At some point in any given project its obvious that the thing is going to grow beyond your ability to "do it all" for lack of a better term. Certainly thats the case with the the TV show. Hell, I knew that even before we shot so much as one frame of video. Once I sat down and started mapping the project out, the one thing that really stuck out like a diamond in a goats ass as being one of those areas that I was going to need help in, was post production. Not that I cant edit. I can certainly do that, and WOULD be doing that. No, what I needed was the equipment.... So in a day in age when spending a grueling ten minutes with Google makes you pretty much an expert in any given field of inquiry, I had, in short order, a list of companies that seemed like good prospects for involvement in helping me get this off the ground. I narrowed the list to three possibles. One, (my dream company) looked like it would cost a million dollars to get in the door. My hearts first choice, but my bank accounts last one... Never the less I had kept em on the list regardless. (Just because I'm a penny less fuck with no production budget and doing this on a shoe string doesn't mean ill ALWAYS be that way). The second company on the list was my "plan B guys" just in case, and finally company number 3 looked appropriately small sized and approachable. So I made a call and had a meeting. Things went well, and it seemed like a good working relationship was going to be established in short order. Eugene, the principal at "VIP" was very reassuring, and all smiles as we talked about the concept and how to get a satisfactorily engaging and pitch-able show in the can, as it were.
However, it takes more than a bit of enthusiasm and that aforementioned reassuring attitude to actually get shit done. As well intentioned as I do, to this day, believe Eugene was- ultimately he proved to just be a flake that didnt really care about the project. That or he got busy with actual paying customers. I dunno. Either way, the end of the road came pretty quick. But not before it cost me two weeks, and a couple of sleepless nights. Mostly what Eugene never did was something as simple as just return my calls. If even for something as simple as to tell me to screw off. Whatever. At least that would've been helpful in getting me to stop trying to second guess the reasons as to why we werent getting anywhere in the editing process.
Luckily though, no money had exchanged hands, so to a large degree it was a "no blood no foul" kinda deal. Fine. Ill move on.
Ok, time for the Plan B guys. Remember them from the first paragraph? Yeah, well turned out they are a FAITH BASED company that make videos for gawd. TOTALLY unusable for my project. That little bit of revelation left me smack dab on the doorstep of my dream company, with nothing more than a nearly depleted checkbook and a smile. With more than just a little trepidation I dialed the phone and made a call. After a very nice dialog with the owner of the production facility, a meeting was scheduled, which ultimately led to another and then a series of negotiations that found me a home with what should have been the guys I should have been dealing with right from the beginning. And, more importantly at a very workable price.
Firmly ensconced now in the editing process, it feels nice to be dealing with a company that actually answers its phones, has professional people working in all aspects of its day to day operations, and takes what it does as seriously as I do.
Finally getting down to the raw nuts and bolts of the editing process has gotten me engaged and excited again about the show, and watching the teaser/ trailer come together frame by frame is a lot like watching your dream house being built brick by brick. Patience a virtue be, indeed. And although I am two weeks behind where I wanted to be, at least now, I know for a fact I'm going to get as a good a product out of this as possible at the end of the day.
Next time, we talk about the ethos of editing - and how easily it turns out you can get sidetracked with bells and whistles.
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