrible and have since scratched them and started over. Wednesday we had a student video showcase. Basically, we got to see our competition. Just kidding. We got to watch videos of what our fellow students have worked on. It was a lot of fun. I was going to put in a video, but the music video Emily and I did is at home. So we couldn't show it.

Yesterday, those of us in the Narrative Storytelling class had a 10 to 5 class. "Good God!" Yeah, I know. It wasn't too bad though. Jeremy is a great teacher and it was all really interesting. Anything you could want to know about the parts of a story, I can get you information on. It was also our only lecture for that class. So that will make up for the long day. Today, I had a meeting with the Tech director (Patrick) and his wife and Housing Director (Sarah) to go over what my expectations are for the semester. They are also buying us lunch! Sarah and Patrick are funny people so it was a lot of fun. Actually, all the professors here are pretty entertaining. Tomorrow we will be getting a tour of the Dolby theater, previously the Kodak theatre. Also, the place where the Oscar's are held. Next week I have an interview to decide what places I should intern at. Chris (the internship lady) will then send out my resume and (hopefully) I'll have a job interview later in the week! I will be posting soon after I find out.

I am having a blast out here, and it still hasn't really hit that I'm living in LA. I'm sure it will hit soon though. I'm getting really excited to start this internship, whatever it is. I have heard of people working on well known films. Jeremy got to work on Titanic when he was here, and one of the other professors read the script for Brokeback Mountain, but passed* it. Hopefully one day, I can say that I read a screenplay or worked on a film like they did. A couple of people here already have internships too. I know a girl who is working at Ashton Kutcher's company and one of my roommates is hoping to get a job at MGM.

Be sure to check out Emily's blog too (link in the information at the top!) and ask her about the adventure to Ralph's, where we ONLY took left turns (Did I mention that there are NO protected left turns here?). That was fun. Until next time!

*Interns who work for producers are the ones who read the scripts. They then write a coverage (basically a book report, but for a script) of the screenplay and they can suggest one of three things to do with it. Recommend - "I think that this is a good investment for our company". Pass - "I don't think this is a good screenplay" or "I don't think this screenplay is right for our company". Maybe - "I don't really know how I think about this script soooo... I'll just pick this one"

The Best Years of Our Lives

So this is just a short blog updating you all on how the move in and first day in LA went.

I was the first one to move into my apartment, so I got first pick of the room. I chose the smaller, two person room. I figured that would be better than the larger, three person room. As you can gather from that, there are five of us in this apartment, and even then, it still isn't even that crowded in here. We finally got around to putting away all the dishes and cooking supplies that they provided for us, but we have had a busy day, so I think that justifies putting it off.

We got a tour of the LAFSC. It's on the 16th floor and has a great view of downtown LA, Beverly Hills, and Hollywood. I'll post a picture later. The halls are lined with movie posters (Talladega Nights, Pan's Labyrinth, Fantastic Four, Step Brothers, Arrested Development, etc) that were donated to the LAFSC. Each one is signed by an alum who worked on that film or TV show. It's really cool to see what people who graduated from here have done.

Info about this blog:

Just for Doug

It probably won't be called this, but Doug asked me to do a tech section so that he can be even more jealous/excited about what I'm doing out here. I'll try to put one of these out every time there is some techy stuff I can talk about.

Events

On the upper right you can see events that I am doing out here. These events are linked to a Google Calendar that you can see here if you are interested in seeing more than just the five events the app posts. I will try to update this calendar with new events as soon as I find out new events.

Well, it's time to relax for a little bit. I've had a busy day and I've got a busy week ahead of me. I'm really excited about this semester and look forward to telling you guys everything that I'm doing out here! Until next time.

Sullivan's Travels

Wait, what? I'm moving to LA on Thursday?! No matter how many times I say that, it still doesn't seem real. I don't think it will seem real to me until I am on my way there. But yeah, on Thursday, my mom and I will begin our 24 hour (yeah, a whole day) drive, through two time zones, to Los Angeles. I'm really not looking forward to that drive, but at least there will be two of us. Orientation begins on Saturday with I think a dinner. We still don't really know what our schedule looks like for next semester. I guess they like to keep things interesting. From what I can gather though, I will be taking classes on Tuesday/Thursday and working at my internship on Monday/Wednesday/Friday.

I will be taking three classes next fall: Faith and Artistic Develpoment in Film, Hollywood Production Workshop, and Narrative Storytelling. Faith in Film (what I am going to call it since that name is ridiculously long...) is our bible class for the semester. We will be learning about what it means to be a person of faith in the film world. In Production Workshop, we will go through the entire process of making a festival ready film (this class sound strangely familiar *cough* Advanced Creative Production *cough*). But in seriousness, I learned a lot in ACP and I really think that it will help me be prepared for Production Workshop, since I will know what to expect. Narrative Storytelling is our elective class. The other two choices being Screenwriting (been there done that...) or Professional Acting (yeah, um, no), so Storytelling seemed like the best option. In this class we will divide up into one of two tracks: a history based one where we learn the history of story, or a technical track where we learn about the aspects of cinematography and post-production. After that, we will group back up and make two short films. So for those who have been keeping count, we will be making not one, not two, but THREE short films this semester. In addition to those classes, I will have an internship for 20-24 hours a week, which doesn't seem like much, but considering it's only three days a week, that 7 to 8 hours a day. Also, it seems that I will be quite busy next semester so that number seems good.

The apartments I will be staying at

The school provides apartments for us. Now, these aren't you kiddy college apartments, these are real people apartments. People not going to school will live around me. That just seems weird. However, the apartments do come completely furnished. With beds, and couches, and a TV, and a DVD player. Wait! That's more than college apartments give! I know. Isn't LA great. The apartment complex also comes with a gym (state-of-the-art), wi-fi, a pool (olympic sized), a multimedia theatre (yeah, we have our own theatre) and an onsite video rental. Go here and be jealous! -->http://www.parklabrea.com  There will be five of us in one apartment, but as you probably gathered from the things that it comes with, these are pretty nice apartments, so five people isn't going to be too big of a deal.

This week I have been packing and cleaning all in order to get ready for Thursday. I finally got around to unpacking from OC (I know, I'm terrible) and I got rid of everything that I don't need and, amazingly, I have a lot more room in my trunk than I expected. I still have a lot more to do, including laundry (so that I can actually have clothes to pack), getting kitchen stuff (so I can eat next semester), and just finish putting all my stuff together. I am very excited about next semester. I hope that you all will keep up with my blog to see how I'm doing, cause I don't want to have to tell what I do multiple times...


I'm going to miss everybody next semester! I will see you next Spring!