Carol of the Bells

This is what they call an impulse post.



Feeling festive yet?

From the train

There's no other way I'll be able to blog today, so I decided to take advantage of the Blogger app on the iPhone and post a thought. I took these pictures in the course of writing. So you know.

Anyway, life is great, but about as busy as it's ever been.

What about being a film student? Isn't that what this blog is about? OK. So lately I've been impressed by this process of artistic humbling. by that I mean: we are all really crappy at this stuff, relative to people who are better and more experienced, and certainly relative to our eventual abilities (assuming we continue to work and improve).

The trick, and it is a trick, is to both acknowledge and ignore this. There are two options: feel discouraged and give up, or feel humbled and work harder and more eagerly. Plenty of people victimize themselves into thinking discouragement is inevitable, and thus suffer the inevitable impoverishment of their work and passion.

I think most of us strive for the humility and succumb to the discouragement by turns, but I do believe there can be a point, with enough sustained effort, at which humility is the default, hard work the lifestyle, and discouragement the occasional hiccup in an otherwise productive career.


Anyway, I hope that. And the hope is encouraging. Directly self-fulfilling, in very fact.

This is where I am.

mini'stache

Today's post isn't grand enough for a real, or even a cleverly stylized 'stache. So instead, I will share this incredibly dumb drawing I just made on my iPhone.

So, I didn't know you could make a living doing this:




And here's a pretty wonderful rendition of "O Holy Night," a collaboration between some Provo musicians. I think you'll like it. In fact, I downloaded it immediately after I heard it, which is something I...don't ever do.

Some light and grain

Guess when I remembered I needed to update this blog before the day was out.

9 minutes ago.

There are actually a couple of very significant posts I'm working on, but I don't have time to finish them up right now, so here's this picture of light and grain:

Near Harvard, a cropped iPhone picture

Soon, I will go out and grab some sweet shots with my Canon. Soon. Oh, let it be soon.

In other news, today was a very good writing day. I had taken a bit of a hiatus to re-evaluate the way I pick stories. Today, I dug deep, and I ended up breaking a new story that I'm enthusiastic about. It's as close as I've ever come to telling a story directly about my life. Kind of a cocktail of different things I obsess about, rolled into some coherent context, with, I believe, an entertaining premise. We'll see how it goes.

Good night, dear people.

The Friday 'Stache

I'm not going to spend a lot of time typing at you today because you've got a lot of watching to do.

First, a pretty exciting promo for Dr. Fubalous, coming out this February. This little gem is pretty hard to find without knowing where to look--by design, actually. The creators wanted to give their growing audience a scavenger hunt. So if you want to hunt before you see the promo, click here. If you're lazy, like me, and just want two minutes of hypalicious video, just click here.

The cast they've got lined up for this series is surprisingly impressive: Donnivin Jordan (you might recognize him from Julian Smith sketches, like Malk), Flavor Flav (...I know), Danny Trejo, Colleen Ballinger (Miranda Sings), and...wait for it...Antoine Dodson. 

*****

Just in case you missed it when it officially released yesterday on YouTube, The Letter from Pearl Harbor:

As I predicted, it's beautiful. And the music is lovely. I'd love to hear what you think of it. You can just leave a comment below. Don't worry, this is a safe place. Gush or growl, it's doubtful more than six people in the world will read your comments if you leave them here. But I'm one of those six people, and I would really love to know what you think.

*****

I was asked to narrate the latest from Quiet Dignity: another installment of "Quiet Thoughts." Unfortunately, they needed it sooner than I could manage. Fortunately, they had Trent, who seems to be channeling me in his narrating. I'm flattered and impressed. 

*****

Mr. Graham, I am digging this:

*****

If you've been reading carefully, and following the links, you'll know why I'm sharing this last one:

*****

I do hope you follow those links when you can. Otherwise...well, I guess I've wasted my time in worse ways. Also, comment if you want me to love you more. It always works. Always.

The Letter from Pearl Harbor

I've got to put out a quick word for this short film, which is getting released on YouTube tomorrow. I know almost all of the people involved. Two of the actors, Aurora Florence and Shaun Frenza, were in Weighted (my capstone film), and I took an upper-level screenwriting class with Katie Golden, who wrote The Letter from Pearl Harbor. Kristen Hillier, the film's producer, shot my capstone, and Jacob Schwarz (the director) and I have been friends for years.

It's a sure bet the film will be gorgeous and well-acted, so I very much encourage you to check out the trailer (below), and "like"the Facebook page, and watch it when its released online tomorrow.

A List You Won't Care About

Here's what I have to get done this week:

• 6 script coverages
• Grade 23 8-page papers
• Create 9 multiple-choice questions for an exam
• Redraft 3 short scripts
• Write the first 10-20 pages of a feature
• Complete a 6-8 page (single-spaced) analysis of the film Ordinary People
• Read and critique screenplays from fellow students
• Study for and take an Acting final (I'm not real worried about this one)
• Write a final paper for same (again...)

I'm not doing one of those, "Everyone look how busy I am!" things. I just couldn't figure out what to post about, but I really wanted to keep my commitment. So I figured I'd present a good overview of what my experience with grad school will be this week, so close to what other people refer to as "finals." 

Also: as of a couple of days ago, it officially became OK to listen to Christmas music. I began yesterday with "Winter Moon," by Mindy Gledhill. 

If you want movie recommendations for Christmas, I published just such a list last year, when I was writing for Rhombus (which has unfortunately stopped updating entirely.) Here's a link. 

And here is a not-very-good picture I took:

Somewhere downtown. I can't remember precisely where. It was cold that day.